Limbo

Limbo.

A wasteland created where the rules and the laws of reality no longer exist.

In its blood-soaked sands and suffocating air, someone can be reborn and become something greater than themselves. Whether a coward becomes a hero, or the immoral learn a shred of morality.

The soul is renewed.

As much as she put on the facade of believing in legends and fairy tales like that, Erena couldn’t bring herself to see it with the reality before her; she and so many other students would be forced to survive like they had done all their lives. They’d be forced to destroy the last semblances of humanity they had within them to awaken “that” inhuman power with a contract.

An Anima.

Erena gazed out the window of an airship, one of many that carried her and the other students over Limbo. Her gaze dulled at the sight of students falling out of another airship like black rain. Some had the power to slow down their descent into hell, while others fell to their demise. A stinging sensation overtook her heart, but Erena pushed it down deeper the longer she sat in the air, counting the meticulous ticking that surrounded her.

Rapid breathing slowed, and minds focused. No matter what came next, each of the students knew that when they fell, there was no longer a chance to talk or wonder about what they wished to do or believed.

Those with the strongest desires would survive, no matter the cost.

The ticking stopped and Erena looked down with a slow exhale before all the safety she had was stripped away. She plunged into the harsh atmosphere of Limbo. Air crushed her body as she spun in the air lifelessly, her mind dazed from the shock. Everything around her blurred together from the airships, people, and even the sound of her own heart thumping in her ears like a soundless drum had escaped her.

Erena’s arms stretched out through the slicing winds but she only grasped darkness. From within that darkness came forth her reiju; a spark of energy. It spread across her body before igniting like flames, crackling along her fingertips. She opened her eyes, and they glowed with violet life until she gazed at the bloodstained earth beneath her. Though far, a black pile of corpses lingered beneath her, and for a moment her heart wavered.

When a soul is weak, it is meant to break and die. Things that are broken can no longer hold the power of reiju within them. Erena closed her eyes, preparing to let the darkness overtake her. At least, then it wouldn’t matter if she died in a place like this.

It was useless ⸺ yet, on such a day in the depths of her thoughts, an image of a boy repeated in her mind.

His name left her lips like an idle prayer to a god that would never answer.

“Guisei.”

Wind seared her ears like a burning blade, but through it she could hear a voice — his voice.

“I GUESS I SHOULD HAVE KEPT MY EXPECTATIONS LOW. YOU CAN BARELY LAND!” Guisei shouted in Erena’s ears before she felt the metallic embrace of a chain surround her body.

They shot towards the surface of Limbo, and Erena didn’t dare to open her eyes. The rhythmic, hollow chime of Guisei’s reiju was all she heard before they hit the earth with cold thud.

***

Rebirth.

Deep inside, Erena wanted it more than anything else. To have a chance to leave the past she had behind, the name she carried and what they had done ⸺ what she had done. Every moment her heart thumped was a constant reminder of it.

She survived while the rest of them didn’t.

Erena opened her eyes, but her vision was blurred. All she knew was that like so many other times, she found herself alive. Guisei sat across from her, but his clothes were ripped like a beast tore into them. He looked at her with a cold, devilish gaze, even if the dark circles under his eyes told her his mind was elsewhere.

“Finally done napping? Nearly thought playing dead with the other bodies was your strategy on how to survive this place.” Guisei kept his eyes open, fighting to stay awake.

“I’m still just — I’m surprised that you saved me is all,” Erena said, trying her best to hide the growing grin on her face. Guisei perked up at her words with an annoyed glare.

“Why wouldn’t I? We had a deal, just because people here might not be strong enough to do that much shouldn’t have anything to do with me,” he said.

Something about the way he said it was familiar to Erena, like a distant whisper that she couldn’t grab. Erena lingered on his words, settling back before feeling her hand enveloped in the cold scarlet sand of Limbo. Instead of the rock she heard was like burning steel, all she held was soft grains. Her words trailed off her lips like the sand that escaped her fingertips.

“Where…are we Guisei?” she asked.

