“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 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 guilt 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.”

“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, got nothing better to do.”