Anna’s Perspective

My heart pounded rapidly in my chest as a hammering rhythm against my ribs. I felt blends of emotion that flashed so quickly through my mind that it made me want to be sick. I finally settled on the feeling of relief and nervousness after what felt like an eternity.

A chill flooded my veins.

He's here.

But I hurt him.

The thought echoed through my mind as a cracked and fragile vase that continued to shatter in my mind and repeated all of my insecurities and then replaced them with acid only then to move back to relief. The backdrop of the swirling chaos of my emotions burned and soothed in equal measure.

It threatened to consume me.

He’s alive.

Darren.

I love him.

I hurt him.

He is my everything.

I needed to do it!

I could have found another way!

He stood there, frozen mid-swing with the wooden Daito length katana aloft like a banner that showed off the empire that was the relentless training he’d clearly been undergoing. His eyes were wide with disbelief and had locked onto mine. His mouth opened and closed as words failed him in the face of what he clearly thought was impossible. The sight of him, solid and real, sent a wave of warmth washing over me.

The warmth chased away the lingering chill of the erasure I had foreseen.

“Anna?” he finally choked out as his voice thick with a potent mix of shock and relief that resonated deep within my own chest.

I felt a painful echo of the emotions swirling within him.

A nervous smile bloomed across my face. “Surprise?” I breathed as my voice shook with nervous desperation and fear.

What if he hated me for what I did?

What if he never forgave me?

Screams of doubt and self-blame pounded against my subconscious mind.

How could I explain? How could I possibly convey the sheer, soul-crushing terror I had felt?

The agonizing glimpse of a future where he was simply…gone? Erased.

A void where his laughter and his soul-filling warmth never existed.

An empty hole in the world where his unwavering presence should have been.

Lord Edo’s voice came as a deep and resonant rumble as it cut through the charged silence. “Well, now you’ve seen someone who can use Body Ki. I think you came at a bad time if you wanted to keep the situation a secret, though.”

My gaze flicked to Lord Edo with a silent plea for guidance, But in his piercing golden eyes were the feeling of only hope of my success and nothing else.

He continued to merely offer a wry smile and a subtle tilt of his head towards darren acknowledging the tangled web we had woven to save him and unwilling to help.

Darren’s brow furrowed with confusion that clouded his features. He lowered the wooden katana, the tip resting against the further portion of dusty ground. My contemplation of how long a daito was in the hopes that I wouldn’t have to say anything were dashed when dareen spoke.

“Anna…what…what are you doing here? How...” He took a hesitant step forward as his eyes began to search mine while seeking desperately for answers.

I forced myself to breathe and to anchor myself to the present. The chilling vision of his erasure and the gaping void it had left in my heart continued to be felt as it still lingered with a phantom ache.

He’s here now, I reminded myself fiercely. He’s alive. That’s all that matters.

“It’s a long story,” I said, my voice regaining a measure of its usual playful tone. “One I’m not sure you’re ready for just yet.” I offered him a reassuring smile that trembled and shook hoping it masked the turmoil still churning beneath the surface.

Beside me, Jessa emerged from the shadows as her white and gold kimono shifted from an indistinctly colored enchantment.

It continued to shift back to gold as it flowed behind her as an excessively stark contrast to the muted tones of the training yard and my bright pink set.

Her amethyst eyes glittered with a false amusement that I could tell hid a terror and fear equal to mine. A hint of mischief played at the corners of her lips but it was a mask and unnatural on her face. “Besides, Darren,” she drawled as her voice was only half-full with a false cheer that would never convince anyone.

With her characteristic sass, she spoke again as she continued to hide her absolute terror. “don’t you think you have enough on your plate already? Learning how to not die, and all that?”

Darren’s gaze shifted between Jessa and me, his confusion deepened as he opened his mouth to speak.

It seemed that Lord Edo could not watch a 12 carriage pileup turn into a smashed thoroughfare and his voice cut all of us off.

It seems he had caved and decided to help.

