Vol.3 Ch.62 - Let me drown

I am asleep. I hear nothing but the waves surrounding me as the frostbiteattacks my skin relentlessly. The tides surround me, swishing me around,toying with me as if I was just another body taken by the waves. I am in greatpain, but I do not mind. It is only at this very moment that I have realized mylife has most surely come to an end.Another wave threw my body into an arbitrary direction, this time making mehit a piece of wood, most probably wreckage from the ship. It hurts Ithought, but I still refused to open my eyes and check the damage. I am tired,my body is irreparable, my only option now would be to accept this harshworld’s treatment and drown along with the countless others I’ve killed.Even still, a small voice in my head beckoned, heck, even pleaded for me toopen my eyes and live on. It was my mother’s voice. I heard her yell out forme to go downstairs and help her arrange the table before father comes backfrom work. When I heard those familiar words of hers, I wept. Tears trickledone after another, without any signs of stopping. I will never see them again.After a while more of crying, my body took in some of the surrounding water,and I started choking in the sea. Can’t I die in peace?! I cried out as loud as Icould, whilst still refusing to open my eyes. I wasn’t cut out for adventuring,but can’t I die in peace at least? Give me this much! I don’t want to witnessmy own death!As I finally composed myself, I accidentally hit another floating body.Probably one of those bandits, I said to myself, those bastards ruinedeverything, serves them right.But then, the body struggled for a bit. Strange, could they still be alive? Icontemplated opening my eyes just to check, but I refrained. For my last sightto be that of the enemy, and such a pathetic one at that, I’d rather not.The body flailed around a bit more. Even though we were in the waters ofSibirus, I still felt its warmth as it occasionally bumped into me. You’re notliving through this, just give up I said to the poor soul. It suddenly heededmy words and stopped for a second, before swimming away from me.I thought it strange for the enemy to listen to me, so I instead decided to openmy eyelids out of curiosity, if only for a bit. The person swimming away fromme was quite small, and they seemed to be looking for a big enough piece ofwreckage to hold onto while they slowly drifted into the vast sea. Suchcommitment to survive… it’s almost inspiring.My eyelids were starting to close once again. It appears my body wasreaching its limit, but there was still one thing I didn’t understand. It’s alwaysat times like these when Spark mysteriously activates, so why isn’tanything happening this time?It may seem weird, but it appears my own body subconsciously wanted me tolive on, so the fact that it’s doing nothing this time only proves that this istruly the end of Lune Grimheart. Well, then again, little is known about Iros,and a lot of new breakthroughs are being made, so there may be a logicalreason for this. Thinking back, I did use Spark and Fireball a lot, so maybe Iused it all up?Eh, I don’t care anymore. I have no more reasons left to live. Cecily andNelly popped up in my head, but I don’t really want to see them, I’m tooashamed. After them, Ed came to mind. We made tons of promises, fromexploring the world, to understanding its mysteries.Since we were in Sibirus, the nights were for whatever reason longer thanthe days, and by a large margin at that. I opened my eyes once again to take aproper look at the night sky (For the last image I see in my life to be the stars,I’ll accept that). Thousands of stars laid spread in front of me, as if each dotof light suggested something greater was beyond it. I recalled the time Ed andI looked at these very same stars back in Trivis Numerica. Back then wemade a promise to figure out how and why the stars exist. I’m not sure if hetook it seriously, but I never forgot that promise. If there’s anything I regrettedin my life, it’d be not figuring out all the secrets behind them in time.Ed’s face faded out of my mind, and the guys from the gang popped up.Aaron, Max, even Carter. If they saw me in such a pitiable state, they’dprobably have tons of things to say, but that didn’t happen. They simply stoodthere, looked me in the eyes, and smiled as if they simply waited for me topick myself back up. Why? I yelled out, Why are you just staring at me?!Say something!It was then that I finally realized the truth. I don’t want to die, damn it. Iwant to live! I have too much unfinished business! This epiphany made mequickly get my bearings, and I opened my eyes wide for the first time sincefalling into the water. I looked around for any land, but there was none. Itwas sea, and only that. No matter how much I wanted to live, the worldsimply can’t make the impossible possible. I’ve run out of miracles, and I amnow all alone, adrift in the nigh endless sea.