You had it all figured out.
You had your life down to your apartment, your job at the box factory, and the walk between the two.
And then one night, on your way home from the box factory, you were attacked by the Serpent of the Two Burdens . . .
1.Main Title/Akira Ifukube (Battle in Outer Space OST)
2. Coppelia no Hitsugi/Ali Project (Noir OST)
3. Necronomicon/Les Baxter (The Dunwich Horror OST)
4. Gats/Susumu Hirasawa (Berserk OST)
5. Fury/Francis Monkman (The Long Good Friday OST)
6. Arrivals-Main Title/Jerry Goldsmith (Extreme Prejudice OST)
7. War Erupts/Edwin Montgomery (Wasteland OST)
8. Motorcade/Michael Gibbs (Hard-Boiled OST)
9. Etorofu/Kenji Kawai (Innocence OST)
10. Fear/Susumu Hirasawa (Berserk OST)
11. Boatyard Battle/Michael Gibbs (Hard-Boiled OST)
12. Thin Red Paste/Edwin Montgomery (Wasteland OST)
13. Body Count/Michael Gibbs (Hard-Boiled OST)
14. AK-97/Edwin Montgomery (Wasteland OST)
15. Corridor Creeping/Michael Gibbs (Hard-Boiled OST)
16. Monster/Susumu Hirasawa (Berserk OST)
17. Hospital Inferno/Michael Gibbs (Hard-Boiled OST)
18. Boss Battle 2/Yasunori Mitsuda (Chrono Trigger OST)
19. Forces/Susumu Hirasawa (Berserk OST)
20. The Ballade of Puppets: The Ghost Awaits in the World Beyond/Kenji Kawai (Innocence OST)
21. Behelit/Susumu Hirasawa (Berserk OST)
22. Apocalypse/Kenji Kawai (Apocalypse: World War 2 OST)
23. Earth/Susumu Hirasawa (Berserk OST)
24. Heart of Madness/Kodomo Band (Fist of the North Star Movie OST)
25. Substitute Invasion/Shiro Sagisu (The End of Evangelion OST)
26. Murder/Susumu Hirasawa (Berserk OST)
27. Mystery’s Apotheosis/Fabio Frizzi (City of the Living Dead OST)
28. Rise From the Ashes End Titles/Masakazu Sugimori (Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney OST)
. . . in the end, you found yourself at the bottom of a crater in extreme pain, and convinced that victory was indistinguishable from defeat.
Your pain was so intense that it blotted out all other sensations . . . even itself.
Numb to your very numbness, you crawled for days until you escaped the crater.
Things got blurry. Your memories from this time are all busted.
In the hospital, things got sharp.
Your feelings return . . . especially the pain. But there are painkillers in the hospital.
Not much to do but catch up on the news . . . which is pretty much all bad. Your battle with the Serpent of the Two Burdens got way out of hand. No more city. No more box factory. No more apartment. You get paranoid about people blaming you or trying to arrest you, but no one seems to realize that you were the one who fought the Serpent with such ferocity. You decide to keep it all to yourself.
You get better. It takes years. But you’re fixed up like new. Maybe even better.
As you walk out of the hospital you think to yourself,
Actually, my victory is distinguishable from defeat.
Soon enough you find a new job, a new apartment, and a walk between them . . .
SIDE OVER.
TO BE CONTINUED . . .
