Nolan Salvatore did not lose the screams of the past.
The rage that built up did not go away. It was pure willpower that held him together. The curse, the fragile soul, and the maddening screams of the dead did not seize. Every waking moment of his existence was held by the souls of the damned, the ones who could not reach out.
The betrayed shouted mockery at his forgiveness.
Leave me alone! He shouted at them. How could they understand the beliefs that he had? No, no, Nolan Salvatore was not kind, nor he acted out of the ideas that were held firmly inside his head.
Dirt tastes badly here. Ah, Ciara, she’s lovely, but can I really trust her?
Kill her, said a voice.
Throughout the valleys and the mountain worlds, he heard the anguish of the fallen. Even as the rest of the Bleak Walkers marched with them he could not do it. No, he wouldn’t do it. He did not have the heart to do what would have been a scene. He explained, “We are in a truce right now.”
They said, “Fool, you are being fooled. Oh, when will you learn? When will you learn that she’s here to break you?”
Old Nolan looked at her back. “She’s her alright, and no one other than her feels like this.”
“She’s like that,” Nolan said.
Lanon shrunk at their comments.
He continued marching while the banging on his head kept on pounding.
He leaped up a tall mountain, slid through the slopes, and followed her through forests of vines. His body acting as a shield. His sword-arm defends her from the things she could not deflect.
It was always like this for the years he remembered. The years where Nolan Salvatore would defend a woman who did not need defending. She was far stronger than him. Her power was enough to direct the war effort against the overlord of the demons to a close.
He recalled that her death had caused a blow to the army of light. People back then were so single-minded about their belief in the war maiden. When she dies the hopes of the people died as well. It was like a funeral that never ended.
He left the army of light and marched with those who took the Bleak Path. He joined armies and became a rank-and-file soldier of the Bleak Walkers. An army of fools who went on suicide charges to defeat the undefeated. He broke through the ranks massacring enemies and making use of their bodies to defeat the enemy.
All of that to defeat the overlord that was escaping from the shadows that cover the land. It made sense to them that it was him alone that wanted the end of the world. But no, he and his people were only victims as well. A victim of a world that was starting to get devoured by the shadows. It had no benefit. There was no other purpose other than to save the souls of the people that he rules.
Why would someone want to destroy the world that he or she lives in?
Perhaps they didn’t ask that. Maybe they could have done something. But there was no true solution to people who differed in forms and races. Even back then the people were barely clinging to that dead world. People ate the monsters and the monsters did the same.
Kids were birthed in the dark. They were poor kids that did not know what peace felt like. What a world with a sun felt like. They grew up hunting monsters for food or joining the war effort against the light.
But maybe they found hope when that sun shone again. The final battle broke through the impossible, and the world trembled with the amount of power that was being generated.
Nolan felt hope and peace when his back fell on that sand.
He knew that the world was saved. But was it truly saved? Did the sun during that time truly return? Or was it a false sun that gave hope only for that hope to be ground into dust?
Were all those sacrifices all for nothing?
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No, if all the worlds existed then it meant that in one of those timelines they had succeeded again and again. That all those killings were meant for something despite it all. He wanted to believe that.
So why do they still scream at him for not driving a sword in her chest?
“Is that you, Kaiser? Why does your soul does not speak? Why do you not speak at all? Hey, you are strong, right? Why do you not speak at all?”
“Are you okay?”
Nolan caught a branch and barely avoided getting pummeled in the ground. Aria pulled him up the branch and stared at him for a while. “Are you sure that you are fine? You’ve not spoken for days now.”
“Just the visions,” he said truthfully.
“The ones that wanted to kill me or the ones that scream at you?”
“Both.”
“Aw, that is troublesome,” she went around him and started poking his neck with her elbow. “Well, I can’t blame you for what the other me did.”
“Ciara.”
“Yes?”
“You hated me didn’t you?”
“I did. Why would I not hate you? You were an annoying individual that circled me like a vulture. I thought you were a weirdo that wanted to just bed me. I hated you for that. I tried almost everything you know? But who knew that you wouldn’t give up for years…and well you grew fine. I was jealous and then things happened. You know the rest.”
“Did you regret it?”
“You are asking that?”
“I do.”
“Yes, of course, I regretted doing it. If I could turn back time I wouldn’t do it. Remember that dream I told you once?”
He recalled in the pits of his memories. A dream that they shared.
“That one day we’ll live in a quiet place if the sun returns.”
“A place where the golden wheat grows, and where one could see the ocean.”
“A happy ending.”
“But that’s hard, right?” She said with a bitter smile.