“Prota?” John called out, waking up in the familiar black space he called the “reset room.”

The small girl was standing, looking around as if trying to spot something in the endless black void around her. Her head snapped around at the sound of John’s voice, and she ran towards him.

“Hey, you good?” he said carefully. She’d died quite a lot while training with him, but dying in real combat could’ve been a much different experience. However, to John’s relief, she was fine.

“Again?” she said as John pulled her off of him.

“...again?” John chuckled, but it was a nervous one. Was she really so unfazed at the death of so many living beings? Sure, they were monsters, but she was blowing their heads off at close range. And how about those three bandits? Was she nervous about that?

How about her own death?

“Hey, Prota. Are we taking this too fast? You…” he took a deep breath. “You know you’re… uh… killing people, right? And… you just died.”

Prota looked up and thought for a bit, but then nodded. “If John says it’s ok, it’s ok. I trust John.”

“It’ll be all ok in the end, right?”

John felt a twinge of guilt in his heart. Wasn’t this taking advantage of… no. It wasn’t taking advantage. It was a feeling of trust that he would have to reciprocate.

It was a feeling he hadn’t felt for a long time.

“...thanks, Prota,” he said, eyes shining. He quickly wiped them and turned away, his face composed once more as he turned back. “I’d do anything for you, too. Let’s go kick ass.”

~~~

The second run went different from the first. For starters, Prota understood what she was supposed to do this time, immediately charging up a large scale attack instead of going for single targets at a time. However, the attack ended up using all of her energy, and the goblins pounced on her as soon as she was done. John shrugged and shot himself in the head, prompting another reset.

The third run went similarly, save for the fact that Prota hit one more goblin than the previous attempt. However, still unable to fend for herself after the initial attack, the ended up dying.

The fourth run, up to the tenth all went similarly. Attack, kill, cooldown, die, repeat. John could probably have finished the remaining ten goblins off on the tenth attempt, but that wasn’t the point.

He’d made Prota an adventurer to help her improve. Right now, she lacked combat experience. She was gaining more than any training session John had ever given her.

On the eleventh attempt, Prota tried a different strategy and went for a few individual goblins before unleashing a powerful attack, killing all but eight of the goblins.

From that point on, she mixed and matched attack strategies, varying from a guerilla style attack, to a very head on method, even attempting to recall Elfin’s wind magic, which ended up in a drastic failure. By the twenty first attempt, she was a bit tired of it all.

“I’m tired,” Prota sighed. “Can we stop?”

“That’s enough,” John nodded, patting Prota on the head. “I’d like to see, though…”

He reached into his hoodie and unslung two massive pistols, futuristic in design. The barrels began to spin as he put his thumbs on the hammers and took aim.

The first volley of bullets blew the heads off two goblins, attracting the attention of the rest of the group. They spread out, but John was ready for it, immediately picking off the ones near the edge before dashing into the forest behind him. The goblins followed, making sure to keep their movements random so he couldn’t just mow them down.

With a grin, John pulled a bomb from his hoodie and threw it down on the ground, and a massive explosion shook the ground three seconds later, taking out yet another two goblins.

Prota watched with amazement. John wasn’t using any large scale attacks of any kind but was rather picking off the goblins one by one by forcing them to chase him. It wasn’t flashy, but it was working. He was just running around in circles while slowly killing the goblins off. Prota didn’t know it, but it was a strategy he’d developed from playing video games back before he’d become a [Charcter].

However, with half the goblins gone, John was getting a bit tired. He turned around and unleashed another volley of bullets, but to his dismay, there was a click signifying that the barrels were empty.

“Shit,” John grimaced, and threw them to the side. Bending his legs, he got ready for hand to hand combat.

The first goblin came at him, swinging wide, and John caught the thing by the wrist and wrenched the knife out of its hand, spinning around and plunging it into the goblin’s neck, killing it instantly. Two more came at him, and he smashed his foot into one, sending it flying into the other, then charged forwards, driving his fist into the two of them.

Unfortunately, that left his back wide open, and a goblin plunged its dagger into his back.

“Fuck-!” he gasped, falling to the ground. He could hear Prota yelling in the distance, but everything was getting quiet as his vision faded, slowly going black…

~~~

“...Prota?” John called out. There was no one there in the darkness.

