Chapter 1: Prolouge: From A Depressed Life To An Alien World

The alarm clock rings and the day starts. I wake up, wash my face, get into clothes, and wait inside the house till a new alarm rings.

It is a quiet and dull life, with everything programmed and served. It is a life I don't need to do anything. A life I could simply wait until I die without consequences. It is a life I hate to live.

But who is an ex-soldier to grumble about a quiet life since I fought for the days of peace and prosperity, or didn't I?

My name? Erwin, Erwin Blade, and only a year ago, before the peace treaty, I was a special force soldier fighting on the frontlines and accomplishing missions seen as impossible by many.

But to not confuse you more, let me go back into history a bit. Just enough to reach my childhood.

I was born in a family with deep ties to our country's arms industry and military. Fitting that, all my descendants fought on the frontlines throughout history or made weapons for the soldiers fighting.

I am no anomaly either, but this was nothing of a surprise. I started my education with private tutors teaching me the basic steps like writing and reading at the age of four and finished those before reaching the age of five. Then till I reached the age of seven, I spent most of my days learning basic traditions of my house, from medieval-style combat to horse riding, which I kept training for a long time.

But the turning point of my life was at the age of seven. Just like every member of my family, I got sent to a military school. It wasn't very different than an ordinary elementary school, except teachers focused more on discipline and physical education.

And for the rest of my education life till university, I kept rolling in military schools until I finished university with a degree in mechanical engineering. Of course, it wasn't all my life as I frequently visited (every six months of a year, to be exact) my visits to my grandfather, who was living in a privately owned forest and spending his days hunting and surviving on his own. He taught me how to find food, cook, light a fire, and most importantly, how to kill to survive.

I used almost everything he taught in my days of soldiering.

And it started with a tragedy. Roughly fifteen years before, only one year after my graduation, and in my first year working in the family company, something that changed my life happened. Our neighboring country, which we have a not pleasant history, decided to reignite the ashes of the past and started a war with a terror attack on a veteran gathering, at which my father was a guest.

Everyone inside the building the event was happening died. I remember rushing to the first train ride to the city even took and seeing my father's remains, a puddle of mushed-up flesh, bones, and blood.

We didn't even have the chance to see him one last time at his funeral, and I remember seeing my grandfather with a face so desperate and sad. My words are not enough to describe it. Even worse, he died only two days later. I learned the truth about the word of old people not being able to handle the shock of the death of a loved one.

I tightened up my fist with anger.

I still carry the hatred of that day in my heart.

But even though I lack the choice for showing my wrath today, I had one back in the day, and I used it. I joined the military, and in four years, I found myself on a special forces team. From then on, it is just killing and nothing more.

Promotion after promotion followed me, and with every bullet I shot, every mission I accomplished, and each enemy I killed, people began talking about me more.

Politicians used my loyal squad members and me as a tool for propaganda. The Pack of Wolf, fearsome warriors of our nation hunting the enemies without the slightest of hesitations.

Back then, I just played along, did whatever pose they told me to, carried small cameras on my helmet and gun for them to release footage, and read all of the speeches they gave to me.

Long as I had a weapon to fire and order to kill, I couldn't care less about the other work, but I must admit, I felt good seeing crowds of people shouting my name, supporting me, and wishing death to our enemies.

How naive I was back in the days, missing all of the death and chaos war was bringing, perhaps I managed to find the peace in the eye of the storm by throwing myself on the most dangerous of the battlegrounds, and maybe, I loved it too much, but I learned what happens behind the frontlines later. War is not limited to soldiers. The actual bloodshed happens behind the lines where civilians live.

And not all soldiers take it easy as well. After all, war is madness. It can turn the sanest person into a wild beast, doing anything and everything for survival.

Its effects can effortlessly turn a bright young person into a walking corpse with no hope for the future.

War is horror, war is murder, and war is hell's incarnation in the world.

But, I also discovered that there are some souls who wear their agony and hatred as a banner of acceptance and march straight to that hell without a moment's hesitation.

And there are ones who enjoy, ones that can laugh in the rain of blood, maniacs who want the smell of blood and gunpowder. Is there even a term for them?

But even the darkest night will end, and the sun will set on the horizon, cleanse people who wore their darkest emotions like armor.

And me, I hate to admit it, but I am one of those who loves it.

*****

"I am leaving." I closed the main door and exited the house.

Two armed guards were stationed at the gate by the government. In case anyone tries to take payback me with an assassination attempt.

"Good morning, sir. Are you out for your daily walk." One of the guards asked.

"Mornin' to you, friend. Like every other day, it is a must for me at this point." I answered with a friendly tone.

Guard nodded. "Be careful, sir. The neighborhood is safe, but you know the drill better than I do. You have many enemies who want your head."

"They can try taking it and join their brothers in arms in hell." I gave laughter and left the house. From here, I must do my daily walk around the neighborhood, but perhaps I can skip it today for a short walk in the city.

I moved to the bus stop and looked at my clock, gifted me by a minister, five past six. The bus here never misses a minute, so it should be turning the corner right now.

As I finished my sentence, a bus turned from a corner and stopped at the bus stop at the exact arrival time. Inside of it was empty, except for the driver.

I entered the vehicle and tapped a card on the screen next to the entrance.

The driver greeted me as the screen read the title. "Veteran."

