The mutated forest was already starting to heal.
Morning sunlight shone through the tall trees, breaking into golden pieces through the green leaves.
The glowing blue flowers that only grew in this weird forest swayed in the cool breeze, giving off a sweet, heavy smell.
It almost hid the smell of old blood, and death.
The battlefield wasn’t loud with explosions anymore.
There was only the endless sound of leaves blowing in the wind, like a quiet prayer to a god that wasn’t listening.
A cool breeze brushed against Lucy’s bandaged face before fading into the woods.
She stood all alone.
There was no squad marching behind her.
No heavy armor covering her skin.
She just wore normal army clothes and thick white bandages wrapped tight around her ribs.
Every breath felt like breathing in broken glass.
Days had passed since the monsters broke through.
The federation had cleared the battlefield, burning the massive piles of dead monsters to stop the rot, while recovering the fallen hunters so they could be sent home.
But battlefields never really get wiped clean.
Broken armor and weapons still shined under the moss.
Dark, permanent stains baked right into the dirt.
Nature was already taking the forest back, but people hadn’t moved on.
Lucy took a painful step forward, ignoring the fresh stitches pulling under her bandages.
She stopped in front of a shallow ditch.
Everything went totally quiet around her.
This was where Kellan died.
The memory hit her hard: the mountain of armored muscle crashing down, his final, desperate swing of a hammer, and his loud, crazy laugh right in the face of death.
She looked down with tired eyes.
The handle of his war hammer rested quietly across the ditch.
The massive metal head was completely gone, broken during his last strike.
Only the scratched black handle was left, half-covered by fall leaves.
Tiny forest bugs crawled across it like it belonged there in the dirt.
Lucy dropped to her knees, the wet dirt soaking her knees.
Her shaking fingers touched the cold metal.
It hadn’t moved since his heart stopped beating for good.
A hot tear dropped softly onto the handle.
She gripped the cold steel tight.
The unmovable wall that always protected her was broken forever.
“…I’m sorry…” The broken whisper didn’t make her feel any better.
Sunlight poured through the branches, turning the broken handle a warm gold color.
Lucy finally broke down.
The cry that came out of her was an ugly, raw, choking sound of pure heartbreak.
Years of being a tough, perfect soldier completely fell apart in the dirt.
Her breathless cries echoed through the empty woods, with no soldiers to salute her and no one to comfort her.
Only the old trees were left, and they had already seen enough death.
She stayed on her knees for a long time.
The golden morning light slowly shifted as the hours passed, turning into harsh afternoon shadows.
She cried until her chest cramped and her throat tasted like blood.
She cried for the team she lost, for the giant man who threw her out of the way, and for the heavy guilt of being the only one who lived.
She cried until there was simply nothing left.
Eventually, the tears just stopped coming.
Her body still shook with dry, hollow gasps, but her eyes were completely dry.
A heavy, blank numbness settled over her.
She felt totally empty.
Lucy slowly pushed herself up.
Her knees popped, stiff from sitting in the damp dirt for hours.
She wiped the mud off her face with the back of her hand.
She didn’t say a big, dramatic goodbye.
She didn’t salute.
She just gave the broken hammer one last look, turned around, and walked away.
She left the forest in absolute silence.
The long walk back felt like moving through a bad dream.
For miles, the only sound was her own boots hitting the ground.
Slowly, the glowing blue vines and glass-like trees faded away, replaced by gray ash, broken roads, and crushed concrete.
She walked past burnt-out trucks and deep holes in the earth.
Nobody stopped her.
Nobody asked her questions.
When she finally reached the massive steel gates of the city, the absolute silence of the forest was suddenly broken by the loud, chaotic noise of survival.
Military trucks drove endlessly through the cracked streets, kicking up thick clouds of dust.
Smooth medical drones floated above, guiding the hurt people toward packed, temporary hospitals.
Sector 135 was completely blocked off behind giant metal walls, a ruined district marked only by tall cranes and dark smoke.
But life violently refused to stop.
Lucy stepped into the main city square.
It was a massive, messy sea of humanity.
Thousands of people packed the streets.
People ran until their lungs burned, limped heavily on crutches, or just stood totally still, searching the endless crowd of passing faces for someone they knew.
Lucy drifted through the crowd like a ghost, her tired, dry eyes watching the survivors.
“…Mom!” Lucy watched a young, bleeding Hunter spot someone in the crowd.
An older woman froze in her tracks, dropping her supply bags right in the dirt.
They crashed into each other in the middle of the square, her arms wrapping around his neck so tight he gasped.
He laughed even though his face was covered in bloody bandages.
“I thought…” His mother’s voice broke completely.
“I thought… I lost you forever.” “I’m here.” He smiled weakly, tears mixing with dried blood.
“I’m here, Mom.” Nearby, a little girl with pigtails ran toward a man, crashing hard into his heavy armor.
“D…dad!” His scarred hand rested gently on her head, holding her like she was made of glass.
“I kept my promise.” A little further away, Lucy passed an old couple standing completely quiet in front of their exhausted daughter.
They weren’t even talking; they were just holding her shaking hands.
Someone nearby cried happy tears.
Someone else whispered crazy prayers, thanking a god they never really believed in until that scary night.
For a lot of people, the nightmare was over.
