A Monster's Fate

 For anyone reading this, prepare yourself for the rushed and janky ending that was season one of this fic, also, sorry not sorry, as at the time of writing this chapter, my motivation for the fic was running on fumes.

/YES, FINALLY, SEASON ONE IS DONE.

 Now, as I said in the false chapter, don't expect good writing, expect mediocre at most, also, I accidentally left a few plot holes with how the ending went down, and I will confidently say, it could have been better, but I don't feel like fixing said holes, so I'll leave them as is and give a simple answer to the more obvious ones in the author note. Moving on, expect problems with grammar, character personality, lack of character personality, unreadable sentences, sentences that don't make sense, pacing, and more; hope you enjoy this mediocre piece, enjoy.\

"Fuck."

 That was the only word I heard Chuck say before he picked me up and started blitzing back the way we fled, his gaze frantic with terror.

 There were a few things I wanted to say and ask, but I was preoccupied with shielding my face from the belting winds, and small pieces of debris kicked up by his speed. This was further complicated when one realised I only had one arm to work with. 

 It didn't take long for this shielding process to become bothersome, so I was quick to think of something. After a second of focusing and ignoring the winds, my body ignited in green, and a thin layer of grid-like film enveloped me, shielding me from both the winds and debris.

 However, this rediscovered ability was soon to be found useless as we stopped on a roof not far from the house I described earlier, after which I was put down, though not very gently, as he basically dropped me like a sack of potatoes.

 Thanks to the green film, nothing was hurt, but it still pissed me off that he would just drop me like that; I mean, come on, what happened to that humility from earlier?

 "Clem..." He spoke as he focused on something near the house, "I need you to do me a favor... Okay?"

 Still ticked off, I scoffed, thinking nothing of his odd behavior. "Fine, what do you want, stupid old Baka."

 He chuckled, "I need you to stay up here, no matter what you hear or see; stay up here and don't move, Okay?"

 I was not too fond of his tone; it made it sound like he was going somewhere, but I wasn't one to argue unless I was high on emotion, so I nodded and crouched down, looking to get comfortable until he got back.

 Smiling, he reached down and patted me on the head.

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 I knew how this was going to end; I knew it since I leaped off the roof. Looking back, I caught a few glimpses of that thing; its many hands doing well in getting it moving.

 Yet despite the inevitable, I could smile; I could smile, knowing Clementine would be safe.

 I pushed myself further, leaping even greater distances to get the creature to speed up. Looking back, I seemed to work, as the creature had completely thrown away stealth, instead opting for a pace that could keep up with mine.

 Looking forward, I found that I was coming up on a gas station, its walls only slightly crumbled, and the things that made it a gas station only slightly rusted.

 Deciding that this would be the best place to do it, I leaped one final time before landing on the sidewalk next to it; from there, I hauled ass over to the two very similar pumps; now, all I had to do was wait.

 Sighing, I pulled one of those wine bottles out of a satchel on my back before popping the cork. I heard it; the groan of concrete. After taking a swig, I looked over to find the creature eyeing me with what looked like drool leaking out of its toothy mouth.

 I chuckled, "Do I really look that good?"

 To my shock, the creature nodded.

After the shock subsided, I grinned. "Say, you wouldn't happen to know how to speak, would you?"

 The creature started walking closer, "You- you- you food- me- me eat- food- you eat- food- too?"

 I couldn't take anymore and burst out laughing, dropping the wine bottle in the process, "Well," I struggled out, "That's new." 

 The creature had not ceased its approach but did start mimicking my laugh, joining in like an emotionless doll trying to imitate a human.

 After regaining some air, I backed away closer to the pumps but kept it discreet just in case the thing was that self-aware. Soon, the thing had sat right in front of me, mouth wide open, ready to tear me limb from limb; however, it was in for a nasty surprise.

 Using my hand on the pump, I started rapidly forcing my mana to collide under my palm, creating friction that was rapidly heating up; it got to the point where my hand burst into flame, embers of my melted flesh falling to the ground carrying flame with them, this flame had eventually reached the shattered bottle of wine setting it ablaze.

 The creature reacted to this by trying to jump away, but I wasn't going to let that happen, and locked the thing in a side hug, using mana to reinforce my body enough to keep it still.

