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The tiger growled as it eyed us, blood dripping from its mouth.
“Big cat...” I mumbled, trying to get some sense into Lia. But the girl was a lost cause; she hadn’t moved a fucking inch. At one point I thought she might have turned to stone or something but no, she was just frozen in fear.
The goat eyed me, and I eyed the it back, we clearly understood the situation but it was too late.
Either run now while using Lia as bait or die together. I was technically already dead once and I had no idea if I was going to be reincarnated again if I died but... but- I liked this damn life and I liked how things were right now. I didn’t want to lose it all.
So, the most optimum solution was to run for my life, and run with the goat.
Yet- “MOOOOM!!!” I screamed at the top of my lungs, grabbed a stray branch and braced myself. She always wanted to hear that word but, but now she was probably never going to... so, my farewell. No, no what the fuck am I thinking. Get your fucking head outta the gutter! We gonna survive this!
Grrr... the tiger, however, just glared. It was big, bigger than a typical tiger. I’d seen them in zoos. Those cats were obviously big but this damn thing was bigger than a cow and it had two fucking heads. Both almost sneering at us.
BaaH! The goat slammed her hoofs on the ground. Buzz... electricity streaked in the air, no, it streaked near her horn and grew a ball of streaking light.
“Magic-” I mumbled, grabbing Lia firm, but she wasn’t moving... slap! So, I slapped the hell out of her and pulled her back.
CRACK! The electro ball or whatever it was, flew and crashed into tiger. Electricity buzzed all around the tiger but... but it wasn’t affected. “Rrr...” It was almost as though the tiger understood our powerlessness and was laughing at us...
“It’s a fiend...” the words escaped my mouth. And although Lia had moved, her shaking legs couldn’t carry her weight so she again fell on her behind.
This was hopeless.
Fucking, hopeless.
I had no real talent. When I first popped up in this world, and got carried home by an elf, I distinctly believed I’d have magical powers and an adventure when I grew up. But reality often hits hard, and I got fucked in the ability lottery. Now I probably wouldn’t even be able to grow older. I was afraid mother would stop being mother after I grew up. But fucking hell, I was going to die here.
However- The least I can do is go down in style. Last time I got murdered by a fucking train and by my own best friend. This time though. “ARGHH!!!” I screamed, throwing the stick as best as I could.
Thud. But it just fell on its feet, powerless.
Fuck.
BAAAHHH!
But- I’d distracted it. I’d successfully distracted the damn thing and its heads for one second. That was enough for goat mama to impale the damn thing with her electric horns. Or so I thought but the tiger jumped and as a foreboding familiar feeling coursed through my spine, time almost came to a halt.
I could hear the sounds; I could feel my fleeting heart going crazy. And I could tell, the thing was jumping over me, but I wasn’t its target. The shivering girl behind was instead.
You can die.
No, after her, you’re next.
That’s why you should run.
Run and go where? It’s going to kill us both!
Mother will come!
But it will be too late by then!
It was almost as though I was having a conversation with my own self while the tiger just hung in the damn air. What the actual fuck was happening? I didn’t know. I didn’t quite understand it. However, ... I could move- very slowly, but I could move.
And I moved- just enough to... get in the way.
“ARGHH!!!” it fell on me, bringing those damn teeth down on my feeble arm, impaling my skin like there was nothing there.
Burning, stinging- stabbing pain!
The pressure nearly knocked me out but it was only getting worse and worse and worse and worse-
“Arrggh- arrgh- aHH!” Drops of blood dripped down, as I flailed my powerless arms and legs trying to not let it cleave the arm off. Yet... Yet it didn’t let go, it enjoyed everything. Lightly pressing, showing off its strength. But- but I hadn’t given up. The pain was strong enough to make me go crazy and faint. But I didn’t. I’d already died. I knew what dying was like. And this wasn’t it. This wasn’t nearly enough to kill me. “You want my arm? You can have it!” I punched the damn thing’s eye with my other hand, and tried poking it. “Do it, goat!” I screamed.
And the goat?
She rammed her horns into the tiger. Yeah, straight into its fucking asshole.
RAAAA!!!
It roared heinously, letting me go; I fell on top of Lia, barely able to stay conscious anymore. Too much blood loss, I was pretty much out of commission and at this rate, the goat too. But...
I hope this was enough. I hope this was enough for mother to be proud.
I heard their conversation even though I shouldn’t have. They were probably talking about how I was possessed by demons or something like that. Meaning, even if I kept pretending, it was only a matter of time before she considered I wasn’t who I was and... that was probably the reason I hadn’t run to her first thing when Lia ran away. Instead, I ran after Lia... because I didn’t want to confront mother, because I didn’t want to confront that topic.
And now... I was never going to be able to-
“Sol!” Mother. In a second my heart slowed; the anxiety dissipated.
She was here.
She was... she jumped past me, and cleaved the tiger’s head in two with her short sword. And she immediately slid down on the ground, grabbing me to her chest. “Mothe-” I managed but things just went dark. I vomited some blood and felt my life leave... a very familiar feeling, the same one as before. the same terrible feeling from that back then.
Mother, no, Mom was here.
But in the end, I never really got to call her Mom, huh? In the end, I was just haunted by my previous mom and her stranglehold.
Things were going hazy, and my eyes leaked. The lights went out.
“It’ll be okay,” she said. My vision was gone but I could still hear her. Everything was going cold yet I could still feel her warmth. So comforting... so... warm.
Perhaps one last time- “Mom...” I mumbled, before everything just... went cold.
Lindell Arnius
Lin was sick of her friends, sick of them teasing her about her lack of taste.
