I couldn't stop crying. My body shook as if every sob was tearing something loose inside me. The sound of gunfire was fading into a nightmare blur, but the fear of losing Akira cut sharper than any bullet.
"Is this… what it feels like to love a warrior?" I whispered to myself, voice breaking. "To watch the person you love face death every second?"
Another gunshot sliced the air—
And Akira's leg buckled.
He fell to the ground.
My heart stopped. My vision blurred. Something primal surged through me, drowning fear in a rush of reckless determination. I shoved aside the man Akira had ordered to restrain me. It didn't matter how strong he was—my body moved with a force I didn't know I possessed.
I saw Akira bleeding on the dirt.
I saw death reaching for him.
And I ran.
A gun lay beside a fallen soldier. I grabbed it with trembling hands, not even knowing how to hold it properly. My chest burned, my throat closed, but I forced my legs forward until I stood in front of Akira—shielding him the way he had shielded me.
"Move!" he screamed hoarsely. "Get away from here—you'll die!"
"If death is waiting," I cried back, "then I'll meet it with you!"
I pressed the trigger.
The recoil slammed into my arms again and again, but I didn't stop. My shots were wild, blind—tears fogging my eyes—but somehow bullets found their marks. Enemy soldiers fell, not because I was skilled, but because I refused to let the world take him from me.
Then—
Click.
Empty.
My mind froze. My breath stopped.
A Manchurian soldier raised his gun, aiming straight at me.
Akira saw him first.
With the last fragments of strength in his battered body, he lunged forward, crashing into me. His arms wrapped around me fiercely, protectively. His blood soaked into my clothes, warm, terrifying.
"A-Akira!" I gasped, feeling his weight collapse against me.
His head fell onto my shoulder. His breath trembled against my neck.
He didn't respond.
Before the soldier could fire again, a thunderous wave of Japanese forces stormed in like salvation breaking through hell. The ground vibrated as their bullets tore into the enemy ranks.
We were saved—
But Akira wasn't moving.
I tried to lift him. My arms trembled, legs weak, but I dragged his bleeding body toward the camp shelters. "Help!" I screamed, barely able to breathe. "Someone please—please help him!"
The medical team rushed forward. They lifted him from my shaking arms and carried him into the first-aid room.
The moment he disappeared behind the door, my strength left me.
I collapsed on the cold floor, covered in his blood, shaking from head to toe. His scent clung to my clothes—metallic from the blood, warm from his body, heartbreakingly familiar. My tears wouldn't stop. I cried until it hurt to breathe.
God… please.
If a life has to be taken, take mine. Not his.
Every moment I'd spent with him replayed in my mind—his voice, his warmth, even the pain he caused. Somehow, in the span of days, he had become everything. The world without him felt like an empty shell.
The doctor finally emerged.
I stumbled to my feet.
"H-how is he?" I choked out.
"We reached him in time," the doctor said, adjusting his gloves. "Another few minutes and blood loss might've taken him."
Relief crashed into me so quickly my knees nearly buckled.
"Can I see him?" I asked desperately.
"He's sleeping. I have to treat others. Can you… clean him and bandage the wounds I've stitched?"
I nodded without hesitation.
Inside the room, Akira lay unconscious on the bed, breathing unsteadily. The doctor had already cut away the damaged clothing from his wounded side. His skin—blood-streaked, bruised—looked fragile and fierce all at once.
My hands trembled as I touched him.
Not from embarrassment.
Not from fear.
From the overwhelming, aching truth that I loved him more than I understood.
I removed the rest of his ruined clothes carefully, respectfully—only what was needed to clean and bandage him. My cheeks burned with a deep blush, but the tenderness in my chest was stronger than the heat.
His body, though injured, was the body of a man who had fought storms and survived—scarred, powerful, breathtaking in its strength. A warrior's body. The body that had shielded me again and again.
I wrapped the bandage around the wound in his thigh slowly, my fingers brushing his skin lightly, reverently. Each touch carried a storm of feelings—fear of losing him, gratitude he was alive, and something softer, deeper, that made my heart twist painfully.
When I finished covering every wound, I sat beside him, stroking his hair gently. His long, dark strands slipped between my fingers, silky and warm. The simple act felt intimate, grounding, almost sacred.
I leaned closer, feeling his faint breath against my wrist. "You're alive," I whispered, voice trembling. "You came back to me…"
I didn't remember when sleep claimed me.
But I remember the last thing I felt—
Akira's presence beside me.
His heartbeat, faint but steady.
The comforting warmth of the man who had almost died for me.
And the crushing, undeniable truth in my chest:
I loved him.
With everything I had.