Right then and there, all I could do was breathe. Not too heavily…not too lightly. Just enough for me to remain as calm as I possibly could. Enough so that I wouldn’t make any sudden movements. My life was on the line, and if I made even the slightest of mistakes, it would all be over.

Speaking on the subject of life and death, the infamous killer was right over there, blankly staring at the still bodies. Her gaze unwavering, she never once smiled or frowned. All she did was…stare.

What had to be going on in her mind? Was she satisfied with all of this? Was it all part of her plan? I just didn’t know. Regardless, she was extremely dangerous, and I was quite fearful of her. It would be in my best interest if she were to leave the chamber immediately.

But of course, the world truly hated me. In fact, it was something to be expected.

As soon as she finished staring at the bloody corpses, she turned to face my battered body. Thereafter, she began to slowly approach me.

I sharply inhaled, a rush of oxygen surging through my nostrils. My head screamed for me to run, but my body wouldn’t allow it. I was far too injured to move even an inch.

But I had to do something. Or rather, it was better that did nothing. If she believed that I was another corpse, then surely, she’d leave me alone. A killer wouldn’t find interest in fiddling with a dead body…right?

Snap out of it.

I didn’t have time to overthink things. This was life or death. I had to take risks in order to survive.

Following my resolve, the killer finally arrived to where I laid. She hovered over me, her gaze piercing a hole through my torso. Well, that was what I assumed she was doing. My eyes were completely shut so I couldn’t tell for sure, but I definitely felt an irking presence. It caused me grow ever more fearful.

“Are you okay, sir?” she suddenly asked.

To my surprise, her first approach was to ask an innocent question. That was far from what I had expected. I had imagined that she would drive a spike from whence I laid. Or could it be that this was some sort of ploy? Perhaps she was trying to play me for a fool so that once she confirmed I was alive, she’d kill me.

No, I must ignore it. I must only proceed with silence.

And so, that’s what I did.

“Are you okay, sir?” she repeated once more.

Another attempt, another failure. I refused to utter a single word.

However, she wouldn’t have any of it. “…You’re not a very good liar sir,” she said, breaking the silence. “If you were truly dead, you wouldn’t have screamed like that just a moment ago. Unless…you really did want to die?”

“No wait wait! I’m sorry! Please don’t kill me!” I shouted almost immediately. My eyes widened as I was consumed with panic. Yet again, I was begging for my life.

“So it appears that I was right.”

“No no. I-I’m sorry for lying. Please have mercy on me.” My body tried to move, but it was utterly pointless. I had believed right then and there that I was a goner…until-

“I’m not going to kill you,” she calmly stated.

“…huh?” I uttered, dumbfounded.

“That was never my intention to begin with. Well…none of this was what I intended.”

“You never intended…What do you-” I suddenly stopped myself, biting back my words. I didn’t know what I was doing. Was it such a good idea for me to be conversing with a killer? After all, I still didn’t know what her true intentions were, and one slip up could cost me my life.

I wanted things to stop, but in the end, none of it really mattered. Without much regard to whatever I was thinking, she decided to move the conversation forward.

“It’s just as I said. I had never meant to kill them. It was all a mistake. An accident if you will,” she said, crouching closer to my body.

“An accident? Is that what you just said?”

“Yes, an accident.”

“You call this…an accident?” I said, somewhat baffled. “Murder is just an accident. Do you…even understand what you did?”

“Indeed, I disposed of two very dangerous men,” she affirmed calmly.

“…How could you say that so casually?” I said, locking my eyes onto hers. Her gaze was dull, yet somewhat intimidating.

“I believe I’m speaking in rather reasonable manner.”

“You…you killed someone. A normal person would feel…something. Like, I don’t know, guilt or sorrow or....”

“I don’t see the need to feel such a thing if my actions were justifiable.” she said, crossing her arms.

“Justifiable?” I asked in a louder than intended voice. I lifted my head slightly from the ground. “What is justifiable about any of this?”

