Reborn as a side character with a system

The Price of Survival

Chapter 28

The defense dragged on for over twenty minutes, each second stretching into eternity. Nolan stood alone in the offense, his magic tearing through the darkness, fire and wind and earth exploding from his palms in desperate bursts. Blood sprayed across the forest floor, black and red, painting the leaves in streaks of death.

The lizards learned. They adapted. Their attention switched to him alone, abandoning the shielded knights to focus on the mage who burned their kin. They attacked in groups, coordinated, silent, shadows given fangs and claws.

His men stepped in, defending him as much as they could, their swords flashing, their shields rising, their bodies becoming walls between their lord and the monsters.

"Give me your sword."

Nolan didn't wait for permission. He snatched the blade from a knight's hand and stormed into the fray, his movements wild, reckless, driven by adrenaline and fear. He slaughtered lizard after lizard, steel meeting scales, magic meeting flesh. But for every one he killed, two more appeared from the shadows.

He attacked another, his sword burying itself in its neck. But behind him, another lizard emerged from nothing, its stealth dropping at the exact moment its blade descended.

Nolan slowly turned his head toward it.

Time fractured. Everything moved in slow motion, the lizard's sword inching toward his chest, his own body too slow to dodge, too committed to his attack to defend.

"No..." His mind screamed, his eyes wide, his heart hammering against his ribs. "This can't be where I end my journey. I've fought my way here. Isabella, Victor, the goblin chief, all those were my obstacles, and I fought through them all. And... and now it ends here?"

The lizard's blade drew closer, so close he could see his own reflection in the steel.

His face hardened. Rage ignited in his eyes, burning away the fear, the doubt, the despair.

"I refuse." The words were a growl, a vow, a prayer. "It won't end like this. I won't lose a life I fought for so hard. I will fight, no matter what."

His body erupted in purple flames, wild and uncontrolled, devouring the air around him. Wind surged, swirling into a tornado that lifted leaves and blood and broken weapons into the air.

He forced his body back, muscles screaming, bones creaking.

The slash came. The sound echoed through the clearing, wet and terrible.

Blood sprayed into the air in a crimson arc.

The knights stood frozen, their faces pale, their eyes wide with horror.

"I survived..." Nolan muttered, his breath heavy, ragged. He let out a chuckle, weak and disbelieving. "That was close..."

None of his men spoke. They simply stared at him, their faces drained of color, their mouths open, their bodies trembling.

"Why is everyone staring at me like that?" he wondered, confusion clouding his mind. Then a familiar chime echoed in his head, and a blue screen flickered into existence before his eyes, glitching, turning red like a warning sign.

[System Notification]

[Host has been injured severely. An arm has been removed from the host's body.]

[Installation of pain added. Removal of adrenaline activated.]

[Warning... Host's INT too low to comprehend the pain.]

Nolan slowly looked down at his left side.

His whole body shook. His eyes darted all over, refusing to focus, refusing to believe. There on the ground, lying in the dirt and leaves, stood a hand. His hand. The fingers still twitching, the sword still clutched in its grip.

He whipped his head toward where his left hand should be.

Nothing.

Only a stump. A fountain of blood pouring from the wound, painting his side, his leg, the earth beneath him.

With his right hand, he clamped his mouth shut, forcing back the vomit that surged up his throat.

[System Notification]

[Warning... Host's INT too low to comprehend the pain.]

[Pain has been added.]

Nolan's body froze in place. The veins in his neck, once blue, turned red and bulging as all the pain rushed toward his head in a single, devastating wave.

"ARRRGGGHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!"

The scream tore from his lungs, raw and animal, so loud it echoed through the forest, so piercing that even those far away stopped and turned. Birds scattered from the trees. Beasts fled from their dens.

The lizards stepped back, shocked, their yellow eyes wide with something that looked almost like fear.

Far to the north, Ralph's head snapped up, his sword falling from numb fingers.

Deep in the east, Hilda froze mid-step, her heart clenching like a fist.

Somewhere in the south, Isabella dropped the dagger she was sharpening, the blade clattering against stone.

"Master Nolan."

They spoke as one, their voices carrying across the miles, united by terror, by love, by the bond of a lord they had chosen to follow.

And in the center of the storm, Nolan kept screaming like a mad person, his remaining hand clutching his head, his body convulsing. The world around him grew fuzzy, everything spinning, tilting, falling away. The pain seemed to increase with every heartbeat, feeding on itself, growing, devouring.

[System Notification]

[Warning]

[Host's INT too low to comprehend the pain.]

Nolan could barely read the words through the fuzziness, through the red haze that clouded his vision. He kept screaming, his throat raw, his voice cracking.

One of the lizards saw the opportunity. It leaped forward, blade raised, aiming for the screaming boy's exposed neck.

A knight charged in, blocking the attack with his sword, steel ringing against steel. Another knight dashed forward, his blade finding the lizard's heart, killing it instantly.

The first knight dropped to his knees beside Nolan, gently lifting the convulsing boy, cradling him in his lap. Nolan's screams had weakened to whimpers, his body limp, his eyes rolled back.

"With his current state, it's going to be impossible to clear out those lizards. It's best we get out of here. You hold them off while I rescue him to the camp."

The knight didn't wait for a response. He dashed into the trees, Nolan clutched against his chest, leaving the others to form a wall of steel against the remaining shadows.

Deep in the woods, the knight ran, branches whipping past, roots threatening to trip him. Nolan no longer screamed, but he remained in a state of terror, his pupils blown wide and black, his lower lip bitten bloody to hold in the pain.

"Hold on, Young Master. We'll get there soon."

"Wha... what's going on..." Nolan's thoughts swam through molasses, slow and thick. "This pain... it's far worse than when I was poisoned. Far worse than fighting the goblin chief. My body should be strong enough to handle this. But why..."

And then it hit him, just as he thought, Isabella's words echoing through the fog.

"With the kind of field work a person chooses, they must also be prepared for what's to come should there be downfalls."

Nolan's eyes widened in the darkness behind his eyelids.

"She was right... I got blinded by the fact that I knew the world I was sent into. I forgot that this is now my life. And now it ends here..."

He let out a soft smile, blood trickling from the corner of his mouth.

"I've lost a lot of blood. My body feels numb... Well, let me close my eyes a bit and feel this warmth that's coming."

His consciousness faded, sinking into blackness, into silence, into the warm embrace of death.

[System Notification]

[Unknown god has tampered with the system.]

[Bonus points have been transferred to INT.]

[Required Points: 10]

[10 of 39 points have been subtracted.]

[Intelligence: 49 to 59]

Flashbacks of his daily training hit him like lightning. His bonds with each character he'd met. His meals with his mother. His battles with Victor. All stormed inside his head like newfound memories, bright and sharp and real.

"That's right... I've come a long way to be falling down now. I've been Nolan so much that I forgot who I truly am."

His eyes snapped open in the darkness, blazing with purple fire.

"I'm Leonard Cohen, the greatest gamer in the world, and this... this is just a novel I read for the love and thrill of ever playing it. I won't lose. Even if it's on hard mode."