Post by Deleted on Oct 26, 2015 10:15:03 GMT
Unfortunately, Sayha hadn’t had a lot of time to recover from that fight and was ambushed by two Rock Parasites. She had been able to take care of one, but the other one had dealt the final blow.
Sayha knew she would end up being resurrected if she died, but she, well, hadn’t known what it was like to die. Now she had died in plenty of games before, but that was different. She had died in her own body. She thought her mind would have just gone black, and she would awaken at the Westminster Abbey. However, that was not the case… at least for her.
Her mind had gone blank for a moment, but suddenly the landscaped merged and changed around her… to a very familiar scene.
Around her was the vision of her “hiding spot.” It wasn’t really a “hiding spot” as much as it was an escape. An escape from her step-mother. An escape from her father. An escape from… well, everything. It was a field that was technically off-limits due to soil issues and stuff, but Sayha found that it was relatively safe. Also because it was blocked off, no one ever looked for her there or found her their either.
Off to the side, Sayha noticed… well herself. A slightly younger version of herself that is. The copy was wearing what she normally wore when she went out: black cargo pants, a blue tank top, and black fingerless gloves. She was sitting cross-legged just looking down at her hands that were in her lap. On the other side, she had mid-length black hair, hazel eyes, and glasses.
Sayha took a deep breath and looked around again. She had come to the field often, but she went there almost daily when her father had told her they were moving to England. It was a place to clear her head… and gave her perspective. At that point, Sayha had neither.
What had Sayha been doing? For a long time, all Sayha had done was survive. She didn’t really remember why she decided to level. Maybe it was because she was tired of just rotting. She had done the minimum to stay alive, only doing what was necessary. Then she decided to join on an “adventure” with the swashbuckler Dumah. Of course by that time, she had decided to actually start leveling. That adventure hadn’t turned into much, but that was how she had started.
As she had leveled, she had made a friend – Hiro, a level 90 monk. Eventually, she had ended up joining his guild, Aprocrypha. However even then… she felt like there was something missing. Actually she still felt that missing feeling even now.
The Sayha-copy stood up and stretched, and Sayha watched the copy as she made her way out of the field. Sayha decided to follow the copy. The street she took was familiar, and it made her heart ache. It was the neighborhood she had always lived in. They lived in a suburb so all the houses were huge and well-kept. Her old home was no exception. It was built in the Victorian-style, and it was quite… extravagant. The lights were on outside, but no one seemed to be around.
Copy Sayha had one inside the home, and real Sayha followed her. The living room was tidy, and her father was sitting in an armchair, probably reading the newspaper on his tablet. He looked up and gave Sayha a nod, but went instantly back to reading the paper. Some days, it felt like she was more of a hindrance than she was his daughter. In the background, Sayha saw her step mother. Sayha and her step mother had an agreement to hate each other or at least that was how it felt.
Sayha remembered when she first met her step mother. She was four at the time so she didn’t remember a whole lot. What stuck out in her mind though was the way her step mother looked at her when her father turned his back. It was a look of disgust.
Copy Sayha made her way upstairs, and real Sayha followed. That was where her room was. Her room was rather large. She had a full size bed as well as an extravagant computer desk. She also had mats off to the side of her room where she could practice her martial arts at home.
The copy Sayha instantly went for the desk and sat down and started playing games. Real Sayha though went over to the nightstand by her bed and looked at the picture setting on it. It was the only image she had with her mother in it. It was when she was three… right before the car accident.
The three of them had been out and about town; Sayha didn’t really remember what all they had done, but she did remember it was the last time she ever saw her father smile a real smile at her. Her father had been driving, and they had been at a stoplight. When the light turned green, they went to go… but then a car came speeding down a side street and crashed into the passenger side of the car. Sayha had been hurt, but it wasn’t life-threatening. Her mother, however, was killed on impact. Her spine had been severed completely.
Sayha, looking at the picture, felt tears fall down her face. Then, she put her hands to her face and just cried, and the pain in her chest grew. She had finally realized something. She had jumped from group to group looking for a place to belong… but that wasn’t really what she had been doing. She was trying to fill a void in her life that could never be filled. She was trying to replace her mother’s love.
When she finally stopped crying, Sayha opened her eyes and realized she was no longer in her old home. She… she didn’t know where she was. Around her was white sand, and in front of her a water lake as clear as day… and Sayha was wearing the clothes her copy had worn. She looked up to see… earth? And the night sky? In the air were crystal shards floating above the water. Was she on the moon?
Sayha remembered reading rumors that the original test servers for the Elder Tales game had been on the moon, but she never thought it was true… let alone possible. Maybe though the moon was what the other games considered the graveyard. But how would she get back to her body?
At that moment though, the images she had just seen flashed in her mind. She realized and understood something now that she had not quite understood before. She would never find a replacement for her mother, and that would never change. What she needed to do though was fill the other parts of her heart that were empty… the parts where she was never able to make friends. She did have friends, and she needed to let them in. She also may need to apologize to some of them. She remembered something. It was something she learned while teaching herself psychology… it was called emotional transference. She had been transferring her feelings of hurt and neglect onto others through her being overly blunt. She had always been blunt but things seemed to have progressed worse and worse over time.
She needed to figure out how to be less blunt… and maybe more polite. What she needed to do was move on… and she needed to forgive her father as well. He had shut down because of the same reason Sayha had. He hadn’t meant to ignore her like he did, at least she didn’t think so anymore. Sayha went to video games to cope. Her father dove into work to do the same thing.
Sayha rubbed her eyes and shook her head. She was ready to go… for real this time. And this time, she also wouldn’t just “survive.” She would live.
The world around her turned white, and she had to close her eyes. When she woke up, she was laying in the Abbey. She sat up and looked around. No one was there, and that was fine with her. She stood up and made her way to the door. Her first order of business would be to get the house she had just purchased in order. Next, she would work on getting stronger in both levels and in emotions. She would grow and move on. She refused to be her father who was stuck.
It was time for her.
