What is this place?" I felt the chills of this place, not the ghastly chill, but the chill of the sounds that resemble a war.
What I see right now is like a metropolitan city but in ruins. The tall buildings are destroyed, the ground is shattered caused by an earthquake continuously wrecking everything.
"This is the West Clild Yard District 200 years ago, and the place you're standing right now is the current location of the Cloudspire Garrison".
"I see, we've been with each other for a while now if you don't mind, may I ask who are you? What is your name?" I smiled to at least look courteous around her.
"I am Cordélia Sylvain, you can call me Sylve." She smiled back, and at least this time, her smile looks genuine. But somehow, a sad emotion is etched on her eyes. I wonder what's going on.
"What happened here?"
"50 years ago the so-called 'The Great Stampede' took place in which, millions of people died. Everyone panicked, even my fellow soldiers were slaughtered after facing kuishinbos we've never seen before. If you look closely there,". She said as she pointed towards the direction where humans are fighting? I'm not sure if they are human, but they are fighting alien-like creatures who resemble the thing that attacked me yesterday, but this time these aliens like creatures or kuishinbos are much fiercer and larger. Some can even be considered giants. "Those people who fight the Kuishinbos are called Charlanders. They are mutant soldiers, biologically engineered human beings designed to fight kuishinbos much more efficient than hunters does, I am one of those". She then showed off her wings and flapped around. "And yes, I was there in that war."
Hmm, not surprisingly, if they are biologically engineered, they aren't even human anymore. They can live for hundreds of years, or even more than that. After all, it is expected that necro can alter the human body components.
"Then why are you here?"
"Because I survived that, obviously." She giggled. "Jokes aside, we retreated, and then came back after a few days to take control of the district, of course, we won,"
Leon then started to step forward, and Sylve and I followed, "But the thing is, this disaster did not happen only on Clild Yard District, the whole Lumiere City was attacked by the Kuisinbos, out of five districts, only two survived."
Hmm, I wonder if Leon is also one of the Charlanders. "What happened to the three?"
"Well, they fell into ruins." Sylve lowered her head, and her voice turned soft. "Those three districts, North Silrast Acre, South Fist Hill, and Bac East are now ghost districts." We continued to walk as they help me evade all the debris falling from here and there. The weird thing is that I hear loud sounds from explosions everywhere, but I remain calm. We also staggered due to the tremors that are occurring from time to time, but what's impressive is I remained calm and focused on what they are saying. "Places that have been attacked by a lot of kuishinbos are no longer suitable for living since the area is full of impurities, the amount of oxygen has been reduced, and who knows? There can also be remnants of kuishinbo out there which can be dangerous." She stopped speaking for a moment, "However, because of a large number of kuishinbos killed during the war, Lumiere City became a good place to farm for ashes which can be sold to a good amount especially to merchants that comes from the City of Slydenn or the City of the King."
Leon butted in, "Because of that, the higher government tried to rob us by forcefully asking us to hand over all of the ashes in exchange for their support in the military."
"But that would cause a decline in your economy right? Especially, they are planning to buy are raw materials for production, if they choose to drain all your land's resources, farming and agriculture won't be enough for trading other necessary goods to keep every single citizen here alive."
Leon smiled and messed up my hair. "I'm starting to like you, Vander, you're sharp."
"Stop it, you sound so gay."
They both giggled.
"Yep, the City Lord knows that, and that is why he refused." I saw Sylve clenched her fist, "The councils didn't like it that's why they abandoned the whole Lumiere City, they also block all the trade routes and ban us from trading with other cities, they basically imprisoned us here leaving us to die with all the remaining resources we have. They also decline their military support here, it's quite considered a miracle how we survive for 50 years."
"It didn't change after 50 years?"
"Yes, obviously."
"That's unfortunate."
I shifted my gaze to both of them and noticed how they look so down. However, it's the rule of the world, the strong rises, while the weak are crushed. Even after everything, nothing changed. Humans are still animals pretending to be superior.
I realized I should lift the mood here. "I understand but I'm confused, what am I going to do here?"
"I'm sorry, I almost forgot." She then fixed her posture, trying to compose herself, "This is a realistic simulation of the great stampede. You have to survive here for 3 days and 3 nights, this is training on how you will overcome hardships in case a disaster like this is bound to happen once again." She said in a sombre tone. "This will train your state of mind not to panic regardless of how uncertain the situation is, we wouldn't want the same shit to happen again."
"Am I gonna be all alone here?" My voice raised quite a bit in a questioning tone, "What will I do?"
"You are alone, and you have to survive, by any means, that's all you gotta do" Sylve also raised her voice. "Don't worry, since it's just training, we'll be here around to monitor you, but we're not allowed to interfere though, you don't have any necro right?"
I shook my head off, "Yeah."
Sylve then smiled, "But you have this?" She pointed her head just like I did earlier.
"With that being said, we have nothing else to remind you or teach. You'll have to figure things out on your own, research guild learn through experiences." Both of them stood up straight and reached their hands to me, "Good luck, Vander."
I nodded in response.
With that, they suddenly disappeared, and I'm here all alone. Right now, my current situation is the 'Great Stampede,' an all-out war between humans and kuishinbos.
"Maybe I'll find out something from here,"
I started picking up on the ground a stick made of steel with medium length. I know that this won't be of any use when it comes to protecting myself against kuishinbos, but oh well. I started walking around with caution to scout my surroundings. The ones fighting in the middle of the battlefield generate loud sounds, and I'm interested in how humans and kuishinbos fight, so I decided to walk and find a place to watch these people fight when suddenly…
"Shit! A civilian!" A man with spike-like hair and wearing a high tech suit while running as if chasing someone. "Go away! Get out of there! Ashddsdhsa" I didn't hear anything he said next aside from, I should get out here?
"What?" I asked aloud.
"I said leave now !!"
I felt like someone was ploughing on my left side.
I immediately ran away along with a large chunk of cement spewed out from the buildings behind me, and I ran as fast as I could.
However, one of the buildings I passed by suddenly collapsed right before me. Many of its debris fell upon me, a long piece of metal rod pierced somewhere near my ribs.
"Aww fuck! That shit hurts". I could feel the blood flowing to my side, and my vision was slightly blurred. I forced myself to stand up, and even though I was staggering, I walked away. At that same moment, I saw a well-maintained tower on the other side, and there I sat and sheltered myself for the time being.
'This simulation is slowly killing me.'
I tore a piece of my clothes to tie to my side that was already covered in blood. This shit hurts so bad; my ribcage is broken. While resting and treating myself, I watched the man with the spike hair fight. He's wearing a lot of armour and a long sword that looks very heavy, and yet he's so freaking agile. The kuishinbo, on the other hand, is enormous and has a humanoid figure, same as the one that attacked me when I woke up. The guy jumped so high and landed in a building. He jumped to rush the kuishinbo from there. The kuishinbo saw that rush, so it raised its hand, but the man twirled around the hand of the kuishinbo and cut half of its body.
When the kuishinbo was slowly falling, it immediately jumped up and stabbed the kuishinbo around its centre until it turned to ashes. The guy rushed, walking towards me, "Are you okay?" He looked at me and smiled. "Don't worry, everything is fine now, you can follow me to take you to one of the-"
A large sound clamoured nearby, I saw the guy in front of me looking up, and he said, "Run! Run! Hurry up!"
Unknowingly, my feet began to run so fast, and I have no idea where to go. It's just my instincts telling me that I have to run faster than any run I ever did in my entire life.
"Fuck this training."