Awakening

Time seems to stretch on for eternity, yet passes in the blink of an eye. My mind ebbs in and out of a state of relative consciousness. But all that meets my lucid self is the agonizing feeling of my skin boiling and threatening to peel away from my flesh.

I want to die. I want to die. I want to die, I want to die, I want to die…

But as I endlessly tread the line of oblivion, only one thing shines through. It's a voice. I can't hear who it is or what they're saying… but I know they're there. And as my mind fades out one last time… that voice begins to grow clearer.

"Come back to us now. Come back to us. Please, come back."

And with that… come back, I do.

It's like I'm slowly rising to the surface of a deep, pitch-black ocean. My senses come back to me slowly, one after another. First, I can feel my head lain out on a soft, comfortable surface. Something is draped over me as well, wrapped around my chest. The scent of earth and still water drifts past my nose. But also the fragrance of herbs and flowers. I can hear the crackling of a fire not so far away, and the echo of soft, patterned breathing. Now that I think of it… I can feel the breathing, too. On my chest. And I can hear another, just above me.

As soon as my eyes open and I see just who it is… tears begin to well up in my eyes. Lasula sits over me, asleep with her head leaned against the cave wall. All of a sudden I can hardly contain myself, and I bolt upright.

"Lasul—"

A screaming agony suddenly washes over my body, nearly syphoning the air out of my lungs as I cry out in utter pain. My body throws itself backwards and I roll around on the floor, clutching my arms around myself so hard my nails dig into my skin.

Lasula is startled awake, immediately jumping to attention.

"Marco—!" she bursts. She's reluctant to touch me as I uncontrollably writhe in agony.

Lyra, also disturbed by my awakening, sits above me on her knees with her arms raised.

Lasula seems to panic and ends up clamping her hand over my forehead.

"I-I'm sorry— Sleep!" she cries.

The last thing I see before fading out completely is an increasingly blaring blue light.

I wake up again. I don't know how much time has passed, but it's a much more immediate response than last time. I find myself jolting upright again, although this time the wave of pain doesn't follow.

I glance around. My eyes eventually settle on Lasula and Lyra, both still roughly where they were before.

"Is that better?" Lasula asks.

"…H-Hundred percent…" I mutter, still stuck wide-eyed at what I had experienced.

What next draws my attention is Lyra.

Lyra, who typically has only one expression, seems to actually be visibly holding back tears right now. Her lip is quivering, and her face is all scrunched up with her shoulders raised and her arms tucked tightly into her side.

But then, without warning she leaps into me, burying her face in my stomach and wrapping her arms tightly around me.

She doesn't cry, but I can hear her sniffing into my heavily bandaged chest. She doesn't seem to want to let go. So I awkwardly sigh and sit there with her practically curled up in my lap.

After a moment, between snivels, she seems to gear up to say something. But it takes another few passes for it to finally come out. And when it does, it's soft, strained, and causes my heart to sink.

"…D… Don't ever say you want to die…"

As I hear it, I find myself at a loss for words. I know I was thinking it, but…

I glance up at Lasula, who has her arms crossed and her eyes closed. There's a concerned look on her face.

"…I'm not sure if you recall, but you spoke every once in a while," she says. "It was… usually only an expression of the pain you were experiencing… If it wasn't you crying out in that pain."

"…Oh…"

"Marco, I must ask… What happened?"

I hesitate, my mind flashing back to the moment it happened.

"I… I just… It was silver," I mutter. "…If I would've known that that's what happens…"

"Silver…?"

"…My Aversion. I guess."

"An aversion…?" she questions, inching closer. "N… No, I wouldn't think so… What happened to you goes far beyond any Aversion."

I let those words settle for several seconds. But as I think, I only get angrier. And sadder. I suddenly grit my teeth and clamp my hands to the side of my head.

"God… dammit—!!!" I holler. I quickly turn to Lasula. I can't help that tears have started to stream down my face. "Then what the hell is happening to me—?! Tell me!!!"

Lasula's lip trembles, and she reaches over and quickly wraps Lyra and I in an embrace. She says nothing for several seconds, just burying her face in between the two of us.

