This game was rigged from the start. I never stood a chance.
"Stop him! Close the gates before he escapes!" one of the knights bellowing behind me shouted, and I could hear the thunder of their boots getting closer with every second.
Why did I have to reincarnate into this character out of everyone in the entire game? Why him?
The future was already bleak before I even opened my eyes in this body, and no matter how hard I tried to find some angle to work with, all I could see was more darkness closing in. Luck had never been on my side, and today was no different. If they caught me, I was seriously considering just ending it there, because I couldn't wrap my head around how things had fallen apart this badly.
I had a plan. A real one, with every variable accounted for, or at least I thought so at the time.
The plan itself was simple, and under normal circumstances it should have worked without a hitch. But I had missed one crucial detail, which was that I had no mana, no real physical strength, and no plot armor to fall back on. I was as powerless as an unawakened child, just an ordinary villain, a stepping stone, a footnote buried somewhere in the middle of a story that didn't belong to me.
"Stop him! Cripple him if you have to!" another knight shouted from somewhere behind me, and a chill shot straight down my spine.
The reason I was running was simple, my plan had failed completely. I didn't know what I had been thinking when I came up with it, because in hindsight it was obvious that I couldn't take on a knight alone with this body. My idea had been to sneak attack one of them and steal his armor, which had sounded reasonable enough inside my head, but the moment he spotted me it went sideways immediately, and the only reason I was still breathing was pure dumb luck.
I hated everything about this.
The knights were closing in fast, while others fanned out to my sides to cut off any angle of escape, running a coordinated pincer that was going to be very difficult to outmaneuver. I could feel my strength draining with every step, because every bit of energy this frail body had was being burned just to keep me moving at this pace, while the knights behind me glided forward effortlessly on mana manipulation techniques that made them look like they were out for a casual jog.
"Damn it!" I gasped, my legs feeling like they were dissolving underneath me, the pain of pushing past every limit this body had making each stride worse than the last.
I looked ahead and spotted the one thing that could still save me, the massive gate, which for some reason was still open, though it was already beginning to lower on the orders of whoever was in charge out there, grinding downward slowly as if it wanted me to watch my only exit disappear in real time.
I can't make it, I realized, and the truth of it settled hard in my chest. As much as I wanted to hold onto the possibility, the math just didn't work.
Then something hit my calf, and the pain that exploded through my leg was immediate and total.
An arrow.
"AHHHHHHH!"