Everything was a blur. Violet truthfully thought her life was coming to an end. They say that humans have two responses when in immediate danger – fight or flight. But the pain in Violet’s shoulder and the frostbite surrounding her fingers took both of these instincts away from her. The only thing she could hope for was the small chance that a new variable would be thrown into the equation. It is difficult to say whether Violet was the luckiest or unluckiest person in the world at this very moment, but she would claim the former, at least for now.

Following the head of the axe to the handle with her eyes, Violet thought the hypothermia was causing some sort of illusion. It could not possibly be her, right?

“C’mon, Vivi! Get up! We have to get back across the border!” that familiar voice said.

The figure helped a stupefied Violet to her feet, which she could not feel any more in her cold, wet shoes, and propped her up on their shoulder. Together they slowly made their way back to the border, following Violet’s horse's hoof marks.

“It was a trap, Vivi! They were expecting us the whole time! I don’t know how they did it, but this blizzard was their plan all along!”

“Is that really you…?” Violet said quietly.

“Yup, it’s your favorite girl, Fae. Now, snap out of it! We gotta keep moving and warn the others!”

“Wh-where’s the rest of your squad?”

“We lost each other in the low visibility…A lot of people died and even more panicked from the onslaught of arrows and ran off to God knows where. Where’s your squad?”

“I-I ran ahead of them to come find you…I don’t know where they are.”

“You’re so reckless, Vivi. You’re lucky I found you. I heard a shrill scream that sounded like you, so I ran straight here. I’m just glad I made it in time…” Fae said, squeezing Violet a little tighter.

“I’m sorry…I just wanted to protect you…”

“That again?! Who just saved your ass, Violet?! I’m never leaving you out of my sight again! I’m chaining us together the second we get back to base!”

Violet let out a small, pained laugh.

They kept moving slowly towards the Admian border. They did not hear any more arrows coming their way so they felt like they might just make it.

Once again, Violet was the one being protected. In high school, in the academy, and now, on the battlefield…Fae always was the one picking her up and never the other way around. Fae would tell a very different story, but these feelings are difficult to convey even to those closest to you. It is hard to convey exactly what someone means to you through words alone. Violet gritted her teeth and squeezed Fae even tighter with her uninjured arm. Fae looked at her, giving her a smile that said, “I’m not going anywhere” and they kept moving.

After what felt like an eternity of slowly shuffling through the snow, they managed to find the long grass that they knew signified Admian soil. Fae and Violet felt a sense of relief upon finding it, but that would soon turn to absolute horror, when they saw what was waiting for them. Their visibility was back with the blizzard being cut off at the border and they could see plainly that no Admian soldiers were where they expected them to be. Instead, they saw a cloud of dust rushing towards the 1st Division base in the distance. The other squads had already retreated. What was waiting for them instead, was a band of fifty Shanglooian soldiers, waiting at the edge of the border. Surrounding them were dead Admian soldiers in cold, soaked uniforms. The trap did not only lie beyond the border, but past it as well.

Violet and Fae sat at the edge of the border, unable to process the situation. The enemy soldiers had already noticed them the second they left the border and were advancing towards them with their weapons raised.

“They f-fucking left us to die!” Violet yelled, still shivering. “Those c-cowards!”

“N-no way,” Fae said. “They’ll turn around any minute! I’m sure of it!”

They watched the Admian soldiers in the distance who showed no signs of stopping their retreat. It was clear they had no intention of trying to retrieve soldiers stuck in the blizzard. Leaving their own men to die was something the Admian military was notorious for after all.

The Shanglooian soldiers now had Violet and Fae surrounded as a wave of soldiers appeared from the blizzard behind them wearing snowshoes, heavy coats, and carrying blood-soaked blades. There was nowhere for them to run to.

Violet gripped her sword with her good arm, but the arrow in her left shoulder made it very difficult for her to get a tight grip on her shield. Fae took a fighting stance and held her battleaxe in front of her, menacingly. There was nothing they could do but fight. The first soldier to intercept them swung a large flail harshly at Violet. She put up her shield which blocked the brunt of the attack but also knocked away her shield in the process. The soldier reeled back his arm again for another swing, but before he could take it, Fae yelled, “DUCK!” at Violet who reacted immediately, falling to her knees. Fae swung her battleaxe straight at the enemy soldier and cut off his arm at the elbow. The man screamed and the flail hit the floor along with his severed arm. Violet got back to her feet and slashed the soldier's neck, taking him out of the fight. She made eye contact with the soldier immediately after impact and saw the face of a boy who looked younger than herself. War was truly a horrible thing. The loss of their comrade was enough for the soldiers to realize not to underestimate them. They came at them in a group of five now. They all brandished short swords and bucklers.