“Indeed,” he boomed, his tone authoritative and assured. He tried to fill it with an unmistakable note of finality. “There will be time for explanations later. For now, Darren, your training continues.” He gestured towards the waiting practice dummies as their wooden faces bore an unsettling resemblance to Darren himself. “Show Anna what you’ve learned. Show her that you’re not the same talentless boy she remembers.”

All of it backfired.

He looked around and then grit his teeth.

I knew we were in trouble.

I observed as Darren’s eyes narrowed and his jaw tightened into a grimace of anger. The wooden Daito-katana in his grip trembled slightly and began to crack with the hilt as the epicenter. I witnessed as his inner turmoil churned and boiled over.

“NO!” The word echoed through the training yard’s unnatural lighting. It was like a crack against a stone wall that echoed the shattering of the upper half of the wooden blade he was holding.

The unnatural silence of the dreamscape began to shift as our mental landscapes affected the training space. The fabric of the false reality around us rippled as the images of our shared and now destroyed hometown shifted into my endless field of training dummies. Then the world shifted into Jessa’s blood-soaked lakeside hut flashing into a disorienting shudder that simulated a small earthquake.

“You need to tell me what’s actually happening! What do you mean I was erased?! Last time I checked, you ceased to exist! I thought I had to go on an eternal quest to avenge your final erasure or recover you from a timeline that no longer existed! Now I have no idea what is happening! explain!”

I grimaced as my violet hair shimmered in the light of the training ground. I opened my mouth to speak, but Jessa stepped forward with a scowl and narrowed eyes. Her white and gold kimono rippled as she moved. She stepped forward with fury until she was in Darren's face. Her amethyst eyes flashed with anger.

“Don’t you goddamn talk to her like that, Darren! A thousand days of death, and this is what we come to? You demanding ans-”

“JESSA! SHUT UP!” my voice cracked like a harsh whip, silencing Jessa mid-sentence. “He deserves to know. But don’t berate him for not knowing what's happening!”

I turned back to Darren, as my silver eyes overflowed with the tears of my agony. With a deep, agonizing sadness, I began to explain. “Darren…” I began hesitantly as I fiddled with the hems of my sleeves. My voice cracked with as many emotions as I could muster. Hope, despair, love, sadness.

The tempest filled me and I finally spoke.

“Originally, Jessa and I were the only ones selected. To be…Sword God Empress candidates.”

Darren blinked, his scowl deepened slightly.

I nodded. “When Lord Edo told us I…I saw it.” I closed my eyes for a long moment, as I relived that terrible vision “A vision. A horrible glimpse of the future. If we accepted it would erase everything! The entire timeline where we had ever met! Our time at the orphanage! The time we met when you saved me from those bullies!”

My voice trembled, and tears fell from my eyes. “I couldn't bear it, Darren. The thought of never seeing you again…it was unbearable! It tore me apart!”

In the corner of my eye I saw Jessa as her anger began to subside.

She approached and placed a comforting hand on my shoulder. “We both saw it,” she added, her voice softer than Darren had ever heard it. “But I saw a second future, too.

I saw a future where you were so powerful you could easily erase the prime devourer and it terrified me when you wouldn't even look at me. A future where all you had left was Anna and I was the friend who you barely noticed! That kind of future wasn’t what we all wanted, right? Or at least It wasn't one I could bear. I just- I couldn't!”

I nodded as I wiped away the tears that streamed down my face. “ Lord Edo said we had five hundred attempts. So we went back into the loops…hundreds of times. Each day we came up with a plan. To…to push you to your mental limit. To unlock the willpower and aspects that Lord Edo was looking for. In the hopes of keeping you from being erased. Keep myself selfishly away from a world where we had never met and you never loved me.”

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“We died. Over and over, twice as many times as you.” Jessa added, her voice flat and devoid of emotion. “Trying to orchestrate the perfect scenario. To force that damn prophecy to trigger. Do you know how many times I had placed that book in your pocket and you never even noticed it? Five hundred additional times. For you. For us. For Anna. For a relationship that might not exist.”

