While we walk through the forest, I ponder whether I should call this “group”... I guess this isn’t a group—more like two guys who almost killed each other when they met and some girl. If I did name whatever the hell this is, it would be called “The Devils”. The name came from something I said to Miyamoto when we met. That I’m The Devil stuff.

  To get back on topic, Miyamoto and I were walking in front of this Celeste girl. It didn’t mean we trusted the girl, but we figured we could survive anything she could throw at us. I had to ask if he could better describe what those blue flames coming out of his katana were.

  He said he infused fire-type magic with his katana, but creating such a strong flame to execute the T. Rex did knock the wind out of him. Magic… Huh. How does that even work? I guess the Law of Conservation of Mass has been thrown to the wind? Probably should research the topic at the library if we ever make it there.

  I guess it doesn’t matter too much; knowing your enemy is important, but I got everything I need. My gun and knife—it’s not like I’m going to fight in a war or battle a god and the Devil at the same time. Celeste has walk up to us and said that this is where the ambush had taken place. We look around for clues as to what could have happened after Celeste ran away. During my investigation I discover a blood trail and follow it for a bit.

  There was an encampment with a cave behind it with about a dozen or more little green things. There was a rather foul smell nipping at my nostrils coming from the cave. Well, it seems rather normal here to reek. If this is a land of magic, then I’m guessing these things were goblins or something of the sort. So I decided to walk back to the other two to inform them about what I had found.

  “So there are about a dozen goblins, of course; there could be more. First, Celeste, I need to know what you can do. To see if you would be of any use.”

  “I cast a fi-fi fireball the size of a fist, and I can-can create arrows made of magic.”

  "Okay, give me a second to think; we don’t just want corpses by the end of this.”

  I start to pace around this once land of battle, just pounding, trying to remember what Conrad taught me. I took a swig from my flask and started to spin my plan.

  “Okay, Miyamoto and I will take out the main encampment, and when we lure the remaining enemies out to you, Celeste, you’ll just have to set a blaze to the remaining forces. I guess the first true team meeting for The Devil has now been completed. I wish luck to each of us.”

  I grab my Bowie knife, and Miyamoto takes out a wakizashi. The journey to the camp was a long one due to the need for sneaking. Anything could happen during a battle, and our plan can be destroyed at the drop of a hat. Every movement may very well be drawing us closer to damnation.

  With my arrival at the encampment, sounds were filling my ears; it was something that almost could be called speech. My eyes found two goblins with wooden spears muttering to each other. I pick up a small rock that was next to me and chuck it into a deeper part of the forest.

  Cling.

  Hearing the noise, the goblins walk over to it.

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  I pull my knife out and crawl after the two.

  The two had split up.

  I follow the one that went left. The goblin looks to his left and right and then starts to piss. I stab the fucker again and again. Always remember: in combat, overkill doesn’t exist. I did the same thing as the one who went to the right

  I wipe off the blood from my knife onto the grass and return to the camp. The shit that the camp reeks of is driving me fucking mad, and it all was coming from this bloody cave. I could no longer hold back the need to investigate, so I journey into the cave without backup, keeping my gun at the ready.

  Even if I want to, I can’t call for Miyamoto because his location and the number of enemies left out front are unknown. Celeste was too far back to be of any help and would’ve pass out from the damn smell; couldn’t blame her. There was a strong sense of uneasiness that was consuming me while walking down this rocky passageway. As if I was walking into something that would change me mentally for the rest of my life, as if my brain was flashing big red lights, but I could only continue to go. Driving straight into this abyss. When making it into the stomach of the cave, I damn near vomited from the smell; the smell was like a power punch to the gut.

  Oh, death is near.

  I walk into the heart of cave… Corpses pile up, and screaming came deeper down… Children. Women. Men. All pile on top of each other… The rot of death is surrounding me. Puddles of blood filled any area where it could combine. In one of the piles, a child's body was looking right at me in the eyes with its cold, dead eyes.

  Any better man would have snapped from seeing all this. Seeing all this horrific reality of evil revealing its horrendous face to me. My ears are ringing, and my throat dry, I stare at the face, and my mind…

  My departure into this hell continued with killing each beast with as much pain as possible, but also as quick as I could. My mind fills with what the men who found the concentration camps must have been thinking… Could their minds comprehend the horrific reality of what they were seeing?

  I become drenched in the blood of these fucking beasts. Tracking down the source of the screaming, I see the rape of a horrified woman upon a wooden table. I enter a round into this son of a fucking bitch's brains out… Damn near ready to pull the gun on myself. Puke was filling my mouth after this scene, but I swallow it all down. I will not die before I eradicate all these rats. I help the woman off the blood-soaked table; the table was caked with both new and dried blood… I believe anyone can figure out what that means. I cannot dare think of it now, or I will throw everything up.

  I keep on moving, keep on killing.

  Bodies and the smell… the… what could any man have done to deserve such a fate?

  What can anything that has ever been created deserve anything… anything…

  I discovered a cage full of people, broken, dead-eyed, and traumatized.

  The ability to cry was lost to me a long time ago, but I wish I could remember how to now.

  Their faces are blank and hollow.

  With the mere wish for death written within their skin.

  There was a lock on the cage.

  “Cover your ears!”

  They did so, and I shot the lock off the door, leading the people out.

  We were coming up to the piles of bodies.

  I told the people to cover their eyes.

  There was a tug on my shirt when I said this. It was this young girl mounted on the back of a huge dog. She was looking up at me with a piercing gaze. Her face looked like that of a boy who had just come back from war.

  A tear fell down her cheek.

  I went to pick up the girl, but the dog start to growl at me. The girl patted the dog's head, and she reached out to me. I start to cradle her in my arms, placing her head into my chest, knowing I was not hiding anything from her eyes.

  When I made it outside again, the dawn had already broken overhead. The world kept moving even after the end. After the events of tonight I was covered in blood and filled with nothing but the horrific face of reality.

  The golden light of dawn revealed the abyss.

  The dawn was warm, and I have grown tired.

  I place the girl back upon the dog, and then I collapse.

  “He who fights with monsters should see to it that he himself does not become a monster. And if you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." ― Friedrich Wilhelm. Nietzsche