Content warning: Self harm...kind of.

  I dreaded what I had to do, dreaded it every time.

  I could control the memories somewhat when I was awake, and through pain and mana I could temporarily abate the tortures of my mind. With awake, I had increased the efficiency of the pseudo-spell, but not enough to matter in the inevitable encroachment of time. Four hours I had lasted last time, four blessed hours of training to occupy my mind.

  But I wasn't strong enough to go entirely without rest, and I wasn't a fool to think that avoiding the necessity wouldn't hinder my growth.

  I had to get stronger...and in a way I deserved this, to run from it was to deny what I'd done.

  There were about a dozen nightmares I cycled through at the time, with the rare variations interspersed. Rarely were the anomalies peaceful dreams, but I was thankful when they were.

  All the others followed the same theme.

  Was it weak to lament my elven memory? That extended into dreams, or at least I thought so, because I remembered them more often than not. I would have to compare sometime, when the world became a peaceful place.

  I was stalling, but for once I was okay with that.

  Eventually my eyes grew heavy, and I closed them to suffer my nightmares.

  ---

  I walked.

  It was too dark to see where I was, but I recognized the smell of shit and piss. I couldn't find the walls though, which was fine, who needed walls in this place? Just a pointless extra if you asked me. So there I was in the dark, with just the sound of my steps as my company.

  Then the chewing started.

  The first thought that entered my mind was how wet it sounded, then there was the tearing once the predators finished with their morsel. The tears sounded like screams, of agony and accusation. There were happy chitters, sadistic chitters, hungry things feeding on flesh and suffering both.

  It permeated everything, a constant sonata of something feasting. Squelching flesh and crunching bones. I walked, because that was all I could do. I walked, because that was what I had to do.

  Ever forward.

  I walked through a corridor/hall/bridge, listening to the sounds as I waited for something to change.

  My next step led off a cliff, and there was nothing there to catch me. The sickening weight of gravity pulled me down and made a mess of my stomach.

  There wasn't anyone there to hear my screams.

  Falling.

  Falling.

  Falling.

  I hit the ground, and it was nothing solid, for a moment I was engulfed with something that burned. I clawed my way up, desperate for an escape. I found none. An eternity of pain in a bid to escape.

  Eternity surprisingly didn't last forever.

  I was kneeling on a pile of guts, corpses surrounded me as far as the eye could see. Somehow I recognized all of them. They were dead. They were staring at me. I closed my eyes, but I could still see.

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  I hand grasped my arm, and I let out a scream.

  My mothers grip was boney and ever bleeding. She squeezed my forearm with the strength of sorrow, crushing my bones and causing another scream. I looked down with tears in my eyes to face my mother.

  Her gaze.

  Oh, her gaze.

  It said so much more than words could've possibly communicated.

  Disappointment, hatred, fear.

  As she melted away, those feelings only intensified. Until she was nothing at all, and it was just me and the corpses once more. I gripped my forearm, it wasn't broken now, but there was a brand there. A handprint. It felt like a curse.

  "Why?"

  That voice, I recognized it.

  I knew I shouldn't look, but I did, and in my gaze was a boy. His brown eyes met mine, and there was so much sadness and horror. Too much.

  "I'm sorry," I cried. "I'm so sorry. I didn't—I thought it'd be safe, I swear I thought it'd be safe."

  The boy shook his head, both of us knowing that the excuse was just a thin veil for what I'd done. He stared at me, and that stare was worse than any pain I could've compared it too.

  Someone strode through the darkness to stand beside the boy, the girl's gaze wasn't one of judgement. It was of betrayal.

  "You killed us."

  "I'm sorry," I sobbed. It was all I could say.

  She shook her head. Grabbing a small knife from her sash, she strode over to where I kneeled. I looked up at her with pain and resignation. She kneeled down to face me, and an understanding passed between us.

  She offered me the knife.

  "Atone."

  I looked at her, and didn't question the voice that sounded nothing like my friend. I grabbed the offered knife, sucking in a breath, and punctured my heart.

  I choked on the pain, crying, and I looked up to my judge to see if she was satisfied.

  The gaze I met wasn't her's, instead it was something stern and aged. One my father rarely used, one reserved for true scum. In his hand was a hammer, familiar and menacing both. He glared down at me with open hatred.

  "You're a monster."

  I hung my head and drooped my shoulders. What could I say to that? He was right after all.

  "Atone."

  I looked up, tears still fresh in my eyes, and I saw my father as he held out his hammer. His gaze brokered no argument, I would take it, because it was only right. I pursed my lips and closed my eyes, raising the hammer up high.

  My hand shattered as I brought it down.

  This time I couldn't hold back my cry, letting it loose to mark my shame.

  I spent a while just crying.

  "You're pathetic."

  I knew that voice. It belonged to the village elder's son, one I spent so many years training alongside. I couldn't bear to look at him.

  "You're selfish."

  A Shepard's daughter, the voice of reason that anchored us so often. I'd never heard her tell a lie.

  "You're pretentious."

  The voice of a boy destined to be a mason, one that was so foolish as to have an infatuation with me.

  "You're evil"

  She was so innocent, so pure. It wasn't fair that she died, wasn't fair that any of them died while I lived. I remember burying her, and a foolish part of me hoped that the action would've been enough.

  A sword clattered down in front of me, my refusal to look at them proved not enough to escape.

  I gripped the swords handle.

  It was the same one I used to fight off the goblins.

  "Atone."

  It wasn't a fast process, having only one functional hand tended to be an obstacle. My guts still met the floor as I carved myself open, the clumsiness enhanced the pain, but that was okay. I stared at the strange organs that escaped from my belly. Thin intestines wriggling like worms as something burrowed under the gore, and I watched with resignation as a rat poked out from under the pile of guts.

  It was pristine despite having swam through my innards, porcelain white and obsidian black split at the middle in imperfect waves.

  It chittered at me.

  I gave it a sad smile, I didn't deserve the kindness that it offered. Instead I looked up, knowing full well who I'd find.

  The Rat-King stood with a smile, replacing the corpses and gore with the polite fiction that was his shop. So clean where I was covered in blood. The rat behind him ruined his image though. The titanic monster was absolutely drenched in gore, and it was smiling too. Between its teeth were plenty of flesh bits and bone shards.

  "Did you think you could escape consequence?" The Rat-King laughed. "Did you think your selfish pursuit for power wouldn't lead to tragedy? Aren't there plenty of stories back in your first life about such foolishness? Did you think you wouldn't turn out like me?"

  "I just want to survive!" I cried out, but it sounded hollow to the both of us.

  The Rat-King clutched his belly and started a chorus of deranged laughter, each screaming to my ears like the wails of the damned. "You should know, little rat-slayer, that some people don't deserve to live."

  I gripped my blade harder, and the Rat-King's smile widened further than should be possible.

  His lips moved, and out escaped both a suggestion and command. Something absolute, something divine.

  "Atone."