Today was the day the town of Lika was going to celebrate the foundation of the town... what they didn't know was when they least expected the enemy kingdom, Rolk, would attack their village. Directed by one of the generals, Folkur, the third strongest in Rolk.
Iko, a farmer that was caught in the fire, she knew how to fight, she had fight all the wolfs and other animals that tried to eat the crops but humans were another thing, they were all armored with armor that was nigh impenetrable with their weak weapons, Iko grabbed a sword from a fallen adventurer, she knew the guy, but it wasn't time to lament, they were surrounded and if Folkur wanted they all would be dead by now, so Iko wondered. why doesn't he don't kill us all and be done with it? what's his objective?
that question clouded Iko mind before suddenly she was thrown to the ground by an enemy soldier she was fighting, she knew how to fight, just that she wasn't strong enough to be actually able to do anything against them.
The soldier that throwed her to the floor started speaking "hey girl, you are actually kind of cute now that I see you well~ what do you think of joining Rolk as the general’s concubine? After I have some fun with you of course"
Iko was furious, was this man being real about that? did he think that she would just let him do whatever he wants with her body? she spat at him, that was the only thing she could do since this soldier was apparently blessed by the [System], a mysterious force that appeared in Ruk hundreds of years ago, capable of turning a no one into one of the strongest men in less years that would take a genius learn how to use a sword properly.
"YOU BITCH!" screamed the soldier before cutting her arm of and stab his sword in her stomach, Iko screamed, screamed like she never done before, she was hurt before, yes the first time she has lost an arm or being stabbed, but it shouldn't hurt that much, "it hurts right? the [System] gave me the ability to make you feel more pain than you will normally feel, you little bitch! you will regret rejecting my offer!"
suddenly the soldier body fall, he's head landing next to Iko's arm and next to the beheaded soldier was a man she knew well, everybody in the kingdom, being a commoner or a noble knew about him, the third strongest soldier of Rolk, Folkur, she froze, the pain being numbed by her fear of being in front of such monster of a man.
"Hmm, a farmer huh, to think that bastard of a soldier thought of making you my concubine... ridiculous, you do are a nice specimen, I could sell you for quite the money in the black market" Iko was frozen, she didn't even processed the words in her mind, she couldn't not when she was fighting to breath under such an intimidating aura.
"Well sadly for you, if that soldier didn't cut your arm and stabbed you I would have taken you to Rolk and then sell you, you look obedient, but your price can't be higher than a few silvers right now, not worth the trouble, so sadly you have to die" this time his words did enter Iko's mind before she rolled to the side dodging the man sword, how did she did it, she has no idea but it helped her since Folkur was surprised she could dodge his attack, she got up and started running through the buildings looking for a place to hide, she didn't even bother trying to find someone to help her, they were all dead and the few alive were in the middle of a battle or hiding, she may be about to die but she didn't want to bring anyone with her.
While she was running, her waist long white hair moving with the wind, she suddenly couldn't feel her legs anymore and fallen to the ground when she turned she noticed her legs were cut off and in the distance Folkur was in a cutting stance, demonstrating that it was him who cut her legs dozens of meters away, he started walking towards Iko, she started to crawl with one arm the furthest she could, but not even 3 seconds later Folkur was already in front of her with his sword up in the air, ready to cut her down.
"goodbye, you were a pest" while his sword was falling on top of her there were only thoughts of hate and revenge in her mind, why? was the main question in her mind, what did we do to be targeted by them? we never entered any war, we don't have any important resource either, we are just some lonely town in the middle of nowhere, we didn't do anything, so why?
while those thoughts clouded her mind she heard Folkur said something in a whisper that she somehow heard "soul shatter" then the pain that came with the cut was enough to make her pass out or it was supposed to make her pass out, she was awake through the whole prosses of her soul breaking, the soul was supposed to be untouchable, divine, messing with it being your own or other was an immediate death sentence by the gods, so why, WHY, was the man in front of her just fine after cutting through her soul, the cut didn't even scar her body but her mind and soul was breaking apart, the pain worse than anything she had ever experienced, even worst that when the soldier cut her arm or her legs were cut off.
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"W-why?! Just why?!" Iko shouted between screams of pure pain and sorrow, her eyes filled with hate that if stares could kill Folkur would be probably dead already, "WHY US?! WHAT DID WE DO?!" she asked, desperate, and holding the urge to just fall unconscious, she couldn’t; to know the truth she couldn't fall unconscious just yet, not until he talked.
