Ethan stood over Violet, sword in hand.
His breathing came in ragged gasps, each inhale like a blade scraping against his ribs. Blood soaked through the leg of his pants, pooling slowly around his boots. His fingers trembled around the hilt, but he did not drop it.
The dagger lay inches from Violet's knee. She hadn't moved since she surrendered it. Her eyes were shut, but her lips were parted as if she were waiting—hoping—for him to say something. For him to do something.
The silence between them stretched long and suffocating.
Above them, the arena's blood-red lights pulsed like a dying heartbeat.
"Only one may leave," the announcer repeated. "If you refuse to act, you will both be terminated."
That voice. Calm. Icy. Completely detached from the carnage it had created.
Ethan wanted to scream at it, to rip the ceiling down and drag the sadistic billionaire out of whatever godlike perch he was watching from. But all his rage, all his fury, all his pain... it came down to one thing now.
Violet.
She opened her eyes at last, meeting his.
"I'm not going to fight you anymore," she whispered.
He knelt, ignoring the pain in his thigh, and placed the tip of the sword on the ground. The metal hissed faintly where blood met steel.
"You really think I can just... kill you?" he asked.
Violet looked at him—not with fear, but with something far heavier: understanding.
"No," she said softly. "But I know you will. Because you have to."
He shook his head.
"I've lost everything already. My family. My dignity. The only person I trusted stole what little I had left. And now... I have you—and this stupid, impossible choice."
Violet reached forward, her hand brushing against his wrist. Her touch was feather-light, like she didn't want to take anything more from him—even the moment.
"Then don't do it for me," she said. "Do it for yourself."
Flashback – Ethan, Age 17
He sat outside the foster home with a half-broken guitar in his lap, plucking chords he barely knew. His case worker had warned him: "Don't get attached to anyone. You won't stay long."
But he had made a friend—Caleb, another orphan who liked to draw monsters in his notebook and talk about comic books like they were sacred texts. One day, Caleb disappeared. No goodbye. No warning. Just a new bed in the room.
The lesson was cruel and simple: Everyone leaves.
Everyone.
"I didn't want to believe it," Ethan said. "That the world was this cruel. That people could just be tossed into a pit like animals for someone else's amusement."
He looked around the arena—at the cold steel, the flashing lights, the empty seats above where cameras likely hid.
"But you were different," he said. "You kept your humanity. Even here."
Violet smiled faintly. "Only because you reminded me how."
They sat like that for another minute—two souls at the edge of a cliff, too broken to climb down, too afraid to fall.
Finally, the voice returned.
"Final warning. One of you must die within the next two minutes, or both of you will be executed. This is non-negotiable."
A mechanical whir echoed through the arena. A countdown timer appeared in the air above them: 1:59... 1:58... 1:57...
Violet closed her eyes again. "Don't make me watch."
Ethan stood.
His grip around the sword tightened. The metal groaned slightly under the force.
He walked around behind her slowly, each step shaking from injury and dread. He raised the blade.
1:32... 1:31... 1:30...
"I'll never forget you," he said, voice barely audible.
He could feel her trembling, just slightly. Maybe it was fear. Maybe it was acceptance.
1:15... 1:14...
Violet whispered, "Neither will I."
He lifted the sword higher.
1:05... 1:04...
Then, with a sharp cry, he brought the sword down—plunging it deep.
Violet gasped.
For one awful moment, Ethan felt everything leave her body through the hilt of the sword. Her pain. Her life. Her spirit. And his heart broke right alongside it.
Her head leaned back, eyes fluttering once—and then stillness.
Ethan staggered back.
His blade slipped from his hands.
"Contestant Violet has been eliminated."
A hiss of steam filled the arena, and the lights shifted from red to a soft blue. A panel opened on the far wall, revealing a hallway glowing with a pale white light.
"Congratulations, Ethan. You are the final survivor of Round 3."
He collapsed to his knees.
Tears fell freely now, mixing with the blood on his cheeks.
Was this what victory felt like?
Was this the price of becoming the last one?
He had survived a hundred-person massacre, a mind-breaking psychological game, a brutal duel with someone who might've been the closest thing he ever had to a soulmate. And now he was alone again.
More alone than ever.
But somewhere beneath the pain—beneath the guilt—was something else.
A spark.
Not of joy.
Not of triumph.
But power.
He felt it the moment Violet died.
Something deep in his bones shifted, like the rules of reality around him had begun to bend ever so slightly. The world didn't feel the same anymore.
His pain dulled faster than it should've.
His vision sharpened unnaturally.
He felt a pulse in the back of his skull—as though some unseen force had touched him and left a mark.
The voice returned once more, this time lower, more theatrical:
"You have chosen survival over compromise. Pain over peace. Strength over mercy."
"And now, you are ready."
A new door opened ahead.
Inside, something waited—something beyond human understanding.
Something that would explain everything.
Ethan stared at the light and whispered the name that echoed in his chest like a scar:
"Violet."
Then he rose.
And stepped through.