1
Everyone should be running for their lives right now.
No, the woman shouldn't have stepped forward and put her life in his hands in the first place. But she had done so because there was something more important than survival.
Animal instinct was nothing more than, at the end of the day, the shadow of the human heart, which burned like a bonfire. And what fueled the flames was hatred, rage.
Sweet, sweet revenge.
That's why many would not move. There was nothing worse than feeling like your world had ended and, on top of that, not being able to do anything about it. Not to fix anything, but at least to get even.
Jonathan was extending a hand to them. A way out.
It was almost as if he had them hypnotized.
"How are you feeling?" He asked the dead woman who had just risen. Maybe it wasn't the best idea, depending on how she responded, if she responded at all.
But he had a feeling he needed her to say something to really get them.
So they could put themselves in her place.
"It doesn't hurt anymore."
Jonathan smiled slightly, biting his lip on the inside so it wouldn't go any further.
Luckily, she'd given him a more than perfect answer. His instinct had hit the nail on the head. Again.
Jonathan had been above all else a pirate captain for decades. He knew very well how to manipulate people, convince them to do what he wanted even while they thought it had been their idea.
He hadn't had an proper education.
Still, he'd become a fine viper. Though it was true that he functioned more by instinct than anything else.
"This is madness," one of the guards shouted, scrambling against the undead who had no hold on him.
Did he think he would hesitate?
He sent him to a silent death.
The guard fell to the ground, his neck wide open. A carpet spread out beneath his body.
The crowd didn't react to that, good or bad.
His comrades, who now understood how screwed they really were, did react, however. With predictable stupidity.
One more had to go down to make them stand still.
He'd managed to scream before his throat was slit, mind you, but would any patrolling guards have heard him? Surely not. Surely this would be over before reinforcements arrived.
Of course, he added the two fallen to his army.
"None of us want unnecessary deaths. But I was given no choice. You understand, don't you?"
However, Jonathan left them face down, eyes closed. Considering the situation, the emotional high, it was unlikely they realized that resurrection stole people's will. Or at least the will to turn against him.
If they realized that, his plan would collapse, well, no. Not exactly. But he would be forced to take drastic measures. Which he preferred to avoid.
The more they gave themselves to him with open arms, the better.
He wasn't a monster.
Some nodded, others exclaimed wordlessly.
Still others remained silent. But Jonathan was aware that he had them all. Otherwise they would have fled long ago.
"I wish I could resurrect your loved ones. And my own. But there is nothing left of them but ashes. We can only avenge ourselves. You know that. But if you don't want to fight, I won't force you. Leave, come here to be killed or do it yourselves. The choice is yours.
Revenge.
Humans would always choose revenge.
He could not fix anything, it was true. The broken hearted would remain broken. But so what, better a broken heart and a little satisfaction than living knowing that the son of a bitch was still out there. Without his punishment.
One of the soldiers of the city guard managed to free himself from the grip, even grabbing his weapon and making a move to unsheathe it. But he didn't get very far.
Not because another one of his soldiers intervened, making him leave this world before he could complete the move.
Well...
Looking back on it, it had indeed been one of his soldiers. All of them were. The crowd was all over him, lynching. Not all of them, but enough that one man couldn't do much.
Especially one in conflict. Who didn't want to point his sword at innocent people.
Their rage and hatred rained down on the guard like hellfire. By the time it was all over, his helmet was crushed, his face unrecognizable, and there was no way of knowing who had struck the final blow.
So much commotion. So many screams and loud sounds, like steel sliding across armor, causing sparks to fly.
Reinforcements would be here. Soon.
But the important thing was that he had them in the palm of his hand. Not only had they killed for him already, they were dying for him.
Killing themselves in front of his eyes.
And he took that bravery and willingness to fight, adding them to his army unconsciously. It sounded strange, but indeed. It had already become second nature. What didn't go unnoticed was the feeling that came over him as he did so.
That power.
With each undead he added to his army, he grew stronger and stronger.Without a limit?
No. He shook his head slightly.
There was a limit. The place where the Count was. But it was still far away.
"I will be the one to grant your wishes, to heal your souls. I will kill that man and save you all.
That was what he said.
On the platform, only, but feeling as if he were on top of the world; in fact, he had been feeling for some time as if his feet didn't touch the ground, so light. A twisted declaration of war in which he was a messiah of sorts.
Jonathan's smile grew wider and wider.
He jumped down from the platform. He had already gotten...not everything he wanted, but what he was going to get, here and now. He couldn't do more.
One of the city guards spun quickly on his heels, grabbing the knife from the undead that had him trapped.
And turning it on his soldier.
