Reincarnated as the Only Human

This was another place where time lost all meaning, but unlike the glorious stretching of time that came with mind bogglingly good sex, this was just... it was something I wouldn’t wish on anyone, ever.

My head was aching and swimming at the same time, my arms were like lead yet they were trembling like a leaf in a storm, my stomach had already expelled all of its contents yet I was still here, heaving and coughing...

It was just horrendous, and it seemingly had no end... until, of course, it finally began to subside a little, and the moment it began to do that Dama immediately turned me away from the corpse of the Dogkin as a precaution.

”Feeling better..? Well... are you feeling less like absolute shit and more like you have one hell of a hangover?”

Her voice was somewhat tender, and the way she was patting my back as I breathed heavily was definitely... not something she usually did, but very much appreciated in this moment of time.

”I... If there are... hangovers like this... I don’t ever want to touch a bottle again...”

Dama snickered at that and rubbed my back some more before saying ”They do in fact exist, but the bottles you need to touch to get this way... well, it’s pure alcohol, and that shit is nasty. Only ever had it one time and I nearly caught myself on fire~!”

The absurdity of her statement helped distract me, something that my logical and relatively ’smart’ brain was telling me since it was a sort of psychological trick that worked in all sorts of ’manic’ areas... like after you just killed someone.

”That stuff tastes horrendous. Burns all the tastebuds off your tongue, numbs your throat... Goddesses above, I thought I was smelling colors and might never be able to taste things again! Spit it all out after the first little bit slid down my gullet... straight into the campfire. Fun thing about alcohol... it burns very, very easily.”

When she kept going I found myself thinking more about the sort of scene that must have played out instead of what I had just done, and it helped soothe me a little as I asked ”That... bad..?”, to which she pat my back again and just grinned at me.

”Worse. Horrible stuff, high proof alcohol. I think it does better at sterilizing wounds and scaring away all the dirty shit rather than being something you ingest. Ever since I’ve kept myself to beers and wines primarily, but it’s been long enough that I find myself missing the stronger stuff. Nothing that potent though.”

I took a few more deep, calming breaths before pushing myself back and sitting on my haunches, fighting the headache and screwing my eyes shut as everything spun again; it took me a moment to remember that magic existed, and when I did I flushed my system with it and immediately felt better.

”Thank you... I uh... think I might be... fine...”

Cocking her brow and just staring at me for a few moments, Dama’s eyes flicked over towards the body behind me before she said ”Uh huh. Y’know, I said that on my first kill too. Proceeded to hurl again when I saw it. So... if you do turn around, keep yourself around. I doubt you got anything left to hurl, but better safe than sorry.”

Fixing her with a bit of a glare, I took another few breaths before I slowly turned myself around, trying to mentally prepare myself for what I already knew was there; it worked, to a degree, and I only gagged when I saw the kneeling corpse of the Dogkin.

Blood had pooled around her, spilling from the hole in her chest and trickling down my spear as she leaned on it; a chill crept over me again as I noticed her eyes, so before it could get worse I got to my feet - somewhat unsteadily - and began to... deal with the body.

By that I meant I just gently pushed her head back and pushed her eyelids down, hoping that they would stay in place before I wrapped my shaking hand around the haft of my spear; covering my hand in mana to cleanse the blood, I pushed the body back and retrieved my weapon, only to cringe when I put too much force into it.

She knocked against the ground and just laid there, though before I could do or think anything Dama just quipped ”It’s alright, she won’t feel that knock on her head...”, causing my anger to flare up a little and burn away everything else.

When I spun to glare at her she was just smirking at me, though it softened as she said ”You’ve done better than I thought you would.”, a hint of morose pride tinging her voice as she nodded at me.

”Better than I had done, though that might be because it’s just you and me here rather than me and a whole squad of idiots. They wouldn’t let me hear the end of it for a week at least, and each of ’em was fucking insufferable about it.”

My anger faded as fast as it had arrived, replaced by a bit of confusion as I asked ”They... were insufferable about this?”, the disbelief more than evident in my tone; her grin returned as she gave me an answer, distracting me some more so that she could start rummaging through the Dogkin’s belongings.

”Sure as hell weren’t supportive... at least in a nice, helpful way. I was a greenhorn, fresh out of the Academy, and they were all hardened by the war already. Came in as an Aide to their Sergeant, had to fight beside them against a surprise attack... The fight itself was easy, but the aftermath? Not so much.

Much like you I just couldn’t really grasp the severity of what I had done. The whole idea of snuffing someone’s life early never has sat right with me, but ever since I’ve come to accept that it’s either their’s ending early or mine.

I grappled with it for a bit, was sick just like you - even worse cause it was in the rain, plus it was a cold damn day - and overall felt like shit. They immediately used that as fuel to try and prove that the Academy was horrible and I wasn’t prepared... Whole lotta shit considering they’re dead and I’m here, but oh well. Aha~!”

Holding up a piece of paper, Dama grinned at me and left that story there, letting it occupy my immediate thoughts all while she gradually buried the body while reading the paper out loud, giving me multiple things to focus on that wasn’t the corpse of the Dogkin I just killed.