 It raved, striking and biting, even going as far as to rip off one of my legs, yet I bared with it, endured, until eventually, something popped, and my world was bathed in flame.

 I smiled one final time, "Did I do well... Ru?"

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 "Lee! Lee, are you there!?" I screamed, hoping he'd call back. Sadly, the only thing I got in return was the bellowing moans of the walkers below, their rotten and broken forms hovering under us, desperate to rend us nothing more than a pile of flesh. 

 As I was about to try calling again, someone stopped me, they're hand laying tight on my shoulder. 

 Turning to face Molly, I let my displeasure be known, "The fuck you want."

 She sighed, "Listen man, I know you care about your friend, but yelling down at an ally full of walkers won't help find him."

 In frustration, I swatted her hand away, "Fuck off."

 She frowned before continuing, "Besides, I doubt he's dead."

 It was my turn to frown. "What do you mean?"

 She shook her head before pointing down at the alleyway, "See that manhole cover? It wasn't open when we first got here, so I'd say he'd managed to slip in before he was surrounded."

 At the observation, I felt relieved; I'd already lost so much to those freaks, and the thought of losing one of the last threads tying me to this god-forsaken earth hurt more than I'd like to admit.

 I sighed, "Ya, you're probably right, sorry."

 She grinned, "Don't sweat it, old dude; we all have our rough days; it's just some can hurt more than others."

 I felt comforted by her words, yet still very annoyed at being called old; I was only forty-two, for god's sake. 

 Forgoing that train of thought, I looked away from the ally and to her, "So, got any plans on how we get down without being mauled by walkers?"

 She grinned, "Why yes, I do, and you'll be acting as the bait."

"Bait?"

 It all happened so fast, one second, I was standing on the roof with her, and the next, I was back down at the peer where I was checking out the boats.

 Tuning away from the water, I decided to question what the fuck that was later and crotched over to the ally all the walkers were supposed to be in. Peaking around the corner, I wasn't surprised to find the many walkers still scrambling over each other to try and scale the building, but unsurprisingly, they failed every time.

 Looking up at where I was just at, I saw a note of some kind engraved into the stone, its letters glowing in turquoise. Once again, ignoring the oddity, I read it.

 'If you are reading this, then that means I was successful, and with this success comes the next part,' Come on, she can't be serious, 'make as much noise as humanly possible and run, run as far as you can.' Does she want me to die? 'Ps; you won't die. Love Molly.'

 Sceptical of this, I did exactly the opposite, opting to back up from the ally entrance; however, it looked like I didn't have a choice in that matter, as in a sudden twist of events, every step I made sounded like a gunshot going off.

 In a panic, I turned to find every walker that was in or around that ally pooling out like a swarm of insects, their eager, empty eyes looking to rend me apart.

 Now, seeing as I had no choice but to obey that stupid message, I turned and ran like hell. Yet despite this, when I looked back expecting the walkers to have fallen behind, I was terrified to find them keeping pace. 'Were they running?!'

 I didn't want to believe it, but the fact that they were right there made it almost undeniable. So now, with a new problem to worry about, I pushed my body to its limits, too afraid to slow down even for a second.

 Clearing hurdle after hurdle in both the literal and metaphorical sense, my focus eventually slipped, leading to my inevitable collision with the pavement.

 Still filled with fear, I looked behind me to see if I had at least put some distance between them and me, only to be met with an open maw, ready to tear my head off.

 Without giving me any time to think, its jaw snapped shut and my world went black.

 My eyes snapped open as I bolted to my feet, eyes frantically looking around for that hoard of runners, yet instead of finding them, I was instead met with Molly, her cheeky smile ever present.

 Glaring, I nearly screamed, "What the fuck was that!"

 She had the gale to chuckle, "Well, I take it this is your first time seeing someone using mana?"

 My face scrunched in confusion, "Mana?"

 She chuckled again, "I'll take that as a yes."

 Still confused at what she was talking about, I pushed. "Wait, wait, first off, what the hell is mana? And second, didn't I just die?"

 She grinned a bit, "How about we talk about that on the move; it's getting dark and I'd rather not be hopping buildings in pitch black."

