He was home.
Durge groped the darkness
surrounding him, only to find little sunlight passing through the thin curtain
of his room. His head aches as he tried to lift himself up from his slumber.
Little did he remember about his nightmare, one of the worst nightmare that
left his limbs tremble in fear for a moment. He truly hoped that it was a dream,
a nightmare that he didn’t need to remember anymore. Sadly, it wasn’t.
His palm crawled on the small table
near his bed, and fetched a clock that was always there. When he interpreted
the arms of the clock, he felt a sudden urge to jump out of his bedroom, doing
every trivial things he always did in the morning, a daily ritual of a student.
And he did it in a rush; indeed, he was late for school. But from the very
start, it seemed that it was an off day for him. He wasn’t supposed to be alive
to see the day coming.
Homework left undone, twenty pairs
of clothes scattered everywhere, it even took him fifteen minutes just to find
his school uniform in the mess of his piled clothes. Taking the time left into
consideration, he didn’t bother to take a bath, and only quickly washed his
face before he swept everything on his desk to his bag and ran outside. Durge
Eltiorra never come late before, and he intended to keep his record. If only
there was no rock for him to stumble upon.
Never before did he ran at such
speed, at such distance just for a normal trip to school. Never before did he
jumped high enough to cross over the wall that blocked the shortcut to his
school. Never before did he find himself ramming into a fruit stall, sending
apples, oranges, and watermelon flying and splashing everywhere, and
infuriating the seller. Never before did he stop a speeding car, six inches
from his hips, just to cross the road at the wrong time. Never before did he
jumped and slipped between the closing gate of his school, tossing the unaware
security guard. Indeed, his trip to school was never this tiring; never this
exciting.
He was lucky to step into his
classroom right when the bell rang. He bowed, taking a breather after such an
intense action, before proceeding to his seat. Silent filled the whole
classroom, for such bizarre occurrence had never happened before. For Durge to
be almost late was unthinkable, unheard of, and it was rumored to be the sign
of the world’s end. Of course it was just a joke, but when it did happened, the
rumor reached its climax between the awkward silence. His classmate began to
whisper to each other, fearing that the unintended prophecy would actually
happens. None of them knew how true that rumor was.
“Durge?”
A girl with long, blonde hair that
sat beside his desk whispered, wondering what could have happened to him. He
met her blue eyes that plead for answer, but he could only turn away from her
gentle face. It was the one and only Resha Valentine, the victim of the untrue,
the girl stained by the lust of a devil, the one he had a crush on. She wanted
to press the issue, if not for the teacher entering the classroom and starting
the lesson.
While his ears denied his teacher’s
unlimited lecture, he looked at the snowflakes falling slowly to the land
covered in white. It was the first time in his school life that he truly
appreciated being seated near the window. When the sky became clear, he was
amazed by the scenery of the school ground, with trees covered in snow that
danced with the wind. Sometimes he would notice a car or two passing by, but it
sure was a halcyon moment for him. He could only take his eyes of the beauty
when the teacher scolded him for not paying attention. For the whole lesson, he
stared at the plain snow.
“Durge,” the blonde, tall girl from
before grabbed his hand, when he was about to leave the class after school. Having
given up from avoiding her questions, Durge fell onto one of the seat, leaning
his back against the wall, letting out a sigh. The girl let go of her hands and
sat right next to him. “It isn’t like you to be late this morning. What
happened?”
“Nothing,” he replied shortly. “If
it is like me, I won’t even show up today. I’ll be dead.”
“It ain’t nothing, Durge, and you
know I know it,” she paused, biting her lips. “I-I’m glad that you changed
your mind, but..”
“Look here,” Durge tried to get her
attention, as if wanted to say something important. “This isn’t anything about
changing my mind. I was there, in the middle of the great bridge, and I was
just on step away from dying. I’m just a coward, okay? I’m not what you truly
think I am.” He stood up and began to walk away, if not for her blocking the
way out.
