Arthur stared at the gun in his hand like it was foreign—even though he'd held one his entire life, this time felt different. As if the gun was too heavy for him to carry even though he always used it. His fingers trembled around the grip, the weight of it somehow heavier than it had ever been in battle. His chest rose and fell in shallow, uneven gasps. His legs stiffened, refusing to move.

  “I can’t,” he whispered, voice cracking under the pressure.

  His eyes locked onto Ray, who was struggling—desperately trying to stand, his body shaking, lips pressed tightly to contain the pain. But his gaze never faltered.

  Douglas raised an eyebrow, his smirk faltering. He hadn’t seen Arthur like this before—not in all the years he had molded him. Then, with a slow and calculated motion, Douglas pulled another gun from his holster and pointed it directly at Arthur.

  He glanced toward the squad, a cold smirk curling on his lips. “If he won’t pull the trigger, he’ll die in front of you.”

  He stepped closer, pressing the barrel firmly against Arthur’s forehead.

  “Are you fine with that?!” he barked, voice cracking into a growl.

  Desperation clung to his tone, unspoken and furious, as if control was slipping from his hands.

  “Sergeant!” Danny cried out, his voice hoarse and strained. “Choose your life over ours! You deserve that life you always talked about. We want you to finally live it—really live it.”

  Albert strained against the cuffs, muscles shaking, but the cold metal refused to give. “Arthur!!!” he shouted, desperation raw in his throat. “There’s no time to be selfless!” He bit down so hard on his lip that blood began to trail down his chin. “You’ve done enough for us—more than enough. Now it's time to choose yourself!”

  “Pull the trigger, Arthur!”

  Ray’s voice echoed through the dimly lit room.

  “This is your only chance to survive,” he added, his tone calm, his pale blue eyes steady and unwavering.

  Arthur’s hands trembled as he slowly raised the gun, his grip unsteady. He bit his lip hard, his brow furrowed.

  “W-Why are you d-doing this, Ray?” he stammered, his voice breaking as his breath hitched. This wasn’t something he had ever prepared for—not in the most dreadful scenarios he could imagine.

  Ray smiled—a soft, almost serene smile that didn’t belong in a moment like this. Despite the odds against him, he still found it in himself to smile.

  “There is no other way. We want you to survive,” he said quietly.

  He closed his eyes for a moment, drawing in a long, steady breath, as if bracing for what was to come. When he opened them again, the determination in his gaze was unshaken, fearless.

  Arthur’s heart clenched.

  “R-Ray…” he murmured, his voice barely audible.

  The words hit him like a knife to the chest, cutting deep. He wasn’t ready to hear that. The pain twisted inside him, showing in the tight set of his jaw and the slight quiver in his lips. His eyes gleamed with tears he refused to let fall.

  “PULL THE GODDAMN TRIGGER, ARTHUR!!!”

  Ray suddenly roared, his voice cracking under the strain.

  He grabbed the barrel of the gun and shoved it against his forehead.

  “SHOW YOUR FUCKING OWNERS HOW LOYAL THEIR DOG REALLY IS, YOU IDIOT!”

  Ray’s outburst sent Arthur’s emotions spiraling. His breath quickened, his vision blurred with hot tears, and a scream tore from his throat. He tightened his grip on the gun, every muscle in his body trembling—

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  and pulled the trigger with all the strength he had left.

  After that day, I think I stopped being human. Or maybe—I was never one to begin with. Maybe I was always just something hollow wearing a uniform, something shaped by orders and sharpened by loss until nothing soft remained.

  Ray and everyone’s blood had been warm. Too warm. It was the last warmth I ever felt on my hands, and even after it dried, even after I scraped and scrubbed until the skin split and bled on its own, I could still feel it clinging to me. Not the stickiness of it—but the weight. It stayed there, soaked beneath the skin, humming just under the surface like a ghosts that refused to leave.

  I tried to forget. God, I tried. But Douglas didn’t give me the chance.