Sticking deep into his neck. But it was the guard who screamed, as if he was the one who had been wounded. Blood splattered on his face, rushed into his eyes, and he only screamed louder.
Jonathan was the monster in many other people's lives. Innocent people. But he didn't care.
Besides, didn't the fact that he was the savior of so many others make up for it? Billions, counting the people Adam would kill if he didn't stop him. If he allowed him to continue his horrible work with impunity as he had been so far.
The other soldiers also broke free, following the example of the first.
The crowd, of course, backed down. It was very different to face a guard who had been taken by surprise than a dozen guards armed and ready to kill. Although they didn't run in terror then, either. Credit where credit is due.
Reinforcements would soon be here. But the fight was already over. The few guards in the square were no threat to his army.
So Jonathan advanced without concern through the crowd. Amidst all this chaos.
With his arms outstretched. Smiling.
All around him, people kept killing or dying. Jonathan absorbed it all. He saw a father strangle his young son to death. He saw several people throw a guard to the ground and stab him dozens of times with several knives.
He saw the head of one of his undead roll on the ground and keep fighting.
How? Well, by biting, of course.
He bit the guard's ankle so hard that he tore off a good chunk of flesh, and the guard fell to his knees, screaming as if he was dying.
He wasn't. But he would die soon, for he had brought his neck within reach of the head.
Meanwhile, the headless body continued to struggle independently. Jonathan hadn't expected something like that. Well, they weren't dead, but they weren't alive either. They could see with more than just their eyes. Evidently.
One of the guards was being devoured, literally, from head to toe by half a dozen of his undead. There weren't words for his agony. So he released the desperate animal instinct for survival and ended his life. He must have bitten his tongue.
And more.
More, much more than he could grasp going through the square that fast. It was "that fast" even though he was merely walking.
Complete pandemonium.
And he was picking them all up, joining his army. Feeding off all this chaos, death and despair. He was a hero, a monster or a parasite, depending on who saw him.
What did he think about himself?
It didn't really matter.
Jonathan opened the stats tab with a casual wave of his left hand, as he continued to move in a straight line across the square. Without changing direction or being moved at any point. He was getting lucky that no one would bump into him, that he wouldn't trip or have to go around any obstacles.
Interrupted.
Light. Like walking on air.
For example, his strength stat was seventy. A trifle compared to the human limit, which only Adam had reached. But that wasn't the real number.
It flickered continuously, changing from seventy all the way up to one hundred and forty.
These weren't his imagination at all.
The undead under his control were giving him strength. He was becoming more powerful with each person he killed, in other words. And, more importantly....
He could do it.
No patience for years, decades. No complex plans.
He could kill the Count with this power.
And anyone else who got in his way. Speaking of which, the reinforcements finally arrived, spears ahead. Armor protecting them from head to toe.
"Do you really want to do this? "Jonathan asked. "Just move to the side. No one else has to die today. I'm leaving this town.
Jaws clenched, teeth chattering.
And fear, spreading like the poison it was. What would it drive them to? To fight? To charge uselessly? To charge uselessly against someone who was like the Count, who could do whatever he wanted for the simple reason that there was no one who could stop him, when he could come back to life again and again?
No. They turned away.
And the funeral march of Jonathan and his army of the undead continued, with nothing and no one to stop it.
If the gods were above, then they had averted their eyes from the horrible spectacle as well.
2
Jonathan left the city of Ils, his hometown, with no weight on his heart. Nothing that hadn't been there before, at least. There was nothing for him in that town. Nor anywhere.
In fact, there never had been.
The thing he was fighting for now hadn't been his from the beginning. Family.
How had he been so arrogant to try to start a family when he didn't even know what that meant? Not arrogance. Fear.
He didn't want to be alone, plain and simple.
Watching as the city disappeared behind the horizon, Jonathan held his hands to his head. Running it over his cheeks, through his hair. Brushing more than just the seawater off his face. He was sweating.
Fixing...
Fixing nothing. Just his hair. There was nothing he could fix.
Jonathan closed his eyes tightly, as if trying to resist the memories hitting his defenses like a battering ram. Futile. They broke through. They always broke through, sooner or later.
3
Jonathan woke up in the dark.
It wasn't like the darkness in his room, but complete and total darkness. He couldn't even see his own nose.
He had no idea where he was or how he had gotten here in the first place. But more importantly, he couldn't breathe.
Weight. There was a weight crushing his chest, preventing him from breathing. He heard creaking, things sliding. Maybe more than one weight.
In any case, this was bad.
He opened his mouth, trying to say something. Call for help, maybe. But he couldn't utter even the faintest sound. His throat was too dry and constricted for that.
