‘Enough for the day,’ Seira thought and crawled into the sheets. It was late at night, the sun had long disappeared from the horizon and the moonlight illuminated the empty streets of Orchidia Town. Seira could see through the window from her bed and hundreds and thousands of stars sat in the night sky. She had not been able to sleep yet and her mind was still busy, thinking about the events of the past two days and how she should handle them. It was late and she was tired but everything was still bothering her, still keeping her mind busy. The young woman couldn’t help but think about the blue entity that had connected to her two times already, and even though she had met it, even spoken to it, she wasn’t smarter at all and still had no idea what she was dealing with. Seira herself had no true connection to Orchidia and its myths but the people here were, at least, paying her well to handle those things and she decided to stay and finish this up before leaving. It had already been over a week since Seira had come to town and even though she had formerly not planned on staying so long she couldn’t exactly leave in the middle of an unfinished mission either. But then again, it was not like someone was waiting for her anyways so it didn’t exactly matter. The Sorceress turned around and stuffed a pillow between her legs to make it more comfortable. She closed her eyes and exhaled deeply, thinking about everything that had happened so far. It had all started with her spending some time in a bar late at night, talking to a few travellers from Nanuq when Dex Miller, a citizen of this town stormed into the bar and caught her attention. Although he was confused, a bit dizzy and most definitely lacked a few screws he was a bad person or a liar so Seira chose to believe him when he spoke about seeing “something blue” close by the river that made him feel unwell. Seira remembered their first meeting not going so well and after touching the blue entity for the first time it had even attacked her and emitted a strong aura that knocked out Dex Miller completely and left her wounded. Although she wasn’t exactly suffering from the aftereffects, what Seira had seen was what bothered her more. An image of her late mother standing close by, and even though she had long passed away for a moment it felt as if she was still alive and still there with her. Seira couldn’t quite explain the feeling she had and with each passing day she lost the ability to remember whether or not their meeting had actually happened. For all she knew she might be imagining things.  After that she had been contacted by Dacol, who believed what they had to say and since this was now something beyond Dex’ abilities Dacol had decided to keep her company instead. He had also done some research and the blue entity had turned into the form of a child instead, now directly speaking to her when they met.

None of this made any sense whatsoever and Seira was completely clueless as to what the entity wanted from them, but she decided not to lose sleep over it. It was getting late and tomorrow she would speak to someone about it but tonight she needed to rest and recollect energy. She fell asleep quickly, Seira never really had trouble sleeping or falling asleep to begin with, but after a few hours of resting peacefully she started to dream. Seira wasn’t someone who dreamed a lot, her nights were usually quiet and over quickly but when she heard a voice reaching out to her she somehow knew that it was a dream—while still being asleep. Something started saying her name, repeating it over and over again until she eventually got annoyed by it, but didn’t wake up just yet. As usual with dreams, Seira didn’t have full control over her body and actions either so she just had to listen to it for a while before it eventually started speaking properly to her. ‘The river, Seira. Come to the river again, I will meet you there.’ The last two sentences were different from everything else before that, it was no longer a gentle whisper but a loud and clear voice that caused the woman to wake up immediately. Strangely enough, she also still remembered every word it had said. Seira figured that she was now somehow connected to the entity and it was calling her back to the river. Even though she didn’t exactly want to deal with it first thing in the morning she didn’t really have another choice and so she got out of bed and got ready, even though it was still fairly early. As soon as Seira had left her hotel room and entered the lobby she spotted a familiar face, more or less, who had already been waiting for her. They had never directly met before but Seira had heard of him and was also aware that he would be taking things over from here on. His name was Inspector Nilan and he was a well respected citizen of Orchidia, even though he apparently wasn’t even from here. They sat down on a table together and Seira ordered some coffee for herself while he pulled out a note block and a pen and started asking her about the events. Seira decided to simply retell everything to him, everything she had just thought about the night before and watched him as he made his notes. Of course it was important for him to know everything that there was so Seira decided not to leave any important details out and was very in depth with her explanation. She also noticed that he had what seemed to be Dacol’s notes with him, probably with Dex’ impression written down on them as well.