"I'm sorry…" she murmurs. "I'm sorry… I don't know… I'm so sorry…"

I was informed of just how long I'd been out. For four days… they didn't know if I would live or die. Apparently I kept emitting waves of… anti… magic… that would interrupt Lasula's healing ability. So they had to rely on traditional needle and thread to keep me from bleeding out, which… Lasula admitted she wasn't experienced with.

My Aversion, or… whatever the hell, didn't cause me any injuries. They keep dodging around the subject of when they found me, but insist that I was just lying there with that monster nowhere to be seen.

They stayed with me in this cave for days, while I screamed in pain and begged to be killed. Even when her magic worked, Lasula couldn't find anything wrong with me. For all they knew, I could've been dying. I think Lyra's still really shaken up by it. And I… don't blame her.

Goddammit… I feel like such a monster.

"…With all that said," comes Lasula, "we are overjoyed to have you back and healthy. As you can probably tell."

She sits just an arm's reach away, and has on her usual passive smile.

Lyra is still basically huddled up in my lap. She's never been this clingy before, especially not to me. Sometimes she acts like an old lady, and sometimes she acts like a kid. But never her own age, for whatever reason.

"I… just wanna go," I mutter. "I don't wanna be down here anymore… I wanna get out."

Lasula watches me for a few seconds in silence. Moments later, her eyes drift to the ground.

"…I'm sorry. It must've been so very difficult…"

As I think back on what happened to me… It wasn't the monster that scared me the most.

"…I thought things were going well," I say, clenching my jaw.

"What was?" Lasula asks.

"Nothing. Never mind," I mutter, instinctively turning my head. "I… just wanna go."

I can still feel her eyes on me, but I try to ignore it as best I can. After a while, she just sighs and places her hands in her lap.

"If you don't want to talk about it, then I won't force you," she says. "You are alive, and I'm willing to leave it at that."

"Yeah…" I nod slowly.

Lasula glances away. I decide to turn back towards her. As I do, though… I notice a scar across her neck on the left side, just under her jawline. The light of the cave made it hard to see it before now. It doesn't look new, but I'm sure she didn't have it when I last saw her. It's fairly noticeable, now that I've seen it.

"…What happened there?" I point.

Lasula quickly brings her attention back to me. Her hand immediately goes up to the scar.

"O-Oh… right, that," she says. "It's… It's just that when you fell, I… lowered my guard and was attacked by one of the remaining two. Y-Yes."

"Oh…" I say. "Come to think of it… how the hell did you two get out of that? And… how the hell did you get out of it…?"

Lasula hesitates. She purses her lips and brings her gaze down to her toying fingers.

"The… thing is," she murmurs. "Technically speaking… we are…"

"They are holding us prisoner," Lyra mumbles, turning her head so she's staring up at me.

"Technically," Lasula chimes. "It was… strange circumstances."

"W-Well… what the hell happened?" I mutter.

After I fell, the three remaining attackers started to argue. Their anger seemed to center on one of them in particular, the one who was about to stab me when I tried to save the girl. The other male figure grabbed his shirt and began to throw him around. Sounds like some kinda familiar struggle. But Lasula and Lyra were still in shock. They really thought I was dead.

Lyra told me that Lasula tried to jump down after me, but she had to hold her back. The attackers really weren't paying attention anymore, so they managed to gather enough focus to get the hell out of there.

Took them a while to get safely down, and they had a run-in with that monster just like me that brought them way off course. Their explanation gets a bit vague between evading the monster and finding me, but the gist of it was that shortly after they were surrounded by these people all in the same cloaks as the ones that attacked us. Lasula and Lyra were preoccupied with me, so we ended up being brought back to their village and were thrown into this cave… thingy here. They explained it better than I did. I'm just overwhelmed and bad at retelling events that I didn't experience.

"They are a primitive people on the verge of starvation," comes Lasula. "I'm not sure why we were ambushed on the road, but it makes sense if they saw us coming. We had supplies to last the mountain voyage. Enough to hold out a few more days for a small congregation like this."

