Taking up my sword and shield as that is all I will ever really need, I leave. Keeping to myself as the noise outside grows, I puff up my dark collar. Moving into the shadows, I slip behind some supplies and head away, into the forest. The night-covered path crunches with each swing of my points.
My grip on the weapon tightens and my steps become harsh. While nominally I walk without sinking into the ground, each step sees me stabbed into it. My points hit rock and I come to a stop, teeth clenched. Tenderly, I get back to it and sheath my blade.
Putting one hand on the rock, I climb higher and higher, not missed in the slightest. The past few months rush back through my head, fueling the desperate grip I need to climb with. I saved them, I saved them all and so many others. I've taken blade, club, rock and arrow to my body and have lost much blood for their sake.
And now, when all is said and done, when the evil is vanquished and we are free. I am forgotten. I look out to the small world I grew up in and wonder if years have gone by, but, no. I know it's not even been a week.
They all celebrate with the others as if they're responsible for the heroism of days past. I gave so much for them all and I lost my home because I did not bring back treasure. The girl offering her affection to me this entire time was insincere. I don't understand.
I did everything for my people, I gave them all I could and more. When others fell, I paid heed to where I stepped and used their efforts to rise higher to victory. Even the gods, for all their wisdom and power, they have not answered me at all. I am no warrior, I am not bound to Waionr, so why do they not listen?
Am I so mired in death that I am not allowed to pray to anything but it?
Gripping one more rock, it comes loose and I calmly hang on for dear life. My expression is straight as is my fear-filled heart. I sigh and hoist myself up. Heaving my way up the final bit of mountain rock, I find myself running into an unfortunate sight.
The woman that was promised to me by father and her word, I can see her with the one she actually cares for. Mutually shared love is noisy and embarrassing to look at, but not for me. I can only feel resentment and oddly, humour. I climbed a mountain to escape them but so many others have ascended up here so that they can begin to have a child.
Keeping to the mountain edge, I head around to the path down and spot the rope bridge that will take me out of this valley. A twig snaps behind me and I turn, hand on hilt. A couple giggle and carry on making love, paying me no mind. I watch.
Growling quietly, I march off to an empty strip of mountainland and hop down onto the path. Breaking into a sprint, I throw caution away like I have the rest of my property. Tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap, tap. I catch a tree, flying up a little and hitting back down.
Huffing and puffing, my antenna light up and I brightly shine my displeasure at the world. Blinking and shuttering the glow I produce in order to make it as filthy and disrespectful as possible. I draw my sword and get into position, shield raised at the tree. Blinking as I feel warm despite the cold, I start to slash away at the bark.
By some form of bad circumstance, somehow, the tree I am cutting away at is the same that gave me my name. A willow. Will. A fitting name I suppose.
Will is what allowed me to fight my way through all the hardships. Will is why I am as good a fighter as I am right now. It's why there's a home to even go back to. My will is why there are even people left to scorn me like this...
Anger sets itself firmly into my features and my sword-grip flexes. Roaring into my mouth, I twist and turn until I have built enough force into my blade to allow it to just slice through. Bark litters the ground and I slash it once again. A branch falls and I turn away as the tree collapses.
That tree not long ago filled me with such relief and now I have cut it down so that I may never find my way home again. Crossing the rope bridge and reaching the end of it, I contemplate using my sword in anger like this one more time. Frowning, I relinquish the grip and stare longingly at the loving lights escaping the mountaintop woods. She's there, with him.
Looking away, I shake my head and go on my way.
Everything.
Everything...
I gave so much for my people and they'll forget I ever existed in a week once they're done taking that which I have left behind. My name will slip their minds and they will never shine it out again. Taking my collar, I quickly dab my eyes with it and my next breath shakes. I snap a branch off and start to tap the earth, a song of guidance in my bulbs.
With how my heart is right now, I cannot speak brighter, it would not be right. But, I suppose I can say that about the way I have been treated. How is it right or fair to ask so much of someone and then just... Throw them aside?
It doesn't make sense.
Have I not done my best to help those around me? Am I not charitable or generous? How much is good enough? What even is good enough anymore?
