The Price of Peace"
The Red Ground We Stand On"
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A Land That Shouldn't Exist
The soil was black.
Not from fire.
Not from ash.
But from dried blood soaked so deep that the ground itself seemed to bleed.
Corpses, limbs, bones — all scattered like trash.
Buzzing flies clouded the air like smoke.
Eyes, torn from skulls, stared blankly at the sky.
A sky that never cried, no matter how much the world beneath it screamed.
This was the 85th War Zone — called by soldiers as The Red Ground.
For three months, two nations fought over it.
But no one remembered why.
Maybe for land.
Maybe for oil.
Maybe because someone was bored and had power.
All that was left were boys and girls barely 16… clutching rifles heavier than their courage.
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"Form up! LINE UP!"
Hundreds of soldiers — bloody, broken, starving — knelt before a jagged hill.
At the top stood Commander Rovel Kaien, cape torn, boots covered in blood not his own.
His left arm was gone.
His right hand held his sword.
His gaze burned through the fog of war.
The soldiers were scared.
Some were crying.
Some had pissed themselves.
Some held photos of mothers or dead siblings.
And some… looked hollow.
Like death had already borrowed their souls.
Rovel raised his sword high.
His voice wasn't loud.
It didn't need to be.
It cut through fear like steel through flesh.
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COMMANDER ROVEL'S SPEECH
> "Do you know where you are?
This land has no name. No future. No flag.
It's the dumping ground for people no one needs."
> "We were sent here to die.
Because we were poor, unwanted, forgotten."
> "They sit in their halls, clean and full, while we bathe in the blood of friends."
> "But listen to me now—every one of you."
He slams his sword into the ground.
"We do not fight for kings. We do not die for glory. We do not bleed to be remembered."
> "We stand, right here, for the one next to us."
"We fight so the one beside us might see tomorrow."
"We charge… not to win, but to mean something."
> "Let them forget us."
"Let them bury us in lies."
"But let them NEVER say we ran."
> "If we die today, we die facing forward.
Eyes open. Hearts full.
Not like pawns.
But like monsters who chose our fate!"
> "So rise, my brothers and sisters of the forgotten.
The world will never forgive us.
But it will fear us."
He lifts his sword again.
> "Charge into hell — and tear open the throat of fate itself!!"
The soldiers scream.
> "RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHH!!!"
The horn sounds.
The battlefield answers.
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HELL
Artillery blasts the left flank — bodies explode like ripped fruit.
One soldier gets caught in a napalm flame — his flesh melts off while he screams.
He runs three steps before falling, skinless, steaming.
Another boy's lower body is gone — he uses his arms to crawl, begging for someone to finish him.
A girl — no older than 14 — is shot in the jaw.
Her mouth flaps open in a horrible "O" as she tries to breathe.
She dies kneeling.
Landmines pop like firecrackers.
A man screams after his legs fly upward and hit his own chest.
A tank rolls forward.
The ground beneath it detonates, flipping it into the air.
It crashes, crushing five soldiers into a puddle of red and crushed bones.
In the middle of this, someone laughs — a laugh so broken it sounds like crying.
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A CHILD HIDING BEHIND A WALL
Rael, age 12, grips a bag tightly to his chest.
His fingers are bruised, skin torn.
His face is cut from falling into barbed wire.
He breathes in — blood.
He breathes out — smoke.
He sees everything.
His mother… body bent backwards.
His father… head split like a melon.
His sister… clutching a small doll, eyes open but glassy.
Rael doesn't scream.
He just stares.
Behind him, another explosion — he falls to the ground, hits his head.
Dazed.
A shadow appears.
A soldier points a rifle at him.
Rael raises his hand.
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But before the shot is fired…
A HAND PULLS HIM BACK
A masked stranger — face hidden — yanks him into a sewer tunnel.
Rael falls into the darkness, gasping.
The soldier above shrugs and walks away.
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UNDERGROUND
Water drips.
Rats crawl.
The masked figure kneels before Rael.
Removes the mask.
It's a girl — maybe 16 — eyes full of scars, one arm missing.
> "You'll die if you keep watching," she says softly.
Rael doesn't reply.
> "What's your name?"
"…Rael."
> "What do you want, Rael?"
He looks up.
There is no fire in his eyes.
Only a quiet storm.
> "…I want to understand why people are like this."
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> "If peace is the dream… then maybe the world has to be broken first to rebuild it."
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