How To Survive A Calamity

"And besides, those guys refused to listen to us and insisted that they'd stay back while we go explore the cause of the explosion." I said.

They said they'd keep trying the bracelets in hopes that maybe it really wasn't damaged and merly turned off or something like that.

They would rather stay in place and wait for the storm to blow over — literally and figuratively speaking — than continue to risk moving around.

Those guys were...

"Bunch of fools."

"Huh?"

Discard hope and embrace fear... Those words...

I think i began to more clearly understand the twisted dark words of the vice principal from before.

Hope kills and fear is what keeps you alive.

"Those guys stayed back and are going to die because they hope something will happen, something will save them. And we continue to run and move because we fear what we might face in that storm and that's why we'll live and survive." I unconsciously muttered those words as if almost forcing myself to truly believe in them.

Just then...

"...But who is to say we'll actually survive though...?" Trise said in a small, weak voice.

I continued to take a step forward as my feet continued to sink partially into the sandy ground. Wisps of stale wind blew through my hair.

"Stop shouting bullshit, you idiot." I snorted in response halted briefly.

"Huh?"

I looked over my shoulder and gazed at Trise aloofly and raised a finger to point against my chest.

"I don't know what you're thinking but don't go killing me off that easily, idiot number 2."

"I-idiot number 2?!"

"I'll survive." I said dryly then shrugged and turned around.

"It's all that matters."

After all...

Survival was my reason for survival in this world — no, Aethoria as a whole.

"Huhh? Wh-what are you talking about? And I'm the one that's talking nonsense? Look at this guy calling me an idiot, you idiot!"

"Pffttt. What, Vic, did you think that actually sounded cool? Look, even Don stired in his sleep because of your cringe worthiness. Pftt buahaha!!" Chelsea burst into laughter.

Th-this stupid kids...

Ah.

Just thinking about their faces made my fist tremble.

Ah, oh god of this world...

I want to punch them.

****

Somewhere in Terra Sanguis.

The sharp blade of a sword ruthlessly came down, slashing through the air and severing through its victim with a sickening squelch.

"Ahh!!" The victim — a wounded male cadet gave a bloodcurdling scream as his left hand was swiftly severed. The severed arm flailed through the air in from of him like a horrif reality, falling limply against the ground.

Blood formed a morbid trail from his bleeding stump amd the cadet desperately shuffled backwards against the sandy ground.

His face was pale and strewn with horror. Thick tears of blood flowed down from his eyes as cold sweat formed a thin film over his dirty forehead.

The cadet painfully grasped at his bleeding stump, moaning painfully im anguish.

He couldn't control it.

His severed arm.... The stump of his severed right arm wouldn't stop bleeding.

'It hurts!'

It felt like an incinerating heat was burning through the rest of his shoulder and body from the ghastly wound that pulsed as the muscles around it twitched.

"Wh-why? Wha...what have i done to deserve this?! Why, why, why, why, why?! Why me...?!" The cadet cried out in anguish, pain like a colony of fire ants crawling over him filled his body from inside.

He struggled to breathe through his punctured lungs and coughed out a thick puddle of blood. His ribs had been crushed at some point during the confrontation.

The cadet was terrified and confused.

It all happened so fast.

What did?

One minute we were just...

Just what?

...with that brat...

What brat?

That monster!

And then—

All of a sudden... Everyone was...

Everyone else was dead aside from him.

Like awakening from a long dream, a horrid nightmare, the male cadet realised he stood alone in graveyard covered in the blood of his companions.

They had all died, tearing each other all apart like mad men.

Like hungry beasts without control.

And he too had also...

But the Cadet hadn't been alone.

He wasn't the last one standing just as he thought.

The cadet coughed painfully, choking.

"N-no.... I don't want to die... Stop, please...." He shifted his bleeding gaze upwards to his attacker standing over him.

It was another cadet in the same uniform weilding a long sword smeared and dripping in blood.

The sight surrounding the scene was that of carnage, with dismembered body parts and corpses sewn all over around them in a morbid picture of blood and gore.

Blood which had spilled generously against the ground had been mercilessly dried up by the desert sand.

The attacker stood strangly, staring over the male cadet who had lost an arm to his very blade. His eyes were wide and hollow, deviod of human will and only filled with pain and struggle.

The attacker was also a young man woth a contorting expression. Blood was also streaming out of his eyes.

The attacking cadet matched a step forward at his victim. As he moved he seemed unsteady and light like he would fall over.

He was also battered and covered in varying injuries from heaf to toe.

It was like he had barely managed to come out alive from a cage of tigers for a free for all.

The cadet raised the sword yet again, the blade trembling in his quivering arms.

But regardless.

"N...no, don't do it! We're from the same group —!"

The stained steel of the blade still ruthlessly descended.

With the sharp biting sound of slicing wind, the sword cut through the body of the cadet deeply, killing him instantly.

And once it was over...

"Ah..." A small sound escaped the dried and dirty lips of the remaining cadet standing.

He alone stood amongst a macabre graveyard of blood limbs and twisted corpses.

His hollow and empty eyes began to regain clarity and the sword slipped out of his hands.

The cadets eyes widened and his shoulders trembled.

How did it feel?

'It was like waking up from a long dream, a nightmare that never seemed to end.'

"This is enough...? Then...." A black figure suddenly appeared from out of nowhere overlooking the surviving cadet who was trembling unnaturally at the middle of the carnage.

The figure raised forward one arm, a strange and ominous black bool spewing sinister miasma and shadows fluttered open out of thin air..

The mysterious figure stretched an arm out at the cadet, a sinister voice resounded

"Shall we begin...?"

The male cadet twitched, then all of a sudden his entire body began to convulse like he was having a seizure while on his feet.

His face increasingly turned pale until they became grey. His eyes lost focus entirely like they had been gouged, staring widely.

The cadet, his lips parted in horror.

And then—

"Heeeaaaiiiiaaakkkk—!!!"

A wretched cry resounded.