 At the sun's mention, I turned to see that she was right; it was slowly but surely falling over the horizon, "Wait," my head snapped back to her, "Did you just say hopping buildings?!"

 She was laughing at this point.

 "Hey!" My face was turning red in embarrassment, "Why Are you laughing?! And what did you mean by hopping buildings!? Stop laughing! It's not funny!"

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 If I had to describe the scene before me, I'd say it was horrific. Blood littered almost every inch of the room, and piles of unrecognizable gore sat scattered around, littering both the floor and metal tables.

 Walking further in, the smell really became recognizable, so much so I had to use my hand to pinch my nose shut, lest I puke up my nonexistent stomach contents.

 Shaking my head, I decided it was best I didn't linger too long and began moving to the other side of the room where I saw a door, upon turning its nob, it opened with a satisfying click, revealing an identical sewer on the other side.

 Sighing, I continued my march forward, determined to find an exit.

 In my determination, I was oblivious to the duel-colored arua leaking off my figure, its black and white form looking close to a Dalmatian, that is if the Dalmatian had its colors evenly split down the middle. 

 I was also oblivious to the light trail I had been subconsciously following, its lead taking me where I wanted to be the most.

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 I bolted up with difficulty as I looked into the distance to find something big had exploded, yet as much as I wanted to check it out, I had promised the old Baka I wouldn't move from this spot until he said otherwise, and on top of that, the last time I went off on my own, I ended up with a missing arm.

 This is what my thoughts were before my gaze turned to the house Chuck was gazing at earlier. The only thing I could find cool about the house was the fact it had a spiked metal fence surrounding most of it, but other than that the thing looked as plain and normal as any other house you'd find around here.

 With it not being as far away as the explosion, I figured it would be okay to investigate. As such, I walked over to the edge of the building before letting myself fall to the street below, this time landing on my feet.

 Standing straight, I made my way over to the house's front door before trying to open it, but after a few seconds of it not budging, I resolved to kick the door down, only falling in my ass twice while trying. After three kicks, the door was forced open, revealing the nearly untouched exterior inside.

 However, just because it looked untouched doesn't mean it wasn't, and the wide claw marks on the wall could attest to that.

 Walking further in, I could tell that some struggle had occurred, and I didn't base that off of the still-wet blood painting the walls, but the still-warm body of Ben, his head having been ripped clean from his body.

 With my bipolar tendency, I had completely discarded my worries about Chuck, instead opting to crouch down with a smile and poke the lifeless corpse, looking to get a reaction out of it.

 However, when the body made no move to react, I was quick to bore. Standing up, I kicked the corpse for being so boring before making my way upstairs, where I could smell more iron.

 The iron scent was immediately identified as Krista, her body having been mangled and her eyes gouged. Walking over, I scoffed, "Bitch." I still hadn't forgotten how she treated Lee back on the train, and I could only sing my praise to whatever had managed to get to her first.

 As I was about to stand and go find the final scent, something stopped me. Reaching down with curiosity, I fetched an eye, fully intact; now, the normal thing one would do in this situation would be one, run out of the house after seeing the first corpse, and two, put down the eye and walk away, but I think we've already established that I wasn't normal, nor could I ever remember being normal. 

 Blurred memory sprang to mind at the thought, showing what I was sure would have been things before the apocalypse had they not been so distorted.

 Shaking my head, I let my curiosity get the better of me before popping the eye in my mouth like a gumball, letting the irony flavor sink in. At first, the taste was nothing special, but after biting into the thing, some kind of liquid that wasn't blood started leaking out, smothering my taste buds in something that tasted like a cake I'd used to get from San- something. Either way, it was a treat that the San person used to give me for being good and behaving.

 Letting the flavor sink in for a bit, I tried looking for the other eye, wanting to save it for later, but after a few seconds of looking, it grew too bothersome, so I gave up and stood.

 Having already sucked the flavor out of the now-deflated eye, I spit out what remained and walked away, aiming for the faint heartbeat I could sense in the room at the end of the hall.

 Walking up to the door, I pushed its ajar form open to find the owner of said heartbeat, Omid. 