But as Lucy kept walking, the happy sounds of reunions slowly faded behind her.
Near the far corner of the huge square, kept on purpose away from the happy families, she found the other side of the war.
Rows of plain wooden boxes rested under white army flags.
There were no shiny medals here.
Just names carved into cheap metal plates.
Some boxes were heavy with broken bodies.
Others had almost nothing in them, a ripped hunter patch, a broken weapon, a handful of ash.
Families stepped forward from the quietest line in the entire city.
Some hugged the boxes tight to their chests, trying to share their body heat with the cold wood.
Some dropped straight to their knees when it was their turn.
Others just stared into space, unable to understand how a whole, living human being could possibly fit inside something so small.
The line never got shorter.
It just got quieter.
Lucy stopped walking.
From the edge of the crowd, she watched an old woman move slowly toward the front.
Her back was bent over from old age, one hand leaning heavily on an old cane, the other holding a faded photo.
“Excuse me…” Her voice was shaking as she walked up to a young officer standing next to the endless rows of memorial boxes.
“…Son…
He’s nineteen.
He left three days ago…
It was his very first mission.
He should’ve been home by now.
Could you please help me find him?
His name is Ethan Miller.
He’s all I have.” The young officer carefully took the photo.
The dark bags under his eyes showed the exact same deep, awful tiredness Lucy felt in her bones.
His polite smile dropped.
Slowly, heavily, he turned to his computer and typed in the name.
From where she stood, Lucy could see the screen flash a bright, harsh red.
The officer didn’t say anything.
He just closed his eyes, swallowing the big lump forming in his throat.
He stood up and walked over to the quiet rows of wooden boxes.
He stopped near the end of the line, his gloved hand resting gently on a flat lid, his thumb brushing the gray city dust off the nameplate.
ETHAN MILLER.
He picked up the box.
It was way too light.
The old woman’s gentle smile never faded as he walked back to her.
“…Did you find him?
Is he in the medical ward?” The officer stopped right in front of her.
He didn’t know what to say anymore.
He lowered his head, gently handing her the small wooden box.
“…Your grandson gave his life protecting people, ma’am.” His voice cracked, losing all its tough army sound.
“He died…
as a hero.” Lucy’s chest tightened as the old woman stared blankly at the wood.
Her shaking hands reached out for it.
Her cane hit the ground hard as she let it drop.
She traced the cold, hard letters carved into the wood with her thumb.
“…Ethan…” A single, terrible tear rolled down her wrinkled face.
Then another.
Her fragile smile stayed frozen, like her brain still expected her grandson to pop out of the crowd and laugh at the bad joke.
Instead, she slowly pulled the super light box tight against her chest.
She held it exactly the way she probably held him when he was a scared little kid.
No scream tore through the square.
There was only silence, the heavy, choking silence that happens when the very last piece of hope a person has quietly slips away forever.
Lucy turned her head away.
War makes big heroes, their names proudly carved into shiny stone.
But no stone statue waits nervously by a living room window at night.
The world remembers how a hero died; the broken people who loved them spend the rest of their lives remembering exactly how they lived.
The real weight of the fight wasn’t the giant hole in the forest, or the ruined city blocks of Sector 135.
It was carried home by hundreds of families.
Because the war never really ends when one side loses or dies.
It ends… When the very last family finally stops waiting by the front door.
⋙ ──── ✦ ──── ⋘ Just a few blocks away from that awful silence, hidden behind the bright, clean walls of a temporary hospital room… The steady beep…
beep…
beep…
of a heart machine echoed loudly in a very quiet room.
Pain shot through every single inch of his broken body the second he woke up.
Kai’s bruised fingers twitched against the crisp, clean bedsheets.
His eyelids felt heavy, like they were made of lead.
Slowly, painfully, they opened.
The first thing his blurry eyes saw was the bright ceiling lights.
The sharp smell of cleaning chemicals completely covered up the smell of rain and smoke he was used to.
The second thing he saw was a small, warm hand wrapped tight around his own.
Raina.
She sat slumped against the metal rail of his bed, fast asleep.
Dark bags rested heavily under her closed eyes.
Her clothes were still wrinkled and stained with gray soot from the ruined street.
She hadn’t let go of his hand once.
Even while sleeping, her fingers stayed locked with his, holding on tight, like she thought letting go might make him disappear into the dark too.
Kai stared at his sister, his throat feeling like he had swallowed dry glass.
“…Raina…” His scratchy whisper woke her up instantly.
Her dark eyelashes fluttered.
Slowly, her red, puffy eyes opened.
For a second, she just stared, like her tired brain couldn’t believe what she was seeing.
Then, fresh hot tears spilled down her cheeks.
“K-Kai…” She jumped to her feet.
The metal chair fell backward onto the floor with a loud crash.
Without caring about the tubes taped to his arms or the bloody bandages wrapped tight around his chest, she threw her arms tightly around her brother’s neck.
“You dummy…” Her voice cracked between hard, shaking sobs.
“You…
absolute dummy…” Kai slowly wrapped his good arm around her shaking back, holding his little sister tight.
But the warm feeling of them being together was immediately broken by the awful, heavy words that came next.
“I thought…” Raina buried her face into his shoulder, crying for the quiet boy who wasn’t in the room with them.
“I thought I’d lost you too…”