Chris was sitting alone under a frail, limp tree whose swaying leaves flowed quietly as their lives slowly vanished. Chris put his right hand in front, trying to save a falling leaf. The small leaf touched his scarred hand, and it shattered as if it were made of glass, similar to a rustic mirror.

“Just like me… A used and broken hero….” Chris speaks as he looks up at the tree he is leaning against. The tree had only a few branches and leaves, but the leaves kept raining endlessly in a random dance with no distinct pattern. These leaves fall just to shatter like glass, creating a minefield of broken bodies and lost dreams. His left arm was wrapped in bandages and had a rose-like color, and his armor had that same red splattered all over, yet he was nary a single injury.

“I wonder if the sky is free to do as it pleases. I can only wonder alone,” Chris laments while staring at the cloudy, softly colored orange sky. The clouds seemed frozen in place, unlike the rest of the things around Chris. The clouds were painted with orange hues, but not from the sun, which had already gone to bed. The clouds acted like a mirror reflecting the world, while Chris seemed to be wandering and roaming, frozen in place like his world and future.

Chris slowly shakes and trembles. He begins to look down at the grass waving around him on the blood-soaked grounds. He reaches out to feel the flowing grass next to him. The grass sways in a single direction to stretch itself thin, only to bounce back in the other direction. The grass moves so desperately as it tries to evade the falling leaves and the burdens they hold within.

“Such a futile struggle,” Chris spoke in such a whisper as if not to disturb the ritual around him.  He watched the grass around him get piled on slowly by the endless dancing leaves, wondering if he would be consumed in that same manner in his bleak future. As Chris glazed over this begrudging battlefield, he noticed that a single spider lily stood proud, surrounded by shattered leaves, yet remained free and unbothered by the weight. The spider lily stood about a foot tall and fully blossomed in the late fall as if protesting against the rules of nature and the world. A flower that made a path for itself by its own rules.

Chris leaped at the flower, screaming as he began violently punching it into the ground. No matter how many times he hit this rebellious flower, it stood up. Yet Chris kept hitting it while crying and screaming—actions that didn’t match his role or the innocent, rebellious flower.

“WHY DO YOU HAVE SUCH FREEDOMS THAT I DON’T… WHAT MAKES YOU BETTER THAN ME?” Chris screamed at the top of his lungs as he cried with a monster beneath him that had nothing but a soft smile and dead eyes that seemed to pity such a broken young boy. The boy was surrounded by dismembered monsters on a battlefield without a single weapon, but he had a bloody sword and was surrounded by flames that slowly consumed the remains of a castle. The sound of a horn could be heard in the distance, a sound without hope or love. The young boy stopped what he was doing and walked away as if programmed to do so. Still, tears fell from his face without a sound because they wouldn’t like an actual hero.