"Good morning, sir Wolf. I suppose you are skipping the jogging today." His voice was joyful since the driver was a fan of mine, and he is a good man who knows how to keep his mouth shut. Perhaps he is also assigned by the government, but who knows.

"Yes, I did," I answered the man and began moving to the back of the bus. "And please be quiet about it."

The driver nodded, closed the doors, and the bus slowly accelerated forward while I sat on a single seat near the window and opened a small notepad filled with photos, letters, and writings from the past.

I looked at every page of it until I reached a page with perhaps the most important photograph of my life.

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A photo I took inside a military basses cafe, and in it, eleven people, including me, are standing around a table. I stand in the middle, and six people stand on my right, while the remaining four are on my left. All of them were my teammates.

All of them were wearing specially tailored clothes, and each had a badge that symbolized a different animal they earned through their specialty. It was the gimmick of our team.

"Pechman, Ronald, Jim, and others. Half of you are either dead or retired right now, yet with the war ending, I hope all of you found the peace I didn't."

I closed the notepad, put it inside my coat pocket, began watching the forest outside slowly connecting to the city, and put on a mask to hide my identity.

And fifty minutes later the bus stopped at the city center.

"Have a good day, sir." The driver avoided using my name, thinking if people on the bus heard famous Wolf was with them, they might attack him for a photograph.

"Thank you." I implied that I sensed what he did for me and jumped out of the bus.

After recovering my balance post jump, I reached into my pocket and pulled out my cellphone. "Now, what was the number of that man. Oh yes, seven five five..."

The phone ringed for several seconds until a man opened it.

"Hello?" An old man with a deep voice answered.

"It is me, Erwin. Are you okay if I visit you right now?" I asked.

"Fortunately, my schedule is free today. You may come anytime." The man answered with a cheerful voice.

"Okay." I ended the call. My destination is an old but luxurious apartment built in Victorian style with neon lights on its front for god knows what reason.

***

I reached my destination in a short amount of time. At the entrance, the assistant of the therapist, who was drinking tea, was waiting. She greeted me the moment she saw me. "Good morning, sir. Dr.Martin was waiting for you."

"Good morning to you, dear." I moved through the entrance corridor, entered the elevator built on the end, pressed the button for the highest floor, and watched its door close.

Elevator slowly climbed with the most generic music you might hear and slowly stopped as it reached its destination. A floor with only a single door, with this written over it. "Great Psychiatrist Martin." I entered the room in front of me. A man was waiting near a therapist's couch put in the middle, reading something from a book.

Knowing the drill, I sat on the couch, and the man sat on the chair next to me. He is Dr.Martin. He is a little goofy but a master of his work.

"So, how the peaceful life is going for our country's strongest war machine."

"Not good as you may see." I exhaled. "That same feeling, the void in me is still there, and no amount of walk can change that."

The doctor nodded and moved his fingers like he was scribbling something. "The same emptiness as always, the emotion you cannot fill no matter what you do."

"So, no cure for this time as well," I asked with a desperate voice. "God cursed me with peace after I loved war so much, I suppose."

The doctor got up from his chair and began moving around me. "Look, Erwin, we are a doctor and patient here, and I will be honest with you. You are an odd case, and want me to tell the reasons other than almost two decades of never-ending warfare you endured or your childhood which you spent with your mad grandfather who taught you how to hunt and survive in the wild until you reached the age of sixteen."

I stood up. "I want to know."

"Look, you are now a level-headed and civil gentleman, but when you find yourself in a life-threatening situation, you go batshit, no other words, complete madness. Keeping you away from any violence looks like the best way, but even if you go and become a monk in a temple at the top of Mount Everest, you couldn't just destroy these instincts of yours. You can only suppress them. Of course, unless you want to take hundreds of different medicine with god knows how many different side effects, that will be another story."

"So more walking and doing nothing." I sat back on the couch.

"Yeah, pretty much that, maybe start your little zen garden or do those weird mediation things people do with candles but keep yourself away from anything that would bring you back to the past."

I nodded, got up from the couch, and moved outside the room, but stopped at the door to say one thing. "If it was only that easy."

Again and again, even now, something inside me is tingling, saying something destructive will happen at any time, and I feel excitement for it. Damn it! I exited the elevator and began quickly moving towards the exit.

While walking, I didn't even notice Dr. Martins's assistant was missing and jumped to the street.

Suddenly a man began walking towards me. Something is off with him, but I lay a finger on it. He could be a fan. I must say he mixed me with someone.

The man loudly called my name. "Sir Erwin, the great Wolf, I am a fan. Let's take a picture."

"Sorry, I couldn't." But people walking around were already heard him and began circling me. Damn it!

The man grinned as tens of civilians packed around me for a photograph. "Yeah." He slowly said. "Smile for the photos and souls of my fallen brothers you killed." He added with a devilish and disgustingly happy tone.

It was too late. I knew something was wrong, my instincts warned me, but I missed the message. The man was a suicide bomber.

The man pressed a button on his phone, and it was all dark in seconds. My life passed through my eyes, and the last thought of me was these three words. "Fuck, that hurts."

***

"How heartbreaking. Such a good piece, dying out like that." A divine voice that resembles a goddess echoed through the endless abyss.

"Maybe?" She added with a curious tone. "We may have a little place for this wonderful sinner in our little game."

"Yes, we should." A new voice added.

"Then do it." Nine more new voices jumped into the conversation."

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