I have too many questions and a distinct lack of any means to get answers. Whatever their reasons are, I am at my breaking point. They played me along so that I would fight instead of them. I was promised a future before a hearth with a family to call my own.
Instead, here I am, leaving my home of many years behind because of so many lies. I walk the cold and dark world with no one at my side any more. The whispering flickers given to me before the campfires. The slipping away memory of our foreheads together as the world around us burned and the beast roared.
None of it meant anything.
Even the night sky isn't interested in offering me anything beautiful to look at. Clouds are blocking it all out, there is only a sheet of darkness just barely thick enough to stop the moonlight. Finding an end to the path, I stop at it and test the edge. Something crumbles.
A sound snaps out across the wind, one like cracking glass and a fair bit too. Raising a brow at the noise, I grasp my sword just in case and keep my ears open. They twitch and wobble, picking up on something just before I consider shaking my head and carrying on. It's muffled and noisy, humans, it must be them.
Minding my sword and shield and the skills enriched into my bones and blood, I nod. Humans are a plentiful people with equal amounts of problems that need solving. My home was taken from me over taxes and a lack of treasure. I will simply be so good at their jobs that I will accumulate more treasure than what I know what to do with.
The noise of the humans suggests they are close, but, there is nothing up here. The path does not lead to a camp or one of their mountain holds. I spot no fortresses and no animal dens. No caves like all of our ancestors once called home burn bright with firelight.
Each step I take, though, I cannot get away from the noise. I see no one but they're getting louder and clearer. Looking off into the distance, I see an odd sight. Shaped like a lightning bolt trapped in perpetuity, something is taking up the valley centre below.
Hopping down the first step I see, I keep on going down, casting aside my branch and taking the rope hammered into the rock instead. When I can, I slide my way down and skip the various slots and steps. Nearing the ground, I let go and stumble forward onto my knees. I glance up at the direction the noise is coming from and move closer.
A clear light peeks through, like the Orbital-Halo in the early angles of the morning. Somehow, it is always in the same spot on me, painting me as some broken man. I frown as it's not far off. I have been betrayed by those I should have been able to have trusted. Cast out as if I am the villain and not the hero.
Sneering at a nearby rock, I step close to the strange sight. It can only possibly be the byproduct of some ancient people. Like my sword and shield, someone must've found it inside flooded ruins somewhere. I scratch my head and the noise comes through clearly enough for me to figure some things out.
It's an argument.
A man and a woman, bluish like the stablest of power belonging to the ancients and green like something else. Oddly enough, this colour has a familiar feel to it. Divine. How I know this is baffling, but, I step closer as the crack shifts into the shape of two figures.
The woman strikes me as a beauty, she has flowing hair that reaches her tail and a shape worthy of a well-loved mother. Oddly enough, though, I can make out the sharp angles of armour. It strikes me as unbefitting but that which is around her neck rattles and jingles. Whatever is causing her strange colour, that must be the source.
I turn my eyes slightly, focusing on the man instead and how odd he strikes me with his posture. There's something grotesque about such blocky feet, only three digits a hand and an unsavoury, buggy chitter to his words. He seems to get this, it's why he's under a heavy cloak, wide-brimmed hat and snout-covering mask. He is strong, very strong.
He must be like me, a great hero.
Then, why are they arguing? That is what this noise has to be. The woman, I can hear tears. The way she moves, she is heartbroken.
I was near a mirror the day all the bad news came to me before I shut myself off from the world. I know what a heartbroken body does and looks like, even if we are not the same species. Whatever they are, it doesn't matter. Yet, oddly, I feel connected to the man, like he owes me something but I have never met any of them before...
I can't understand anything, I can only read their body language. I lock up a little and grow angry, the man is refusing the woman. She seems to love him and he is throwing it away with everything he has. Somehow, gods somehow I can grasp what they are listing off at each other in the growing rage.
Feats of heroism and bravery. The kind of things that captivate the heart. That which I thought I had done for those around me. It's as clear as daylight to me even with all that is going on.
Oddly, patting around for some reason, I cannot find my shield, only my sword. I grab it and blink, my back aching with millennia of immobility. Leaning forward on this throne of mine, I look around at the darkness and touch the wall ahead. I gently press against it and lean away to contemplate things quietly.
The argument gets louder and louder.