The blood still looked fresh, like if he had just died. Dying is horrible, but seeing yourself dead isn't pleasant either.

The man had already pulled out his sword, and Kagehara panicked. He didn't want the other night to repeat. Not again. He wouldn't be able to endure it.

His mind was working as fast as it could. Maybe that man wanted something, maybe it was his subconscious telling him something?

Maybe he could talk his way out.

-Hey, stop- said the boy, terrified.

No response. The figure just continued walking towards him, sword drawn.

-What do you want from me?

No response.

-Why do you hate me?

The man stopped for a second. However, he continued walking.

-Stop, I don't know what do you want from me.

He was getting closer, as the boy panicked more and more. Maybe if he accepted his fate he'd let him be? His mind was racing straight into a black hole. 

In the end, he just stood there, waiting. The figure seemed slightly surprised with that reaction. The boy didn't even flinch. He was internally screaming, but he didn't want to show it. This time he'd die with dignity. Kagehara felt the sword stab into his side, cutting and making his body resonate with pain and adrenaline. However it wasn't a fatal blow. 

He was trying really hard not to scream, as tears were just filling his eyes, making his sight go blurry. Even in that state, he didn't move from his place. He'd leave a better dead body this time.

-What the fuck are you doing?- spoke the man finally, with confusion and anger on his voice.

-I... I could ask you the same- answered Kagehara, finding strength in his anger. That person had already stabbed him twice and now he asked what was he doing?

There was no response once again. The sword did for him, cutting him on the leg. This time apparently was going to be way worse, the boy could feel it.

Still, he had decided to die with dignity. So, breathing through his teeth, and bleeding profusely he continued standing still. The sword cut and stabbed a few times more, opening wounds on his arms, sides and legs. Pain was just unbearable, but he was too focused. His aggresor would get tired at some point. And he definitely was going to pass out staring into his eyes. If he was going to get traumatized, that man would too.

After what seemed like an eternity, his killer just went for his neck, slicing his throat open.

As the boy was drowning on his own blood, he looked at the man. He allowed tears to finally flow free, as he struggled to get a grasp of breath, accepting his death with way more dignity than the first time. His ill brain, which was switching off, decided that he'd smile at his killer. 

However, as he did, staring under the portion of face that the mask didn't cover to search for a reaction, his last smile froze.

Without doubt, in the pale portion of his face he could see, there were water drops, running down his chin. His nightmare was crying.

As his brain died, due to the lack of oxygen, he only managed to think that he was glad at least his killer was human.

He woke up on his chair. His hands hurt like hell. Under the dim light that passed through his curtains, he noticed that he had engraved his nails so hard into his hand palms that he had blood on them. At least the real pain made him feel slightly less the phantom one.

The clock told him the time. 06:02.

A horrible thought crossed his mind. What if this was going to happen every night? 

He didn't even draw. Just sat there, staring into the wall. Everytime he blinked, he would feel the pain, see the bloodied sword and worse, remember the tears of his killer, with drops of his own blood on that mask that wouldn't get out of his mind.

After a while he managed to get up and walk to the bathroom. His had a sore back, from sleeping in that uncomfortable chair. 

He looked at his reflection in the mirror. His face looked more tired than usual. He washed his thoughts away with cold water. 

After that, he bandaged his hands. Luck was on his side, even if luck wasn't exactly the word, because his parents weren't home.

He continued his morning routine. Breakfast, bathroom, get prepared, walk to the highschool.

It was helpful to have something to get used to. Repeating the same stuff over and over stopped him from breaking down. 

Walking was the worst part. In those moments, he was alone with his mind. And it was a fucked up place up there. Especially that day. The boy had a lot of things to think about. Why did the man of his nightmares want to kill him? And why was he crying in the end? After way too much time overthinking it he arrived at the centre.

People entered the jailed highschool, with a more depressing aura than usual. People were way more silent than usual.

Once in the classroom, he pulled out his sketch book. He drew the man once again, but this time from a below perspective, where the tears could be seen. Kagehara had drawn him so many times that anyone wouldd think he was obsessed with that man. For a second he thought: I actually am. But shook those thoughts out of his mind. 

There were also a ton of drawings of the guard he had watched die. Not only of his dead body, but also him smiling at them on the playground, holding his sword so people could see it, fighting some minor amalgamations...

