“Why am I even fighting? Why am I doing this to myself?” It was a dark night and I was surrounded by bodies. I was so close to obtaining my goal, but I didn’t know what it was. I thought back, to the simple times, before the shit hit the fan. Then I remembered why I was putting myself through all of this torture and carried on fighting.

Darkness. I woke up to darkness. A never ending void that swallowed me whole. I was alive, the throbbing pain on the back of my head was letting me know. I sat up, rubbing my head. I expected there to be blood, however, my head was dry. It wasn’t only my head that hurt. Once I was fully sat up, my entire body began to writhe in pain.

I just sat there, breathing heavily, waiting for the pain to disperse. My lips were dry and cracked, I needed something to drink. After the pain faded, I thought about how I got here. There were only flashing images of monsters. I couldn’t remember anything else, not even my name, I didn’t even know what I looked like.

Slowly, I rose to my feet, careful to not disturb any rocks near me. After all, I didn’t know if there were any of the monsters I had seen in here with me. When I took my first step, I almost fell straight to the ground. My legs were weak, maybe atrophied, I didn’t know how long I had been laying there.

“Finally awake!” A voice exclaimed. I would have looked around if it weren't for the pain in my neck. “Wh-?” I began to speak, but the lack of water and use had made my voice croak. Right after, I had a coughing fit. Once the coughing ended, I continued. “Who’s There?!” My voice still rasped, but the voice understood me.

“You can hear me? You’re weird.” It said, slightly confused, but obviously enjoying the situation.

“That doesn’t answer my question.” I said with clear annoyance in my voice. “Sigh~ I'm Akai, a demon.”

“A demon?! You’re not going to eat me, right?” I asked, slightly worried. “What? No, I don’t have a physical body. You don’t even look like you’d taste any good.”

“Oh.” I felt a bit offended for some reason. I had sat back down during the conversation, so now I had to stand up again. After standing up, I tried to walk around, but walking while basically blind folded wasn’t easy.

“Pff, You look so stupid.” Akai ridiculed. “Shut up, what else can I do? Wait for my death?” I retorted. “Yeah.” She snickered. Ignoring her, I continued doing what I had been, bumbling around in the dark. After around an hour, I sat down, exhausted.

“Do you have any recommendations on what I should be doing?” I asked.

“Yeah, move to the right five steps.”

“Why?”

“Just do it you pussy.”

“...”

Needless to say, I took the five steps. On the fifth step, I felt something warm. It was like I had stepped into a warm bath.

“Is this water?” I asked, kneeling down carefully.

“It’s blood.”

I fell over backwards, away from the blood. “What!? Why would you lead me to that?” I demanded. “Shh.”

“Hello?” A weak voice called out. It sounded different from when Akai spoke, hers was more like a thought in my head, but this voice was clearly not.

“Yeah?” I responded. “Over here.” The woman's voice seemed to be getting weaker by the second, so I moved over to where I heard her voice. “Here.” She said, lifting up a small pouch. I took it out of her hand and looked inside. There were three unlit torches, A small dagger, a flint, and a glass bottle filled with purple liquid.

“Wow, A mana replenishing potion, a pretty good one at that.” Akai mused. Multiple terms I didn’t understand were used in that sentence, so I just lit one of the torches in the bag. I kind of wish I didn’t. The woman was split in half from the waist down. Parts of her intestines were stretched over the ground, connecting the two halves. I would have puked, but for some reason I didn’t feel nauseous.

“Please, kill me.” She said as she began to break down into tears. I just sat there, slightly unsure if I was seeing things correctly before pulling out the dagger. When she saw it, a small smile formed on her face, but was quickly replaced by fear. I unsheathed it and plunged it into her neck, hoping to give her a quick death.

For some reason, I felt nothing as I took her life. Not a sliver of grief or hesitation. I actually felt an energy enter my body when she died. Akai noticed it too.

“Mana?”

“Huh?”

“Mana just entered your body.”

“Wait, something is inside of me?!” I asked, looking around my body frantically.

“Man, you really don’t know anything.” Akai said, followed by a sigh. “Mana is the energy that allows mage’s to practice magic.”

“Magic? You mean like fire balls?”

“Yeah, I guess.”

“So you’re saying I can do that now?!” I asked, sticking my arms up. “Fire ball!” Nothing happened.

“Pff.”

“Don’t laugh.” I said, feeling my face redden.

“Of course that's not going to work, you don’t know how to use mana yet.” Akai said while trying to suppress a laugh.

“Can you teach me?” I asked

“Of course, I've got nothing better to do.”