Watcher

This was a small island. It was only that Sonia's barren vocabulary had failed to produce a better noun. The place was nothing more than a palm-sized spot suddenly bulging out of the sea, as if one slightly larger wave would be enough to drown it. But the sea was quiet. Perfectly quiet. There was not a breath of wind. Sonia stood with both legs sunk in the seawater, her feet on the wet sand, and raised her head to look around. Milky-white fog closed in on every side, filling every inch of space. The sky was like a blot of thick ink spreading outward, dim and heavy. I'm dreaming, Sonia thought. She remembered with perfect clarity that she had been asleep in the women's dormitory at Sword and Rose Sorcerer University. She could not possibly have appeared on a small island all of a sudden. Once she decided it was a dream, Sonia felt much more at ease. Curious, she crouched and tasted the seawater, and found it was the same as the water she usually drank—there was even a hint of sweetness. It was nothing like the salty bitterness described in her online courses. That only made Sonia more certain she was dreaming. She had never been to the sea and had never tasted seawater, so she had no idea what it was supposed to taste like. "But if I am dreaming..." Sonia looked toward the center of the island. "Why would I dream of a corpse I have never seen?" At the center of the island, an unfamiliar corpse half-knelt on the sand. He wore a pitch-black trench coat with the hood up. His face was blurred, his clothing heavy, and nothing about his appearance showed whether he was man or woman. A longsword had pierced his chest, yet he had not fallen. He knelt on one knee. His left hand rested on the scabbard at his waist, and his right gripped the hilt of a sword not yet drawn, as if his heart had been run through before he could draw. Aside from the corpse and the sand, the island held nothing else. Sonia could not swim, and since she believed she was dreaming, she had no fear of the corpse at all. She walked over boldly to examine it. She found that the longsword piercing the corpse was still dripping blood. The blood ran along the beautiful engravings on the blade, flowing upward against its course to the dark-red gem set in the crossguard, until the whole sword seemed to have come alive. It was simply too beautiful... When Sonia came back to herself, she was already gripping the longsword tight. A scabbard that fit her palm perfectly, resplendent engravings that struck her taste dead center, and a feel like an extension of her own limb—this sword seemed as if... ...it had been forged to fit her alone. She did not stop to think. Sonia pulled the longsword out of the corpse. She had assumed the body would topple, so the moment she drew it free she stepped back, to keep the corpse from crashing down on her. But the corpse did not fall. On the contrary, he stood up. Tap, tap. To the sound of steel-soled boots on the sand, beneath Sonia's frightened gaze, the corpse slowly straightened his back and drew a cold, keen longsword. With a sharp rasp the edge split the air, and his sword tip pointed straight at Sonia. She could not make out his eyes at all, yet she felt an emotionless, ice-cold gaze! "Rest easy, Sword Princess. This time, I am not your enemy." The corpse's voice was neither male nor female, like consonants snapped out by meshing gears. "I am only going to kill you." Your definition of an enemy seems to differ rather a lot from a normal person's, hey... Sonia clenched the resplendent longsword in her hands, as if that might give her a little sense of safety. "Who are you?" Her voice shook slightly. "My name is End Watcher. You may call me Watcher," the Watcher said. "For the next seventy-two hours, you can leave this place only by defeating me. Otherwise, you can leave only after staying the full seventy-two hours." "This isn't a dream?" Sonia's eyes went wide. "The difference between dream and reality is only that reality is a dream everyone weaves together, while a dream..." "is a cage you build for yourself." The words had barely ended when the Watcher stamped the sand, stepped in, and cut. Sonia had already retreated as far as she could, yet she still could not evade the shining gleam of that blade— "You have a ten-second rest." Sonia knelt on the ground, both hands clamped tight over her throat, her face full of terror. The tearing pain was utterly real, as if that incomprehensible freak had just severed her neck. If this were a dream, then the instant she suffered pain like that, she ought to have woken in her comfortable, warm bed. And yet— "The ten seconds are up. I advise you to grip your sword tight. Only then can you..." Sonia looked up and saw the Watcher seize the hilt, draw it in at his waist, take a ready draw stance, and kick hard off the sand with both legs, charging in to cut her down! Sonia hastily raised her longsword and retreated, but that one step of the Watcher's crossed more than ten paces as abruptly as a sideways slide. By the time she saw the sword-light he had left behind, the Watcher's voice was already rising behind her— "...die with a little more dignity." "You have a ten-second rest." The instant Sonia came back from the pain of beheading, she did not hesitate. She turned and leapt into the sea, unable to swim or not! Fear of death seemed to have stirred some hidden potential. Sonia had all but taught herself to swim. It was an extremely ugly dog paddle, nothing but splash, but so long as she could get away from that dreadful island and its freak, that was enough! If her belly had not been empty in the dream, Sonia would even have