As soon as their eyes opened, all Jess could hear was the sound of screaming. After a few moments, they realized that it was their own and the screaming quickly silenced. Looking around, they found themself in the last place they remembered, the third chamber of the searcher trial. In front of them, there was a flickering green fire floating above the ground just below eye level.
Walking over to the flame, Jess found that their body was incredibly heavy. The effort of taking even a single step was excruciating, but they pushed on, hand shakily outstretched.
Approaching the flame caused it to flicker more wildly, eventually bursting outwards in to a roaring inferno. After a moment, the inferno began to condense, slowly forming the shape of a familiar figure. A smile began to creep on Jess’s face as they watched Beth appearing before them. Unfortunately, the pressure on their body only increased and they found it nearly impossible to move.
A roar ripped through the air, this time not one of fear or confusion, but of anger and determination. Jess ground their teeth and, despite the seeming impossibility, continued forwards, eventually reaching the flaming apparition of their most valued friend. Fighting through the excruciating pain, Jess lifted their right arm upwards, attempting to touch or grasp Beth for some kind of balance or to alleviate the pressure.
The instant that Jess’s arm touched Beth’s flaming body, the flames spread, leaping up and around their arm, encasing it in wild green flames, searing their skin and only further intensifying the pain they were currently feeling. Jess cried out, but refused to remove their arm, allowing it to burn, to the point where it began to fade and Jess thought they might pass out. Jess tried to thrust their other arm forth, but as soon as it made contact with Beth’s body, the flames vanished, leaving only a tiny burning ember in their place.
Before Jess could even attempt to grasp the ember, a large beast made of horrifying swirling darkness leapt forward, snatching up the ember in its jaws, causing it to dissolve and disappear. Jess cried out and as they did, their eyes shot open.
Jess frantically glanced around, finding that they were in a bed somewhere. The room they were in was mostly dark, save for a few small lanterns dotted along the walls which were currently only illuminating a small bit. As Jess looked to their side, they found that there were beds on both sides, around four or five on each side. Right now, only one of the other beds was occupied and the person in it was asleep. In front of Jess’s bed, there was a chair and asleep in it, a blanket draped over her, was their mother, Silvia. She was fast asleep and she looked terrible.
Scattered around Silvia, there were all kinds of various scraps of paper, most of them crumpled letters and envelopes. Others seemed to be random scrawls from Silvia. Accompanying the random scraps of paper, there were hundreds of tissues laying inside of and around various garbage cans. As Jess looked to the other beds, they found that there were no chairs or anything, leading then to believe that Silvia had brought them herself or specially requested them. From the look of her hair and the severe bags under her eyes, Jess could tell that she had been here for a while.
Jess was about to get up and go wake their mother, but it then occurred to them that they weren’t entirely sure what they were doing here. It felt like there was something they were forgetting, something important that they had to ask Silvia, but as they searched, it escaped them. Unfortunately, Silvia was awoken regardless by the bright flashing and ringing from the monitor next to Jess.
Her eyes shot open and immediately fixed on Jess who was sitting awake in bed. Her eyes widened, filling with tears as they rushed over to hold their child, squeezing them perhaps a little tighter than would be recommended, but Jess didn’t mind. The feeling, while painful, was very comforting. “I thought you might never wake up…” Silvia managed in a concerningly raspy voice that Jess had never heard before in their life.
Silvia was quickly interrupted by a group of three medics rushing over to the bed, thanks to the alert that the monitor had provided. Arriving at the bed, one of them urged Silvia to part from Jess, at least for the moment, which she begrudgingly obliged while the other turned off the alert. The third began immediately running various tests on Jess, a seal glowing on their palm as they ran it over Jess’s body.
“Jessica, do you know where you are?” the medic at the monitor asked, taking up a position beside their bed.
Jess tried to think. “I’m in… a medical tent… somewhere in the Great Spirit Forest…?”
The medic nodded. “Yes. That’s correct. Now, do you know why you’re here?” he asked.
Jess shook their head, feeling a slight pain as they tried to remember, but they only came up empty. “No… What happened…? I feel fine…”
The medics looked to each other in concern. “Jess… You were taking part in the searcher trial and well… you were attacked…”
The dark beast from their dream flashed through Jess’s mind and they could hear their heartrate beginning to climb. They gripped the sheets of the bed tightly, their entire body shaking. “Wh-What happened…?” As they asked, they felt once more that there was something that they were forgetting.
“Other than some minor destruction burns that were basically all over your body, you seem to have sustained very little damage from the creature that attacked you. However…” the medic sighed and moved closer to Jess, pulling the covers that had been draped over them down, exposing their right arm or the lack of one, “you seem to have overextended your supply of essence and in an effort to perform magic, you instead burned up a part of your body in the process…”
Jess gazed down at their arm in horror, finding that the majority of their right arm was completely gone, leaving only about a third of their upper arm. Unknowingly, tears began to stream down their face, staining the sheets as they fell. “C-Can’t you regrow it…? P-People lose limbs all the time… Even for missing limbs, healing magic can create new ones, right…? Why can’t you just make me a new one like the old one…?”
The medic shook his head and sighed. “Unfortunately, Jessica, because of the way that you sustained the injury, the arm cannot be brought back… that way… Even if the tissue had been scarred with destruction essence… we could have simply applied the usual treatment and removed the scarred tissue and then regrow a new arm, but in this case, the arm was lost in such a way that the injury simply can’t be restored. Your body would reject any treatment of that kind and likely, you would end up losing the rest of the arm if not more. I’m sorry.”