“Well, that’s quite the story,” he eventually said to the young woman and Seira smiled weakly at him. “Yes, it really is. I didn’t expect all of this to happen when I followed Dex Miller to the River and even though I did believe that there was something up and that he knew something I was clueless as to what it could be—but this is something I didn’t see coming, no matter what way I look at it.” They exchanged a few more words and Seira eventually decided to tell him about her dream as well. The two of them came to the conclusion that this wasn’t over yet and that they had to find out whether or not this entity was evil and a danger to the citizens of Orchidia, some of who spent quite a lot of time in the forest after all, and since it was already in her head Seira didn’t want to deal with it for much longer. When the Inspector asked her to go to the river together she agreed immediately.  He was an investigator so it was only natural for him to be curious and he also had been nothing but nice to Seira so she had no concerns about bringing him along. They were quiet when they walked together, and it seemed that everything that needed to be said had been said already. Seira was more focused on her surroundings anyways and when they arrived at the same spot where she had already met the entity twice she was not surprised to find it there, again, but this time looking a bit different again. He now looked almost completely human, a little boy with blue eyes who wore something resembling clothes made out of fabrics. He was on his knees and although Seira had already realized that they weren’t alone, he made it quite obvious by pointing at something else, something different floating above the river. “I suppose this thing is the reason why you called me here?” Seira asked and glanced over towards the other spirit. It looked somewhat human, even though it was colorless and floating. “Yes,” the blue entity responded, “this is the tainted spirit and he needs to be defeated.” As if it had waited for its introduction, the tainted spirit immediately turned around, rushed towards Seira and attacked. It happened so quick and without a warning that Seira was surprised and felt the spirit almost go through her, so she moved to the site and focused directly on it. It was quick, but the damage it could inflict probably wasn’t very high, so as long as she could land hits on it it would be fine. Seira turned around and waited patiently for the spirit to attack her a second time.

As it did, she clenched her first and created a sharp blade made out of petals connected to her arm to slice towards the spirit, injuring it and causing it to back down. She then used that moment of surprise she had still on her side to extend both arms, creating a pillar out of petals where the spirit was right now, engulfing it in a small storm of petals that would hurt it as well. After the damage was done the tainted spirit broke free and charged back towards her at an incredible speed yet again and Seira placed both of her palms together, creating a storm out of petals which she would send directly towards the tainted spirit to counter it. It got hit once again and its movements had already gotten much slower. Although it was fairly quick Seira soon realized that it wasn’t very strong and even when she took another hit she could still keep going. Seira waited for the spirit to come closer and approached it when it didn’t, extending her arm to send petals flying towards the tainted spirit, knocking it out with her final hit. It seemed that Seira had won the battle because after her last attack the spirit suddenly sunk down and took on a more human shaped form. He was wearing a brown trenchcoat and had blonde hair and green eyes. The boy fell to the ground and with a delight expression on his face the blue entity immediately rushed over to sit by his friend’s side. Seira was now a little bit confused but before she could say anything the blue entity started thanking her profusely and spoke a few very sweet and nice things to her about how he appreciated her helping him out with this and that it meant a lot to him. He then proceeded to explain that he had a gift for both of them and Inspector Nilan was the first one to receive it. They touched and held hands for a while and the Inspector was happily reliving some of the memories he shared with his late wife. He seemed to be very happy for a while, being able to see her so close to him again. The entity then turned towards Seira and asked whether or not she wished to see someone from her past again to share some good memories and relive them, but unlike the inspector Seira denied this offer. Unlike him she had nothing and no one from her past she wanted to remember or ever think of again and it was a chapter in her life that she had finished a long time ago. The entity was accepting her answer and together with the other spirit, his friend, they then disappeared into thin air only to never be seen again. Seira and Nilan remained close by the river and the Inspector was now bursting with happiness, repeatedly telling Seira about his wife and how beautiful she looked when he saw her again. Together, they finished the notes the inspector had been keeping track off, now that they could consider this mission finished, however, there was not much else to do and worry about. Seira then got her well deserved reward and went back to the hotel to rest.

[2022]
Quest.

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