Victory in Defeat

A Story by Shubham

A motivating follow-up to “Sword of Defeat”.

Falling, I realized the meaning of a true warrior.

It's amazing what the mind can concoct up as it feels life slipping through itself. “Things start getting clearer in the last moments of one's life.” I didn't believe this when others told it to me earlier , thinking “dead men tell no tales”. But I guess someone somewhere did take long enough to die so as to pass on this piece of wisdom to those who would outlive him.

It turns out, the warriors who trained with me and were as good as, if not better than myself, had managed to defeat The Great Beast. They live now to fight another day.

But they will definitely die. One day, not much later, everyone of them will be dead as a door nail (though I agree with Dickens’ Christmas Carol, that its not quite clear as to how dead a door nail really is). If not this beast, then some other will have the pleasure of drawing the blood of a heroic warrior. When they lie in this same position as myself, won't they get the very same feeling of defeat? Of not being a warrior at all? So does no warrior ever feel he is one?
That's not true.

A real warrior can actually be recognized when its his time to let go of life. He is one who, in his honorable demise, softens the heart of the enemy. Makes the enemy salute the ground he fought on, and kneel before the mortal shell that warrior left behind, with an expression of forgiveness and serenity still on its face. The enemy knows that he was fortunate to have met an opponent with as much vigor in his soul as was in his physical being. A warrior’s death is a lesson, which the enemy learns. He inculcates the fine points of his defeated opponent’s being, into himself. Thereby immortalizing him and becoming less of a beast at his own heart..
Warriors never die.
They live on.
In the hearts of other warriors who defeated them and bowed to them.
Or in the hearts of demons who, having fought once with a warrior of such caliber, would be demons no more.

Knowing this, and knowing that I will not be able to defeat the demon who stands before me. I will stand up again. I will prove myself a warrior. Not to myself, for I already know of the warrior I am. Not to the world, only fools seek to prove themselves to a world that couldn't care less of them. I will prove myself a warrior, to this wide - eyed beast staring at me, with the aghast face of someone who sees his foe stand up to fight, with a sword still going through his body.

Once our battle is over, my body will be lying on this ground, in a pool of blood. I will breathe my last, and the beast.......he will bow down to this warrior that he would sacredly tell his grandchildren about. This warrior that he will learn from. This warrior that he will salute.

I will immortalize myself within his actions. He shall be a beast, no more.

I win.