“I don’t quite understand what you’re getting at,” she responded in that irritatingly, passive voice.

“You don’t understand? You don’t understand?! You killed someone!” I yelled, unable to contain my own passive demeanor any longer. “You brutalized them with that spike you summoned! You blew off his face and you stabbed the other in the gut! There’s no good in any of this. All of this is bad. No, it’s…it’s evil! It’s so very evil! What you’ve done is truly evil! You’re a murderer! They didn’t deserve any of this. They were…they were…”

“They were what, sir?” she suddenly snapped back. “Were they perhaps your friends by some sort of off chance?”

“N-no! Of course not! I hated them.”

“Then why is it that you sympathize for them?” she asked, leaning closer to me. “If I recall correctly, you were on the verge of death just a moment ago.”

“Yes, but that’s-”

“Shouldn’t you be happy that they’re gone? That you’re safe? It’s just as you told me. You’re the one that’s suffered the most, correct? Then perhaps you should take this opportunity as some sort of blessing.” With each sentence, she veered even closer. “Think about it. Now you’re able to go back to your perfectly peaceful life. You can read all the books you want, make as much money as you so desire, and drink to your very heart’s content. And you’ll be able to do all of those things again, simply because you’re still alive. Isn’t that exactly what you wanted?”

“N-no this has nothing to do with-”

“How is it that you could still be so ungrateful?” her voice blared over mine; her glare growing ever so venomous. “Why is it that you have such a narrow outlook on your own life? You wouldn’t be breathing right now if those guards hadn’t died. No, you’d be slashed to bits. A bloody corpse worse than those two. And yet, you still have the capacity to complain about it all. To me, this is just another one of your blessings. Your capability to strike so much fortune is truly unfathomable. You’re the luckiest person I’ve ever met. It’s sickening. You’re absolutely sickening!” Her words rang throughout the chamber, echoes bouncing from wall to wall.

For the first time since I met her not too long ago, I could finally hear a range of emotion behind her words. It was raw, almost painful, as if she had been holding something in for a long while. Honestly, seeing her get like that unnerved me even more than when I initially thought I was going to die. Or perhaps it was due to the fact that I’ve now enraged her that I was for sure to die? However.

“I apologize, sir. I might’ve gotten a bit carried away there,” she said, immediately switching back to her usual, calm behavior. However, there was still a subtle undertone of disgust behind her apology.

She stood and moved away from me, walking towards the adjacent chamber wall. She leaned her back against the wall before slowly descending into a sitting position.

Once again, the room had turned silent. Everyone was left to their own devices. In my case, I was extremely troubled by what had occurred.

On one hand, watching those guards being brutally murdered took a mental toll on me. Their dead bodies were nearby, but I had refused to look. They shouldn’t have ended up like that. If it weren’t for her, that killer, they wouldn’t be. They would’ve been alive, living their lives to the fullest. It should’ve been that way…

…But that in itself was another issue. Their endeavors were downright cruel. They wanted to hurt others. Hell, they’ve probably killed a few for their own, sick entertainment. If they were to be left alive…then I would’ve been….

With that realization, I turned my head just enough to face Anna. She was looking down at the floor, hugging her knees. From a stranger’s point of view, she could pass off as an innocent teenager. And you know what? Maybe she was. Perhaps I was the cruel one for calling her such derogatory names. After all, she was the one who saved me.

Heh…I really am a terrible person.

My guilty conscience gnawed at my broken chest, urging me to say something.

“Anna,” I began, feeling slightly nervous. “I’m sorry for being so selfish. And you know what? You’re…you’re right. My life has been…quite good up until now. I haven’t realized it then, but maybe I have been very lucky.”

This night had proved many things to me. The slums. The way those guards treated those people. My first encounter with that lady and her child. And then how Anna was just about to be beaten and killed. All of it was absolutely repulsive. I had no right to believe that my life was any more unfortunate than theirs.

“I mean, I was just about to die, and you came to my rescue. How could I not be grateful? In fact, I’m very grateful. And so I-”

“I wasn’t going to save you,” she said, cutting me off.

