>>6321286>>6322350The environment shifts again, just as the memories continue playing. The cracked spring from which the Stilladìa and Helias sprouted recedes, giving way to the night forest, the silver light of the planetary ring seeping through the branches as it dapples on her brown hair, on her bruised and bloodied body.
Helias is holding her up, and helping her walk, one arm around her waist. He looks like liquid, bottled night, all black besides the two golden eyes glowing in his head.
“How do you feel?” He asks, his voice just as caring as before.
It reminds you of when your friends did pull you out of the Temple, when you had been reduced to an unthinking mess, unable to form any complex words or thoughts. Just the events enough to mash you into a pulp.
Bragia’s lips shiver, then they open.
“I—”
She looks over herself. Her wounds are closed. Even those on the side of her body that is still <span class="mu-i">hers.</span> At least for the time being.
“I think I should ask you this question.” She grimaces as she looks at his reconstructed body. “Are you in any pain? How can you even walk like that? I—I’m sorry, I am sure we can revert everything back, I can go—” she freezes before she can say the rest of the words, dying on her lips.
You know what she was about to spell out.
<span class="mu-i">I can go to Ansàrra.</span>
The same one who just had her betrayed. Slashed. Sacrificed like an offered animal.
It is what you would have said, all the same. You suggested it to the Stilladìa just shortly before.
“What matters,” Helias cuts through her words, slowly clenching his fist, “is that I feel <span class="mu-i">myself</span>. I can perceive none of the Seven’s malice in myself. It is as if this new body had been out of something else, some kind of otherworldly substance…”
This gives her pause, and, amidst the tears running out of her green eye, turns her sob into a wet chuckle.
“—it is you, indeed. N-Nobody else would be so focused on that r-right now. Oh, <span class="mu-i">Helias</span>,” she sighs, pulling him into a tighter embrace. So close that under the silver glow her face faintly reflects on the sheen of his body. “You are here. It is all my fault. I have no idea what I did wrong. I must—”
[cont.]