"…But something… seems missing," I mutter. "Why'd the first ones try to kill us and the big group capture us alive?"

Lasula sighs.

"While we could ponder what happened, the truth of the matter is that knowing the reason wouldn't change our predicament."

"So we're just… stuck here?"

"Not in the slightest."

"What?"

Lasula smiles and holds up a finger.

"…The thing that makes magicians so powerful is that so long as they are awake, no amount of meddling can prevent them from casting their spell." She pauses. "In other words… we should easily be able to escape at any time."

"Badass…"

"They are well-trained, but… with the help of magic we should be able to put them all past us."

"Hell yeah! Let's get going, then! Why don't we—" I freeze, bringing my eyes down and scanning the area. "B…But… W-Wait… where is it…? Where'd it go?"

"Where did what go?" Lasula asks. Her smile slowly fades. "Oh— is your… sword what you're looking for?"

"Y…Y-Yeah, did you put it somewhere? I gotta bring that with me!" I say. "And… my whole bag, too!"

"They took your travel pack when they put us in here. But as for your sword… I have it. It's safe," Lasula replies. There's a kind of sternness in her voice as she says this. "I think… I should hold on to it for the time being. I'm sure you're in no rush to accidentally touch it again, correct?"

"W…Well… What happened was just weird chance… and I doubt that'd happen a second time, especially if I latch the box better… So I can just—"

"I'm not going to allow you to take that chance, unfortunately," she replies. "You are going to have to be very, very, incredibly careful. From here on out, you will not touch anything made of metal until you can easily confirm, without a doubt, that it isn't made of silver. It is for your safety, and— and… Y-Yes, for your safety."

"B-But that's what I've gotta deliver to Mares, to the… the guy! I-I already told you about that!"

"And the Guildmaster will have to wait until I know you won't ever be so reckless with your life," she replies. "Honestly, if I knew that much about your sensitivity, I would've first destroyed the sword than let you carry it for so long."

"R-Reckless? It was an accident!" I burst.

"And the moment you step into civilization proper, you run the risk of having thousands of 'accidents,'" she says. "What you do not understand is that silver is used practically everywhere. A house of even modest standing uses silver for mere eating utensils. Can you fathom how simple it would be to forget for only a second, only to find yourself once more in complete and utter agony?"

At this, I kinda shrink into myself. In all our time together, Lasula's never once raised her voice at me. Don't get me wrong— I'm used to people yelling at me for whatever reason… Usually involving me having stolen something… Or that time I taught the blacksmith's kid how to curse—

But to hear it from her…

I shake my head to clear the thought.

"W…Well, whatever," I say. "…But you'll give it back to me, right?"

She hesitates.

"Y-Yes… But only if I know for certain," she finally nods. "And I will be testing you once we make it to Whiteridge. It's far too dangerous to make light of it."

"Then… it's fine, whatever. As long as it's safe…"

"It will be. You have my word," Lasula nods. "Now if you are ready… we can make our escape."

"I want out of this shithole," I huff. "Let's go."

She nods. With that and not a word more, we all get to our feet. I struggle the most with this, having been asleep for four days— but with Lasula holding my arm and Lyra at my back, we eventually make our way to the front of the cave.

We're met with a solid wooden door that seems to be latched shut. I jiggle it a bit, but it doesn't move. Figured it wouldn't. I step back and let Lasula do her thing.

Lasula places her hand on the wall beside the latch. A faint red glow spreads across the rock, and the narrow area around it begins to crumble away. With nothing to latch to, the door then creaks open, revealing the blackness of night beyond.

"Woah, that was—" I begin, but something causes me to stop dead in my tracks.

Because looking down below, in the base of this narrow ravine sits a small village made of twigs and mud. But what startles me the most… is that it's on fire. And a lone entity stands at the center of the destruction.

Though it's missing an arm since the last I saw it, the fear it strikes into my heart causes me to shrink back all the same. It's the blind monster from before… and it lays waste to the village below with all the ferocity of a hundred demons.