tried the fart-propulsion method from the jokes. Amid the thrash of spray, Sonia clearly heard the Watcher's voice. "Running away is shameful." "And useless." A sudden chill touched the nape of her neck. Sonia looked down and saw a cold sword tip jutting out through her throat. Before the pain could roll over her like a wave, Sonia found herself back on the island. "You have a ten-second rest." This time she did not run. She looked at the Watcher's hand. "You seem to be expecting that once I throw the sword, I'll have no weapon left?" The Watcher sheathed the sword at his leisure. "You have already died several times. Why are you still this naive?" "You're being completely unreasonable." Sonia gave a bitter smile. "Reason exists only on the point of a sword. If you want to talk reason, your mouth is useless. Convince me with a sword." Before the Watcher had finished, Sonia splashed into the sea. This time she did not swim. She dove under, trying to dodge the Watcher's attack. 'You can't very well cut the sea in two!' she thought. And so it truly was. Five seconds, ten seconds, thirty seconds... A minute passed, and Sonia was not attacked once. But she could not breathe, and she felt she was about to faint. This was clearly a dream. Why would a lack of oxygen still leave her brain short of blood!? The pain of holding her breath was not one bit less than beheading. Sonia could not bear it. She picked a spot at random and surfaced, meaning to snatch a breath and dive again, a slim hope in her heart: I'll only breathe for a second or two. He can't possibly find me that fast!? A few seconds later, Sonia was sitting on the island, covering the mouth that had just been pierced, licking her teeth over and over with her tongue to make sure the flying sword had not cut her tongue off. "You have a ten-second rest." "Watcher!" Sonia shouted, her face full of rage. Teeth clenched, both hands tight on the longsword, she gathered her courage and walked toward the Watcher. The Watcher let out an "Oh," his right hand lightly stroking the hilt. "If you want to end the rest early, I have no objection." Smack! Sonia thudded to her knees before the Watcher. "O great, benevolent, and kindly unknown sovereign, Sonia is willing to pray to You day and night, to hear Your holy words, to follow Your miracles, and to chant your decrees... Please don't torment me like this. Whatever you want me to do, just say it outright. I'm very good and very obedient. You can order me to do anything, wuuh wuuh..." "Truly anything?" the Watcher asked. Sonia raised her head. She wept like rain on pear blossoms, exceptionally alluring. She seemed to hesitate. A blush rose on her face, and she gritted her teeth and nodded her fair head. "Anything." "Very well. I command you—" The Watcher gripped the hilt and took a ready draw stance. "Defeat me." Shing! "You have a ten-second rest." Sonia lay on the sand, staring blankly at the sky, black as thick ink. Then she flipped up like a carp, got to her feet, and asked in confusion: "No, wait. I never offended you before. Why waste your time on a nobody like me? The world is full of people guilty of monstrous crimes. If you want to punish evil and root it out, I can recommend a few. If you're a great villain yourself, I can also recommend several high-ranking, powerful figures who put on righteous faces." "I'm just a very ordinary female student. I'm not worth all this effort against me. What you're doing now is like firing a spiral light cannon at a mosquito, or sending a sword sorcerer to chop firewood. It's an enormous waste of resources. Wouldn't you say?" "Whatever you want me to do, just say so. Anyone can see I'm a frail rose, there for people to ravage as they please, born only to drift with the current..." Just as Sonia tried to move him with feeling and persuade him with reason, the Watcher shook his head. "You're wrong." Sonia said at once, "Where did I go wrong? Tell me, and I'll correct it for sure." "You went wrong with the very first sentence." "The first sentence?" "How can you be so sure," the Watcher said, gripping the hilt and taking a ready draw stance, "that you never offended me before?" Shing! "You have a ten-second rest." Perhaps because she had died so often, Sonia even felt that beheading was really just that. Once you got used to the pain, it was nothing. She looked up at the Watcher. "If I only stay the full seventy-two hours, I can leave this damned dream?" "Yes." The Watcher nodded. "But there is no clock here. Set against a human life, seventy-two hours is not long. For death, though, seventy-two hours is not short either." "Can you really endure seventy-two hours of dying again and again?" "And why would you believe the words of someone who keeps killing you in a dream? What if I am lying?" "Even granting the furthest concession—suppose you truly can leave the dream tonight, what about tomorrow night? And the night after?" The Watcher took a ready draw stance. "You have already seen death. You should not put your hopes on a miracle." Shing! The Watcher stepped forward. As he drew and swept the blade across, his whole body spun a full turn with it, crossing more than ten paces in an instant. Borne on the enormous force of that spin, the longsword was about to behead Sonia once again, like a hot knife through butter— Clang! For the first time, Sonia's blade blocked the Watcher's edge! There was no expression on Sonia's face then. No fear, no anger, no killing intent, no plea—only the coldest silence. In pupils like rubies, the Watcher's blurred form was reflected, as if she would imprint him deep in her heart! "You leave me no choice."