Hesitant, he reached out towards the shining light and slammed his fist on the reset button.

~~~

“I’m tired,” Prota sighed. “Can we stop?”

“...” John looked at Prota. He remembered something similar…

“No way,” he thought. “If I die without her, does she not remember…?”

“To answer your question, no,” Zero said in his mind. “She won’t. Use that information as you will.”

John grit his teeth. He’d been so enwrapped with the thought of having a partner through all his resets that he’d forgotten that Prota was still just a small girl. His delusions of having someone who would stick with him, understand what he had to go through, understand the pain of the things he had to bear… they’d blinded him. They’d stopped him from seeing the truth he thought he’d accepted so long ago.

There were certain things he still had to bear on his own. There were still certain things only he would understand.

He vaguely remembered when he’d first buried his emotions. Memories rushed through his head, unpleasant memories. It had been out of frustration back then. Frustration at someone, anyone, for not understanding what he was going through, for not knowing what he had to endure…

Some of that frustration was coming back.

Or maybe it wasn’t coming back. Maybe what had always been there was now coming out, just a bit.

“...John?” Prota said worriedly. She hesitantly reached out, but John’s hand shot out.

“Don’t,” he panted, gritting his teeth. He took a deep breath and threw his head back.

“FUCK!!!” he yelled, clenching his fists. His left eye shot open, and he was suddenly gone, reappearing in the middle of the group of goblins.

His hand shot out, grabbing the head of one of the monsters, smashing it into the ground as green blood splattered everywhere. Unlike every other run, the goblins didn’t attack. The bloodlust emanating from John was so strong that he gave off the aura of a predator rather than prey, and the goblins knew what to do when in the presence of a predator.

They ran.

Unfortunately for them, John was faster. He whipped out his guns and pulled the trigger, but this time, instead of bullets, a massive beam blew out of the barrels, annihilating half of the survivors. Throwing the guns to the side, John crouched low, then shot forwards, leaving a massive crack in the ground behind him. He appeared beside the rest of the goblins and grabbed one, smashing its back on his knee, and cracking its back. He threw it so hard at another goblin that it ripped its head off.

“Huff… huff…” John panted, wiping his mouth. He was almost calm, but not quite yet.

“Fuck,” he growled quietly, dashing forwards again, his bare hands tearing through flesh and bone as he ripped them apart, green blood splattering all over his clothes and body.

“Why now…?” he sighed, throwing his head back. He saw the last goblin sneak up on him, but he didn’t care. He didn’t even feel the blade enter his body as his vision went dark one more time.

~~~

“...John?” Zero said hesitantly. “Hey, John. You good?”

“...”

John was curled up in a ball, hugging his knees in what he thought was a corner in the infinite space they were in.

“It doesn’t matter, does it?” John said quietly. “In the end, it’s still the same. It wouldn’t be a story if it wasn’t, right? The characters have to have some trauma, huh? Gotta spice up their life? Gotta torment them for “character development”?” His laugh was hollow. “Who am I kidding. I thought life was gonna be good from here on out, but nope! Sweet man made horrors beyond my comprehension await me, don’t they?”

“...”

Zero had nothing to say. There was nothing to say.

After a while, John got up and stretched. “Well, in the end, it doesn’t matter, does it? None of it matters. None of it’s real. So who cares?” His voice sounded light, but there was a sort of desperation behind it as if he was trying to convince himself of his own words.

Zero looked away. He wanted to say something, but once again there was nothing to be said.

“Nothing left to do but go back, I guess,” John started, but was interrupted as a searing pain burned through his head. Words appeared in his vision, glitching as if they were on a TV with bad reception.

[John?]

“...what the fuck?”