He would have to help himself. As usual.
He swung his arms around. Stumbling around in the dark. Whereupon he only succeeded in scratching himself, hurting himself. The pain would have blurred his vision even if he could see anything in the first place. He whimpered weakly, like a beaten dog.
But it wasn't just that.
He knew he had hurt himself, that maybe it was really serious, by the blood running down his arm. He felt it very clearly.
Jonathan was used to that, too. The pain and the bleeding.
But not to this oppressive darkness or the inability to breathe. He had to get out of here as soon as possible, and no one would come to help him, so he had to get moving.
Through the darkness, like crossing a tunnel.
He had to get to the other side before he drowned. He might be a child, but he understood perfectly well that no one lasted long when they stopped breathing. The only question was how long he had left.
A question he couldn't answer.
Like so many others. For example, how he had ended up here. Or what he had done to deserve this too.
Or what was here in the first place.
He'd had enough.
Of everything.
Fed up.
He hated his mother as much as he loved her, for being too much in love with this man to realize that they were both victims in a prison. And he hated the man who called himself his father for being the jailer of that prison. For being too despicable to not get away with it.
He hated them with all his soul, but still he thought about them in his last moments, as he drowned.
Last moments? No. No. No.
Besides, above all else, he hated himself. He had no idea what this was. But if it was all going to end like this, he should have run away a long time ago and tried his luck.
Why had he stayed behind for the sake of a woman who didn't love him enough to do what was necessary?
Now he felt alone, a beaten and cornered animal, near his end.
But the truth was that he had always been alone in the world. His mother had been looking at someone else all this time.
He had thought it was the end, but eventually he managed to get out of there. How long? How close had he been? His face was bathed in sweat, but it wasn't the only thing that dirtied him. He didn't even want to think about it. About any of it.
The sky was clear. Clear. Maybe it would have been better if he'd gotten a good downpour.
He ran a hand over his face, pushed his hair out of his eyes. He had finally made it out of there, but where was he? The answer was, of course, right before his eyes.
Literally a mountain of garbage.
As soon as he saw it, it all came back to him.
"It's true... Those kids threw me here. They thought it was funny... And it's true."
He had started his life among the garbage and had almost come to an end buried under it. But that went for the kids who had done this to him too, of course. Maybe they thought they were better, but they were all the same kind of street rat, scavenging through garbage.
Jonathan laughed.
Laughed and laughed, without stopping.
Until all that was left inside him was rage. Moved by dark intent that seemed not to come from within him, the boy stood up.
4
He saw a boot descending again and again.
Kicking, crushing hard. Him? The only thing that came into his field of vision was the boot, so that could only be it.
Or so he thought, but that wasn't true.
Maybe his soul slipped out of his body or something. Because suddenly he was seeing everything from outside. Two kids fighting, one kicking the other. But it wasn't him on the ground.
It was a boy he knew well. It was a name he had long forgotten.
One of those who did that to him.
Who almost ensured that his life, which had started in the garbage, would end up in it too. A sick and cruel joke.
What had propelled him, driven him so far.
He kept kicking at him, smashing the boy knocked down on the floor against the wall. Smashing his face, to be more exact. On one occasion, his leg swerved and the knee hit him squarely in the teeth. It was an even worse sounding blow.
But what would always remain in his memory was the physical result of his actions.
A pair of teeth flying, followed by a spurt of blood.
He heard them fall. Jingling on the floor. The child whimpered faintly. Jonathan was the only one screaming, but not in pain.
"You're not going to kill me!"
That was all he was screaming, all he could think about as he beat the shit out of him. He could say that he had been very aware of one thing. That, if he got up again, Jonathan would pay dearly for it. He and his friends would lynch him, so he had no choice but to continue.
He could. But it would be completely false.
He wasn't thinking about such complicated things back then. Just that he liked it. Just about the high. And that, even so, or precisely because of that....
He was better.
"I am... better! I am better!"
He had no finer words to express what he felt, as such a little boy. Poor and uneducated. But it was enough because the words were for himself. The whimpering sack of shit at his feet probably could only hear his ribs creaking.
"Please... Stop..."
But he still possessed enough will to try to cling desperately to life. Jonathan might have forgotten his name, but not the expression he showed back then.
An expression completely devoid of any trace of the pride with which he had tormented him and made his life hell, when it already was.
He liked it. He liked it a lot.
Fuck, he felt on top of the world. Like he was walking on clouds.
So he didn't stop.
Jonathan didn't stop until he realized he'd killed him.
His mouth was full of blood and missing teeth. Jonathan's whole body ached, but especially the foot he had kicked him with.