 He had his back against the bed and was missing an arm and leg; it looked like something was in the middle of eating him, but was distracted. 

 Discarding this fact, I walked up to him before crouching, and much to my delight, this got a reaction out of him.

 "Clem... Clementine...?"

 Seeing as he hadn't raised his gaze to look at me, I'd assumed he could tell it was me due to my small figure or dress, which now that I noticed, was covered in a vast amount of blood, specifically on my left side, which I could only blame my missing arm for.

 I was drawn from thought by Omid, whom I had completely forgotten about in favor of thinking of my dress.

 "Is... Krista... Okay?"

 Half tempted to go back and drag her body back to him, I instead shook my head before sighing, "Afraid not, 'Last I saw she had been torn in half and missing both eyes, one of which I turned into a snack' But from what I saw, it was instant, 'It probably felt like torture.'

 His breath paused, "Ohh," It was his last.

My only response to this was pity and glee.

 Curious as to what his eye would've tasted like, I reached for one but was stopped when someone very familiar screamed, "Holy shit!" Downstairs.

 Excited, I had forgotten about Omid's eyes and went to greet my second favorite person. Upon getting to the top of the stairs, I was met with Kenny's gaze, his eyes flashing from relief to horror as his eyes drifted down some.

 "God!" He all but ran up the stairs, "What the fuck happened!?"

 A warm sensation spurred at his worry, and I grinned at the feeling. But he was looking for an explanation, so I was quick to think one up. 

 The story I told him went like this; we were all just sitting in the house, waiting for them to return, but out of nowhere something started violently beating on the door; Krista was quick to get me and Omid upstairs before going back down to help Ben block the door, but halfway down, the door was forced open, and something really big made its way inside, where it then proceeded to kill Ben.

 Having been at the top of the stairs just behind Krista, I then watched as Krista turned and ran back, but doing something stupid, I stayed, trying to buy time for her and Omid; as the creature was about to rend me to pieces, Krista had pushed me away, resulting in me only losing an arm instead of my life.

 Unfortunately, the same couldn't be said for her, as the creature began to violently rip her to pieces. After that, I ran up into the attic instead of the room Omid was in, closing the drop-down stairs behind me.

 Not long after going so, I heard Omid scream out in pain, so I tucked myself against the wall and went silent, after a bit, Omid had stopped screaming, and I heard the creature turn, before running out of the house, seemingly distracted by something else.

 From there, I waited a bit longer before opening the attic again.

 I left out the rest, as there was no reason for him to know that; plus, he now had a clear picture of what happened to the others, and I had an alibi for my missing arm.

 I was drawn from my devious thoughts by Kenny's pitying voice, his arms having wrapped around me to bring me into a hug, of which he started profusely apologizing; for what, I had no idea, but I didn't really care, as this was the first time he's hugged me.

 Bringing my one arm around, I cried with crocodile tears, selling the story and making look like it had actually affected me in some way.

 However, I knew this story wouldn't work with Lee, as he was already very aware of my absence from the house, so thinking back on Chuck's comment, I'd opt to tell him the whole truth, minus the eye part of course, that could stay between me and the air.

 After pulling back from the hug, Kenny kindly wiped away my salty tears, leaving nothing but thin lines running down my face. It was nice, and my liking for him was increasing tenfold every second, but strangely enough, with that liking came an unnatural hatred for his now-deceased family members, though I couldn't care less about them, as they were dead now.

 "Come one Clementine, I think it's best for us to get out of here before whatever that thing was shows up again."

 Nodding, I began to descend the stairs before realizing what he had said, "Wait, what about Lee?"

 He simply smiled, "Don't worry, I have an odd feeling he'll find us."

 It was reassuring to hear him say that, but at the same time, it wasn't the most comforting. Taking his word as it was, I reluctantly left the house with him, oblivious to his glowing red eyes; however, if you thought back on it, he was very quick to dismiss the deaths of the group, so I suppose it was my fault for being naive and taking his hand.

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 "Wait, hold on a minute; you're saying everyone will be able to use this stuff?" I said, directing my question toward Molly.

 Without missing a step, she replied. "Well, that's my theory at least, so don't take it to heart, K."

 I sighed, "So what can you do with your magic stuff anyway?"