[Hey, John. Sorry about this. Uh… fuck, what was I gonna say….]

“...you’re him, aren’t you. [Author].”

[...feels weird to be called that, but yeah. It’s me.]

“Just you wait, you bastard! I’m gonna-”

“John, stop,” Zero said quietly. “I know we’ve been through some shit because of him, but… just wait, ok? There are still things you don’t understand.”

[Uh… yeah. I mean technically I could really say this at any point but really isn’t this a much cooler time to say this at?]

Zero and John just stared.

[Prota… she’s important. Not just to me. To you. You were never meant to be alone. So… protect her, ok? Treat her as you would them. You know who I’m talking about. You made a [Destiny Bond] with her. Don’t let that bond break.]

[John. Don’t forget yourself.]

“...” John just shook his head. “You think any of that matters to me?” He laughed.

“You’re the one who cursed me with all this shit. You won’t let me be a character. You won’t let me be a writer. You won’t let me be a reader. You curse me with goddamn knowledge that nothing is real, and yet there are all these fucking memories of me living in a real world I know I’ll never reach. You make me call everyone a character, and yet I’m a character myself. You give me the power to change the world and yet won’t let me do shit because it’s “too powerful an ability”. Don’t start treating me nice now, you fucking bastard!” John finished with a yell. He was panting, his body trembling.

“Don’t start now.” Tears streamed down his cheeks. “Fuck, this is stupid. This isn’t even a good point for character development. Nothing important’s happened yet. Why now?” he asked one last time. “Why now?”

“I decided a long time ago to treat the world as a story. To a [Reader], none of this is real. You’re the one who made sure of that. So I’ll treat the world the way you want me to treat it.”

He wiped his eyes, closed them, and when he opened them again they were blank once more.

“Don’t fucking tell me everything is real now.”

He went to punch the white glowing reset button he’d hit so many times before.

Another death, another life… existing couldn’t really be called “living” at this point.

An endless cycle, again and again.

~~~

“Boss, we brought in another three,” a man panted. His face was streaked with sweat and dirt, his hands calloused and bruised. Behind him was a cage covered in some kind of cloth, but sounds of breathing could be heard inside.

“...just three?”

A man in a large furry cloak sat behind a desk, large and menacing, his face dark save for the lit cigar in his mouth. Jewels and gold adorned his fingers and neck, glinting in the dim light of the shack the two men were in.

“...two- two are children,” the first man said nervously, “But the third… she’s an adventurer.”

“Oh?” There was interest in the larger man’s voice. “What kind?”

“I… I think she’s an elf, sir.”

“Hmm… good enough, I guess. Now get out of my sight, you disgust me.”

The man bowed and scurried out of the tent, leaving the larger man alone with the cage. With a swift motion, he pulled the cloth off to reveal three figures, two unconscious children and an unconscious adult female, presumably an elf based on the ears.

“What’s an elf like you doing in the human kingdom?” the man mused, rubbing his chin. “No matter. What a nice gift you’ve given me.”

He opened up the cage and threw the elf out like a sack of wheat. Walking over to her, he slapped her face, waking her up.

“No- no, stop!” she cried out upon waking up, then went silent as she realized she was now somewhere else. “Wait- who are you? Are- are you here to save me?”

“Yes,” the man said in a honeycombed voice. “I’m here to save you.”

Behind him, tendrils began to grow out of his back, black and slimy, reaching out towards the woman, who started backing away in fear. Her hands shook as she held them out in front of herself, trying in desperation to hold the man back, but there was nothing she could do about it.

“Ho- hold on!” she cried out. “Stay back! Stop! Please! Please, someone, help me! Someone save me!”

She turned around and ran, but didn’t get far as her feet were crippled, the bones broken to prevent just what she was trying to do.

“What are you doing?” the elf trembled, trying one last time to get out of the situation she was clearly doomed to be in.

The man grinned, the tendrils drawing closer. “Why, saving you, of course.”

The woman’s screams pierced the silent air.