Flow of Existence

'This is impossible, he is a monster, we can never defeat him.'

This was all that was going through Ade's head as she saw the horror that was unfolding before her eyes.

Ade was walking home, just having confessed to Nash, when a man in a crimson robe had suddenly descended upon the village.

The man draped in crimson had long crimson hair matching his robes. His eyes were an eerie coppery brown color and looked like they could pierce the soul themselves.

The moment Ade saw this man the only thing her whole body and mind screamed was that she had to get the hell out of there. Run, run and leave everything behind. This demon was not something she would be able to handle, not in a hundred years.

But she couldn't run. The pressure coming from him prevented her from even moving a single hair. She stood there nailed to the ground when the immense pressure coming from him had been too much, Ade had passed out.

When she woke up again it had been a bloodbath. 

In front of her, laying atop a hill of ash and blood, were the deceased corpses of about a dozen villagers. And none of them had been weak villagers either.

The two Ade knew best were parents of two kids Ade often trained with. It was Kes' father Yosen and Nash's mother Viola, both were incredibly strong members of the hunting team.

Nash had often talked about how strong his mother was, and even without that Ade knew stories of Viola. She was known as the strongest female in the whole village.

Kes too had told stories of his fathers impressive Flow proficiency, and how he had gotten better so quickly thanks in part to his great teachings.

And now those two were gone, just like that.

She remembered how the two had shown up incredibly fast after the man had arrived. Even before Ade had passed out, they must have died desperately fighting the monster that had arrived to raid their village.

But the crimson demon, as Ade had decided to call him, stood there pretty much unfazed.

Blood of the villagers and flakes of ash stained his crimson robes, but his face showed somewhat of a bored expression. He turned his head towards Ade who was sprawled on the ground.

Slowly stepping over, seemingly without hurry, he made his way towards the terrified girl.

Ade shuddered once for every step he took, the closer he came to more oppressive his Flow became.

The demon opened his mouth. "Don't resist and I won't kill you. Trust me when I say life as a slave is much better than death."

His voice was somehow a lot more pleasant than Ade had imagined to come out of the mouth of what to her looked like the incarnation of death itself.

But the fearful but antagonistic look never left Ade's eyes. The thing she wanted the most right now was to brutally murder the man standing right in front of her.

She thought of Nash, the boy she had just confessed to. Then she thought of how he would respond to the demon in front of her.

Would he give his all in defending the village? Would he prioritize his own life?

She thought for a while before responding.

"I will never give up my life to you." Ade managed to bark out under the immense pressure of the man's Flow.

The most painful realization to Ade was that he was nowhere close to going all out either. The demon really had no reason to ask her, he could just knock her out and be over with it.

The demon sighed. "I see, that's too bad."

The demon seemed to be making a move to kill her, but before he could a gigantic ash wall formed between the two.

The wall of ash was larger than Ade had ever seen. She couldn't imagine anyone within the village being capable of this, not even Cantor. But maybe she had underestimated the leader of the hunting team, or he was hiding most of his strength.

The person who revealed himself was not Cantor, instead it was an old man. An old man Ade knew very well, he was her grandpa in fact. It was the village chief.

The village chief wore an expression Ade had never seen on his old wrinkled face before. It was pure unfettered rage. The old man was immensely mad.

Ade remembered his impressive display against the wolves, she remembered how her grandpa had formed walls of ash and intimidated a whole pack of wolves with his Flow alone.

She also remembered the imposing lessons her grandpa had told her afterwards, according to him survival was everything. She wondered if her grandpa had heard her earlier declaration and was mad at her now, for deciding to fight and die, it completely went against his philosophy after all.

But yet Ade could not believe it. The immense wall of ash he had formed, and the immense rage coming from his Flow, should in Ade's mind not be something this old man was capable of.

She doubted even Cantor, who was seen as the strongest of the village, would be even able to do half of what her grandpa had just done.

But Ade had no time to talk to her grandpa, the demon suddenly shot through the wall and the village chief moved to intercept him. 

The immense clash of Flow by the two forces colliding that followed was enough to make Ade pass out again.

…

Cantor was wobbling on his feet, barely limping towards where he thought his house would still be.

The odds of it long being burned down were incredibly big. But he still tried making his way towards there, in hopes of meeting one of his family members.

On his way back he had been attacked by two more people, barely managing to clinch victory. But his body was in an awful state.

His sides were incredibly bruised and an almost purple color. 

Multiple profusely bleeding stabbing wounds were all over his body, places where knives had been plunged in deep.

It was a miracle he was still standing, with the immense bleeding wounds and bruises all over his body he should have been forced down long ago.

But he had to keep moving forward, he had to get home. Cantor wanted to see his family at least one more time before he inevitably bled out and died.

As he limped and struggled to keep moving forward he heard more and more screams. Screams of children, screams of defenseless women and screams of people storming into battle to give their all to defend their village.

The screams sounded grating in Cantor's mind, he knew there was nothing more he could do. After today, Ashen village would fall.

He wished he could do more, he wished he was stronger but he wished most of all for the survival of his family.

He hoped his foolish son had been smart enough to not stand up and fight. He hoped he would just let himself calmly be captured and live on as a slave.

He knew his wife Viola would give her all in defending the village, he knew it would be too late for her.

As he stepped closer and closer towards where the house had once been located he looked around him once more.

Most of the houses were burned down, he couldn't expect his house to somehow still be standing up.

He took step after step when he suddenly felt an immense burst of Flow coming from somewhere within the village. He wondered who the people fighting and producing this immense pressure could possibly be, but he quickly disregarded the thought.

To him it no longer mattered, it simply had no importance anymore.

The only thing that was important to him now was seeing his family alive once more before he died.

And as he limped over, and his burned down house came into view, what he saw shocked him to his very core.

He saw his son fighting, desperately resisting, one of the village raiders draped in red.

Nash was struggling to keep up, but he wasn't getting completely overrun. He used his small and flexible body to weave around the attackers punches. He even managed to land a couple of hits himself.

Immense pride washed all over Cantor's body.

He now thought all his earlier thoughts had been stupid. Laying down your life, submitting and becoming a slave? That was simply stupid.

The incredible pride he felt as he watched his son cleverly dodge and weave out of the way of the attacker's punches. And how his son desperately tried to defend the village was more than Cantor could have ever asked for in his final moments.

He focused the last bits of Flow still left in his body and dashed over, swiftly finishing off the attacker that was fighting his son. He knew that after doing this there really would be no hope in ever recovering.

His son gave him a look full of confusion and joy at seeing his father again. But when Nash noticed the state of his father's body his expression shifted to one of worry.

Meanwhile Cantor looked upon his son, he was still standing firmly on his two feet. His expression was one of seriousness and pride.

"Nash, I need you to kill me."