Jessa paused for a moment as her face turned from an unnatural stillness to a bawling mess and raised her voice in a shout of agony. “On the 499th loop we got desperate!”

She paused again and met Darren’s gaze directly as tears streamed down her face. “I…I fell in love with you, Darren. Around the three hundredth loop the first time around. I’m not sure if you know how hard that was but it was agony! I’m not a good person anymore and I’m horrible at showing it, you know? It nearly tore me apart, but at least I knew the truth. Even now I don’t even show it properly. I'm just-” I approached her and drew her into a hug as she shifted her weight awkwardly. Her eyes began darting each way before snapping back to Darren’s. “We agreed to…share your relationship. On the five hundred and fiftieth loop- on the second set of five hundred- you know- fiftieth of UGH!”

She shook her head sending tears shedding in different directions. “Anna and I…we talked. A lot. We both love you, Darren. In different ways, but- but we both want to be with you.” I turned from Jessa’s shoulder to stare in Darren’s direction. All of my hope and wishes were placed into that one pleading look as I stared into his eyes.

Darren stood there with a stunned and gobsmacked expression on his face as if I had slapped him with a fish or something equally absurd.

The weight of our words and the sheer magnitude of our sacrifice- the wish for a three way relationship with me and his best friend.

I could see as it pressed down on him and began crushing the anger and frustration he had felt only moments before. The flickering images of the dreamscape faded, replaced by the stark reality of their shared pain, their unwavering love for him.

I could tell he was panicking and then something snapped.

“I’m…sorry,” he whispered as his voice sounded like he was choking. It was full of emotions I couldn't identify with any amount of certainty as those two words left his lips.

The katana slipped from his grasp as it clattered against the dusty ground. He turned away, unable to meet our gazes as the weight of all of our shared suffering too was much to bear. With a sudden surge of will, he forced himself to wake and disappeared from our sight.

I fell to my knees and began to cry and sob in earnest.

Darren’s perspective.

I froze for a moment as my eyes snapped open in the pre-dawn gloom of the stable. The dingy Daito was slightly chipped and the shoto to the pair of swords that Kirin was supposed to hand me was missing.

As I checked it from my lying position. The fight with the samurai from the recruitment booth clearly causes problems for it.

Then I remembered my absolute fuckup!

The weight of the dreamworld, of Anna’s tears and Jessa’s confession, pressed down on me, a suffocating blanket of guilt and regret. I jolted upwards, and a hoarse shout ripped from my throat, not caring that I was supposed to be unseen to stay in the stable. “I’M A GODDAMN MORON! I MADE THEM CRY! FUCK!”

The words hung in the air, swallowed by the musty silence of the stable. I sat there, fists clenched, my mind racing. A thousand days of death. For me. For me. I had repaid them with nonsense! How had I repaid their sacrifice? With the selfish blindness formed of my own pain that masked theirs.

They cried and I said nothing!

They poured their hearts out and all that came out of my mouth was a terrified version of ‘I’m sorry.’ that didn’t actually mean anything at all!

I had to make it up to them.

I had to. But how? What could I possibly do to even begin to atone for the sheer magnitude of their suffering?

They saved me!

From a fate worse than death!

Then,an idea sparked in my mind. These people and these merchants and guards would reset. Their reality, while real in this moment, was temporary.

It didn’t matter if I barreled through the market.

Not in the grand scheme of things at least.

I needed an apology gift.

Something tangible that was also something that spoke of my regret and my unwavering love for Anna and my promise to try to love them both.

I would rob an accessory merchant and I would gain fighting experience at the same time. It was a stupid plan born of guilt and a desperate need to do something, anything, to ease the ache in my chest but it was all I could think of.

I stormed towards the marketplace as the streets of the city moved past me.

My movements were driven by a furious will that demanded only the best.

The pre-dawn streets blurred around me and as I ran the katana jostled with a reassuring weight.