Jess clenched their remaining fist, slamming it against the bed as tears continued to stream down their face. Ignoring the medic that had pushed her away, Silvia once more wrapped her arms around Jess, bringing them in close and crying softly.
“Darling… We’re going to get through this… I promise…”
Jess just sat there, tears falling from their face until they had none left to cry.
“Jessica, I know you just woke up, but-” the medic started.
“How long was I out…?” Jess asked hollowly.
“You were in a coma for three and a half weeks,” he replied.
“Okay…”
“So… Despite our inability to naturally regrow your old arm… thanks to the time you were out, we were fortunately able to construct you a prosthetic out of the wood of the mystwood of the Great Spirit Tree. It was fitted to you, but with you unconscious, we were unable to actually figure out how it felt. Would you be willing to try it on right now or would you prefer to do that at a later time?”
Jess stayed silent for some time, glancing to the medic who had been taking their vitals. “Is everything okay with me…? Other than the missing arm,” Jess asked her.
She nodded. “All of your vital signs seem to be in as perfect order as they can be for someone who just came out of a coma. We still need to get you taking in proper nutrition, but that’s not something to do right now.”
Jess’s eyes wandered to the chair where their mother had been sitting previously. “I think I would like to try the arm on tomorrow…” Jess trailed off as their eyes found their way to a photo that Silvia had sitting on a small table next to the chair. Jess’s eyes widened, they recognized the photo. In the center, Silvia was kneeling with her hands behind the heads of two children, giving them both bunny ears. The first was, of course, Jess, but the second was a young girl with red hair and a wild grin. “Beth…” Jess muttered.
A flurry of images rushed through Jess’s mind; The creature attacking the third chamber, Jess and Beth fighting it, and finally, the creature’s claws tearing through Beth’s body. Jess’s entire body was shaking.
Silvia held them tightly in concern, squeezing their hand. “Jessica, is everything okay…?” she asked.
Jess continued to stare at the photo across the room, a hollow expression on their face as the words fell from their mouth. “Where is she…?”
Silvia cocked her head slightly. “Where is who, darling…?”
Jess clenched their hand tightly, causing Silvia to look up to them and noticed their line of sight, following it over to the photo. Silvia’s heart sank.
“Bethany… Milteo…” Jess managed.
Silvia sighed and nodded, looking to the medics. “You said that their vitals are all fine, right?”
“Well, yes, they appear to be, but I really don’t…” she trailed off as Silvia shot her a death glare rather unfamiliar to anyone who knew her.
Silvia continued to hold Jess’s hand, motioning for one of the medics to fetch a wheel chair that was stationed beside one of the other beds from a prior patient. They nodded and raced over to get it, wheeling it over to Jess’s bed. Silvia then shooed them away and began to help Jess in to the chair, a glassy expression still on their face.
Despite the opposition of the medics, Silvia wheeled Jess down the tent and out in to the quiet night. The moon still hung high in the sky, but neither Jess nor Silvia was in the mood for sky watching at the moment. As they exited the tent, they were met by the quiet of the central village. The tent was located on one of the roads behind the main section of the village, but it only took a few minutes until they were underneath of the Great Spirit Tree. Seemingly noticing where they were, Jess was awoken from their haze, if only a bit.
“The Great Spirit Tree…? Why…”
“Darling… You know everything we do here…” Silvia replied as she pressed her hand to one of the larger roots of the tree, a soft green glow enveloping her hand as she closed her eyes and focused.
After a few moments, the root began to sprout a small branch. It continued to expand outwards and curl in to an intricate pattern, forming a small loop. Once the branch had finished growing, the loop ignited almost like a lighter, a bright green flame appearing in the center of it, flickering calmly and casting a cool glow. Silvia wheeled Jess up to the room, before stepping back. “I’ll allow you some time…”
Jess’s eyes widened as they looked at the soul fragment in front of them. They reached their hand out to the flickering flame and closed their eyes, focusing their feelings and hoping to pass on only the positive ones to Beth, wherever she may be now. Tears once again began to stream down their face. “I’m so sorry… I couldn’t save you… I tried so hard… I did everything I could think of and now we’re both worse off… We wanted to be searchers for so long and we failed spectacularly… And it’s my fault… I should have known… I should have said something… Done something… Anything… Beth… I loved you… I still do… I’m so sorry I failed you…”
“You didn’t fail…” Silvia added quietly.
Jess turned around and looked to her, confused. “What…?”
Silvia sighed. “You didn’t fail. Neither of you did, actually. Considering the circumstances of everything, we saw fit to grant not just you, but Bethany the rank of searcher. You passed.”
“It doesn’t matter anyway… I’m not going to go search for fragments of the Heart of Nature… I can’t do it without her…”
Silvia wanted to speak up, but she held herself back. “I think we should take you back now.”
Jess said nothing as they watched the branch fade back in to the root, the soul fragment disappearing. Silvia wheeled Jess back to the medical tent and helped them back in to bed. The medics ran a few more tests on them, but everything was in order. The only thing wrong with Jess was their heart, but the medics had no way to fix that. Once all of the tests were done, Jess practically collapsed, sleep taking hold of them.
