I stood at the edge of the mountain, staring down at what was left of the world. From where I stood, the land below was desolate nothing but grime, blood, and scorched earth stretching endlessly to the horizon. Civilization had been reduced to ash and memory. The wind howled past me, carrying the scent of iron and decay, and for a moment, I let myself reminisce.
I wondered where it all went wrong.
A bitter feeling settled in my gut. No, lying to myself was pointless. I knew exactly when everything started falling apart. As my gaze drifted across the ruins, something moved. Slowly, deliberately. My fingers tightened.
So this was it.
The last enemy I needed to defeat.
"Bastard," I muttered.
I sighed, already bracing for the attack I knew would come from beneath my feet. The ground shattered as I leapt into the air, the thing erupting upward in pursuit. Midair, I reached into my space and drew my bow, nocking a sturdy metallic arrow. Without hesitation, I released it, aiming straight for its eyes.
"ROARRRRR!"
The beast screamed in pain, clearly not expecting that.
Tch. It had grown confident. I'd already memorized all of its attack patterns we'd been locked in this dance for six long months. Anger burned hot in my chest as I landed and rolled, narrowly avoiding its massive claws as they tore through the air where I'd been seconds earlier.
It slammed its head into the ground, the impact shaking the mountain. I didn't give it time to recover. I struck again, this time at its rear, then sprinted forward, dismissing my bow and drawing my twin knives for close combat.
I slid beneath its belly, slashing deep into the veins of its legs and crippling its movement.
"ROOOORRRR!"
It howled, fury shaking the air, but managed to rise anyway. My position was bad, one mistake and I'd be paste. With a sharp twist, I jumped back, creating distance between us.
With its legs failing, we locked eyes. I smirked through blood-stained teeth.
Roaring back, I charged, my daggers dissolving into light as my sword materialized in my grip. Power surged through me as I activated my ultimate skill.
"Strike of a Thousand Souls!"
In an instant, my comrades appeared beside me every one of them wearing the same determined expression. The ones who had fallen. The ones I failed to save. Together, we rushed our shared enemy. Speed unlike anything I'd ever known tore through my body. I became lightning, and like lightning, I struck again and again until the beast finally collapsed, lifeless.
Silence followed.
I stared at the corpse, the thing that had made me the last one standing. It looked like a grotesque mass of human flesh and fluids, stitched together by suffering. Disgusting. It had consumed everything. Everyone.
I'd seen worse.
After confirming it was dead, I turned away.
Pain exploded through my chest.
Something pierced my heart, and I felt myself being consumed. My skin began to melt, blood boiling as agony swallowed me whole. The tissue impaling me twisted, reshaping into a face I knew all too well.
"…Richard."
He smirked. "Long time no see, Gazelle. I've been waiting for our reunion, Extra."
I laughed hard enough to surprise even him. "Hahaha… Oh my God. And here I thought I rewrote the story. My one and only villain."
"Well, you tried," he said calmly. "What is this, your first trial? Be proud. You accomplished what even the protagonist couldn't after 753 regressions."
My vision blurred, consciousness slipping, but I wasn't done yet. I pulled a vial from my space and tossed it down. White-hot flames erupted instantly, devouring everything.
"AHHHH! You fucking bitch!" he screamed. "We'll die together!"
"Let's see who lasts longer," I shot back, laughing through the pain.
BOOM.
The mountain exploded. I was flung away, body torn apart. My right arm was gone. Half of me remained. I looked down, oddly calm.
So this is it.
Bleeding out, alone, I wondered where it all went wrong. My breaths grew shallow as a silhouette approached.
Not him.
"You have done well," the figure said. "Would you like a redo?"
Rage flared. "A redo? To suffer again? For what?"
"This was only the tutorial," it replied. "The real life hasn't begun."
The words hit harder than the explosion ever could.
Tutorial.
That single word crushed everything I thought I understood.
"Tutorial?" I rasped, blood bubbling at my lips. "You're telling me this world...this hell....was practice?"
The figure didn't deny it. Silence was answer enough.
Extra.
It clicked then. I was never meant to survive. Never meant to clear it. I wasn't the protagonist, wasn't even a contender. I was a variable. A stress test. Something thrown into the system to see what would break first me, or the world.
And somehow, I'd broken the script instead.
"She keeps failing," the figure said softly, almost amused. "Seven hundred and fifty-three times. You weren't supposed to outperform her."
Rage drowned the pain. So that's what this was. Not salvation.
Recruitment.
I laughed bitterly. "No. Hell no."
And with that, I welcomed the darkness.