Aria’s only experience outside of the village had been to the Forest and the Caves but even then, she had never gone alone.
So she wasn’t surprised that she was feeling nervous. Once she left the confines, she spread her wings and took flight. As the wind rushed past her face, the only thought on her mind was getting back to her friends safely.
I got this. Everything is going to be fine
She kept low at first, wings tucked in tight as the southern landscape opened up beneath her.
No one had gone this way before. The mont players spotted the level 8 monsters near the southern ridge, they had turned back.
Stronger than the goblins. Stronger than the kobolds. Most assud anything deeper in the region would be even worse.
To be honest, she wasn’t all that confident when it ca to fighting. Her strength lay in support through buffs with the occasional magic attack using her voice.
She hadn’t even used the dagger that Leo had given her before. Gripping the hilt of the blade at her side, she could only hope that everything turned out alright.
Surprisingly, the farther south she flew, the warr the air felt and a sense of comfort washed over her, as if she was traveling ho after a long day at work.
That sensation made no sense to her though. She frowned as the feeling sunk in, sothing wasn’t right. She ca to a dead stop before launching herself upwards, increasing her altitude
She couldn’t explain why or how she knew but deep down, her instincts told her that if she continued towards the mountain and let herself get lost in that feeling, she would die.
So she kept flying straight up, even as her mind protested against and her body tensed up, her wings continued to carry her skyward.
The sky opened wide above her as Aria climbed, each beat of her wings steady but strained. She didn’t stop. Sothing inside urged her higher. Not out of fear, not even out of caution, but from a quiet certainty that going up was the only safe choice.
The warmth she had felt before deepened. It settled into her like a mory she couldn’t place. Not heat from the sun or the effort of flying, but a gentle, reassuring warmth that pulsed from sowhere below. It felt like safety.
After several minutes of silent ascent, she saw it. A broad, pale layer of cloud stretched out ahead of her like a vast ceiling. It looked soft, perfectly smooth, resting in stillness.
She kept flying.
The mont she entered, everything turned white. A cool, quiet fog swallowed her, muting her breath and dulling the sound of her wings. It didn’t last long.
Then she broke through.
Sunlight spilled across her, blinding and golden, and she froze mid-air at what she saw.
Floating in the sky before her was an isle.
Green hills rolled in gentle waves. Blossoming trees stood in delicate lines, their leaves gold and rose-tinted. Marble paths wound through crystal ponds and flowered gardens, all centered around a tall tower that shimred with light. The wind above this place carried soft music, faint and lodic, like wind chis from a faraway dream.
It was beautiful.
But it made her breath catch for the wrong reason.
Her skin prickled. The warmth inside her vanished, replaced by a cold stillness that sat just beneath her ribs. Not sharp. Not loud. But present. Like sothing was waiting.
The isle was silent, perfect, and full of life. But it felt empty.
A place painted to look peaceful, without the soul to match.
She stared a mont longer, then her gaze shifted past it, toward the mountains she had been climbing away from. Their ridges cut sharply through the air, shadowed by distance and wrapped in rough mist.
And yet, from there, the warmth returned.
It flowed into her like a breath of fresh air, grounding her, quiet and strong. It did not pull her closer. It didn’t whisper or lure.
It simply waited.
She turned her wings and banked away from the isle. The chilling aura she felt faded, though she could still feel its echo in her bones.
She stared at the mountain as she willed herself to float in place. She couldn’t shake the feeling that she was missing sothing. That soone or sothing was toying with her emotions...and she didn’t like that at all.
Yet at the end of the day she was conflicted, did she ignore her instincts and follow her emotions? Or did she go against everything that her body was telling her and go towards the potentially lethal and totally unknown island floating in the sky!
Her wings twitched with the strain of indecision.
The sky around her was bright and still, the air thinner but calm. Below her, clouds rolled like an ocean of white. And ahead, above all of it, floated sothing impossible.
A landmass suspended in the sky.
There were no buildings, no trees, no detail she could make out from this distance. Just the shape. A jagged island of rock and earth hanging there as if gravity had simply let go. Its edges were soft with haze, lit by sunlight that made it glow like sothing sacred.
It looked peaceful.
But the closer she drew, the more her body recoiled.
That warmth she had felt earlier, the one that had wrapped around her like comfort, had vanished. In its place was a cold unease that settled beneath her skin and made her wings feel heavier with each beat. Her breath grew quiet. Her thoughts grew louder.
Turn back.
You do not belong here.
The thought was not hers. It ca from sowhere deeper, rooted in the instincts she had always trusted. It told her that going any closer would tear her apart. That this place was wrong.
And yet it did not look wrong. It looked still. Quiet. Serene.
She blinked hard and turned in place. The mont she faced the southern mountains again, the warmth returned. The safety. The sense of ho.
Her heart squeezed.
She did not know what was happening or why this choice felt so much bigger than it should have. But everything in her scread that flying toward the isle would be a mistake.
Then it hit her. She had always followed her fathers decisions even when she disagreed. But when she received her wings, she realized that she had been living her life in a cage of her own making.
Was what was happening to her not the sa thing? No she would not stand for it. Not anymore!
Aria’s wings cut through the air, steady now, driven by a fierce determination.
This was her mont. Her choice.
She would go to the isle. And she would not be afraid.
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