"Answer me: What are you willing to sacrifice for your family?" It is obvious that sentimentalists would say, "Everything!" The reserved would hesitate, while those who fancy themselves tough would simply remark that they do not care. Ahhh... Too bad I am a sentimentalist.
At ten years old, Eídal Granier would begin his descent into madness, confined within a luxurious room.
"I, Eídal... No. I, Eídal Granier, will work hard and kill the heroes."
---
When Eídal was eight years old, he was an ordinary-looking village boy: scrawny, pale-skinned, with brown hair and brown eyes. He was an orphan, and he had no talent whatsoever for any form of combat. In fact, one could say that his physical condition was below average.
And yet, there was something that set him apart from every other human being. It was an obsessive longing: the desire to have a family.
Yes, a family.
Many might have thought of it as a need to feel accepted by a group. But what truly motivated Eídal was... love.
At first, he considered the notion ridiculous and sentimental. But as time passed, his mind involuntarily began to accept the idea of the heart. His nightly prayers gradually changed from "I want to eat meat tomorrow" or "I want to sleep all day!" to things like, "I wish I had someone who loved me. I don't care who it is!"
Little by little, he wanted to become valuable to someone, to be somebody's number one.
Words such as "I'll work hard so that I can be loved" and "I have to become useful to someone" began to leave his lips almost every day.
But that desire for love had been distorted by a certain ideology.
Every kingdom in the world adhered to a doctrine that determined the value of an individual. In some places, it was beauty; in others, loyalty or strength. But in the Kingdom of Longer, where Eídal was born, that doctrine was utility.
In other words, a citizen's worth was closely tied to how useful they were, or how much they could contribute to society. Everyone, regardless of who they were, was expected to be useful and serve some purpose.
It was their way of life. Their way of thinking.
And so, his pure desire for love ultimately became stained by the doctrine of utility.
Had Eídal been born in another kingdom, where different doctrines were taught, his understanding of love would have been different as well. For example:
"If I want to be loved, I have to be beautiful."
"If I want to be loved, I have to be strong."
"If I want to be loved, I have to be loyal."
But because he had been born in the Kingdom of Longer, his perception eventually became:
"If I want to be loved, I have to be useful."
With an understanding of love warped by that ideology, he arrived at a conclusion:
"If I am helpful and useful, I'll become someone valuable to society, right? And once society accepts me, I'll be able to be loved. Yes, loved! And then, and only then, I'll be able to have a family!"
You might consider it a foolish thought, the sort of thing one would expect from a child.
"But it can't end there. I have to keep proving my love to my family—to anyone who becomes my family. That's why I have to be useful to the people who become my family. Once I have one, I will serve only my family. And nothing else."
And as that desire continued to take root in his heart, his life went on without much change for the next two springs.
---
Shortly before Eídal turned ten, the season was relatively cold, and long hours of rain transformed the sandy roads into veritable swamps. As a result, sending soldiers to defend the more remote reaches of the Kingdom of Longer, a minor monarchy in the central continent, became exceedingly difficult.
That same season brought another, far greater problem. An event that would come to be known as the Great Invasion.
As its name suggested, it was a devastating assault carried out by the Fallen, demons responsible for all the evil in the world. Without hesitation, they tore through the kingdom's borders, seizing its resources and taking prisoners.
Even so, when news of the assault began to reverberate through the capital of Longer, no significant effort was made to protect the smaller villages. Instead, priority was given to reinforcing the great cities and safeguarding the places deemed most useful.
Eídal's village was one of them.
Abandoned by the kingdom, the villagers had no choice but to defend themselves as best they could. But despite fighting tooth and nail, everything was razed to the ground.
The sudden turn of events drove the few survivors into despair. Then, hidden in the basement of the village's largest cottage, they desperately searched for some means of saving themselves.
And just as the kingdom had sacrificed them, they decided to sacrifice the person who was least useful to the village in return: Eídal.
Murmurs spread through the darkness.
"Yes, the boy is the best choice."
"I don't think we could force anyone else to do it."
One of the villagers approached him and, with a solemn expression, said:
"I think we're all in agreement. It's time to be useful, boy."
Eídal could not help but be taken aback. With only a small whimper, he found himself unable to think of the right way to defy the order of someone older than him.
And yet, being dismissed as useless made his heart ache.
The path that would lead him toward his inevitable encounter with the heroes would begin there as well:
Confined within a luxurious room.