  A day later after I killed my squad, I was deployed. No hesitation. No pause. Like nothing had happened. First came the border conflict in the West. I ended it in days—but if reducing towns to rubble and leaving nothing but smoke behind counts as 'clean,' then maybe war was never meant to make sense. Then came the rebellion in the South—angrier, louder, more desperate. But desperation doesn't stop bullets. Cities turned to ash. Names were shouted at me—names of the dead, names of the innocent, names of brothers and daughters—but they were just sounds, just noise beneath the gunfire. I never asked why I was there. I never questioned who they were. I simply followed orders and kept moving forward, like a weapon with legs and a name.

  I became the soldier they always wanted. No, worse than that. I became their masterpiece. Efficient. Obedient. Merciless. I didn’t hesitate. I didn’t think. And eventually, I didn’t feel.

  People started calling me a hero. A phantom. A monster. Some whispered my name like I was a legend; others spat it like a curse. But I didn’t care. As long as I kept moving, I didn’t have to stop. And as long as I didn’t stop, I didn’t have to remember. Didn’t have to see their faces. Didn’t have to hear their desperate voices. Didn’t have to feel their blood seeping through my gloves like it had every right to be there.

  Douglas was pleased. I could see it in his eyes, in the way he smiled every time he handed me another mission—like he was watching his favorite toy perform tricks. And I let him. I let him wind me up again and again because maybe, deep down, I thought I deserved to be used like that. Like, that was the price I had to pay for surviving.

  And somewhere along the way… I lost myself. Piece by piece, I faded. I stopped hearing Ray and everyone’s laughs in the back of my mind. Stopped remembering the way their voice would drop to a whisper when we talked about dreams we knew we’d never reach. I forgot the little things—until eventually, even their faces started to blur.

  But one thing never left me. One thing never faded.

  The sound of that trigger.

  That sharp, final click that tore my world apart in a single breath.

  That split-second when I chose myself—by killing the only people who had never asked anything from me except to live.

  Then, a year later, the war ended.

  I handed Douglas my resignation letter, fully expecting resistance. But to my surprise, he accepted it without argument. No hesitation, no questions. Just a nod and a thin, unreadable smile. But he didn’t took the paper in my hand.

  That should’ve been the end of it—but it wasn’t. Not with him.

  Before I could turn to leave, he spoke.

  “Before you killed your squad… I saw something in your eyes,” he said, his voice low and deliberate. “A spark. I’m not sure what to call it—an emotion? A feeling? Maybe something worse.”

  He paused, eyes boring into mine like he was still trying to dissect me. “But if I hadn’t ordered you to shoot them, I think you would’ve ended up useless. Soft. A waste of potential.”

  He suddenly grabbed my collar, yanking me closer with a strength that caught me off guard.

  “You don’t get to live on that side of the line,” he growled. “You’re not made for peace. You’re a weapon. One that could flip the entire world upside down.”

  His grip tightened.

  “You think you deserve a quiet life? After all the innocent people you killed even before you earned your stripes?”

  He shoved me back, hard. I stumbled, but didn’t fall.

  Do you really believe the dead will let you live in peace?” he spat. “I don’t.”

  In one swift motion, he snatched the resignation letter from my hand and tore it to pieces, the sound of paper ripping louder than the silence between us.

  “We’re at peace—for now,” he said, his voice cold and calculated. “But sooner or later, the world will slip back into war. And when that happens, I’ll bring you back, whether you like it or not.”

  He turned away, casually lighting a cigarette as though nothing had changed. The smoke curled around his face, a hazy veil that matched the emptiness in his eyes.

  “I’ll give you a vacation for now,” he muttered, exhaling the smoke. “But don’t get too comfortable. War doesn’t forget.”

  Then, after a couple of weeks, I moved into a village where no one knows my name. They might know that I am a soldier, but they don’t know what kind of a soldier I was. And in that village, I saw a woman who slowly turned me into a human once again.