The first thing he felt was a soft pillow. The first thing he saw was the breaking dawn. The first thing he smelled was the fruity fragrance of flowers. The first thing he tasted was the crisp morning air.
The first thing he heard was an angel:
"Stop looking at me like that..."
Leora looked down at the man whose head rested in her lap before continuing:
"But thank you... Thank you for surviving."
Axel sat up and slowly scanned his surroundings.
His head still hurt, but all of his minor injuries had either completely healed or left behind scars. He searched for his savior’s jacket, but it was nowhere to be seen. It was gone. Even his weird necklace was missing.
The only wounds that remained unhealed were the one in his hand and a few on his chest arms.
Looking down at his left arm, he traced his fingers over the small divots of scarred flesh left by the arrows.
Leora continued:
"I was beginning to lose hope..."
Axel traced his fingers farther down his arm, toward the weird message that had been carved into him on the day they were summoned. All that remained of the cryptic message was the "Z."
It’s cut had been the deepest.
"Whu... What happened?"
Axel looked up at Leora, who solemnly replied:
"We won... Yeah, we... won."
Axel stared into Leora’s eyes, where faint traces of tears still lingered. Even though they’d ultimately won and gained superhuman powers, it still felt like a Pyrrhic victory.
Axel couldn’t stop himself from asking:
"Where... where is everybody?"
Axel could only spot three people inside the camp. One was a girl named Shin Hae-Ryung, who was quietly napping in the corner. Another was Ilya, the girl whose left arm had been severed.
’Is everyone dead?’
’That can’t be...’
"They’re out hunting," Leora said, wiping at the corners of her eyes.
"Hunting? Already...? Wait a minute! Task!"
[Tasks]
[Slay the Goblin King in the Castle] - (Time remaining: 579:30:34 hours)
No wonder Axel was so hungry, or why his injuries had healed to this extent. Well, to be fair, they had only healed so much because his Aether Core had awakened. But still...
It was the morning of the seventh day. In other words, the fight against the camp had been three days ago.
Axel stared at the timer in shock.
"H-how... how many?"
Leora slowly parted her lips, choking on her words several times before she managed to force them out:
"...Sixteen... we lost sixteen."
"Oh..."
Leora didn’t say anything for a long while after that. She simply observed Axel.
She knew better than to interrupt.
Axel, on the other hand, clutched his head.
Everything.
He remembered everything.
It was his damn curse.
He would never forget the faces of those who had died... He didn’t even know which of them would be the next to haunt his dreams. All he knew was that Mikhail and Huang Gao were just two among the sixteen.
While Axel was lost in thought, Leora retrieved a canteen filled with water and a couple of pieces of jerky.
Axel slowly devoured the rations.
Still, words were difficult for either of them to find. All around him, flowers had sprouted throughout the camp, scattered between little knolls.
Axel would have fallen into complete despair if it weren’t for the knowledge that had flooded his brain moments before he passed out.
Power.
They had unlocked power.
The moment the Relic was transferred to Axel, basic knowledge of Relics flooded into his mind. Relics came from gods and were classified into eight tiers: Minor, Lesser, Greater, Ascendant, Mythic, Origin, Primordial, and Divine. They were items possessing unique abilities and could stored within the Aether Core and summoned whenever needed.
Beyond the Relic itself, Axel’s Aether Core had awakened from the shock of its entry.
"Status."
☼☼☼
Axel Hart
Age: 20 Gender: Male
Contractor: [ - - - ]
[Aether Core]
[Rank: Nascent] - (Progression: 0%)
[Tasks]
[Slay the Goblin King in the Castle] - (Time remaining: 579:15:34 hours)
[Skills]
[Perfect Memory]
[Fall of Babel]
[Relics]
[Afflictions]
[???] - (Progression: 0%)
[Memory Suppression]
[Earth’s Last Hope] - (Will be summoned to Earth in: 43688:15:34 hours)
☼☼☼
Axel grasped on the small light of hope that slept within despair.
The rest of them had a chance to live.
After Axel finished his meal, Leora walked away before returning with several Aether Shards resting in her hand.
Leora finally broke the silence that had settled between them. She handed him the shards and said:
"Here, this is your share."
The remaining twenty-five survivors had decided to split the shards they had collected equally, regardless of contribution.
Axel held out his hand, and a measly three shards dropped into his palm. All he had to do was close his fingers around the iridescent stones and will himself to absorb them.
[You have absorbed an Aether Shard]
[You have absorbed an Aether Shard]
[You have absorbed an Aether Shard]
He felt himself grow slightly stronger as a small amount of Aether settled permanently within his Core.
’A chance...’
A slight chance.
Axel clenched his fist.
He was going to make every damned goblin in the world pay. He hated them now. He’d kill every last one of them and steal their shards for himself.
Not that he’d kill them solely for the shards, but mostly out of pure malice.
Another obsession to add to his collection.
Axel stood with Leora’s assistance.
While the glimmer of hope and thoughts of power flickered within him, Axel still hadn’t asked the question that had been lingering on his lips.
Finally, he blurted it out:
"Who... who survived?"
Leora couldn’t meet Axel’s eyes, but she responded with a long list:
"You, me, Ilya, Hae-Ryung, Zayn, Cory, Cynthia, Carlos, Cayden, Paul, Maks, Amaya, Ruby, Li Jing, Didier, Ryon, Connor, Claire, Darrel, Jade, Julia, Kakeru, Aleksandr, Rita, and..."