He had killed him. With his own hands.
At first, he hadn't thought to go that far, unlike those sons of bitches. It hadn't even crossed his mind, really. He wasn't sure what he'd expected to happen.
He supposed nothing in particular. That he'd just been... too angry to back out.
But he'd killed him.
That was an immovable fact.
Jonathan took a deep breath. Not because he felt bad or anything. He was tired from the beating he'd taken, that kid wasn't the only one winded, in other words.
Jonathan exhaled as if none of this had anything to do with him.
And he stared at the kid, maybe a couple of years older than him, who was no longer moving. He stared at him for a while. Until he'd had enough.
Maybe he should have worried that someone would come along in the meantime and catch him red-handed. A city guard or worse. At the time, however, it didn't even cross his mind.
The thought of getting caught for killing him did present itself in his mind, however.
He got down on his knees in front of the boy. But this time not to beg him to leave him alone.
What he did was... turn him around... and roll him over. Rolling, rolling and rolling, it was surprisingly easy, even though he was literally dead weight and his arms were as thin as toothpicks because his family barely had enough food to keep from starving and his parents had priority because he wasn't the one going out to work and getting food.
But of course, the same went for the body of the boy he had set rolling. They were both the same kind of street rat.
Still, I'm better. Better. He remembered that thought with a clarity more crystalline than anything else that had happened then.
He carried his body to the edge. Not to the edge of the roadway.
To the edge of the river. And there he threw him in.
It didn't take long to sink.
Jonathan stared at his rippling reflection in the water, expressionless.
5
Jonathan reached out a hand toward the door, hesitant. He always had to mentally prepare himself just to open the door and step foot inside.
He always had to, but it wasn't like it would change anything.
He had taught those kids a lesson, but something so small couldn't change his life. He was still a prisoner in this prison. And would remain so until something, or someone, gave in. Falling apart.
Something had to give, sooner or later. But the truth was that he couldn't even imagine an end to this unfathomable torture.
Finally, the boy opened the door. He wished the man wasn't home.
He went into the building, walking slowly and carefully, just as he had opened the door. So that nothing could be heard. It was as if he was in a strange and dangerous place.
Yet it was supposed to be home.
Indeed it was. It was just supposed to be.
He made it all the way to the living room. That man wasn't home, he was sure, otherwise he would have heard it one way or another by now.
But neither was his mother.
The first thing he saw was a shadow, turning on the floor, slowly, slowly, slowly. Something creaked. Maybe the wood of the ceiling.
The boy raised his head.
Slowly, slowly, slowly. Wishing it was just a dream.
"Mom?"
He didn't know where that man might be, but his mother wasn't in the house either. Nor anywhere else in the world. What creaked had been the rope around her neck.
Strangely, the boy didn't scream or cry. He just went to grab something from the kitchen, then returned to the living room, turning off the lights and sitting down beside his mother's body, which still swayed as if it hadn't been too long since her neck had snapped.
Waiting.
Until he heard the door open. Some light must have come in, but it didn't reach all the way into the living room.
"What's going on here? Something stinks. Boy! Boy, turn on the fucking lights!"
Of course, the man's return was heralded with shouts and demands. Normally he would do anything not to provoke him, in silence, trying to pretend that this life was fine with him.
The boy didn't move an inch. He remained seated.
But the lights came on, anyway. He had to turn them on. And at the sight of him, sure enough, his face reddened with rage as he twisted and gritted his teeth.
The boy's heart didn't even skip a beat.
He was so used to seeing it that way that a normal person's expression would have more chance of scaring him, at this point.
He had been afraid of him for many years, for as long as he could remember.
But today he just felt resigned.
"There you are. How dare you not...? Wait. What...? " He didn't finish the sentence. His mouth hung open, as did his eyes, which almost popped out of their sockets.
Looking, of course, at his mother dangling. And slowly swinging like a pendulum.
If it weren't for his mother drawing the eye, the first thing that bastard would have noticed was the kitchen knife in the boy's hands. Anyway, Jonathan took advantage of his surprise to lay into him with that same knife.
His job was over quickly.
He was a malnourished child and he was an adult twice his size or more, even though he wasn't very well fed either. But he had been able to strike the first blow and that mattered enough to turn the tables.
The boy staggered out the back door, now transformed into a man. The kitchen knife was soaked with blood that he kept spilling.
At some point, it had started to rain. And not a gentle rain, exactly.
With one hand, Jonathan pushed back his hair, lifting his head toward a starless sky. An endless sea. Not worrying for a moment that he was getting chilled to the bone.
And he laughed.