 She chuckled as we continued to walk the road, "I think it depends really, but mind you, I haven't run into many others with the ability to use mana, so I can't say much on it; however, I do have a theory or two cooked up, if you'd want to hear."

 I gave her a questioning look, "Well, speak up then; what's your theory?"

Sighing, she went on, "Alright then, but just like the last theory, don't-"

 "Take it to heart; I know."

 She carried on as if she didn't hear me. "Anyway, as you asked earlier, it is not what we can do, but what we are limited to do, for example, if you were to take two people with mana and have them show off, you'd find that one could make fire out of nothing, while the other could manipulate earth; now say the one who can make fire wants to learn how to manipulate the earth and vise versa; they'd both try and fail, no matter how much they practice."

 I scratched my head before popping in, "Okay, one, was that example based on that one show where people were able to play with elements? And two, why can't they learn how to do the thing the other can do; they both have mana after all."

 She snickered, "One, It's the Avatar The Last Air Bender, and two, the reason for their failure wouldn't lie within the lack of practice, but the lack of mana; you see the one wielding fire had his mana tuned in such a way that it allowed for him to do so; same with the earth, so in conclusion, unless they had managed to find a way to swap mana types, they would be unable to ever do what the other could, thus concluding theory one."

 Before we could get into the next theory, a manhole cover we had just passed started rattling, catching both of our immediate attention.

 Twisting back, I was quick to pull out my gun before training it on the manhole cover, nervous as to what was under it.

 Looking over, I was also surprised to find Molly, shaking slightly; now if this were a normal person, I'd say they had every right to be scared, but Molly wasn't normal and could do things as outrageous as jumping buildings, so to see her shaking, was an early warning sign to run the fuck away.

 However, we didn't get a chance to put that plan into effect, as the manhole cover was all but shot into the air, its form landing some ways down the street.

 Now this had me reeling from surprise, but I wasn't going to let said surprise be the death of me, so I kept my crosshairs trained on the now-opened manhole, ready to load the entire clip into whatever came out.

 In a sudden burst of motion, whatever shoved the cover off leaped out; we didn't even have time to react as whatever it was landed directly behind us.

 Moving as fast as I could, I swung around, only to have the muzzle of my gun crushed shut; Molly wasn't any better as she had tried to swing at it with her pick, only for it to be shattered moments later, its fragmented parts barely being blocked by that mana of her's.

 Letting go of my gun, I jumped back as far as my human capabilities would allow, leading to me landing a bit short of where the manhole was.

 It was when I was debating whether or not to try and book it that I got a good look at our assailant, his familiar mug sending unnatural shivers down my spine.

 "Lee?!" I shouted in surprise.

 He responded by glancing at me; after the brief staring contest, he knelt close to the ground before leaping away with a blurred figure.

 I was in so much shock that I didn't have time to process what happened before something took hold of my leg. In panic, I looked down to find a severely decayed walker grabbing onto me from the manhole.

 My panic was made even more severe when it didn't give me time to resist before pulling me down. As time seemed to slow, I looked to Molly, hoping she'd come to my aid.

 But to my horror, she seemed to be dealing with her own problem at the moment, said problem taking the form of a Stag, its body having mutated into something nearly unrecognizable.

 This was all I saw as I fell into the darkness; my fate lying up to what I would do about it.

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 It burned, everything burned; but why?

 I felt like I was walking in a fog; one that had clouded everything.

 I shook my head clear of doubt as I ran through the winding labyrinth, my path clear and direct thanks to the double-colored specks of light leading me.

 It wasn't long before the light had stopped going forward, instead aiming for the ceiling.

 Jumping up, I rammed my shoulder into the solid metal cover blocking me from following the path; it wasn't long before the thing gave way, revealing the brightening sky above.

 Leaping out, I landed behind familiar people. Or at least they looked familiar, my mind was still in murky water.

 'Lee?' that sounded familiar too, but I couldn't put my finger on why.

 I turned, deciding it was best to focus on what I was currently aiming for. Her? 

 Who was her? And why was I so adamant about getting to her?

 I leaped away, still unsure of why I was doing this, but too confused to stop it.

 The path; it was getting brighter.

