Mentality

Jack found staying in the tent to be quite boring, so he went out. However, there wasn't much to do in the hub either. In the end, without even Emma approaching him, he found himself next to her.

"Hi there!"

Emma didn't say anything, instead stepping a bit closer before bringing her face down to his neck and taking a sniff. Once she backed off, she let out a giggle.

"So it seems you've already killed one of the Forsaken. And a pretty strong one at that."

Jack tilted his head to the side with confusion.

"Eh? What are you talking about?"

Emma covered her mouth with the tips of her fingers.

"I suppose it is quite normal not to know of them, since they don't exactly purposely make themselves known."

She paused for a moment, taking a deep breath. Then, she began slowly walking, while Jack followed next to her.

"The Forsaken is the title that an organization calls themselves. Or, at the very least they see themselves as an organization, but they are more like a bunch of rabble cobbled together. They are a feisty bunch that doesn't care about anything else so long as they can gain power. It goes as far as to ruin their own kin."

She stopped by the roulette table to feel the green mat.

"Their specialty includes modifying the body with a modified parasite. In essence, they shed their humanity so that they could gain strength. Their kind has caused my friends and me a lot of trouble. Despite the fact we could've gone our separate ways, they decided to purposefully seek trouble with us, thinking that they were stronger."

Emma let out a small sigh, tilting her head to the side ever so slightly.

"But the problem is that they are all like cockroaches, finding ways to survive even after being killed again and again. They are all quite unreasonable people, seeking to find trouble even when it does not benefit them."

She glanced at him with a smile.

"I'm sure you've had similar experiences."

Jack scratched the side of his head with a bit of confusion.

"Um... I don't really remember anything like that. I don't kill... wait. Did I kill people?"

He was genuinely puzzled by his own actions, thinking over them for a little while. Eventually, he let out a gasp.

"Ah!... I did kill this one person. But it wasn't really me! It was the game that killed them. Or did I kill him? He did seem fine after..."

Emma paused for a moment, looking at him strangely. She let out a small laugh.

"Do you remember any kind of person that looked a little strange? Unless you performed a sneak attack, you should've seen them transform into some sort of larger form of a monster. And if it was a sneak attack, you would see that their blood has a bit of a strange color, while their internal organs are all different compared to most."

Jack thought for a long while, closing his eyes and rubbing his chin. It took him a while to sift through his memories, but eventually, he did remember someone that fit that description.

"Eh?... Did I really kill that person?"

Emma leaned in with narrowed eyes.

"Who is this person exactly? Could you describe them in detail?"

Jack blinked a few times. Before he began gesturing with his hands.

"Um, it was a guy that walked all funny. He had many different gray arms that reached really far and held onto a bunch of swords! I actually have one of them right now. Um... and then I remember he turned into this really big thing with really big arms instead!"

Emma pondered over his response for a little while.

"By arms, do you perhaps mean tentacles?"

"Eh? What are those?"

Jack put a finger on his cheek, while Emma laughed at his expression, thinking it was cute.

"You could see them as arms, but they don't have joints. Look at my finger here, see how it bends at different angles, but is otherwise fairly straight? Tentacles aren't like that, and can bend in many different ways."

Jack's eyes widened considerably.

"Ah! So those are tentacles..."

Emma took another curious look at him, observing him from top to bottom like a pervert.

"Say, how did you end up killing him?"

Jack scratched the side of his head before humming to himself.

"Kill?... I was just having fun. They... They aren't dead. Are they?"

Emma could only stare at him silently, a bit stunned at the strange question. It took her a second, but the same smile soon returned to her face, though it carried a tad bit of nefariousness.

"I can't be sure, but it's possible that you only put them to sleep or knocked them unconscious. However, it's not necessarily a bad thing to kill people, you know?"

Jack's head snapped over to look at her strangely, almost like how a normal person would look at a monster. He put one hand over his heart, which was beating irregularly fast. He wasn't sure himself why it was.

Though Jack knew for sure that a sort of primal urge was gradually rising up from within.

"It's... not bad to kill people? But my Dad said that it was a really bad thing!"

Emma put one hand on his shoulder, bringing him a little closer and giving him a deep look. She whispered to him softly.

"It is a bad thing to kill people, but sometimes it's even worse if you let them live. Even if it's not a good thing by itself to kill people, there are some people out there that deserve to die. If they are left to be alive, then they will do far worse things, such as kill hundreds of people!"

Jack took a step back, while holding onto the side of his head. His brows furrowed as a sense of dizziness assaulted him.

"It's... a good thing? D-Dad said killing was bad... but if they really do kill hundreds of people isn't that super bad?"

He continued to mutter to himself in confusion, desperately trying to make sense out of the sudden moral conundrum he was faced with. There was a part of him that was in disbelief that something could actually be true in that way.

While he was in this frazzled state, Emma slowly raised a finger as her smile grew ever so slightly.

"Just think about it in a simple way. In one case, you kill someone. That isn't a good thing, as your father said. However, what if in the other case, you don't kill someone, but then they kill five people? Isn't letting that happen worse than killing someone?"

Jack's face twitched when he heard that. All of a sudden, he lost all of his restlessness and remained completely rooted to the spot. A memory flashed through his mind.

...

"Now, now Jack. You can't just make it out to be something so simple, alright?"

"Mmm. But I don't get it! Why does it matter just because there are some other people involved? Killing is just killing, right?"

Jack protested while his father lectured him. The two were sitting down and between them was a set of train tracks and figures that had been tied up to represent people scattered around the floor.

His father had a gentle smile on his face as he laughed.

"No, no. Killing isn't supposed to be a good thing, son. The point of it is to show you how something that seems logical may not always be the right decision. Even if five other people die, some people are unwilling to shift the tracks to kill one person, since they don't want to murder anyone, even if it is to save them."

Jack pouted and crossed his arms.

"So what's the right thing to do?"

His father shrugged his shoulders exaggeratedly.

"Sometimes you just don't know. In the end, sometimes it will be unclear and you just have to make a choice. Just remember that."

"Ok..."

...

Jack blinked a few times before taking a deep breath.

"Sometimes... you just don't know."

Emma raised an eyebrow hearing him say that. She looked a tad bit surprised that he came to that conclusion.

"Don't know, huh? I suppose that is true some of the time. No matter how observant you are, you cannot become omnipotent. However, just because you can't fully understand a situation, doesn't mean that you can't see the choices for what they are, right?"

Jack put a finger on his chin, looking at her with beady eyes.

"What does that mean?"

Emma laughed and placed a finger against her lips, making them look more plush than they really were.

"You have to look at things with what you know and make an educated guess. If all we know is one person dying, or five, then we should naturally choose one, right? Even if it requires action, choosing not to is still the equivalent of killing someone. It only doesn't feel that way, and those that say differently are simply cowards trying to pretend that they aren't one."

Jack thought for a while before nodding a few times. He couldn't find any faults with that logic, despite the holes that it might've had.

"That makes sense!"

And so, Jack's mentality changed, for better or worse.