“Fuck…” I mumbled as I shivered in the cold icy waters, “Fuck I don’twanna die, I don’t wanna die man, I-I want to live FUCK I JUST WANT TOLIVE, PLEASE! BUT I DON’T WANT HARDSHIPS, IF YOU’RE JUSTGONNA GIVE ME HARDSHIPS, THEN JUST LET ME DROWN. SHIT, IFI GIVE UP NOW I-I’LL DIE! WILL I DIE? WHAT’S SO BAD ABOUTDYING? OH FUCK! I W-WANNA DIE, BUT I DON’T? AM I CRAZY?FUUUUUCK!”My screams and cries seemed to have rattled the other survivor, whopreviously swam to a nearby scrap of wood so as to stay afloat. I stillcouldn’t make out who they were exactly, since it was so dark out, but Inoticed they started slowly paddling towards me.“Did you get it all out of your system?” She asked me.Huh? This voice…!“Marina?” I answered her question with another question, “Y-You’re alive?”“Trust me, Lune, I know all too well how it feels like to want to be alone andcollect your thoughts. But shooing me away was kind of rude, y’know?”“M-My God, y-you could’ve drowned because of me.” I started beatingmyself up, “I-If you didn’t find a scrap piece of wood to hold onto, you’dhave drowned…!”“Yeah, but I didn’t.” She said with a chuckle, “Don’t think about the what ifs,they didn’t happen.”“God, I’m horrible. Kill me now!” I started tugging away at my wet hair as Iignored her advice.“Woah, woah!” She got surprised, “Calm down! Everything’s fine-”“EVERYTHING’S NOT FINE!” I interrupted her as I screamed in her face,“EVERYONE’S DEAD! WE’RE THE ONLY ONES LEFT, AND WEWON’T BE LIVING FOR LONG EITHER! THIS IS IT, CHECKMATE!HAHA, CHECKMA-!”“…” Marina jumped from her scrap piece of wood and swam towards me,giving me a strong hug.“W-What?” I asked, befuddled at her actions.“It’s cold. We’ll warm up quicker this way.” She explained as she tightenedher squeeze.“Then you should’ve brought me up on the piece of wreckage with youinstead, dummy.” I quietly returned the hug, “…But you’re right. It is warm.”“You’re… precious to me.” She mumbled quietly, “Even more precious thanyou may think. When the going gets tough, I want to be by your side and setyou straight.”“Marina… Thank you.” I cried in her embrace, “Thank you…! So much!”“You gonna throw in the towel early?” Marina asked with a calm andcollected voice, “Gonna act like you went crazy from this journey?”“…I have no right to.” I answered back.“That’s right.” She said, “It wouldn’t be fair to them, would it?”Suddenly, I looked up at the sky once again. I saw three people laughing at usfrom up above. Sullivan Streits, the young short guy who served as ourparty’s heart. He encouraged us to always stay optimistic. GenevraLionheart, the woman who was our elder by a couple years, who saw throughus whenever we tried to keep things from the party, she played the straightman when everyone was clowning around. And finally… Linus Tenford, theman who saved my life, no matter the cost. I wept once again, but this time itwasn’t for me. I wept for the three party members that we lost, the peoplewho I’ve explored a long forgotten Dungeon with, the friends I’ve madealong the way.“Will we make it to the mainland?” I asked Marina.“Who knows?” She joked, “But if we do, we’ll make it together. For them,and for us. We’ll tell their tale, they will live on inside us, even if they’re nothere right now.”“…” I stayed quiet, before looking at her eyes that shined an beautiful browncolor, “We better start paddling then, we’ve got a long way to go before wereach any semblance of land.”“Yeah…” She slowly let go of me so we could both climb onto the woodenwreckage.The waves calmed down, and as we slowly hopped up on the lone piece ofwreckage together, the morning Sun finally arrived as dawn broke upon us.Drifting across these lonely waves, for the first time since leaving Bilgam, Ifelt I wasn’t alone anymore.