“We’re in Limbo,” Guisei replied back like a rifle shot in the distance. “Where else would we be?”

Erena kept feeling around but even the solid earth beneath her was cold. It felt like the blood and heat were drained out of it like dead earth.

“Limbo is hard and rocky. That’s the one constant in this place. A friend even brought me a sample once,” she said, not realizing fully what she did.

Guisei angled his gaze at her when she mentioned a “sample” with a hint of suspicion. His voice leaked out of him like the hot steam that dared to envelop the unlucky souls that stayed within that place too long.

“A sample…from a friend…?”

“I—well. I mean, who wouldn’t want some ‘good old memories’ from surviving this place after all,” Erena said with a nervous chuckle. Unluckily for her, even the likes of Guisei found that strange.

“A place people describe as ‘Hell on Earth’, even if it's a sorry excuse for Hell. That place is where you get a rock sample to harvest the good memories?”

Erena quickly nodded, hoping Guisei would buy such a poorly crafted lie.

“Mhm, yeah exactly,” she said.

***

Scarlet sand filled the air, and rushed through it like an army in the heat of battle. Guisei and Erena could hear the sounds. Every clang of metal and every wild explosion was another wound Erena would have felt, but when she was with Guisei it was like the chaos of the world didn’t matter.

They idly chat about different things among the sounds of explosions and yells of students through Limbo. Erena followed close behind Guisei with a smile she didn’t even notice she had on her face.

“Are you sure you even know where we’re going,” she asked.

“Does it look like I do? I thought you were the one supposed to be guiding us through Limbo,” Guisei said.

Erena skipped ahead, focusing on Guisei with that same inquisitive look she had on the mountainside before letting it drift away when the wind died down. Despite being in a warzone, she looked content.

“It’s not even like there’s much of anywhere to go. This place is nearly the size of Avari from what I’ve heard — maybe even one of the Islands in Luxa,” she said.

Another scream grew closer in the distance even if the two had yet to notice. In Limbo, hunting parties were common among students capable of gaining the respect of another with their power.

Those who were weaker were forced to be hunted like dogs.

“PLEASE! HELP ME!”

A panicked voice choked out through the bloodsoaked winds of Limbo. Unlike before Guisei and Erena couldn’t simply laugh and ignore like this was nothing or didn’t concern them. A boy, looking only a few years younger than them, crawled across the wasteland. Blood dripped from his skin and his vision blurred in and out at the sight of them. Erena shivered at the sight, but her body couldn’t move. Guisei on the other hand kept walking just like before.

It had nothing to do with him, so why do anything?

The boy’s skin burned with pain as he kept clawing at the earth only for the chance at safety. Erena was frozen and a memory seared itself into her mind. The sight was there, repeating all over and she couldn’t do anything. Guisei kept walking, but through the boy’s constant yelling he couldn’t hear Erena’s footsteps behind him.

“We… we have to save him, he’s dying,” she said.

Even from far away he could hear Erena’s voice waver. He wondered for a moment if that’s what he sounded like when Mammon first offered him his power, but his arm burned and he grit his teeth.

No matter how much he thought about it, this was irritating.

“It’s obvious he’s dying, I just don’t see why that involves either of us. That kid with the weird Anima said that this is what you guys were sent to do. So, he either forms a good enough contract now and lives, or he dies. It’s that simple, let’s go,” Guisei said nonchalantly before turning back around.

Erena looked at the boy, unable to move even as he got closer to her. A silver tattoo appeared across his neck before drifting away. It was a mark of a failed contract and Erena knew it. The boy’s body looked like it began to crumble, and Erena stepped back the moment he was close enough to reach her. He looked up at Erena like a piece of his soul was ripped away, and emotion spilled within him like the remaining blood in his body.

When she looked up, the only thing she could remember was Guisei. A golden sword rested in his grip, but despite its weight, Guisei couldn’t feel it. In fact, he couldn’t feel a thing even when he dragged his blade across the boy’s neck.

“You’re wasting your time and my time, let’s go.”