"The damage is infectious, and all that can be done is purge it all and start from scratch."
If life is a series of choices, then perhaps that just means that life is a game? To Akazawa Saki, that's all life really is. She refutes the existence of G...
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Her dreams were an ebbing nightmare, of broken visages and cracked glass, peppered with broken hopes and fallen indifference. Skies burned cinnamon and mahogany with the onset of dusk, bleeding to gray as the light faded to nothing. The taint of smoke painted the rising moon an ugly maroon, like a watchful, scornful eye in the abyss.
The world was bleak, painted sandstone slates and chipped cobblestone formed the walls that man touched, formed the havens that the weary slumped and rested within. Towering spires rose from the barren earth, reaching for the skies like stone fingers reaching for what they could never hope to touch.
The grounds were spilled to life with firelight, tall, mounted braziers filled with oils and wool to burn and cast warm light across the cold buildings and people, contrasting starkly with the urgency that grasped each and every soul that wandered into the light.
Their eyes were weary, distrusting, and their bodies were tense. Clad in the simple woolen slacks and heavily woven tunics and hoods, the people of the barren town quickly retreated to their dwellings to wait out the night with arms filled with hanging bags of potatoes and herbs.
The shrill clang of bells overhead called as the last glimmers of sunlight faded beneath the carpet of dark, plunging the town in stern solitude.
Curfew was in session, and no soul alive was willing to trespass into the dark.
But some didn't have a choice in the matter.
Saki stumbled through the darkness of alleyway shadows, tugged along at the behest of the urging form navigating the way through lifeless streets. Her tiny feet clad in doeskin wraps clapped dully against the stone ground, sinking through pits of sand that had grown with the dawn sandstorms that marred the alleys. Her form was cloaked in tans and browns with the smell of ash and fire permeating her tiny form.
'Mama...' The young Saki called out, softly in spite of the ever-present aching of her feet and the stiffness that had developed in her arm that was still being tugged by her mother. 'I'm really tired. And hungry, and thirsty too... are we there yet?'
'Not yet, sweetheart.' Her mother responded as she tugged little Saki along a bit harder. 'Come, it's not much farther to go.'
'But Mama...' Saki protested, pitifully. 'We've been walking all day... It's been days!'
'I know, but just a little longer, I promise.'
Dejected, all little Saki could do was sound a little whine as she was tugged jarringly towards the right down another set of alleys.
Voices on the air tumbled through the frigid bite of cold that began to settle in on the lands with the sun's absence, an ever-present hum that played havoc with the goosebumps running over the exposed skin of Saki's arms. Many voices singing in chorale echoed throughout the alleys and streets, and yet, it feel harmonious. It didn't instill calm.