Adrenaline was coursing through Violet’s veins. She could no longer feel the pain in her shoulder and picked her shield back up from the ground. As she did, a soldier took that as an opportunity to take a swing at her, but Fae was there to knock away the small sword easily with the head of her axe. She pounced on the off-balance soldier and bludgeoned them right down the middle of the skull with the blade of her axe. The strike easily caved in their helmet, ending their life. While Fae had her back turned, another soldier tried to stab her back, but Violet used her strength to knock the sword away and into the ground. But before she could put through an attack of her own, two soldiers placed themselves in front of their unarmed comrade.

More soldiers were starting to converge on them, and it was quickly turning into an unwinnable battle. There were just too many blades to defend against. Fae and Violet both knew there was no chance they were both making it out of this, so the only remaining question was…how could they save the other?

They continued blocking the blades coming for them, but they were not able to block the sheer number of them cleanly. They each now had their fair share of cuts and wounds and it was only a matter of time before they suffered a fatal one. Fae had managed to take down eight of the soldiers by herself to this point, but it was not nearly enough to make a dent in their forces now that there were over eighty men targeting them. Violet only managed to down three of them, and two of them required the help of Fae to do so. Fae knew that she had the skill to make a hole in the circle of soldiers surrounding them, but it would take a lot of strength and would leave her open.

“Violet!” Fae yelled, as she swung her battleaxe towards the three soldiers in front of her. “I’m going to carve out a hole in their formation! Be ready to run!”

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“Only if you come with me!” Violet yelled, as she blocked a slash with her shield.

“I’ll be right behind you! Be ready!”

Fae took every ounce of strength left in her and ran towards the thinnest area of soldiers in the circle surrounding them. She got within striking distance and swung her axe in a massive circle at the group of soldiers. The soldiers tried to use their weapons and shields to block, but the strength and momentum of her swing easily pushed them to the ground. Seeing an opening in the formation, Violet ran straight to Fae, grabbing her hand. Fae dropped her axe as Violet grabbed her but continued to follow her as they ran out of the group of soldiers. The distance to the base was thirty minutes by horse so them being able to make it that far by foot was a longshot but they had no choice in the matter. They had to try. Violet ran as fast as she could, but Fae seemed to be dragging her feet a bit. Violet also noticed that she was breathing pretty heavily. Looking at Fae, she saw an expression of pain and exhaustion and as her eyes scanned lower, a cold sweat ran over her. There was a large arrow lodged in Fae’s chest.

“Fae!” she yelled. “Oh god…oh god…”

“I-I’m sorry…” Fae said. “I-I screwed up…”

The soldiers were starting to catch up to them. There was no chance they were going to make it without a horse. Violet was mumbling sadly under her breath, but kept moving with Fae’s arm around her good shoulder. The soldiers were even closer now. It was only a matter of time. Just when they thought it was all over though, they heard a loud, manly scream coming from the edge of the border. It was Commander Sticks. He was on horseback and was screaming Fae’s name before witnessing her and Violet in the distance being pursued by a group of soldiers. He raised his hand and shot a massive bolt of lightning accurately at the closest soldier to Fae and Violet. The commander was pushing his horse to its limits, but did not intend to slow down a bit. He continued his onslaught of lightning bolts and was taking out every enemy soldier that tried to stop him as he tried to catch up to Fae and Violet. Once Violet saw that he was going to make it before the soldiers, she decided to stop dragging Fae and laid her softly on the warm ground.

“Wh-what do I do?” Violet said to herself, shaking her head.

“J-just hold my hand…please…” Fae said weakly. She had lost a lot of blood.

Violet obliged and held her hand tightly. Fae’s hand was getting cold. Violet started sobbing.

Commander Sticks had reached the final group of soldiers that were pursuing Fae and Violet and took out his long, steel lance in one arm while continuing to shoot lightning with the other. He took out the remaining twenty soldiers in less than a minute and placed his horse next to Violet and Fae before quickly dismounting.

“What happened to her, Violet?!” he yelled.

