June 13th
A loud piercing scream cuts through the quiet night sky. Its crying weeping shrills. It’s probably another person being torn apart by the wild dogs again. We always tell them to not go past the borders at night, but they never listen. They usually don’t come back, but the ones that do aren’t the same. Chris. Chris was a pretty cool and funny guy before he left, always bringing the mood up when it was sour. He went out one time.
One time.
He came back with his clothes in tatters, cuts, and bruises all over his body. One of his eyes was gouged out, leaving a deep pit of emptiness in the socket.
After he recovered from his injuries he wasn’t the same, I noticed he never had his back to a large group of people, and he constantly looked over his shoulder as if searching for something stalking him. His eyes, well, his eye always had bags under them. He must’ve constantly been awake out there trying to survive and he never got rid of the feeling. His pupil has always been a large dark circle of nothingness.
I’ve also noticed he tends to stay away from light, he keeps away from campfires and his room lights are always off. I’m not sure what’s up with that, I’d imagine after being in the dark for several hours straight you’d want to stay in the light as much as possible. Speaking of the night, I should explain how the day-night cycle works here.
So what I’ve been told is that the day lasts 18 hours in the summertime and 12 hours during the winter. The night lasts 24 hours in the summertime and 30 hours during the winter. There are always 42 hours in a typical day of ours. I heard that there used to be 24 hours in a day before ‘The Falling’, but it just doesn’t sound believable.
My grandparents used to tell me many stories about the world before It all went to hell. Like school, it’s this place where a whole bunch of kids goes learn about math and science. We sort of have that now, but now it’s just about learning how to survive out there. We learn about the types of known creatures out there, the plants, and diseases. Everyone is immune to most diseases out there, or they would get mildly sick before healing right up. Though there’s always something new to find out there.
My grandparents were pretty cool.
My granddad was a Delta Force operator, he was mainly a part of the assassination group, but also participated in regular operations too. He was an adventurer and researcher after The Falling. He went out during the day to go out there and find out about new things. Like new animals or plants, he also researches animals, cures for diseases, and how to get the old planet back. Oh and a planet is just a really big rock in space, I don’t really understand what space is though. A lot of nothingness just doesn’t make sense, where did it come from, know?
My grandmother was a teacher, she’s the one that told me all about the Solar System and what planets were. She also taught me how to read which is pretty cool. But not like the other people, she taught me all about syllables, vowels, and really big words. She’s the only probably the only reason I’m still alive, reading is very useful.
Their kids, my mother, and father, died early in my life. They both were adventurers and were killed outside the walls. That’s all they told me, they never found the bodies. My grandmother told me that they were lost in a cave somewhere, and by the time they made it out of the cave it was dark. They weren’t as lucky as Chris.
Despite the horrors that lie outside the gates, I still want to explore this barren world. My grandparents never tried to stop me, but they prepared me the best that they could. My grandmother gave me all her knowledge on the outside and what types of monsters lie on the outside. My grandfather taught me about surviving in the wilderness and how to fight. He taught me about martial arts called Muay Thai, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, and Boxing.
When I grew up a bit more he told me about these combat systems. All it seemed to be were just more martial arts to me. I once asked what was the difference between these combat systems and martial arts. He explained it to me in great detail, but I can summarize it here.
“Martial arts is an art, like in the name. It’s made to look flashy, and creative. It’s to end a conflict skillfully and beautifully. A combat system, Is made to kill.”
I got goosebumps on my arms after hearing the word, kill. Such a harsh word.
“These combat systems are made to maim, critically injure, or kill your opponent as fast as humanly possible. They aren’t made to be beautiful or flashy. It’s why I waited a long time to teach you about these systems, I needed to know you wouldn’t abuse your power and go around killing people.”
He taught me about Vacon, Krav Maga, and Silat.
He told me that I will never be bested by another human being in my life.
I’m 19 now, and I still practice all these martial arts to this day, gramps always told me to never stop practicing. The more repetitions I do, the closer to perfection I become. I’ve gotten bigger and stronger from all my training, so I became a junior adventurer. I just became one a few weeks ago, we actually got our first mission briefing today. It’s supposed to happen tomorrow, so I’m writing in this journal in case I die on our first journey out. If I survive past that I’ll continue writing my experiences down here. Farewell journal, this could potentially be the first and last time we meet.