I arrived at the marketplace as the first rays of dawn painted the sky in hues of pink and gold.

The familiar cacophony of breakfast stalls and early merchants hawking their wares filled the air, but I ignored them all.

My focus narrowed to a single target: a stall overflowing with fancy hair ornaments.

My eyes scanned the glittering array as I stormed forward.

I searched for something that spoke to me of the feeling of Anna and Jessa.

Then, I saw them.

A fancy black hair bow, its silk shimmering like raven’s wings turned into soft velvet. It had patterns of a rainstorm in the same thread but raised slightly so that only those up close could feel or see it.

It was perfect for Anna’s vibrant violet hair. I would also grab a golden coronet hairpin. It looked delicate and regal, like a tiny pointed tiara that was definitely fit for Anna’s beautiful hair as well.

I also took an amethyst hairpin and a platinum sheath for the wakizashi I saw Jessa carrying.

I reached for them and swiftly shoved them into my pocket and strapped the sheath to my side.

I saw the merchant attempt to close around their delicate forms as I yanked them back out of his hands.

I heard his voice rise in a cry of alarm, “What the fuck are you doing?! Pay for those! Guards!”

People started shouting in surprise and I didn't hesitate. I gripped the incomplete set of daito katana.

As the first set of guards approached, I saw the smug look of the merchant in the corner of my eye. That smug look was matched by the guard that gave me no feeling of threat at all.

He tried to grab my shoulder as the sword finally and left its sheath temporarily.

A silver flash in the morning light. A click was heard.

Two guards, mere cadet-level- probably not even samurai, barely registered my presence and then they split.

The market erupted into screams and I stood in the center of the market.

I felt sick.

Was this worth it?

They were temporary right?!

Am I a psychopath?

NO! This is necessary!

They’ll be alive tomorrow!

Moments passed before a group of four samurai approached cautiously.

They surrounded me and the first lunged without warning.

The surprise lunge was the only thing he did right, as his katana moved in a clumsy overhead swing.

I sidestepped as the blade whistled past my ear and then my shoulder as I fluidly dodged and with an even more fluid motion I slashed through his body shoulder to hip.

I brought the pommel of my own katana crashing against his temple so that he wouldn’t struggle while he bled out.

I felt sick.

This was wrong.

He crumpled like a puppet with its strings cut. The second hesitated, his eyes widening in surprise at his comrade's swift demise.

Just make it stop!

He raised his blade in a defensive posture, but I was already moving. A swift, precise cut across his hamstring sent him to his knees, a scream of pain ripping from his throat. Before he could even hit the ground, my katana completed its arc, a crimson line blossoming across his exposed neck.

That was NOT fucking necessary!

Then the shouts escalated.

Real samurai, their movements sharp and precise, emerged from the edges of the street.

Converging on my position. Three of them.

Their kimonos, the deep blues and blacks of seasoned warriors, marked them as veterans. My heart pounded against my ribs, adrenaline surging through my veins. This wasn't going to be a simple exercise.

The first charged, his katana whistling through the air in a diagonal slash aimed at my chest.

I parried, our blades meeting in a shower of sparks, the force of the impact jarring my arm.

Why am I still fighting?

He followed up with a swift, low sweep, but I anticipated it, leaping back just as his blade sliced through the air where my legs had been moments before.

These people can end the loop and I can give them my apology- so why?!

I landed lightly, using the momentum to spin and deliver a lightning-fast kick to his exposed side.

He gasped, stumbling, and I capitalized on his momentary disorientation. My katana flashed out, a crimson arc that severed his arm at the shoulder.

He screamed, clutching at the spurting wound, his face contorted in agony.

FUCK! They might be temporary but this is horrible!

The second, a woman with eyes as cold as ice, moved in, her katana a blur of motion. She attacked with a series of rapid thrusts and slashes, forcing me onto the defensive. I parried desperately, my arms burning, my breath coming in ragged gasps. She was fast, her blade a relentless whirlwind of steel.