 I lept again. Something caved, and I fell.

 After picking myself up off the pavement, I ignored the uncountability shooting down my leg, and lept again.

 It was after my fifth leap that I felt something poke through my uncomfortable foot; when looking down to investigate, I was numb to the way my foot was distorted, and how the bone that centered it was stabbing through my ankle, its bony structure barely holding up under the concretes impact.

 With force, I kicked out with it, and the foot that had been barely hanging on was flung off, its destination unknown to me.

 After this, I continued to pursue the trail, uncaring of the absence of my foot.

 It was when the trail was getting brightest that a name popped into mind, its letters dancing circles around my tongue. 'Clementine'.

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 My arm hurt, and it wasn't the missing one; no, it was my still-remaining one, specifically the grip Kenny had on it.

 We had started walking to god knows where when, out of nowhere, Kenny took my arm and started dragging me along. At first, it was no big deal, but over the course of a few minutes, his grip had tightened to the point where trying to move it was making my fingers ach in uncontrollable pain.

 Yet, I still kept quiet on the matter, too stubborn in my resolve to keep quiet like he asked. It tightened again, and I winced in pain as I swear I could have felt something crack that time.

 With it becoming almost too painful to bear, I pushed some green mana up my arm in an attempt to use that grid-like film from earlier, its protective nature looking very appetizing.

 However, as the mana was traveling up my arm, something akin to a roadblock made itself known; its red hue too familiar to ignore.

 Thinking it was my mana, I tried pulling at the wall, aiming to put it back where it belonged while letting the green mana continue its path, but in a shocking revelation, the mana, which I thought to be my own, refused to budge and the resulting clash between the two manas sent the equivalent of electric shocks coursing up my arm, and back down my leg.

 Still being dragged along, I did my best to hide the spasms from garnering his attention lest he found out the unnecessary details. 

 It was near the point when my arm started caving that my anger flared, and with it came the molten mana, its temper not easily dulled.

 Without much effort, I broke free, breaking his hand in the process. Stopping, I rubbed at the area where the grip was, noting that as soon as I used the red mana, every once of pain I was feeling had dulled significantly, becoming nothing more than a mosquito bite to me.

 It was also at that moment that something finally clicked.

 Looking up, I found that the click was not unfounded, as standing in the same place Kenny was not long ago was a man with deep black hair and pupils as red as blood, neatly dressed in what looked to be a suit; fancy dress shoes included.

 He was the first to speak.

 "So, it looks like he wasn't wrong after all; your strength is nothing to scoff at." He smiled

 I scoffed at his smile, "Who are you? And what have you done with Kenny?"

 Chuckling, he bit back, "I didn't do anything to him; just borrowed his form for a moment to drag you closer to our destination."

 My brow furrowed, "The fuck you mean, 'Our destination?'"

 His smiling persisted, "Since I have nothing to lose in telling you, I suppose you wouldn't mind sitting down for a chat?"

 I wasn't an idiot, nor was I oblivious/ sometimes.

 Moving on, it wasn't hard to tell he wanted me still for some ulterior motive; what it was? I had no clue, but I was going to find out.

 Sitting down on the pavement, I gestured for him to do the same, which he readily did.

 "Anyway, now that we've turned this overly tense situation into something more formal, I'd say we can get this discussion going." He said while leaning on one hand.

 I scoffed, "The situation wouldn't have been so tense had you just started with your real face instead of using a cheap copy of someone I cared about."

 Grinning, he ignored my explanation and moved on with the subject. "As I was saying, this place I wanted to bring you to isn't anything bad, just something that would help restrain you in case anything went awry."

 Ignoring my sudden spike in caution from the mention of restraints, I pushed on, "What do you mean? Why would you need to restrain me if the place you're trying to bring me to isn't supposed to be anything dangerous?"

 His face cracked a smile, "Tsk, tsk, tsk, I said, 'Isn't anything bad,' I never said it wasn't dangerous; geez, what does master see in an assuming brat like you?"

 I ignored the insult, "Master?"

He looked away in what looked to be boredom before replying, "Well ya, I wouldn't come all the way down to this infected mess of a plant for a useless little runt like you unless I was ordered to, which I was."