Huh?

“I was…going to let you die,” she stated, still glancing down at the ground. “I wanted to let them have at you before they set their focus back towards me. After all, there was no point to any of it. We were going to be murdered anyways.”

There was no point? What does that mean?

“Wait, but weren’t you the one to save me? You stopped those guards before they could do me in. Surely it was your plan to use those spikes if something were to happen to you.”

“…That’s the thing,” she said, pausing for a brief moment, gently twirling a strand of her dark hair. She appeared calm, yet unnerved at the same time. Finally, she said, “…I’ve actually never casted those spikes before.”

“…what?”

“In fact, I’ve never casted any magic up until now. I’m still unable to comprehend how they came to be.”

She’s never…no that’s impossible.

“I don’t understand. Didn’t you literally chant something to cast that? How could it be that you’ve never done this before?”

“I didn’t know what I chanted. It just…came out. And suddenly, a spike formed at the palm of my hand and…flew at them.”

“That’s…” I was unsure what to say. By my guess, casting a deadly weapon such as that had to have required a lot of affinity. Based on what I read, no mere novice could cast rocks as big as those. Could it be that she was a prodigy?

“Regardless, what’s done is done,” she continued, cutting me off mid-thought. “We’re alive and they’re dead. There’s no going back on it now. With that being said…” She paused once again. Lifting her face, she met my eyes before asking a critical question. “Are you going to report me?”

I didn’t answer immediately. Even I was having doubts. Yes, she had murdered, and in such a brutal fashion too. According to the stories Old Lady had told me, murderers would be sentenced to death in a manner fitting to their crimes. Swallowing a bowl of acid, having all of their limbs torn off. Those were just a few examples. When I first heard about it, I sort of shrugged it off. Sure it sounded horrible, but in the end, it was all just noise. However, after witnessing firsthand what death was truly like…

“No, I won’t,” I simply answered.

“…Alright then.”

She stood and swiftly approached the short guard’s body. Crouching down, she grabbed ahold of the stone spike protruding from his stomach. With one forceful tug, she ripped the spike right out of him. What remained was a red, gaping hole down his torso.

“Whoa whoa whoa, what are you doing?!” I exclaimed, completely shocked by her actions.

“I’m going to bury the bodies,” she affirmed.

“Bury them, why would you-”

“I want to be free,” she quietly spoke. “I want to get away from this kingdom. This hell that I’ve been trapped in for far too long. Once I’m gone…it doesn’t matter what happens to me. As long as I’m far from here, that’s all that really matters. I just…want my freedom.” She glanced at the bloodied spike, tightly gripping it. “And that’s why I must bury these bodies. I will do what I must to obtain my freedom.”

She let the spike clatter to the floor as she started to approach the other guard’s corpse. Before she could pull out the spike, I shouted, “Stop!” She paused, directing her gaze towards me once more. “You don’t have enough time to bury them…it’d be best that you hide the bodies.”

“What?” she asked, dumbfounded by my proposal.

Huh, would you look at that? I guess even you could make that sort of face.

“There are some large knapsacks behind those boxes…you can stuff them in there. Tie them up and shove them somewhere far in a corner. That way...no one could find them.”

She stayed silent for a while, trying to process what I had just said. Once she finally got some sort of grasp, she asked, “Are you really okay with this?”

Was I okay with this? Not in the slightest. I had wished things would turn out differently, but it was just as she said. What's done is done. Besides, I owed her. She saved my life. So now, I would save hers.

“I’ve resolved myself. I wish it didn’t have to come to this…but they reaped what sow. They got what they deserved.”

“…I see. Then I suppose you’re right.” She grabbed ahold of the spike that had pierced the guard’s face. “You’re correct, they’ve gotten what they deserved…but…” She sighed and shut her eyes. “I hope to never do something like this ever again…”

She then yanked the spike right out of the corpse’s head, leaving a splattered mess all over the chamber floor.