The mountains were a domineering strip that stretched steadily across the horizon; we had been marching towards them for a couple of days, and now I was aware of the sensation of being minimized to near nothing. As they expanded before us, myself and the men around me had begun to grow quiet, an eerie silence falling upon us, and now we only spoke in whispers, as if something spoken too strong would cause the mountains to readily collapse and bury us alive. We were insects upon the skin of the earth, and Mother Nature had no preference whether we lived or died.

When darkness began to take over the mountain range, we had decided to set up camp. Our campfire warmed my numb fingers and it reminded me that I was alive. Across from me sat Magnus. Flames flickered in his tired eyes and revealed how his eyebrows were perpetually pushed together, as if we were moments away from some tragedy. Occasionally, he bravely glanced out into the surrounding walls of evergreens, mossy ground, and darkness; he would promptly release a nearly imperceptible sigh of relief.

To his side was the gigantic Augustus, noted for his exceptional ability to send an arrow piercing square through an animal’s head from forty yards away. He had this knack for being impossible to phase, even when elbows deep in the intestines of a deer. Any comment towards him was merely met with a warm smile, an eerie shift of the eyes, and a genuine laugh. If anyone were to break the silence, it was almost certainly to be him.

At Magnus’s other side slouched Lucius, who was currently staring out into the darkness. He was the only one out of us four who seemed content as we grew nearer to the mountain range that pierced the sky and bred monstrous clouds. In the daytime, he stared at them with a certain fondness and softness that I was sure he’d quickly deny if acknowledged. Out of these men, Lucius was the only one I’d willingly fight alongside if we found ourselves in this war all over again.

“Gonna rain tomorrow, I think,” Augustus said, but it seemed more like a plea than an observation. We hadn’t gotten rain in the past week and a half, and although our feet were grateful to be carrying less weight, we were in a perpetual state of dry mouths and thickened saliva.

“Why’s that?” I asked. But it’s not like it mattered; we were to go to bed parched either way.

—

Waves lapped at the edge of the water. There was a body slumped peacefully nearby in the sand, a thin wooden rod extruding from the abdomen. I’m not sure how I could tell that this body belonged to Lucius, but I knew it did. His body was now turning the water a murky shade of red.

A man watched me from afar. I wearily shook my head at him, but the action was either lost upon the man or was deliberately ignored, for he merely began sprinting at me. I pushed my palms into the reddening sand and heave myself up. I was vaguely aware that he was wielding a two-handed ax, and I briefly envisioned my insides upon the blade.

My heartbeat was solid in my ears, but a freezing sensation suddenly exploded from my left side. I knew that this wound was fatal. I knew that it was fatal and yet I still urged my legs to run, but soon my knees and palms were bashing against the gritty sand, and all I could taste was iron.

—

Rain drops echoed off the rooftop, but they sound unnaturally hollow.

“You’re awake,” someone observed neutrally.

I didn’t like their voice. There was something severely cold and distant about it and I couldn’t see where it was coming from.

The room around me was incredibly smoothed. Like a clay pot that has been molded a thousand times, made impressionless, but perhaps beyond even that. The ceiling was perfectly leveled, too, and depressingly void of even the most basic details.

Was this the afterlife?

Was this all there was?

“Where am I?” I asked into the chilly air.

“Home,” the monotone voice replied. I took a sharp breath.

“Are my friends here? Is Lucius here?”

“No.”

I stared achingly into the corner of the room.

“I don’t understand,” I whispered.

I gingerly pressed my hand to the side where the ax had plunged into me. After no shooting feelings of pain, I pressed harder. Nothing.

“You were in a simulation, but you’re free now. You’ve completed your duties and –”

“Can I go back?”

This was the first line that evoked a human emotion out of the voice. “You – why would you want to go back?”

“I don’t like this place,” I croaked. And suddenly there was a very real ache behind my eyes and I was pressing my fingers to the bottom of my eyes to wipe away any tears.

The voice didn’t seem to know what to do with this. After a long moment of silence, something clicked, and a heavy white door swung open.

It revealed a very pale, thin man. The agitation I had felt when first hearing his voice immediately whisked away, and now all I felt was pity.

Slowly, he extended an empty hand, but I eyed it warily. I slid myself off the platform they placed me on and my scratchy blue outfit unpleasantly crinkled.

“Can I show you around?” he asks, reluctantly returning his hand to his side.

I took a steady breath and blinked away the tears in my eyes.

“You can show me around.”

I followed the sickly man into a hall that was equally barren and deathly to the room they put me in. There was this persistent buzzing in the air that I think was supposed to mimic the breeze, but it doesn’t do too great of a job. There were also illuminations on the ceilings. When I approached one, I prepared myself for some degree of heat, but they were no warmer than anywhere else. I wondered how they took life out of fire.

After a few minutes, we were on a balcony. I scrunched my nose. This air was stagnant and reeked of ash and something deeply acrid. I tried to pinpoint what in my home best matched this sickening smell, but all I could think of was the slaughterhouse during the most humid and motionless summer days.

To the horizon, there were stretches of destitute gray slabs. Horrible creatures raced upon the surfaces and made a hellish roar. In the sky, there were monstrosities that mimicked the birds. They flew in the churning gray sky and looked like specks, but their power was so violent that I could hear them from where I stood.

And no matter where I looked, I could find no green. Perhaps that was the worst of all.

When I turned back to the man, I could see the glint of fondness in his empty eyes. I wondered how long it had taken him to convince himself that he loved this view.

“Please let me go back,” I whispered.

I think this broke the man, for he let out a wicked laugh and said, “But you were put in a losing war. You saw your men get massacred. You lived in huts and died young and bloodily. Don’t you understand that this peaceful future is beautiful?”

I didn’t need to look out over the sea of mindless gray movement again to confirm my decision.

I smiled weakly, “I’d take death a thousand times in my world over a single life in this one.”

“Well, you don’t get to go back,” he said sharply.

“If this is true,” I continued quietly, “then there is no point in living in this one.”

I stepped towards the balcony.

It looked like a long, pleasant fall.

He began to say some desperate words, but I had thrown myself over the edge before I heard a single one.