 My brows furrowed, "You fraze it as if you aren't also from this planet, why?"

 Clicking his tongue, he sighed. "Not the time; anyway, the place I was ordered to take you to doesn't do well with the unique manas you've somehow acquired, and thus, it's a possibility that when you step into the place, the manas you've collected thus far would go haywire, resulting in your imminent death."

 Chills ran up my spine at the admittance, "Then what the hell are the restraints for?!"

 He faced palmed at my inquiry, "Idiot."

 It wasn't until a few moments of silence later that I myself realized that the restraints would most likely be able to restrain not me but the pools of mana lingering inside.

 He raised an eyebrow when looking at me, "You get it?"

I nodded, hiding my embarrassment.

 "Good, moving on-"

 He was stopped when a noticeable presence made itself known to us, the pressure radiating off it utterly dwarfing anything I had ever felt before.

 We both bolted up at its approach; me curious as to what it could've been, and him looking ready to bolt had anything unsavory showed up.

 Distant sounds of collapsing concrete could be heard, along with it were the now unsettling screams waling with its looming approach; I could tell it wouldn't be long before whatever it was to get here.

 Looking over, I found that the man who acted so high and mighty had fled, leaving me to deal with whatever coming.

 As I was starting to think of turning tail, the building in front of me was reduced to rubble,

 Shielding my eyes, I rested my arm in front of my face, its form covered by a green grid to keep debris from going into it, and my eyes, but that wasn't to say the rest of my body wasn't covered; it's just not a top priority at the moment.

 After a few cuts to my dress and chest, the debris stopped flying, and a dust cloud was left in its wake, completely smothering what had made the debris fly in the first place.

 Lowering my arm, I spun around, not too keen on letting whatever this thing was have the advantage of sight.

 After turning one two many times, I figured it was going to have no effect. Getting low to the ground, I bent my knees as far as they would go; however, just as I was about to launch myself up in the air, a low and light noise not belonging to this world made itself known a few inches away from my ear.

 Shaken but not afraid, I kept my crouching position and slowly turned to face whatever abomination caused this.

 Locking eyes with the six-eyed beast, I froze.

 "Lee?" I spoke in uttered silence. 

 Without any warning, a long spiked leg came out of the dust cloud and pierced my stomach. Letting my head drift down with shocked eyes, I touched around the area, finding my blood to be a very vibrant and beautiful red.

 I coughed, red? The coughs continued; it wasn't long before my entire dress was covered in nothing but bloody red.

 As Lee pulled out the spiked leg, I could feel small trails of tears running down my face, their destination being my dress or the ground.

 Clutching my stomach, I looked up to find the dust settled, revealing what would be considered a monstrous spider, its eight legs, each barbed with points that face away from the ground it stood on.

 Those legs carried its large and detesting body, faces of many imprinted on its abdomen, their screams of agony constantly yearning for the release of death, yet are unable to ever reach it.

 As my hazed gaze lifted, I was once again met with the ever-gentle face of the only one I considered father, the one I was desperate to keep alive, and the one that hurt me the most.

 Helpless to stop my world from turning red, I could feel the exact moment my mind was slipping; soon, I was in the space of my mana pools, crying in their center.

 The crying was made worse when the green man pool left its containment and started enveloping me in a blanket of comfort.

 It was only hours later when my cries ceased, that I woke up naked, exhausted, and alone on a train cart. Sitting up, I looked around, finding that the once vibrant car was now empty, only hosting me and a shotgun I saw in the distance.

 Crawling over, I clutched the gun with my one arm and pulled it close to my chest before crying myself to sleep, thinking of the few words that I could remember from the clash.

 "I'm sorry, Clementine."

 It was safe to say there would be no nice dreams from this point forward.

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 As she slipped away into her eternal nightmare, her bare shoulder lit up in green before a butterfly flew out, its visage morphing and contorting into something more human.

 As two feet placed themselves on the ground, the emerald being knelt down before waving a hand and conjuring an emerald hooded robe, its existence gently laid over her bare flesh.

 "I'm sorry, my child," It spoke, "I'm sorry you had to realize the horrors of reality so soon, and I'm sorry this horror will continue to haunt you until the end of time. I'm truly sorry."