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a little bonus for your patience
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2025-01-26 01:17:51I watch from the shadows as Christian is dragged back to the cells. His head is lowered, his posture slumped, but there's something about him that doesn't break. His face is bloodied, a bruise already swelling beneath one eye, but his eyes, they're still burning with fire, still defiant, still unyielding. I can’t help but feel a flicker of something deep inside me. Hope? No. Maybe something worse.
This place has taken so much from me,...so much from all of us. We’ve been chained and broken, forced to fight, to survive, to serve as entertainment for those who think they control our lives. And yet, here he is,..Christian, the rogue, the former guard, the legend, the one that brought bits of food and from what i heard, the one that saved so many when this all started.
He’s not like the others. I can see it in the way he carries himself. The way his shoulders never fully slump, even when they shove him back into the cage. They throw him in like they’ve done to so many before him, and I can see the way the others flinch. The guards laugh, like it’s some victory, but I’m not fooled.
I’ve been here long enough to know that the real battle is never in the pit. It’s here, in the silence between the fights, when the cage doors are locked and the chains are tight. That’s when they break you. When they leave you alone with your thoughts, with your guilt, your fear, your desperation. When they strip you of everything but your need to survive. And that’s where the others go. They let it break them. They let themselves fall apart. But not Christian.
I’ve never seen anyone take the hits like he does. I’ve never seen someone get dragged into the pit, forced to fight for his life, and still not give them the satisfaction of losing. There’s something in his eyes that says he’s not going down without a fight. That even if they kill him, they’ll have to burn the world to the ground to do it.
I turn my head, pretending I’m not watching, but I can’t look away. I can hear the rattling of his chains as they drag him back to the cages. It sounds like metal scraping against metal. It sounds like defeat. But it’s not. It’s the sound of resistance. It’s the sound of someone who still believes, still fights. Still has something worth fighting for.
As the door to his cage clangs shut, I know something has changed. Christian isn’t just another shifter thrown into the arena. He’s a spark, and sparks,.... sparks start fires. And that fire? That’s the one we’re all waiting for. The one we’ve all been waiting for, but didn’t know we needed until now.
I don’t know if he’ll succeed. I don’t know if any of us will. But I’ll be damned if I’m not going to follow him into whatever comes next.
Christian doesn’t know it yet, but he’s not alone.
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The last Guardian a little bonus for your patience
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The last Guardian Chapter Twenty-Eight: Trial by Fire
Sam’s p.o.v.The morning light slices through the trees, golden and unforgiving. I’m standing in the center of the clearing, arms crossed, waiting and watching as Tara trudges into view. Her steps are slower today, heavier. The exhaustion from yesterday’s training obviously lingering in the tightness of her movements and the slump of her shoulders. Still, there’s that familiar fire in her eyes as she looks up towards me, like a glimmer of stubborn resolve that refusing to be extinguished.Good. She’s going to need every ounce of that stubbornness for what’s coming.I’ve seen my share of battles, but even if only half of what Linda told me will come to be, it’s going to be a suicide mission if she’s not ready.“Tara,” I called, tossing her weighted gauntlets. She caught them, though the force of the throw made her stagger a bit, her muscles must be sore. “Today, we focus on endurance.”She stared at the gauntlets, then at me. She wisely keeps any protests herself, though I saw a flicke
The last Guardian Chapter twenty-seven: The Cage of Despair
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The last Guardian Chapter Twenty-six: Mixed up
Linda’s P.o.v. I look at Tara standing at the edge of the clearing, her breath visible in the crisp morning air. Before her, Sam pacing like the restless predator he is, that boy has never been one to stay in one place for too long, what kept him here till now.. I’m guessing it’s fate and this moment right here. No one can prepare our dear Tara for what’s to come the way he can. I’m not entirely sure what his life looked like in the years after the raid, but from what little snippets the Goddess has shown me, it was a hard life. His gaze is sharp and assessing. Watching from the shadows, I breathe deeply. I saw the fire flash in her eyes again during yesterday’s training, the images that came to me during the night burned just as bright, I finally understand why her family tree has missing pieces, why no one ever wrote down exactly who started her bloodline from both sides of the family. Folding my hands neatly in front of me I try to calm my demeanor to hide the weight of
The last Guardian Chapter twenty-five: Forging a warrior
The first rays of dawn spilled over the horizon, casting a golden light on the clearing behind the cottage. Sam stood in the middle, his arms crossed, a no-nonsense expression on his face and I am stood opposite him, sweat already dampening my clothes despite the cool morning air.“This isn’t going to be easy,” Sam said, his voice hard. “If you want to save your father, you’re going to have to push past every limit you think you have. Your strength, your endurance, your mind—it all has to sharpen. The bastards that have Christian won’t go easy on you, and neither will I.”I clenched my fists, I had been in a brawl or two in high school, I knew how to throw a punch. “I’m ready.” I said determined.He smirked, the scar on his face creating a hauntingly eerie grimace, the fact that the smile didn’t reach his eyes adding to the overall menacing look. “We’ll see.”The first exercise was deceptively simple: running. But not just any running. Sam led me up steep hills, through dense forests,