"you are still able to talk even when your soul is being destroyed... I guess you do have something special" he said with surprise written in all his face, "you will die either way so I guess I could tell you..." Iko was surprised he would tell her so easy, but he was right, it's not like she would survive having her soul fractured.
Iko started losing conscious before hearing him say "it's just my liege orders I follow, I don't ask questions, so I don't really know, but I did hear him say that he was bored and wanted some chaos and blood to spread."
The town was filled with a sense of dread but that specific corner of the town was full of an energy no one has ever felt before, because people with the ability to survive with their soul covered with any strong emotion are near to zero, and no one had ever shown this amount of hate, in their life, it wasn't a strong aura but surprising enough for Folkur to jump a few steps back in succession, just for the aura to disappear just as soon as it came.
"I guess with a broken soul the hate dispersed withing her body as well from the hole connecting them... that's and interesting discovery! I should tell my liege!" was all that left Folkur mouth after destroying someone soul, getting rid of any probability for them to reincarnate or be revived, not that anyone would want to revive a poor farmer, but better be safe than sorry.
Folkur suddenly tensed up, an intimidating aura was coming near the town and by the sounds of metal he could tell the Empire of Kalk (the place Iko lived in) noticed his presence, he shouted to all his soldiers that they need to leave right now or all of them will be dead, in a hurry the Kingdom of Rolk was able to escape the Empire of Kalk with only a few losses (all the made by Folkur) and that's how after everybody left the town.
A man with a white coat, brown hair and glasses, not looking older that 40 made his way through the town, no one, not even him knowing what his looking for, only his god patron would know, but when his eyes land on a certain corpse, he smiles, "I found you" before grabbing Iko's corpse and leaving.
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Pain, hate, vengeance, this emotions clouded Iko’s mind, but not only her mind, her soul was being infected by this emotions too, at the verge of falling apart her hate surrounded her soul making so it doesn’t fall apart anymore but even that is futile when she is still unconscious and in so much pain she doesn’t even notice the fragments of her soul that keep escaping her encase of hate, she felt something, she can’t describe it but it feels gruesome, almost wrong that it was allowed to exist at all, and that something started to invade her soul.
Iko panicked, first her soul is fractured, and the gods do nothing and now something is trying to invade her soul? What kind of shitty luck is that? She tried everything to keep that thing away, she didn’t do nothing worth of mentioning, she even helped it enter at some point by accident, safe to say it didn’t work out for her, the thing in her soul felt wrong but for some reason it felt more warm that wrong on her soul, what was happening to her? Suddenly the pain she was feeling changed into a warm embrace but that felt strange, why would something that shouldn’t even have the right to exist felt so warm?
She opened her eyes, which couldn’t be possible since she is sure her soul, well what’s left, already disconnected from her body, she was surprised to be able to feel anything at all, what she saw after opening her eyes wasn’t what she was expecting if she was expecting anything at all, a laboratory probably, she was inside a tube with cables connected to her body, she can see that some of them were extracting some liquid from her and some were injecting her with something, she noticed it was the same gruesome thing she felt before, but when it entered her body it felt warm… wait, my body? Didn’t my body got stabbed and loose 1 arm and both legs? Why do I have them back?
“Ah your awake!” said a voice, Iko couldn’t move much of her body but she was able to see the guy down below the tube, he had a white coat and glasses, he looked in his 40, Iko didn’t remember him, was he who saved her?
“I bet your surprised right now, after all you got your limbs back! There isn’t even a scar in there! Well nice to meet you, your name is…” he looked over to a panel next to him “Iko right? Farmer of the town if Lika, there isn’t any other information about you, after all, anyone who knew you died, we can’t exactly ask the dead about things” he clapped his hands smiling “I guess you want to know what happened to you? Right? Well let me tell you… first we did… connected… Ancient blood… tube… and now we are here!”
Iko didn’t understand a single thing he said, tubes, ancient blood? What kind of bullshit is that? And this place… it looks suspicious, the people are moving in strange way and some equipment were glitching in and out of existence.
“…” the man stayed quiet, “I guess you noticed right?” he then started to… laugh? “HAHAHAHAH!!! THIS IS FUNNY! REAL FUNNY!” the laboratory suddenly started glitching and the next second Iko wasn’t in a tube and neither a laboratory she was in a glass cell with the man outside still laughing.
“So that thing is starting now… you 3 get up” suddenly 3 mounds of metal started moving and assembling themselves, they were… what were they? They didn’t have a form, they are constantly changing and her mind started hurting just to see them, then the warm feeling started to become colder and gruesome, and the pain started again, she felt pain in her head, back, arms and eyes. And the man just said 8 words.
“Let’s see how you survive the ancient blood.”