It took ten minutes for my hand to heal completely. I didn’t complain once about the unfairness, but rather kept completely silent about it, much to Markus´ displeasure. I lost, not in the way I desired, but I still lost. He should be rather satisfied now and probably won't stab me in the back later on if I beat him in the third round.
Both of us chose to discard the wooden swords and surprisingly, Markus didn’t use holy water for the third round. I felt a bit bad for doing what I had in mind. Just a bit though.
“Try to win next time.” Now it was his opportunity to throw my insults back at me. I smiled wryly and stepped into the circle, ready for the next round. As soon as he stepped into the ring again, I reached under my dress and unveiled the short kitchen knife I tied to my upper thigh. His smile instantly vanished while mine grew even wider.
“Try not to die, alright?” Said I, while storming towards him. I felt a bit sluggish as if I couldn’t exert my full strength. While I could certainly fight the same way as before, I didn’t do so. If I was affected by it, other vampires would be too. The two of them had to know that and as such, I had to move a bit slower than before as well to fool them.
Still, I posed quite a danger to him as he couldn’t just yank the knife out of my hands this time. He evaded my first thrust and even my second and third. Stabbing him like this wasn’t going to work, and yet I still pushed on, leaving him no room to breathe. Wearing him down like this wouldn’t work though. The previous round was way too short for this and I doubted that his stamina was even close to running out. As such, I began to alternate between stabbing and kicking. While a few connected and certainly hurt his legs, I was unable to inflict any major wounds upon him. Even as I switched the knife to my left hand, it didn’t change anything.
Frustrated, I jumped backwards and gave us a little bit of room to think. He wasn’t very keen on attacking at all, but apparently, rather bet on a mistake from my side. In that case…
With a grin on my face, I shortened the distance between us once again, aiming for his hands rather than his body this time. This worked for two times where I nearly stabbed him, but it also enabled him to grab my arm easily which he did during my third stabbing attempt. Interlocked, we just stood there for a second as the apparent shock on my face was replaced by a huge smile. I let go of the knife, my left hand already racing towards the handle. He obviously realized what I was planning and tried to grab the knife as well.
While I certainly had the timing advantage, he was faster than me. Nearly at the same time, our hands came close to the knife. While he successfully grabbed the knife, I simply balled my hand into a fist and punched his solar plexus unhindered as the knife was incredibly close to it. He immediately stumbled backwards, face fully contorted due to the pain and gasping for air. I couldn’t let this huge opportunity pass by and immediately followed him closely, already aiming for his side with my right fist.
“Lucinda wins.” How utterly boring, and yet completely right. Even when Markus would manage to turn the knife around while under my barrage of punches, he was in no way able to fix his stance before he would inevitably collapse completely.
Did the match go well? Certainly not, although I could show Arthur that I was indeed valuable in battle. Markus on the other hand … I didn’t make it worse, but I also couldn’t fix that he didn’t like me. If everything went as expected, this could have been solved, but the holy water changed everything. Now he has to live with the fact that he only won one round through underhanded methods and couldn’t win in the third round at all, although I played unfairly as well. Disgruntled, he was already on his way back to the mansion without giving me another glance.
“Impressive. It has been a long time since he was beaten like this.” Said Arthur and pointed out exactly what I feared.
“Would you be so kind and make sure that I don’t have to deal with him while I serve in the army?” I turned towards him scratched my cheek. I hoped to look a bit cuter than usual, but the bloody patch on my chest certainly didn’t help with that.
“I don’t like when my subordinates quarrel amongst themselves.” Said he, while glancing over to Markus who just opened the door.
“And I don’t like a sword in my back.” He was rather unhappy with my comment, but couldn’t refute my claim right away.
“I will make sure that this doesn’t happen.” With these words, he went after Markus and left me alone in the garden. At least, sort of. As soon as I found a nice patch of grass and laid down to gaze at the stars, she came.
“Is antagonizing everyone a hobby of yours?” Mary White, the duchess of these lands stood right next to me and blocked the moonlight from falling on my face.
“Nah, not really. It´s more of a lifestyle.” Finally, she noticed my annoyance and stepped to the side.
“How about you? Do you like surviving so far?” I said, still annoyed that she was here.
“He cannot attack me openly, at least that’s something. The rat I fed my food to … well, one rat less in this mansion. There are at least two more to go through though.” I sighed and continued to look to the stars.
“Have you ever imagined how it is to be a star? Living in a far, far away place in solitude from the others, shining your light onto everything into all eternity?”
“Apparently, I am not as philosophical as you.” Her answer wasn’t as good as Askas, probably because he was said star until I met him.
“It is lonely. Nothing around a star can understand it, because there is just the darkness. Light and darkness don’t mix well together, don’t you think?” I didn’t know if Mary understood my words correctly, nor if I even wanted her to understand. I was alone in this world and had no way of finding my beloved Aska right then. He didn’t want to get saved yet and as such, I felt completely lost, just like the darkness that was a mere second away from being driven away by a light source.
“And yet, the darkness cannot live without the light and vice versa … are you okay? I don’t want to intrude in your privacy, but-” Her concern was interesting but unwelcome. I didn’t want anyone to get emotionally attached to me. They wouldn’t understand me in the first place.
