Gun of Ashes

”Soldiers! Advance! Soldiers! The enemy’s fortress is right there! Capture them!”

Old Cole seemed exhausted from running, panting heavily as he stood still, then waving his hand to point at an empty spot on the grass. At his command, the patients who were frolicking and running with him danced and ran toward that spot, but their faces carried a stern demeanor, as if there truly were enemies there.

”Dig quickly! Gavin! You deserter, dig!”

After commanding the group of patients, old Cole shouted at Gavin, who was persistently digging the imagined trenches, not responding verbally.

The soil and grass were overturned, with some insects among them, as Gavin’s nails were full of dirt. He was desperately digging, with some scratches on his fingers already, but the nurses had no intention to stop him.

Every time they tried to stop Gavin from doing so, this seemingly calm patient would suddenly go berserk, becoming extremely aggressive. Since digging like this didn’t harm him much, the nurses simply stopped preventing him, letting him carry on as he pleased.

”You’re being quite improper like this; you’ll never get married.”

Despite wearing the same patient attire, as Sir Delun walked, one would always feel he was dressed in extravagant attire. Perhaps, that was the effect of his etiquette. Among these patients, his mannerisms were the most elegant, considering himself a gentleman.

And now, this gentleman was watching Eve clinging to William, trying to pull this old fellow, who was continuously gnawing the grass, up from the ground.

”So vulgar.”

Delun looked at Eve with disdain, turned around, and cast a disdainful glance at each patient in the activity area.

In his eyes, these patients were all vulgar savages, ignorant of decorum and decency.

He rolled up non-existent sleeves, picked up an imaginary cane, and walked steadily around the area, elegantly extending a hand as he reached William, the one gnawing on the grass.

”Need help, sir?”

In return, he was met with a muddy slap, sending Delun tumbling over.

William finally got pulled up by Eve, claiming to be an alchemist. His obvious symptom was the inclination to taste everything as if it was the elixir he had been seeking.

He was also one of those less communicative ones, rarely initiating conversation. After being pulled up by Eve, he just sat on the grass, blankly staring at the spot he had just gnawed away.

Long hair fluttering, sitting cross-legged.

William seemed to be in a trance, muttering something like a spell after a short while.

Eve didn’t mind; this old fellow always appeared to be a little dazed... No, everyone here in the critical area was a bit off, but after all, they were patients, incurable patients.

The nurses regularly administered sedatives to them, but prolonged and frequent injections destroyed what little sanity they had left, Eve had overheard the nurses discussing privately.

These patients were initially quite lively, but as life here progressed, their already shattered will became further diminished, until they ended up like those patients sitting on benches, eyes vacant, like walking corpses.

Eve’s ”friends” couldn’t escape such fate either; she didn’t know what they had been through or why they had become like this; she only knew it was a slow demise, bit by bit, into chaos.

Thinking about this, she felt somewhat sad because she had quite a rapport with these friends recently.

But suddenly, the patients stopped their actions, their eyes cautiously peering in another direction. It wasn’t a sign of sanity but rather a biological instinct.

A nurse pushed a wheelchair through the puddles, with a young boy sitting in it.

Eve had seen him many times; she also knew the boy’s peculiarity... or rather, she wasn’t certain, just vaguely sensed that the boy, like her, retained some sanity but stayed here due to some special reasons. But what piqued her curiosity were the other patients’ comments on him.

”This savage bully.”

Elegant Delun said this, glancing disdainfully at the boy before leaving directly.

”How did he get drafted into the army? Has the war become so critical that they’re using child soldiers now?”

Old Cole made this comment, a bit puzzled, but his poor sanity couldn’t hold up any longer, so he lowered his head and continued to reprimand the trench-digging Gavin.

Gavin didn’t react much, only occasionally glancing at the boy. At times, his mud-covered hand seemed to want to salute, but each time it was interrupted by old Cole.

William showed no reaction at all. After Eve stopped him from continuing to munch on grass, he sat there cross-legged, seemingly in a daze.

He was a young boy, appearing a few years younger than Eve, with soft golden hair and a few sickly pale features on his cheeks. He sat upright in the wheelchair, gazing forward into the void without shifting.

In this way, he appeared just like those vacant patients, but Eve had seen that within those vacant eyes were bits of clarity and awareness, though he was too lazy to express it.

The nurse left him in a corner and left him alone; none of the surrounding patients dared to disturb him. It was like a circle of docile lambs, with the boy being the tiger amongst them, showing no intent, not because he didn’t have any, but simply because he wasn’t hungry at the moment.