**Before Fight** 

Steven listened to the briefing, but there wasn’t much to know about the mission. Bandits are attacking outposts, kill bandits. But while the instructions were straightforward, Steven had a dilemma. A moral dilemma. Was he ready to kill another person?

Sitting in the fake caravan, Steven had nothing to do but think. And all Steven had to think about was the task ahead and how prepared he was for it. Could he kill another person? Steven had been trained for the past few months in several deadly ways. He was given weapons, designed to kill. It was certain that he _could_ kill another person, so the question wasn’t whether he could, but rather, whether he should.

Steven glanced at his childhood friend, Drakul, sitting close to his on hiding spot. Drakul had changed during the initiation, that much was certain. He was almost a different person, which was… different. All of his cockiness and arrogance had gone away, along with his pride. These were all the defining characteristics of Drakul, however, and Steven missed the old Drakul a little. Because for all his arrogance, Drakul was the kind of guy who demanded attention. He brought life when days were dry and light in dull days. Steven looked up into space and smiled at the thought, reminiscing about his childhood. It was ironic, really. Steven couldn’t really say that he liked Drakul before the initiation, but he found himself remembering those days with a particular fondness. Those were days he would never get back. Steven’s smile faded as he thought about things he would never get back. He had never killed another person and he was loathe to do so, because he didn’t know what consequences it would bring. Would he be different to who he was now? 

Steven looked towards the other paladins among his group. Were they ready to take a life? Did they have the guts to face death for the first time? There were a few trainees who were shaking, and Steven couldn’t blame them. This was their first mission after all. There were also a few, like Drakul, who were perfectly still, and calm. Steven admired them in a sense, being able to seem as if they were unabashed by the possibility of death. But it brought up the question again: Were they ready to kill? He knew that baseless confidence could lead to downfalls. This was evident many times during his childhood where Drakul would believe nothing would go wrong, only to receive a blow to his pride when it did indeed go wrong. Even if they told themselves that they weren’t afraid of death, if they are faced with a situation that was more than they expected, it might break their minds. And Steven didn’t want that.

Suddenly, the carriage stopped, as if to stop Steven from thinking about it any longer. Everyone in the caravan tensed in preparation, Steven included. An incomprehensible whirl of thoughts passed through Steven’s mind and passed without a trace, as the tell-tale sound of a sword being stuck through the gut of a bandit signalled the beginning of the attack.

**FIGHT**

Steven was swept out in a torrent of trainees, rushing out of the caravan to get their blades into bandit bodies as fast as possible. Steven struggled out of the crowd and looked around him. There were small clashes around the place, but it was too chaotic for him to see anything. Steven climbed onto the roof of the caravan and drew his bow, surveying his surroundings.

The ring of fighting was some distance away from the caravan, meaning their ambush was effective, but there were already an alarming amount of bandits and the trainees were in the midst of fighting them. A quick check of their weapons gave Steven the information he needed. Basic clubs, swords, axes, crude shields. No bows, no armour. Most were engaged in hand to hand combat with trainees, but there were quite a few preoccupied with a group of only 2 trainees. 2 trainees that he remembered were impressive, but he forgot their names. One was like a whirling ball of death and the other seemed to have more of a supportive role, but was impressive nonetheless. Besides the condition of their equipment and the state of the fight, the bandits seemed to have no strategy and just charged the trainees who cut them down to size efficiently.

Everything was in Steven’s favour, as there were no bandits so much as looking at him. He had the high ground and they had no armour. It would be easy to bypass their shields and he was in no danger of getting hit. Steven knocked an arrow onto the bowstring and drew it back. Still Steven hesitated in firing, because he still wasn’t sure he wanted to kill. What had these bandits done to Steven? Nothing. He tried to remind himself that they had made many a person’s life misery and that they were truly bad people, but as his aim wandered, trying to find a target, he couldn’t help but remember the time when his new ‘family’ had caught a pickpocket. 

One day, when walking along the market, his new ‘Father’ snatched the hand of someone who had his wallet in their hand, fresh out of his pocket. Steven was shocked to find out that it was someone he knew from his time at the ghetto, and he was faced with the dilemma with letting him go and putting him in jail. There were reasons, of course. He knew the child, and he also knew that he stole to survive, and while Steven was fine with that before, he knew it was a bad thing. But on the other hand, he knew that money was needed to survive, and people from the ghettos had a hard time earning money normally. Ultimately, Steven chose to let him go, because that particular child had saved him from a situation once.

He had no reason to save the bandits around him. And yet he hesitated. He wandered aimlessly, hoping to draw out the fight without having to shoot a single arrow. Steven slackened the string and looked around. He spotted the girl he’d described as a whirling ball of death, wreaking havoc on the bandit’s numbers. He felt like he should remember her name, but he never paid much attention to people. He envied her strength, she seemed to have no problem cutting down the bandits. The girl and the heavily armoured knight were a good combination.

Looking around, he saw more remarkable people. There was a dwarf woman, who he didn’t know the name of, who was doing quite well, chopping up bandits with her axe. And there was another person, a human. Most memorable for the scars on her face, temper and her ability to hold her own in a drinking contest with dwarves. She was doing well, annihilating with a claymore. 

Steven’s eyes drifted to Drakul, who was doing quite well. He led a small group of trainees against a small group of bandits who were fighting near the caravan. Drakul had good leadership skills, but he was overextended. Steven didn’t like the look of the situation. Sure enough, an axe wielding bandit came charging towards his exposed back. Drakul was busy fighting against a sword wielding bandit. Time seemed to slow down as Steven raised and drew back his bow, arrow still knocked on the string. With no time to debate over whether or not to kill, he loosed the arrow. 

Seemingly in slow motion, the arrow raced through the air, hissing towards its target: The back of the bandit’s head. The bandit slowly lifted his arm as the arrow sped towards him, ready to strike at Drakul’s unprotected back. The arrow pierced the bandit’s skull and went through the bandit’s eye. An instant kill that seemed to last forever.

Steven lowered his bow slowly, debating over whether or not it was the right choice. His friend was in danger, so it was correct, right? But he had just killed someone. Steven looked at his open hand. No amount of training could have prepared him for it. A life that might have once been similar to his own, all the joys and sadness, gone with a single arrow. _Did humans always die so easily?_ Steven thought. It felt sad to Steven. He wondered about the bandit’s family and what he liked or disliked. In another life, he might have gotten along with the person, and in this one, he was dead.

Steven clenched his fist. It didn’t matter whether or not it was right or wrong. This was what they did. This was what the Luminous knights did. Steven picked a few more arrows out of his quiver and shot a few more bandits. In his heart, he knew it would be like this. Taking a life was easy, yet exacted a heavy toll. With the gritty realism of mortality in his heart, Steven began to rain death on the bandits, morality overwritten by duty.