“Durge, I know you were hiding
something. You promised you’d –“ is what
she yelled before she saw his eyes. It was a red circle – a red, tiny magic
circle of heptagon stars, replacing the pupil of his left eye. For her, that
explained everything. Durge had no idea what she saw in his eyes, for he
himself was struck when seeing a blur, red circle beginning to replace her
pupil. But he didn’t figure out anything out of it, before the eyes became wet
with tears. She jolted away from him, quietly sobbing on the school silent
hallway.
He thought that he had hurt her
feelings, because he didn’t trust her anymore. He wanted to chase her, but his
legs freeze in the empty classroom blended in the sun’s orange light of dawn. True
enough, he didn’t want to tell her, about the fight, the demons, everything. It
was so unreal, so unbelievable. But more than that, he didn’t want her to be
hurt knowing the truth. He never knew that it was not what hurt her the most
- A flash of blade-
Missing
his ear by only an inch, a piece of metal dashed from the window, and was then
stuck into the wall. His instant reaction was to quickly turn and materialize
his spear. Well, should he not materialize it that very instance, he would be
cut by the fierce, metal claw coming from his right, which he barely parried.
He kicked the man in black upon realizing another claw was coming, pushing him
and making him lose his balance.
When
the masked man had stabilized himself, an impaling strike was coming at him,
aiming his belly. However, he evaded the spearhead only by taking one step to
the left, and he did not hesitate to take that chance to slay the spear
wielder. It actually takes quite a lot of concentration for Durge just to take
stance, firmly hold the spear, and strike with such force yet not depreciating
accuracy. No mortal man could react completely to such split-second
counterattack.
Durge
could only jump backwards, only to find that the masked man leaped forward to
strike him. It was a little late for him to dodge to the side, but it’s better
to be late than never. He miraculously succedded in dodging but not completely,
and his stomach was bleeding from the strike. Using the blunt end of the spear,
Durge pushed the masked man, still hovering in the air from the leap, away from
him while he took the chance to run away.
However, with such a wound he
couldn’t help but writhe in pain, while desperately trying to reach full speed,
although he was running with little stability. The direction didn’t matter; he
just wanted to be away from that murderer. With his left hand grabbing the
painful wound of his belly, and his right hand still holding firmly to the
spear, he had no choice but to ram into the door, or take another fatal blow
from the masked man inches away from him. At that very moment, he wanted to
curse whoever it was that designed the school hallway having doors to connect
the hallway and the main corridor. Not that he liked them from the start.
Ramming on door was one thing, but
ramming to consecutive door was another thing, and Durge, with his energy drained
by the pain, was unable to do the latter. His forceful push was stopped, and it
was because he fell that the masked man missed his head. He couldn’t think of
anything filling his field of vision, one that could save himself from such
situation. Even if he tried to block the next attack with his spear, he would
only use his right hand, and it was never enough to resist against one so
ruthless. It was the end, no escape, everything ended with one killing him
instead of him killing himself, he thought.
He never noticed that a sword
wielder was right beside him, parrying the vertical blow and trying to slash
the masked man’s chest, although she missed since the masked man dodged
backwards. Then it was a clash of blades; his claws against her sword, then her
strike against his defense. It was indeed enigmatic how a man had such power
that he could hold a sword, wielded with both hands, with just one claw on his
right arm. However, it was inevitable that the masked man was retreating and the
sword wielder was pushing him to the hallway and away from Durge.
Durge tried to stand, stabbing his
spear to the floor while he pulled himself up. When he was up and could clearly
see the battle in the hallway, he noticed that a girl so familiar was wielding
twin swords, and was putting the masked man at disadvantage. She slashed the
sword on her right, then left, then right again, in such agility and accuracy
that the masked man was having a hard time just blocking the strikes , which
came from almost every direction, with his claws. The after a blow was parried,
she crossed her blade, and jumped forward, slashing outward. The masked man was
unable to react to such surprising move, and he was cut into two, before
transforming into dust.
Then he stood behind the sword wielder,
her blonde her gently blown by the cold winter wind that came from the
shattered window. It was appalling to know that she could have such lethal
ability of swordsmanship, and it was even more appalling to witness her killing
somebody. He was supposed to be the one protecting her, the one comforting her,
but she was then standing as an enemy.
She was no one but Valentine.
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