After a few minutes into his drawing, he suddenly felt a presence behind him. The boy closed the sketchbook faster than he than lightning.

Behind him, staring curious, was the girl that usually sat next to him.

-Erm... Why have you drawn your own dead body?- she asked, awkwardly.

He suddenly turned pale. As clear as the day he remembered the sketch he had done of that dead copy of himself he had seen on the dream. 

-I don't know, why do you draw only lines?- said, looking at her wrists very intentionally. He was tired and had no wish to discuss anything with anyone.

She stared at him back, now it was her turn to go pale. It looked like she was about to say something but she just sat back on her seat.

He drew his way through the classes, but every now and then he took peeks at the girl next to him. The boy surprised her staring at him a few times, but acted as if he hadn't noticed.

After a while, he noticed he had started drawing her. He quickly erased it.

There were no attacks from Amalgamations that day. The new Amalgamation Hunter, in replace for the last one, was a woman, tall and athletic, with a giant crossbow. She looked really serious, always with a martial expression. The teenager wondered what kind of training they had to endure. Most of the guards looked either traumatized or ready to kill someone.

When the classes ended, Kagehara walked back home. Once there he ate lunch alone, in silence. Eating by himself wasn't that bad. He really wasn't feeling like speaking to anyone. Dying was a horrible experience, and he had had to experience it twice.

After he finished he did the dishes and finished his homework. Working helped him slightly with the intrusive thoughts that were assaulting him. Once every task was done he put all his focus into drawing.

He was doing so a lot lately, he realized, which was a really bad sign. 

If his coping mechanism didn't work, he'd have to go to a psychologist. Maybe they would give him medication, he thought with a shiver down his spine. The boy had seen what medication did. Everyday, on his way to highschool he'd see that people, abandoned on their hopelessness, that had given out to drugs and crime to feel alive. Every now and then, especially in winter, he'd see one of them dead against a wall. Some of them even lacked pieces of meat, because food is food.

What if the situation went on forever? What if that man was going to just kill him every time?

He shook the useless thoughts out of his mind and went on drawing. However after a while he had lost all inspiration and anxiety just was going upwards as the sky got darker and darker. 

Kagehara stared at his bandaged hands. They hurt.

-But not as much as getting stabbed- he said to himself.

He felt as if he was losing his sanity. 

After hours and hours just drawing and staring at the wall, changing from one to another, he decided that the situation couldn't go on for longer. The sun died in a dramatic red, turning the clouds of a purple and pink color, while the entire sky bled bright orange.

The boy decided to do something productive and went to his father's office. He had an amazing collection of books. They didn't have that much money, but no one had even mentioned the idea of selling the books. 

He carefully examined them all. None of them were fiction, only manuals about different areas of knowledge. Usually he wouldn't even look at them twice, but he was desperately searching for a distraction.

Finally, in a weird sense, he picked an anatomy one. Kagehara found himself carefully drawing  lines on a cardiovascular model with his finger, marking the places where the sword had cut or stabbed. It was admiring. All the non lethal blows had easily dodged the important blood vessels. When he measured the one on the neck following with his index the phantom pain and checked on the picture, he noticed that the sword had cut both the jugular and carotid. On another drawing of the respiratory system he found that the trachea had also been cut.

He had to take a break to puke.

It was horrifying but also beautiful in a weird sense. 

The first time he died, the blade had perfectly stabbed into the center of the stomach, making sure he passed out due to the pain as quickly as possible.

Another break to puke later and he had started to make note of the places where he could get stabbed and cut without dying. 

The human body was truly amazing he thought. A human could survive getting stabbed in a lot of places for a long time. 

Sadly, he also learned something truly horrifying. The guard he had seen die, hadn't died because of the monster's attack. Even with multiple broken ribs and  organs, he had only passed out. Death had probably come later, after falling from the cage. However, it probably had taken him some more time to finally die. 

The boy thought about laying there, feeling the pain on his broken bones and ruptured orfans, with his poor heart trying to do something to stop the certain death he was facing as his brain slowly turned off.

Another puking break was needed.

However he felt the hunger for knowledge still. He finished the entire book and then re-read it. He didn't even hear his parents arriving home. The boy was going sleepless that night. 

Especially because of what was waiting for him on his dreams.

Around 2 a.m. Kagehara realized he hadn't had dinner. However he was mid drawing a map of blood vessels so he postponed it and didn't remember again.

