To Take Up Weapons |Year 2028|

Anneka

I, Anneka, am weak, and people filled with weakness like me who are done with running away from their flaws and inferiority try to cover it up or compensate for it instead. It was logical to turn to weapons or tools to cover up the natural physical burdens of my flesh and body I felt after that day when I couldn’t do anything. I knew I had to get stronger in order to aid others when my thoughts and words were not enough to save them. I couldn’t face the crippling consequences of failing again.

It started in my room which used to be my safe haven, filled up nicely with my hobbies. I transformed the comfortable former into a sanctioned temple of steel war. I would spend my days after school learning everything about every weapon I could, purchasing the ones I found the most efficient and unique, and in the meanwhile learning all the curriculum I could to catch up to Lex’s understanding of the world. After all my studying, I would train for hours with broadswords, halberds, javelins, and knives in various contrived scenarios until I would feel the fatigue radiate through my whole body. I would make dummies and targets to act as single opponents and multiple opponents, running countless battles and drills through my head. I realized early on that the weapons I was wielding were too strenuous and uncharacteristic for my unmuscular and unconditioned body. It didn’t matter what technique or training I implemented, my body would fall short.

It was obvious what I needed to do was not overcompensate, but conquer. Next, I chose to focus on training my body almost every day so I could muster my strength and willpower in greater amounts, only taking breaks, so I could regain strength for proper workouts. At this point I was almost always outdoors, lifting weights or rough and wet logs and doing hour runs in the vast forest behind my house. I had to do exercises for my core and flexibility, too, which were my greatest test. The food I made for myself to eat was to die for. I mean, I definitely died inside while eating it. I had to eat so much of it while also eating and making so little of anything that actually tasted good.

Thinking back to my darling weapons! Using them every day for two and a half years even with my physical training, it's no exaggeration that I grew infatuated with them. They carved sounds to awaken my silent life. From the way they fit comfortably in my hands, to the way they pierced and scathed the air and straight through targets. And the strength I was belittled by grew through my experience using them. I was fully immersed in their world, one where only violence was possible, but I believed that the peace and saving I could bring would justify the means. Inside my room, I now slept surrounded by three walls of my four plastered with weapons on carriers or sheathes methodically, with two chests of various smaller weapons underneath. I had exhausted my money after I filled up the first wall, so after that, I had to learn to make them myself. I thought about learning how to create them by reading a book or learning online, but my gut or instinct took over. It's irrational to explain but the way I had viewed the world had changed. I didn’t need a book or someone else to teach me how to make blacksmith or modify weapons, when I stared at them, I could visualize them as tools already. It's obvious a baseball bat is a weapon, but how could I still make it more efficient and useful? It's less obvious how to turn junk like a discarded office chair into a weapon, but a weapon’s main beauty is its efficiency and how tailored it is to your use. My hands made that chair into a semi-sturdy mace. I took off the seat and attached a longer wooden staff piece to act as a handle with the wheels and bottom piece acting as the bludgeoning end. A weapon’s beauty always relies on the user. Any weapon can surpass its limits if the user puts in the effort and technique necessary for its use. The more weapons I made, the more haphazard I became. Duct tape, nails, welding, blacksmithing, and fastening were used in a creative attempt to make something usable. Most of these paled in comparison to “normal” weapons, but I felt the experience start to accumulate.

It wasn’t long until I experienced an unknown and distant desire that called out to me. It grew within me like an inferno feeding on every emotion and it gripped me by the chest. The more I trained, held, and collected these weapons, the more in tune I felt with them. I had forged a particularly fierce spear in the confines behind my home and the resulting instinct that I had developed, I understand it as a type of battle instinct. My battle instinct not only helped me visualize how to make weapons more clearly, but also routes for which I could use them in battle. My battle instinct was still not strong and seemed very inconsistent at times, it was still a fledgling. Still I was obsessed with its future strength and potential that I knew were within reach. The more I struggled aimlessly with my routine the more my battle instinct insisted to me that there was only one way left it could grow because it reached its threshold. It would only open the gates to grow once more if I became a human weapon myself.

Weapons and humans are no different. A confusing prospect to many. Ok, maybe everyone, but me. Still, this understanding told me what I had to do. If I were one of my blades, I would have already forged the steel with heat and pressure by training my body, but I had neglected to sharpen the blade of my body in application. Simply, I have never tested my blade or self through countless battles in order to develop my inner proficiency. Targets and dummies are not an equivalent for when a real life situation arrives. My battle instinct was telling me the only way forward was to become a devastating weapon by picking up martial arts and rising to its peak through continuous combat. The task in front of me whittled me awake as I bundled myself in blankets close to sleep, yet so far.