The first snow of winter always tastes like forgotten memories. For me, I never knew a day without snow. Which means I never forgot.
I never forgot about the days I was humiliated in front of my friends, my family.... By my own brother.
And by days, I mean plural. Time, and time again... My brother, Taku Ogawagi, always defeats his younger brother, Kou Ogawagi. Of course, to no one's surprise, I was defeated yet again today.
Our battle took place at noon, and as always, my first opponent was my brother. They always made him my first opponent, to eliminate me faster, there was no point dragging it out. Taku would beat Kou anyways...
By afternoon, I slipped out the border gates to clear my head. I didn't know where exactly I was going, but I knew I was walking away from the clan. But I could always return.
For hours, I wandered around, not even realizing that the lakes were freezing beneath my feet, thanks to Khione's ring (The Goddess of Ice.) snow white crows were cleaning themselves by the lake, which meant there were probably wolves around, waiting for the crows to join.
I didn't mean to walk far. I just needed to breathe, to let the wind scrape the shame off my skin. But the farther I walked, the quieter it became, the more I wanted to walk. And now, I was too far to know where I even was.
Fish swam beneath the ice, their shadows clear through the frozen glass. Once I passed the lake, mountains and pillars of ice could be seen through the blizzard now.
But on top of one of the pillars, I saw something unfamiliar. It wasn't a crow, or an owl, or any other creature. It was as if it was staring at me...
The figure drew closer and closer, until it was so close that I could recognize that it was a human. I lifted my arms up to protect myself, and the man landed in front of me. He stepped forward and punched me away.
I fell on the snow, looking up to see him approaching again. I flipped around, avoiding his attack. I could see him, he pointed some kind of strange… tool? Tube? I couldn't tell what it was, only that it gleamed like polished bone and spat thunder when it roared.
Before I knew it, a projectile, maybe a smaller arrow of sorts flew at me. The projectile, that I later learned was called a bullet, painfully tore through the flesh of my hand, into my arm. After a moment of processing what just happened, I cried out in pain.
The man continued to approach me, I couldn't see his face through the blizzard, only his silhouette.
However, at that moment, another man appeared in front of me, who I later learned was Ciel Voldrald. He was wore some type of a black cloak, it was damaged, rugged, ripped on the ends of it and had a few holes too. The man also seemed to be wearing a scarf around his neck, his hair dark.
While I was struggling to figure out what was going on, and also trying to deal with the pain in my arm, the other man was knocked away by Ciel. I stepped forward, wiped the tears off my eyes.
Now, I could see the attacker more clearly. He was wearing an all black outfit, his clothes were strange, so different than the ones I see daily. He had white hair, whiter than my hair, almost as white as the snow around us.
Ciel stepped backwards towards me. "The kid's with me, Zero." He said, looking at the white haired man.
"Now that's very unfair. I travelled all the way to the North Pole, I'm not leaving without my target." He pointed his gun towards me again. He sounded like he didn't take Ciel seriously at all. "And you know that's not a kid, right? He isn't much younger than you."
Ciel looked back at me. At that point, I could pick out his face features. He had some kind of filth on his left cheek, likely from coal and had faintly red eyes.
He then turned back around at Zero. "He isn't? He looks like a baby!"
Zero responded, spinning his gun around his finger. "Yep. But he's 19, I believe... Born on what, July?"
I stepped forward, still clutching my left arm in pain. "Born on May, not July." I hissed loudly, mostly from the pain in my arm. I was barely standing on my own.
"Meh, July, May, whatever." Zero flicked a bullet between his fingers, his disinterest razor-sharp. "Point is, kid's worth a lot. So I'm taking him."
"You said he wasn't a kid, Zero. But no, you're not taking anything besides blood and..." Ciel trailed off, looking around for a second. "Snow." He said, finishing his sentence.
Zero pulled out another gun from his hip. It was just as white as the other one.
"Fine, have it your way... But you're actually doing me a favor. Two birds in one stone, or bullet."
Ciel dashed forward and I stumbled into the snow. Ciel threw out a kick at Zero, which Zero blocked and shot a bullet aimed at Ciel's face. The bullet hit his cheek, under his left eye and crushed under it's own force, falling on the snow.
I crawled backwards as the two continued fighting, admittedly scared for my life. Who wouldn't be? I hid next to the pillar of ice, trying to heal my wound. But it was too painful.
I saw Ciel knocked back towards me, but he stopped himself. There was blood stains on his left arm now.
He yelled, "Head towards the clan!" Desperation edged his voice, the command sliced through the howling wind, urgent and raw. And I did. I started running towards the clan. But many gunshots were heard, birds flew away in fear.
I was shot on my foot and another bullet grazed my knee, I looked to the side to see Ciel grappling Zero and trying to falter his aim.
I continued to run. Soon, Ciel followed next to me. "Head towards East, there's an avalanche at West!"
He yelled at me. I looked at him, as I struggled to run. "What the hell are you talking about?! There is no avalanche!"
Ciel stopped following and started running towards Zero. "But there is going to be!" He said, I could barely hear what he said.
I heard a few more gunshots, before there was even a louder noise. I looked at Ciel.
His hand glowed a faint color of purple, he made a pulling motion with his hand. Then, I saw the avalanche I was promised.
Zero stopped firing, looking back at the avalanche. "You dumb fuck! Why'd you do that?!"
Ciel grinned widely, he seemed proud of himself. He didn't respond.
So, I also yelled from behind. "Why the hell did you do that, you idiot?!"
Ciel turned around and yelled back, defensively. "I'm saving your ass here, so shut up!"
I saw Zero reload his guns. "I'm gonna make you pay for this..." He gave one last look to Ciel and started firing at the avalanche coming down. I saw his bullets explode into fiery blasts as he shot at the snow coming down.
Then, Ciel started running again, towards me. "What'd I say about running?!" He yelled, so I started to run as fast as I could. He followed.
He grabbed my arm and helped me run faster, dragging me. The avalanche came closer, but Zero seemed to be handling it... He started running too, while reloading.
"I don't get paid enough for this!" Zero yelled to himself and he ran away from the avalanche, and the both of us.
Ciel leaped, once we were by the lake, and pulled me closer mid-air. How powerful is this guy? We both jumped across the entire lake. The avalanche started to pour into the lake, some of it still coming at us.
Ciel pulled me onward and we leaped again, not as far this time, and the snow finally began to settle.