Every now and then they would gather and hunt for food and have some fun away from their families. Lin was an orphan so she never had any family, meaning she was always free and really looked forward to the gatherings.
However, “And that’s why she can never get a man,” Den said. “I mean who would stick out for a-”
Eyes a little misty, Lin left. Usually, she fumed, cursed them, or just gave into the temptation and fought, beating Den to a pulp. However, that day... she didn’t bother. She just left the woods, and traveled due north, ready to leave the south, leave everything behind.
She didn’t have anything here, no family, no ties. Her friends probably didn’t even consider her their friend. So, why would she stay behind in this mess?
To her surprise, she was being trailed by those morons but they of course kept their distance. Lin understood leaving was stupid and she was going to change her mind halfway, but since those guys were following her, she kept walking for appearance’s sake, and actually fumed even more.
She kept going: She kept going for hours and hours, and in the middle of the day... reached a particular point in the field of grass.
Something, no, a baby was there, in the grass. A naked, baby in the middle of virtually nowhere.
She stared at the baby. “Are you alone too?” She said.
I’m talking to a baby? She almost chuckled to herself but didn’t. Cause her friends were here.
The baby had taken a liking to her and stared at her, almost in a daze of sorts. Maybe he’d never seen a Southerner before?
“Get away from that thing,” Den said.
It wasn’t unheard of extraordinarily high rank fiends to possess the corpses of fallen children and use them as bait to lure in prey. And everyone there knew that. Precisely why they pointed their bows at a child.
It pissed Lin off. To the point, she ground her teeth, and glared. She’d experienced something similar in the past. When her parents died, no one took her in. They stayed away from her, out of fear. Fear that she might die and then invite strong fiends....
But she didn’t die. And she wasn’t going to let this kid die here either.
She picked him up firm in her embrace and faced her friends, or rather former friends. “Buzz off, he’s mine~!”
And walked away.
“Ow come on...!” Den grumbled and although the others felt the same, they didn’t or rather couldn’t say anything.
They stayed in the sidelines all this time, watched the two fight and enjoyed it, and now... they were powerless to do anything about it.
Lin took the boy home, and tried her best to raise him on her own. She didn’t have milk, but she did have her guardian angel, Sisna, who came by every time the boy was hungry.
How old was he? Five months at best? Yet the boy was so patient and so well behaved. Lin did have the lingering feeling that it was possible he was possessed but, but she dismissed it the moment she felt his warmth. She named him Soleir Arnius, after her grandfather Soleiran.
Sol was her light in the darkness. The only thing left in her life. The only thing she could fight for.
And it didn’t matter what the world said, what the church said, she was going to raise him, she was going to raise him to be a good man. Someone who wouldn’t go up to a girl and say ‘this is why you can’t get a good man.’ Screw him, Lin grumbled, swearing to pummel Den the next time he showed up.... It was Den, Den who she turned to when it was time to threaten the priests.
***
“No,” she said. “He’s not possessed,” Lin said.
Lyra took a sip. “Well, if you say so. But what’s your secret then? How’s he so damn well behaved and mature?”
“I’m not sure but... I think he might have some lingering memories of his previous life.”
“Wait... really? Then he might be a hero candidate? I’ve been hearing rumors about the demons being restless. It’s possible.” Lyra leaned in, a twinkle in her eyes.
“No, he’s below average. With no particular talent for magic.”
“That bad, huh?” Lyra leaned back. “Then just raising him would be tough. But given how mature he is already I doubt the church would be able to do anything to him. They surely won’t give up though.”
“I won’t let them.”
Lyra giggled. “Yeah, I know. But you won’t be here forever. Besides... you haven’t told him about the Passing, have you?”
“Not ye-”
“Moooom...!”
Her ears perked up for a second, almost disregarding everything Lyra said. A tiny voice, Lin heard a tiny voice but her ears picked up the voice anyway. She staggered up, the chair fell flat on the ground with a thud.
“What’s wrong?” Lyra stood.
“It’s Sol. He never calls me Mom, yet... yet I felt he called out to me.”
“Might just be your imagination. I didn’t hear-” She paused. “I don’t sense their presence anywhere near us.”
“Exactly!”
So she ran, she ran straight out, and then noticed foot prints and hoof prints. “Sisna was with them....” She almost groaned. “He never calls me mom. Something happened,” she ran faster.
Lyra jumped around in the trees but couldn’t keep up. “We got that much!”
They ran fast and by the time Lin reached the end, it was already over. Sol was hunched over Lia, both a bloody mess and Sisna was engaging a Dual Head Tiger. A midrank fiend.
Lin’s mind went empty, as she jumped past the boy and cleaved the tiger’s head in a split second. She didn’t care about anything or anyone else, she just grabbed her boy to her chest. And that’s when she realized, the blood... all of it was Sol’s.
Oh no... Her chest went cold.
The boy was going to die.
Sol... was going to die.
“Mo-”
But he was still conscious, surely- “It’s going to be alright,” she tried to sound as reassuring as possible but she herself wasn’t sure.
“Mom...” But just then for the first time ever, he called her mom... and went out cold.
Lin’s eyes leaked, despite her not crying. She just sat there, dazed, unable to close them. Yet, they just leaked.
“Baah...” the goat came closer, and started licking Sol’s wounds.
Lin instinctively tried to move the boy but the goat, Sisna rammed Lin away and kept on licking the boy’s wounds.
“What is it doing?” Lyra descended, grabbed her kid and after making sure she was alright, brought her attention to the glowing goat and the glowing boy.
The boy stopped glowing as did the goat... and then the goat started leaving; before disappearing completely, the goat looked over at Lin and the boy once, and then dashed off.
“Sharing,” Lin said, dragging her little boy back to her chest.
