Doomed to Die in 3 Minutes

Beginning Again

Fireworks were exploding constantly in the night sky. The cheering voices of people who were exhausted yet somehow found the energy and strength to party on raged like ocean waves.

Corai sat in a wooden tub of hot water, staring at the screen displaying his stats. He hadn’t bothered to look at them in ages but now he had to know. The results were about as he expected. His magic stat was still at one. His other stats had marginally improved.

His HP and MP? They had grown about ⅓ of their previous limits.

He threw his head back and just let his body soak in the warmth of the water. He had been hoping for a major change but it was still more of the same. Still, he had finally found a proper way to fight back. In the past, he had done smaller scale tricks to overcome common low-rank enemies. The effort he would put into slaying just a few rampant wolves or goblins was ridiculous when he started out. It had quickly become boring and hadn’t paid particularly well.

It had always been the same. Making them ram into trees and walls was really easy but it quickly became boring. So he had started this career of being a stage actor. Converting a circus and struggling theatre workers into the most famous travelling show in the world. Or at least in the country of Mega. It was something he could be proud of. He loved the attention of adoring fans… which he had few due to his villain roles and never revealing he was the source of the stage effects. The occasional pat on his back was just enough to keep him going, being the one who made the magic feel real was a hell of a feeling.

He smiled with an exhausted expression on the rest of his face. He felt as if he had lost ten years of his life with the level of excitement he had gone through today. He started laughing weakly as he remembered jumping into the Terror’s mouth. He had to go crazy to find victory. It had worked. He thanked every god he could remember from this world and the one before that the monster had gasped for air before expiring, had that not happened, he would have had to have waited for someone to cut him out.

The idea of being stuck there for a whole day or more was so gruesome and disgusting that he had to laugh even harder.

The whole city was going wild as if this was their last day on earth.

The first few moments after he had put his feet back into the city was hectic as all hell.

Loving voices crying out in joy. All for him. For their edgy but dramatic hero that had saved them.

The man who had turned their fear itself into an act of theatre where their lives were the front row seats and the world itself was the stage. Their mysterious leading man had given them hope when they had none. It was mostly an illusion. A lie that was mixed with a single truth.

He had figured out a way to win for real and that mystery made their curiosity peaked.

Corai had been subjected to a crowd with constant questions, people grabbing at him and yelling at him with such fierce desperation and wonder that it was like a crowd of relentless paparazzi.

He had said some generic words about the unity of people and the spiel of light and dark being two sides of the same coin and how it was natural for him to have won.

All obviously being made on the spot under his Zelo persona. 

Then he used his magic one more time to escape them and return to his normal appearance.

The Saviour in Shadow disappeared in a puff of black smoke.

Then everyone began to celebrate with everything they had. Corai blushed hard as he could hear voices from the window. Many people had turned bold and began to confess to people they had been lacking the courage to spit out the words to. He could have sworn he heard whispers of people also being quite direct in having a single night of pleasure.

On the more innocent side, young boys had begun imitating the mannerisms and words of Zelo with their obnoxiously loud voices. Girls were gossiping about how attractive the Demon Khan had been. Some people were talking about how Zelo could have possibly created his illusions and those words quickly became a burning debate of passionate words until it blazed into heated arguments where they became blue in the face.

Corai got up out of the bath and dried himself off with a white towel and picked up a fresh set of clothes. He walked out of the bathing room and into the rented room of the hotel his group had been given. Then he saw someone on the bed he didn’t want to see.

The Ringmaster Kiri. She was a tall woman with sand coloured skin and blonde hair.

She had a rather seductive almost hourglass figure and wore the black and white outfit you’d expect of a magician's assistant at a casino. The leotard drawing heavy attention to the thighs.

If you paid close attention though you could spot what seemed like lines and cracks across her body. Her eyes were a shimmering verdant green.

 “Corai! I’ve been waiting for you. That performance was amazing! Really, I’m all riled up…”

She licked her lips. Corai shivered. His body said yes but his mind and soul knew better.

“Yeah. No. Told you already that first time was the last time.” His face was full of fear, arousal and disgust all at once. He had been on that road once before and most of the cast members had also tried to taste their fruit once and ended up with the same emotions Corai held now.

Kiri pouted as she stretched and repositioned her body to go into a more alluring pose.

“I promise I won’t bite your head off! I won’t even try! I’ll be a good girl so make me your…”

Corai lifted his left palm and motioned to stop her and she reluctantly silenced her lips.

“I told you and everyone else has said it a million times. No. You’re our boss and it’s inappropriate. On top of that, you say you won’t try and eat us every damned time but you always end up trying to bite at us. Remember that rookie, uhm… his name was Garry I think? He almost died. We had to pay a small fortune to cure him and he ran away the first chance he got.

I heard he’s become terrified of women thanks to you.”

Kiri pouted even harder and motioned with her left-hand index finger for Corai to come over while her right hand patted the bed softly. She had ignored everything he had said.

“So, I guess this is a good time to tell you… I’m going to become an adventurer again. I need to try it out. I’ll come back once in a while, I promise.” Corai nervously blurted out his intention to leave the worlds greatest show, which he had helped make and was essential for.

Honestly, he felt somewhat ungrateful to bow out now but… he needed to say what he wanted before his courage ran out. 

Kiri grew quiet in both words and body. She stared at him with eyes that were changing from green to yellow with sharp black irises and her lips opened revealing that instead of teeth there were scythe-like mandibles within and began to speak in a hissing voice.

“You’ll need to leave me a little gift if you’re parting from the trope… so come over here and-!”

Corai bolted out of the room and ran away like a bug that finally found out how windows worked.

“You’re not the boss of me… at least any more! Farewell, until next time! Adios!”

If he was serious he could escape from her through illusions and some smart thinking, if she seriously chased him he wouldn’t have an easy time of it. So, it’d just be about a normal chase. 

Kiri sighed and chose not to give chase. Her mouth closed and her eyes returned to a natural green. “Geez, why are you such a coward? It takes away that edge you have. You’d be cuter if you had a teensy bit more courage. Though I guess now you’ve got some fangs. Now that you’ve tasted such high-quality blood… you’re just raring to go at the world. That’s quite… sigh. Maybe next time. If I act more ladylike? Or maybe find a spell to stop me from trying to eat people when there in my bed…”

Corai’s second adventurer career was about to begin.

The Master of Manner and the Bringer of Doom.

The Reaper who forced his victims into a macabre dance with death for three minutes.

The Demon Khan. The Saviour of Shadow.

Countless titles, names and legends would be born from a single man.

Unfortunately, or perhaps, fortunately, depending on how you look at it; for him, for a very long time, people would not know the name Corai at all due to his cowardice. He would adventure wildly under different faces in an attempt to avoid publicity...