182 Her Story
“My precious little girl. No one will ever be as beautiful as you.”
“Really, father?” she giggled with glee, a juvenile sense of pride gushing through her body at the words of her father who seemed to know it all.
He was a great warrior she knew. One who protected the world from monsters that spontaneously appeared from rifts carved in space.
“Of course! I’ll protect your innocence and beauty for as long as I live. That’s what I’m here for, right?”
“Right!” the little girl cheered as she danced in her father’s embrace, coddled by the bliss of ignorance and the thick muscles on his body, honed through training.
“Do you think so too, mother?” the girl turned to the figure of her wiry mother who looked pale, bags visible under her eyes with the colour of her irises dimming.
“Hahaha! Your father is always right, dear. If he says it, then it’s true. And you know you’ll always be my pretty daisy in the…” the woman said, dragging out the end of her sentence for her beautiful silver-haired daughter to finish.
“In the rose garden!” the girl yelled in joy.
Ever since her mother had told her the tale of the lonely daisy in the garden of roses, twisting it from a tale of loneliness, into one that preached the beauty of being unique among those that looked the same, she had cherished the story, calling herself the daisy that stood out amongst the many.
“Hahaha! That you are my darling. And when you have brothers and sisters soon, you’ll also tell them the story, making sure that they know they are just as special. Can you do that?”
Hearing the words of her father, the little girl leapt up high, ecstatic at the prospect of being a big sister. She could already imagine herself marching down the village in a straight line with chubby brothers and sisters that shared the same silver hair as her and her father. Or it could be that they could have the same brown hair as mother. Whichever way it was, she wanted chubby siblings!
“Yaaay!” she called.
Her mother smiled weakly as sweat trickled down her brow at the what her husband had said.
He even turned to her after making the declaration, with a determined glint that sought to breed.
He wanted a son.
Nomatter what it took.
His fatherly smile vanished for a split second as he and his wife shared a brief moment of conflict without the need for words.
The sickly looking woman who grew thinner by the day shuddered, as if she could almost hear her husband’s intent.
‘Before whatever illness you have claims your life, you will give me a son.’
The woman couldn’t refute. Despite what her weakened body howled, her mind refused to disobey.
That was how it was.
That was how it would always be.
And no one knew why.
These undercurrents were unknown to the little girl at this moment, as while she happily leapt up and down while being held by the large arms of her father, she couldn’t possibly have foreseen what would happen next.
Nine and a half months later.
An inhuman screech tore loose as a brown haired woman pushed with all her strength, her full effort into giving birth to the child that her husband by her side so desperately wanted.
The local women who aided her did the best they could to support her, one of them who was well versed in herbs and alchemical compounds that enhanced human faculties, doing her absolute best to ensure that her friend had a safe delivery.
Yet…
After quite the number of hours, the eyes of the woman who laid on the bed rolled as she felt strength leave her. Her illness had taken a lot from her, including a quarter of the weight she had nine months prior.
Apparently, her flesh coiled around the child, the womb grasping around the baby within as if to devour it.
This made making an incision on her belly to extract the child difficult as all sought of organs even pooled to the abdomen as if wrestling the child’s birth.
The woman was fading fast, yet the baby’s head was nowhere in sight.
It was hard to believe.
What was wrong?
What was this biological phenomenon?
“Don’t give up, woman! Push! Did you suffer all those months so you could die without achieving your purpose?! Don’t be selfish enough to leave on your lonesome after making me wait for so long! I will haunt you in the afterlife if you dare waste my seed on your way to the Under!”
The woman’s husband boomed, bringing her consciousness back as she then fought off the rippling pain, numbness, weakness, the haemorrhaging, the sting in her eyes and doubts with the dutiful vigour she always had towards her husband.
‘For my husband! For my little girl! I must…!’
She pushed so hard that she bled from her eyes and nose grotesquely and with a final primal scream, the baby finally tearing lose from the strange entanglements of flesh in the womb!
Two scenes occurred next.
The first being a cause for joy while the other, was too depressing to think about.
A child was born, alive and well despite the horrendous ordeal.
A mother died with a slight smile on her bloody face, unable to see her own child before being claimed by death.
In the midst of the new-born child’s cries, the women around mourning the tragic death of a friend, one man happily confirmed that his second child was male and sighed in relief.
