Restart Again: Volume 1 by Adam Scott (pocket ebook reader TXT) 📕

up. I took cover from the archers behind the one available option I had in the middle of the street: the commander. Standing side face, I placed myself in cover behind his tower shield, out of a safe firing line from the bowmen. Somewhere the scraping sound continued, a faint scratch of metal against stone. Part of me knew the sound should worry me, although I didn’t know why.

The heavy bang of the mace renewed my focus. As long as I keep him between me and the archers, they’ll never risk shooting him to hit me. To my dismay, the captain sneered and began to circle around me with his shield raised, clearly understanding my strategy and using it against me. It put me at a disadvantage to move towards his protected side, but I was intimately familiar with the damage a crossbow bolt could do and had no plans to experience it again.

Scrape. Scrape. The soft grating was still present, barely loud enough to reach my ears with my enhanced senses. I stepped in with a two-handed strike leveled at the captain’s head, which connected hard against his raised shield. With a low growl he pushed back against my blade, separating us again. This is going to be a battle of endurance. If I can keep the pressure on, he’ll tire out and make a mistake soon enough.

Scrape. Scrape. He followed up with a rising swing of his mace, forcing me to dodge towards his shielded side again. My forced position was maddening; I knew I could end the fight in mere moments if I could just circle to his weak side, but he knew how to work his advantage effectively. I planted a firm kick center mass on his shield which sent him skidding back a few paces. Chasing him in, I swung another heavy blow upwards to clip the edge of his shield.

The captain grimaced in response to the intense pressure on his defending arm. His eyes flicked back and forth from me to a point in the distance behind me. Lia. I could hear her grunting from exertion, sending powerful blows at the final standing guard who was clearly outclassed. From just beside their skirmish I heard the continual scraping sound moving towards them. My stomach dropped as I finally pieced together what my brain had been trying to tell me.

I turned just in time to watch as the first guard Lia had knocked down reached her, having dragged himself slowly across the patio in near silence aside from the soft scraping of his armor on the marble. He sprang at Lia in a tackle, knocking her legs out from underneath her which sent her tumbling forward. The guard she had been fighting kicked her sword away and reached down roughly to pull her up by her hair. She cried out in pain and kicked violently, catching the man on the ground in the face for a second time.

“That’s enough!” The captain shouted at his men. With a quick hand signal, he sent his archers ahead to take up two positions with clear shots at Lia, who was now held in a tight headlock. “Surrender now, or the girl dies.” His eyes were hard as ice, fully convincing me that he would give the command should I refuse.

“Lux, run!” Lia screamed, struggling against the guard fruitlessly. “Just run!”

An alarming sense of calm washed over me. I knew the consequences that would come from continuing to resist. If I wanted to, I could kill the captain with a deadly quick blow to the neck while his guard was down. It would be easy to clean up the rest of the guards as well, but I wouldn’t be able to save Lia. In turn, I knew what would happen if I surrendered. Lia and I would be put in chains and shipped back to Yoria. There, I would be sent before whoever sat on the Golden Throne to face judgement for my crimes.

It would all be a farce, of course. The real reason I was being summoned, and the reason I was kept in the dungeons, was to be recruited to aid in whatever devastating conflict the country of Kaldan was currently embroiled in. For the third time in as many lives, the world was sending me down the path of bloodshed and loss without giving me a choice. The memory of those injustices I had suffered usually evoked a burning rage inside me, but my head was clear.

“I promise that I will do everything I can to protect the people who can’t protect themselves.” My own words came back to me as a crystal-clear memory, filling my heart with resolve. “I promise that I’ll stop those injustices wherever I find them.” My decision was already made, but my mind hadn’t caught up to realize it yet.

Why should I play along again? This world has done nothing but attack and harass me at every opportunity. The faster it burns down, the better. I tried to convince myself I didn’t care, but deep down I knew it wasn’t true. Relenting to the inevitable pull of the world now would only bring me grief, pain, and hardship. There was something worth saving here, and it depended entirely upon my next actions. Lia was staring across the patio at me with tears streaming down her face, shaking her head.

“I promise it, no matter the cost I have to pay.” My arms relaxed to my sides as I let my sword drop to the ground. Slowly, I unhooked my belt and threw it forward into a pile, relinquishing the last of my weapons. I gently knelt to the marble street and looked up to the captain towering over me. “Don’t hurt her. Please.”

He gave me a curt nod and motioned to his men. The two bowmen came to his sides and patted me down, placing me in manacles when they were satisfied I wasn’t concealing any additional weapons. At the sight of