He didn't go look for other books since he could potentially wake his parents up, so he continued with the same, writing down important notes and drawing maps. 

After a while the boy was feeling tired. The last days had been really long and he hadn't got a lot of sleep.

However this time he was prepared. He took a few sips from a bottle of coffee he had brewed. That night he wasn't falling asleep.

When the coffee stopped helping, around four a.m, he decided that exercise would, so with enough caffeine on his organism to kill a small child, he started doing push-ups. 

It was exhausting and his arms and chest were burning but he couldn't afford to fall asleep.

The sun surprised him laying in bed, heavily breathing and covered in sweat, next to a notebook filled with drawings of body parts, blood vessels and nerves.

The teenager's parents had already gone to work so he quickly took a shower. They'd usually get mad at him for doing so, since hot water was pretty expensive and they would tell him to have a shower at school after gym class. However they weren't there and the boy wasn't going to go to school smelling like sweat.

While he undressed he looked at his reflection in the mirror. His body was really thin, he looked squalid and malnourished. His skin was way too pale and the eyebags he usually had were more noticeable than ever, under his red eyes.

After the shower he had a quick breakfast and went to the highschool, walking as usual.

Kagehara had never been so in need of a rest, but he knew what waited for him on his nightmares. On the way there he noticed the people staring at him more than usual. Probably because of his sick appearance. He could compare himself to the homeless that walked around the alley.

When he arrived at school, he sat on his place, completely dead inside. Quickly he noticed that for the first time ever, he hadn't arrived first though. Next to him, the girl that had seen his drawings was already there, staring into the nothingness.

The boy decided to ignore her, which is why he surprised himself when he asked her:

-Have you ever thought about dying?

The girl turned towards him surprised.

-Sorry, that was a strange thing to ask- he apologized. 

He was really tired and apparently couldn't control his words.

However after a few seconds she answered.

-Yeah, it must be nice, finishing all, not having to worry about anything. You feel the pain for just a second and all of your problems stop being there. Not that I'm suicidal or anythind though- she quickly added- why the question?

Kagehara turned, now somehow mad.

-You feel the pain for just a second? All your troubles are gone? Don't make me laugh- he answered- Dying sucks.

-That's a really childish perspective. In the end, doesn't have a meaning- she quickly responded. 

Apparently now it was an argument.

-Tell me, the hunter of the other day, do you think he's now resting in peace? Do you think he enjoyed losing all of his problems?

She looked at him shocked.

-At least his death was quick, his family will get paid for the rest of their life. No one wants to die but I think he was lucky he got to do so that way.

He exploded. He knew better than anyone how dying felt like. That depressed girl wasn't going to tell him otherwise.

-Yeah great way of dying. I've ran the numbers. He broke multiple ribs and a kidney. Then he fell from about three stories high. He probably lasted from around 30 minutes to an entire hour alive, bleeding out, with way too many broken bones stabbing into him- he quickly lectured her- death isn't some romantic shit where you drink the content of a small bottle and you slowly fall sleep, while sleeping like flowers. It fucking hurts, you come to the realization that you are going to end. No, definitely you aren't thinking about your problems going away because your are fucking in pain and your brain is just dying- he realized he had been speaking louder and louder, ending that sentence screaming.

He quickly looked around, but there was no one yet.

She stared at him, shocked and slightly hurt because of his words. It must be hard having your ideas blown away so suddenly.

-But then the pain stops- she said, holing the tears.

-No, on the contrary, you are going to suffer an inmense pain and suffering for the rest of your life.

The conversation quickly finished as other people started to enter the classroom.

However, as he drew through the classes, he surprised himself staring at her, and drawing her profile. Maybe he had been too harsh with her.

After class he turned to apologize, but she quickly ran out of the classroom before he managed to.

Back home he ate as fast as he could, and started to do his homework, even if it was hard to focus because of the exhaustion and the million themes he now had to think about.

However after a while, his conciousness faded away and he fell asleep, giving out to the tiredness.

And he suddenly was in a familiar field, slightly behind to dead bodies and staring at a masked figure he already knew well.

His last thought before giving out to the panic as he stared at the new himsef that laid dead and covered in blood everywhere was:

"Definitely I didn't leave a better dead body the second time"

And then he entered on the fight or flight mode.