Chapter 2

Pr = Cpt. Ratchet and Annya

Part 7

Frightened, I was frightened to the point where my mind had to turn off itself. In my short life, even with the kind of life I lived, I had not seen so much blood and cruelty as that day. Unfair, it was unfair. A person who could create such cruelty shouldn’t be allowed. How can God allow such thing to exist? It was what I asked myself after seeing his smile, a terrifying smile.

I opened my teary eyes to be surprised by a different scene than the last time. Jack was standing in front of me with a bottle of water.

- You need to replenish your fluids. Drink slowly so you do not drown, your body is too weak from dehydration.

Even if I was scared, I knew Jack wouldn’t hurt me as long as I didn’t disobey him. Moreover, he was right, I was suffering from dehydration and my body was quite weak after not having eaten in a whole day. A child’s body is weak and more in such circumstances. My lips were chapped and my eyes burned me like you have a ton of ground beneath my eyelids. I could only rely on my own luck to survive another day, so I took the bottle the water.

Jack smiled and retired to some place. With this, I knew a new chapter of my life would begin.

After that, an entire month passed. At that time, I was brought to the headquarters of Jack’s organization. Jack had a small mercenary army, which he used to command to carry out most of the work that the Empire gave him or some "special tasks". They were a bunch of crazy fellows, but they weren’t bad with me and even taught me some useful tricks in the battlefield.

Every evening, I would train with Jack, who from now on I would call "Master". My training consisted in strategy planning and ancient magical language in which my book was written. It seemed I shouldn’t do any physical training until I turned 13. According to Master, a child’s body wouldn’t develop faster because of exercise. Sometimes, excessive exercise might cause an injury in the body. Real life was different from the world I had imagined when I used to watch in the TV. After hearing this, I felt as if my dreams had been shattered. But I persevered, continuing my training to become stronger in the future.

The rest of my days were as normal as any other child. I would play with the mercenaries’ children and draw when I was bored. Sometimes I would go to visit some uncles who were in charge of cooking for everyone and get some candies from them. But once I finished my training, Erwin and I would go to our house and watch TV until it was time to sleep.

Erwin was the uncool boy who had been spared together with me that day. But his so-called ability was so awesome that he only had to attend to the strategy planning class and he would free from training. Lucky brat! I really hated learning the ancient magical language, it was so tiring and Master was the worst teacher I’ve seen. He would flirt with his wife every time she passed to check our progress or would throw some surprise test at my when he was bored.

Another thing that depressed me more was I couldn’t use the book’s spells even if I were to learn them. According to Master, humans didn’t have the ability to gather the energy, known as mana, from the environment, thus they weren’t capable of using the spells from my book. And, I was a pure human! So the most I could do with this knowledge was to teach others how to cast the spells. Yes, because of this book I would have to be a teacher for the rest of my life!

Even so, I continued my training. I wouldn’t allow a book to control my future as it pleased, being stubborn was the only good point of my personality after all. If I can become a magician, then I would become a strategist or a soldier. As long as I could save my sister from her master’s hands, it would be fine.

One day, while I was playing with Erwin to the “mustached pig”, Master appeared out of nowhere with his always happy expression. It was pretty rare to see him out of classes as he had didn’t care about our personal lives, unless it affected our training.

- We need to discuss something important – he said with a friendly voice. - It’s about your future.

I got tense, my back started to sweat as a storm. I didn’t know what his intentions were , but I was sure of something, It was time for our first mission, the so-called first blood. Every new recruit had to accomplish a task chosen by Master. Up until now, we have been living as freeloaders, but it was not an orphanage. Here, you had to prove your worth or you would be kicked out, even if you were a child.

- I guess you should know what I’m about to say.

- Yes, Master! – The sweating Erwin answered to him with a loud shout. - It’s time for our first blood.

- Correct, it’s time for the little flowers of Blue Cruelty to have real thorns.

A drop of sweat slides down my back. ‘What would be my mission?’ I asked myself.

- … And this mission would be individual. If someone dares help you, it’ll mean immediate failure.

- Erwin’s mission will be to escort an important politician to Halette city. It’s an easy one. - Jack looked at me and continued. - Marco, you got the riskiest mission because your name was the last on the list. You’ll have to protect a group of talented children from the Empire until I can deal with them. Any questions?

I got the worst mission because my name was the last on the list? I couldn’t believe how unlucky I was. I mean, I got a useless book after being betrayed by my father and now this? I wanted to cry, the world was being unfair to me once again. Master seemed to believe I was capable of carrying out such mission, so he assigned it to me. But it was simply unfair!