At the fight, Heymlir is getting worn out as he begins to visibly be out of breath. Jayce sends a strike at Heymlir’s face, staggering him as saliva flies out his mouth. Heymlir realizes that he must fight back himself instead of simply relying on the black substance.

The black substance covers Heymlir’s arm and he lashes out. Before Heymlir was capable of making a full swing, Jayce parries it with his arm and circles in with another strike.

The black substance formed around Heymlir’s arm snags the wrist of the arm Jayce used to block. Jayce impulsively jerks his body back slightly.

From Heymlir’s opposite side, Archer goes in for an attack. Heymlir swipes his arm in Archer’s direction and a black rope whips out at Archer. Archer rotates his small body mid-air dodging it and follows up with a kick landing against Heymlir.

The black rope stabs onto the ground and begins to cover the floor beneath Archer. Heymlir plans to lock Archer in place as soon as he lands.

Archer’s eyes flare up, his leg lights up on fire making a pinging sound and it ricochets off the air. In what seemed like a near instantaneous motion, Archer’s leg slams against Heymlir’s side, leaving behind a trail of a bright red highlight. Immediately Archer uses the momentum to land two more quick succession of kicks; against Heymlir’s chest and then his face. In the same moment, the opposite side of Heymlir’s cheek gets fisted by Jayce.

Darren, who was watching from a distance, was surprisingly intrigued by Archer's combo attack.

Heymlir gets desperate for more power and he begins coughing.

Darren (nervously): Hey…What’s happening to him now…?

San: When the body is exposed to sudden drastic changes, it will tend to have an adverse effect…His body is still not yet compatible with this influx of power that it suddenly obtained…

Heymlir winces in severe pain, and a second blast of the pressure wave vertebrates through the area; pushing back both Archer and Jayce away from him. Power swells within Heymlir and he begins to go insane.

“Tch…! Not this shit again…!” - Jayce complains as he struggles to move.

Jayce turns to face Archer: Hey, you. Let’s hurry up and end this quick. Before that old man can pull anymore bullsh*t out from his body…!

“...You didn’t need to tell me that.” - Archer begrudgingly retorts back.

Not willing to go through another round of this, everyone but San goes to attack Heymlir while under the effects of the wave of pressure. Heymlir as he fends himself against the group cries out to San:

“San…! You always talked about the glory days of your guild…!”

“And when it disbanded, you ended it off on good terms with everyone and a party…! How nice…!”

“But not everyone can have a smooth sailing end like yours….!”

“Back in my guild….Lionel Duress…! We were ranked 6th at the time…! We too were a happy guild, built on each other’s bonds, friendships, trust…! Our guild made its way up the rankings, we were a rising star in the era! But then…!”

“Our leader quit the guild…!”

Flashback to the past about one generation after San’s. A young Heymlir hears his guild leader announcing to his members that he’s done. Heymlir has his eyes wide open in shock from the sudden announcement. In the background, other guild members can be heard joking about the guild leader’s retirement, with a couple even wishing their best regards to him. But Heymlir paid no real attention to it.

“Ever since then…! Our guild slowly fell apart…!”

Help support creative writers by finding and reading their stories on the original site.

Flashback of another guild member taking on the role of guild leader. He reassures everyone that it’ll be okay without the previous leader. At a small distance, the young Heymlir had a face inkling with doubt.

A little further in the future, it is shown on a holographic screen that Lionel Duress has fell from the rankings and is now at 8th place.

“Slowly…! Members began to leave the guild one after another…!” - In rapid flashbacks, members of Lionel Duress begin to leave one-by-one. The guild room that Heymlir hung around with his guild mates and friends slowly became emptier until only a few remained.

“We quickly fell out of the top ten...But I eventually cared for none of that…!” - A holographic screen now shows Lioness Duress in 16th place.

“I just wanted the guild to stay together….! Until finally…!”

Flashback to a member apologizing to Heymlir and informing him that the guild is officially disbanding.

“Why…?! I was young back then…! A boy within his fleeting moments….With a future...A bright future ahead of him…!” - Heymlir shouts with rage as his face flares up lividly.

In his head, he reminisces about the time hanging out with everyone in Lionel Duress in the guild room, fighting monsters and winning tournaments.

In a crowd-filled stadium, their guild leader throws his hands in the air and the crowd cheers. In the audience, Heymlir as a young boy looks in awe. A guild member pats Heymlir on the head, telling him that he’ll be up there, one day too.

“WHY?!?! Why was my time taken away from me?!?!”

“In the end all the people that I've traveled with and called “friends”, they thought of only themselves…! They never stopped to think how it would affect any of the other members like me…!”

“They say everyone has their time to shine, so where was mine?!!!”

“Huh, San?!?!” - Heymlir howls, lifting his scowling head up to face San.

“My chance was stolen from me…! To leave a mark in this world….A legacy…! I even worked my way to save money to start a new guild!”

Flashback to Heymlir now as a young man working multiple jobs, documenting paperworks, smelting, lifting and carrying large bags in the middle of a rainstorm.

“But by the time I had enough to pay for the first expenses….”

Flashback of an scruffy, older Heymlir looking at himself in a bathroom mirror. His hair, now whitening. Heymlir touches his face in morbid realization - “I’ve already grown old…!”

“I submitted to reality and gave up on my dreams. I settled and decided to start my life anew as mayor of this city…!”

“Since then, I’ve come to realize that with what I lost with my youth….I can replace it with technology…!”

“And now look…! With this, I can finally achieve what I dreamt of years ago!”

“Tell me San! Is it wrong for a man to have ambitions?!” - Heymlir cries out with a crazed expression.

San looks at Heymlir in distraught.

San (thinking): ...I get it…

San (thinking): Now I understand your vision of Argonaut…That’s why you mentioned Rototoskre during your announcement…

San: Heymlir…!

“You’ve…Become a monster…!”

The group continue to struggle putting an end to Heymlir with their restricted movements. Heymlir marvels at the sight of the group putting in all their effort to take him down.

’Ah...I too wanted to be like them….Going on adventures...Tackling on quests....Taking on monsters...Just like what they are doing right now…’ - Heymlir says in his head with a tinge of jealousy.

‘That’s right...I guess I’ve become the monster huh…? In the end, you’ll always be the villain to someone else’s story…’’ - He says solemnly in his head.

‘But if by becoming a monster I can reach my goals, then so be it!’

San feels helpless at the fact that he’s all out of juice since he’s grown too old for any of this.

San (thinking): Dammit…! I wish I could help them…!

San (thinking): Under this intense pressure, I can’t even force myself to move my body…! This is as far as I can go with my condition…So much has happened…I’m all spent…!

San (thinking spitefully): How I’ve become so pitiful…!

Tatsuo slowly wakes up, confused about what's happening. Somebody calls out to him, grabbing his attention.