*
Life changed for the little girl born to a once dotting father and devoted mother who passed. She had wailed bitterly at her passing, not knowing that this was the point where everything she believed would turn out to be have been a ruthless fantasy.
Her younger brother became all that her father saw and cherished. Even as he took on multiple requests with his Guild, leaving the girl to tend to the child along with a hired maid, he only saw the young boy in his sight.
Of course, he awaited the day would grow up enough for him to impart all that he was.
No longer did he set the little girl upon his lap and call her the most beautiful.
Instead, she was given a new calling, which she was made to follow religiously.
“It’s your duty to protect your brother! He’s your responsibility. When he grows up, he’ll protect you in return.”
“But father… Am I still the most beautiful girl? The pretty daisy… in the rose garden?”
All the little girl remembered after asking this question, was a frowning face etched with so many wrinkles marking the displeasure of the bulky man before her that his visage looked several shades darker.
Then came a terrifying voice.
“I don’t care whether you turn into a daisy, or a rose or fucking dandelion. Whether you’re in a garden, or a grave. Whether you retain your beauty or become ugly. Whichever form you take, you will always protect your brother. Do you understand?”
Perhaps it was the same traits she inherited from her mother than spawned this. Or maybe it was her father who naturally had the ability to make people docile.
Whatever it was within the little girl, spawned a soft, “Yes”, from her mouth.
And she did what she agreed to do.
Her life was devoted to her brother.
Every single threat that came his way became her own.
She learned to fight from her father just so could defend him, enduring strenuous training just to keep up with the voice that constantly told her to fulfill what her father had demanded of her.
Whatever her brother wanted to eat became her problem.
Whatever he needed to drink was her duty.
Whatever he needed to learn became her responsibility.
As she grew, she became numb to everything else, becoming solely focused on a single goal.
Then, after three years…
Her father passed.
He was killed on a raid to clear a blue Cluster along with his entire Guild.
This girl who wasn’t so little anymore, mourned his passing along with her brother, but with this event, her father’s words gained more weight.
‘Whichever form you take, you will always protect your brother..’
She followed this religiously.
Unfortunately, the small village in which she lived had changed over the years. Her father’s bad reputation as an apathetic psychopath making her life a living hell.
Even the women who had helped in her birth couldn’t help her and her brother because of their husbands who despised the man.
Reality was that people looked for the smallest excuses to relieve themselves of the duty of kindness.
Fantasies of heroes and heroines with good hearts growing like grass within the world were
brutal diversions towards reality.
The girl learned this well.
In the cold, in the heat, in the barrels of poverty, it was left up to the girl to fend for her brother.
She took on different forms within the garden of roses.
Using her outstanding beauty, she turned from being a mere pretty daisy as she saw the world in the real light, unbiased by naiveté, into whatever she needed to be at a young age.
The world didn’t coddle a pretty daisy.
She did it for her brother.
Unsurprisingly, the world welcomed whichever form she took especially if it tended to please carnal desires and get hard work done.
Four years passed as she gained little and used it all for her purpose, migrating from village to towns to cities until she became a mercenary.
A rather fine one that grew in popularity quickly because of her talent.
She began to earn better.
She gained recognition.
She gained praise.
Yet…
None of this eclipsed the voice in her head which constantly called for her watch over her brother. And so she did.
Until…
In an ironic twist of fate, the same mysterious illness that plagued her mother, suddenly emerged as in her brother as he grew and claimed his life before she could do anything about it.
That was when the girl’s purpose, which she had tried her damndest to keep, had ended up being for naught in the end.
An endless river of tears would have been seen if the human body supported such.
The cruel reality and mystery of what her life was supposed to be, became nothing more than her haunting thought that brought her to the brink of madness.
Despite how she had sold her flesh to degenerates. Despite how she had toiled in rough and hard fields. Despite how she had awakened to her talent as a marvellous fighter.
Whatever form she took, wasn’t enough to stop her brother from bleeding out from his orifices as his body shrivelled, growing pale until he died.
The girl was ready to follow her brother in death. To go to where ever the afterlife was as her purpose was stripped from her.
But…
On a particular day, a certain man donning thick robes appeared where she lived unannounced and turned her life around with a few words.
“Fear not, dear child. The abhorrent events of your life were preordained. The Deities have a grand plan for you…”