“Then don’t do it. And yes, I am okay.” Lonely, but alright otherwise. I was progressing at a steady pace and could amass my knowledge about this world before I actually needed it. This place was like a safe haven, at least for now. “Why are you here?”
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“Am I not allowed to?” She tried to look friendly while saying this, but she certainly wanted something from me. She wouldn’t take the risk of being seen with me otherwise. If it was true and Arthur already tried to poison her, then he would double his efforts to kill her if it became obvious that we were in some way connected.
“Ask your husband if you can or not.” The problem was that she would drag me down with her if we were seen together. As such, I absolutely didn’t want to talk with her until everything has been solved satisfactorily.
“… I need your help.” That much was obvious by now. Yet, I was completely unwilling to offer her any.
“Is there any time where you don’t need my support?” I was kind of grumpy and behaved as such. I thought I was done with Mary for the time being, and yet she came back.
“You told me what I have to do! It is just that it is completely impossible. He will notice when I do anything out of ordinary.” I yawned as she burst out in anger. This conversation was pointless as I would never help her with her issue.
“Solve it yourself. I have no use for someone who cannot fulfil such a simple task.” I closed my eyes and hoped that I made myself clear enough.
“Simple? It is anything else but simple?!” Not even half a day went by since she became a target for Arthur, and yet she behaved already quite hysterical.
“It is in comparison to what I am doing.” I said and tried to shoo her away with my hands. She didn’t get it.
“And what are you doing?” I didn’t want to tell her what I had in mind for the future, nor what I was currently planning. As such, I presented her with the only viable answer.
“I am trying to sleep here.” The grass was soft, the air different from purgatory and the stars were simply beautiful. It was a perfect night … if she wouldn’t stand near me.
“Don’t mind me if I join you then.” Mary laid down right next to me and looked at the night sky. I didn’t know what she intended by doing that, but it honestly didn’t matter. I just wanted her to shut up and enjoy the night.
“I never laid down like this.” Said Mary while I tried to ignore her.
“It is beautiful.” She said in admiration. I didn’t care.
“Lucinda …” At that point, I didn’t listen to her words anymore. Instead, I relaxed and thought about my home. The warmth that I felt there and missed here completely soon returned to me while I went through my happy memories with Aska, one by one. It was incredibly calming and as Mary noticed that I wasn’t listening anymore, she finally shut up. I was drifting into my dreamworld rather quickly and soon fell completely asleep.
Dreams are weird sometimes. And sometimes, they feel incredibly real. If they feel real and weird, then something is incredibly wrong most of the time. Take my seventy thousand deaths for example. They were very weird and real. But still, it wasn’t exactly the same as the usual death I experienced when I slept.
I stood in the middle of countless souls who all wandered in one direction. The gravel down below crunched with every step they made while I defied the flood of souls. I knew where I was. Well, not exactly, but I was definitely in purgatory. But it wasn’t the purgatory I knew, at least not entirely. There was this distinct sound of metal screeching against metal, so loud that it blew my mind. The other souls obviously didn’t react at all, but I did. I began to search for a larger rock and found one after a minute. I was quite lucky considering that these rocks are fairly rare down here, but didn’t waste any time feeling happy about my finding, but rather climbed it swiftly.
Meanwhile, the screeching grew louder and louder until I heard absolutely nothing anymore. By touching my ears, I confirmed that my eardrums must have been snapped. And yet, I could still hear it, at least kind of. The air in my lungs vibrated, the small pebbles on the stone danced around and the earth shook. In the distance, I noticed a light, completely unlike anything I have seen before. It was bright, and yet very gentle. Strangely enough, it didn’t blind me one bit, even as it came closer. The light was attached to a thing that looked strangely like a worm out of metal. Fascinated by this weird creature, I watched how it ploughed through souls, sending limbs flying all over the place. Most souls were just squashed by the worm, the unluckier once got blown into thousand glowing pieces. This worm was incredibly fast and heading exactly to where I stood.
I looked down to the ground as it shook even more and had to balance myself. In wonder, I gazed at two metal bars that laid parallel and went straight through my rock and out of it again, only to be obscured by a few souls after a few metres. Maybe these bars were the worm´s food, maybe it was something different because as I turned around, I gazed at this thing a few metres away from me.
It was strange. It looked man-made as the nose was rounded, with very few edges. But to me, it looked more like a monstrosity as it ploughed its way through the last souls that protected me from this hungry beast. In the end though, I was entirely sure what created this thing as I read the contents of a small screen that was embedded into the front of the worm.
‘Purgatory – Universal …’ It was at that point where it ploughed into me with a speed that I found impossible to achieve at that point. I didn’t even notice my death. It was just the worm and me in one second. After that, there was no me anymore.
My death was enlightening in more than one way. For once, there are things in purgatory I never saw before. This thing was almost definitely created by a god, so maybe Aska wanted to hide this thing? In addition to that, I could read what was written on the screen which wasn´t that strange if one knows as many languages as I did. And yet, I have never seen this written language before.
Puzzled, I woke up under the moonlight alone and curious about what the fuck just happened.