But one second. Just a single second .. that was all it took to erase that smile forever.
The line between life and death... was razor-thin.
So thin in that cursed place...
Selene asked, her face frozen in shock.
What was she supposed to do, when she barely had the strength to remain conscious, let alone stop her bleeding?
As she tried to make sense of the chaos flooding her mind, the war around her only raged harder.
More brutal. More violent. Stronger.
The Ultras’ shells fell like rain .. hellish rain.
The nightmare creatures continued their assault from below, threatening to drag them all into the abyss.
Then, amidst the chaos...
A blazing comet streaked through the sky, hurling molten flames so intense they resembled volcanic eruptions from the heavens.
That fire instantly incinerated the nightmare creatures, annihilating them without mercy.
The comet... was just one man. A man who appeared, destroyed the monsters, and vanished as soon as his task was done.
But while his attack killed the enemy, the collateral damage caused the ship carrying Selene to catch fire, worsening her predicament.
Selene collapsed as the burning vessel beneath her began to sink.
Right after that fiery blast, a barrage of lightning struck .. followed by brilliant blue flames and chilling ice that froze everything it touched.
Someone was manipulating the elements as if they were nothing... destroying everything around them.
His strikes were so overwhelming, they showed no mercy .. neither to friend nor foe.
Trying to endure it, Selene watched it all with her own eyes.
Many were in her shoes... people trapped beneath the wreckage.
People who drowned in the sea. People who fought for their lives until the bitter end.
But some were killed not by the enemy... but by the reckless attacks of the very titans they had relied on to protect them.
Sure, those attacks killed the enemy too... but at what cost?
In the end, the ones who killed them were their own allies...
It was total chaos. And the death toll soared every passing second, reaching astronomical levels.
From the Empire’s side, the elite squad held their ground fiercely, annihilating most of the nightmare creatures on their own ..
Especially that woman who tore everything around her apart with her shadow blades.
The enemy was strong.
But their allies... were just as strong.
Watching all of this with her own eyes, Selene couldn’t help but grasp the painful truth ..
The law that ruled this world.
"The strong will always survive... and the weak will have no choice but to die. Die... as if their lives meant nothing."
Realizing the worthlessness of her own life, Selene once again began to lose the will to live.
Because even if she survived now, what awaited her was nothing but death later.
In that state... she couldn’t help but wonder.. was strength truly the only thing that mattered in this world?
Was strength the sole measure of a person’s value?
Surrounded by blood, fire, corpses, and death... Selene cried.
Why did they have to die, forgotten by all, while others lived on to be praised?
She never chose to fight in this war. She was only sixteen .. a mere child who knew nothing of the world.
But she had been forced to come, because of her weak lineage and lack of power...
When she saw Snow Lionheart deliver his speech, she had felt inspired ... thinking she would fight bravely and see her homeland win.
She wanted to be part of that epic... a childish dream, rewarded by a brutal awakening.
She hadn’t even been able to fight .. falling victim to the horrors of war from the very beginning.
She had done nothing but sit inside a pit of death, witnessing the cruel truth of this world with her own eyes.
Why were they brought to this place?
Only to have their lives thrown away?
If the vanguard, led by monsters like Snow Lionheart, held such overwhelming power... then why bring them?
Why didn’t they just handle everything on their own?
"Why did they play with our lives ...?"
Many of the soldiers who died weren’t killed by the enemy’s brutality... but by reckless strikes that didn’t distinguish between friend and foe.
Be it the Ultras or the Empire’s elite squad ..
They were nothing but monsters. Monsters clashing above an anthill.
And they... were the ants.
Ordinary soldiers. Cannon fodder. Slaughtered in the first clash.
Pitiful souls... doomed to die in the most horrific way imaginable.
How her life had been priced so cheaply... condemned to die in a hell , without anyone even knowing she existed.
And just when Selene thought she had seen the worst horrors war could offer ..
More horns of war sounded in her ears.
Warhorns that marked judgment day... for her and every wretched soul caught in the titans’ war.
After Snow Lionheart’s team dealt with most of the nightmare creatures, they suddenly found themselves surrounded by Ultras forces emerging from the shadows.
It seemed the Ultras had used the monster attack and ongoing bombardment as cover... to sneak their ships into the heart of the Empire’s army.
From the start, the Ultras outnumbered the Empire three to one. And now, after the nightmare creatures had decimated many of the Empire’s ships...
The situation had grown even worse.
Fifteen thousand Ultras launched a frontal assault with their warships, while twenty thousand more flanked them from the east and west.
A perfect pincer move .. trapping the Empire completely.
Their pressure was overwhelming, threatening to wipe out Selene and everyone else to the last soul.
Collapsed where she lay...
Selene could only sit there, bearing witness to the final horror of war ..trying to be a witness to it all.
Her small, blurred eyes couldn’t see much .. but she tried, at the very least, to record the final moments of those who had suffered like her.
Even if only for a while... she wanted to remember them.
She wanted to remember them... at least until her own life was lost.
"We’re not cannon fodder."
As the second round began .. while the titans of the Empire and the Ultras clashed...
Selene remained where she was, holding on .. using her wind to keep her ship afloat as long as possible.
The battle had reached a new level of brutality. Among the Ultras forces were monsters ..some were Hollows, others even Lords.
The battles between them and the Empire’s elite unleashed terrifying destruction...
And as a result... the soldiers continued to die, one after another, at a horrifying rate...
A seasoned warrior lost his life to a sudden ambush.
A young duelist died after recklessly charging into the front lines, only to be caught in the crossfire of a battle between two monstrous beings.
Wounded soldiers bled out... simply because the holy light cast by Saint Yorasha and Uriel never reached them.
As tears and blood streamed down her face, Selene kept watching ..until the very end.
"We are human... just as much as they are. No, even more."
But no one saw them. Not once.
To the so-called "heroes" of this war, they were nothing .. insignificant, forgettable, disposable.
If their lives had held even a fraction of value, then surely the Saint and her candidate wouldn’t have left them to die.
The only thing that separated them was power. Just power. Nothing else.