I barely managed to block a thrust aimed at my heart, the force of the impact nearly disarming me. I saw an opening, a brief hesitation in her attack, and seized-

I yanked my instinctual reaction back and let her strike reach me.

The world tilted, the sounds of the panicking marketplace fading into a distant roar, and then-.

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I awoke a few agonizing moments later in the dreamscape. The shifting training ground shimmered into existence around me.

I felt sick about killing people who had just been doing their jobs and who I could probably work with or see as comrades- but then I slammed myself back into focus.

I grimaced as I saw Anna and Jessa as their faces etched with evidence of hurt and concern that I had inflicted on them.

I had made them cry.

I don’t ever want to make them cry.

The weight of my own stupidity pressed down on me as a suffocating burden.

I shook off the feeling of my immense cruelty back there and got down to business.

I approached them slowly.

My movements were hesitant and unsure but I spoke anyway.

"I'm sorry," I said with as much sincerity as possible.

"For real, this time. I can't say I love you yet, Jessa, but I will try. We’ve been best friends forever, but if Anna wants us all to be together, I won't disagree about being with a beautiful girl who has always had my heart- even if in a different way.” I saw as my words began to coax a smile out of her sullen expression. Then she began to cry.

“What did I do?!” I shouted in panic.

“Never seen happy tears, you big dope! Thank you! Thank you so much!” She tackled me in a hug and bawled into my shoulder.

A few minutes later she had fallen asleep. Then she poofed out of existence into her next loop.

I frowned.

I wasn’t able to give her the gifts.

I shook my head and turned to Anna.

“I'm more sorry than I could ever express, so I will try to use actions instead of words."

I stepped forward and went to bring her into a kiss, but Kirin interrupted.

“Ahem. No. Not while I’m here. Bye.” Then he poofed out of existence.

I grimaced at his empty location.

It wasn’t as if I was going to do anything in our currently reduced bodies. That didn’t appeal at all despite how much I loved the woman who would become my wife.

I just turned back to her and gave her a soft and gentle kiss that held all of my love and feelings for her.

There was no steam or lust in the kiss as we just reaffirmed that we exist together in the same place again and that the love we hold for each other is more valuable than anything.

We pressed our lips together and wrapped our arms around each other in an embrace.

I reached into my pocket as she smiled beautifully as her face glistened with tears. My fingers brushed against her face as I wiped her tears away.

My other hand was in my pocket and brushing against the smooth, cool surfaces of the hair ornaments. I pulled them out, holding them out to Anna and placing Jessa’s back into my pocket.

The black hair bow shimmered in the false light of the dream realm.

I looked at her with a sincere look of apology.

The golden coronet hairpin gleamed.

“So, I think this is a promise of a future where such nice things wouldn’t need to be stolen.”

Anna’s face softened as she took the hair bow and hairpin, her fingers tracing their delicate forms.

A small, watery smile touched her lips. “Thank you, Darren, this wasn’t necessary” she whispered, her voice thick with emotion. “These are very precious and I will always wear them. I’ll forgive you, because we’re all at fault. and these definitely help.” A playful smirk touched her lips, a glimmer of her usual teasing nature peeking through the tears.

Jessa appeared in the realm with a scowl on her face that returned a look of relief when she saw me.

So I took the sheath and hairpin, her amethyst eyes meeting mine. “Yeah…” she mumbled, her voice rough, uncharacteristically vulnerable. “Thanks, Darren. I fucked up. Anna fucked up. You fucked up. We all fucked up, and there’s blame to go around.” She held out the amethyst hairpin, her gaze holding mine. “But this one’s yours. To put in my hair.” she smirked and then shifted into a gentle smile. A genuine smile that was small but real lifted her lips into a gentle curve. “Whenever you see it, remember us. And remember…we’re in this together.”

Anna then held out the black bow and golden coronet, a hopeful look in her eyes. “Me too, Darren. Please?” she whispered. “I want to wear these... always.”

I smiled and got to work.