“Th-there were too many…please help her…”

Sticks fiddled in his pocket and grabbed a white stone which he placed in Fae’s free hand. Green light enveloped her and started closing the smaller wounds on her body. Sticks lightly touched the arrow in Fae’s chest while looking her directly in the eyes.

“This is going to hurt, but please bear with it,” he said.

He opened the top of Fae’s vest and quickly yet carefully dislodged the arrow from her chest. Blood continued to ooze out as Sticks quickly inspected the wound. He shook his head and slammed his fist onto the dirt.

“Sh-she’ll be okay, right?” Violet cried.

“It’s her heart…” he said, softly. “The healing stone isn’t going to be enough to save her…”

“There has to be something we can do!” Violet yelled.

“Shut up!” Sticks yelled. “Why didn’t you protect her?! That’s all you ever blab on about and now look what happened!”

“I…I didn’t…”

“How useless can you be?!”

Fae then dropped the healing stone and grabbed Sticks’s hand while continuing to squeeze Violet’s.

“It wasn’t…her fault…” she said. “It was my mistake…I was being selfish.”

“Don’t talk, Fae,” Sticks said. “Save your strength.” He let go of Fae’s hand and put the healing stone back in her grip.

“I…just wanted her to live…no matter what…” Fae said. Fae then turned to Violet and gave her that iconic cute smile that she was known for. “Don’t you dare…blame yourself for this…”

Violet just continued gripping her hand, sobbing. Tears were hitting Fae’s face as Violet leaned over her. Sticks got up and went over to his horse with his hands on his head. He wanted to give them a moment.

“You better promise me…!” Fae said, trying to sound cheery as blood started filling the corner of her mouth. “Promise! Promise that you’ll live, and you’ll do it without…blaming yourself!” Violet gave a sad nod. Another lie.

“Good…Also…there’s something I want you to know…” Fae gestured for Violet to come closer. “I love you…I always have…”

Fae then closed her eyes with a smile plastered on her face. Violet squeezed her hand even harder, and with her free hand, tried to wipe away the tears streaming down her face. Fae never opened her eyes again.

*Back to present day*

Location: Outskirts of Ravine, Aquarium.

“That’s horrible…” Kenrich said. “I’m sorry that happened to you. No one should have to go through something like that.”

“That’s what war is. One of the many reasons we can’t let that ring fall into the wrong hands. There are thousands of stories worse than mine.”

“What happened after that battle?”

“Commander Dicks scooped up my traumatized self and Fae and took us back to base. We gave Fae a true soldier’s funeral and the amount of people who turned out was staggering.”

“From what you said, it sounds like she touched a lot of people’s hearts in her tragically short life.”

“She was much too good for this horrible world.”

They were both silent for a moment.

“...Thank you for telling me that, V. I know it was a tough story to tell.”

“There are two things I want you to take away from it, Ken. One – war does nothing but bring dollars to the fat pig nobles and glory to the generals who sit idly, while everyone else suffers. Two – I’m not going to lose anyone else. My entire life, I’ve been nothing but useless until the very end. But I won’t make the same mistakes I made in my past.”

“As someone who also struggled to protect what was important to them, I understand. I feel the same way. You can count on me to help you in any way I can.”

“I’m glad,” Violet said with a genuine smile. “I’m not letting anything happen to Atlas or to you.”

“Same here. So, you stayed in the military after that battle?”

“I did, and I took my training a lot more seriously after that point. Fae was right in saying that I was much less skilled than her, so Commander Dicks taught me personally.”

“He did? From your story, it sounded like he didn’t like you very much…”

“Fae would have never wanted us to dwell on her death and blame each other, so he took me under his wing. Under his instruction, I managed to prove myself in many of the future battles in Shangloo and became pretty notorious in the 1st division. I used those connections to find spots on other divisions’ expeditions that suited my purposes and ended up finally finding the location of the ring my parents tasked me with finding in Millin, grasped in the hands of the village idiot.”

“Very nice...Not much of an idiot if I managed to get you wrapped around my finger though,” Kenrich said, shrugging.

“Ha! I’d say it's mutual, Ken. You’ve put life on the line for me quite a bit this past month!”

“Maybe it is-”

Kenrich stopped talking as he spotted the large drawbridge start to lower at the gate of Ravine. Violet saw it too and they huddled together and watched it closely from behind a bush. Once the gate finished lowering, they saw a band of around thirty men on horseback make their way down the road. At the front of the pack was Tinsen.