Once upon a time, the World was balanced. The Six Celestials ruled over the heavens, while the humans ruled the Earth. The humans sang the praises of the Celestials while the Celestials blessed the humans with their ethereal powers. And those humans who lived a pious life dedicated to praising the Celestials were able to enter the land of eternal paradise and ecstasy.
This was how the World worked for many millennia. It was simply the way of life. But it soon changed when the Arion Empire – the empire which stood as the commonwealth of all mankind attempted to steal the star's authority by binding every single human and their descendants to a single cosmic fate.
This led to a bloody war between the humans lead by the Arion Empire and the gods lead by the Six Celestials, which lead to an imbalance in the World, with the heavens coming out victorious from the war. The Arion Empire fractured into multiple kingdoms.
This soon lead to the last descendent of the Arion dynasty to use darkest of magic to create a fracture in the veil. This birthed the once-in-a-generation phenomenon known as The Thirteen Nights.
During the Thirteen Nights, humans usually experience extreme bliss during the daytime, and extreme fear during the night, hearing the whispers of their ancestors who rebelled against the heavens. To prevent the extremes of the Thirteen Nights eternally, the sorcerers of the humans gather together on the twelfth night of the thirteen nights to figure out who to send a bride as an offering to appease the Six Celestials and end the extremities of these nights. On the Thirteenth Night, the 'Sacred Bride' – wearing white to symbolise purity must drown herself in the Holy River Nyx, a river which flows through the continent of Gaia.
The Thirteen Nights occur every 50 years.
This has been the way for 1,450 years.
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It was the Twelfth Night.
Dead bodies were scattered everywhere. The river Nyx was filled with blood, those of humans and gods. The sky was orange, with barely a cloud in sight as the crimson sun's heat grew more intense. Greenery was sparse, barely a flower in bloom. Whispers of curses towards the Six Celestials filled the silence. And then I heard a deafening scream.
I woke up.
The sun was rising and the weather was pleasant, young children played while the smell of fresh bread from the bakery across wafted through the street.
I leaned back, sighing after that intense dream. I drank some water near my bedside table and got up. My cottage was small, but cozy. It was enough for an apothecary's apprentice.
I tied my straight black hair into a messy low ponytail with a brown ribbon. I wore my brown dress with my leather vest on top of it. I wore my boots and carried a rucksack. I was readyfor the day.
I ran to the apothecary, to see my teacher – Arlo Centauri. He was known for being the best healer around the Southlands, and luckily he was my teacher.
I clasped my hands as I spoke enthusiastically.
"So, Mr. Arlo, what will I learn today?"
Mr. Arlo turned to me. "Ah! Aella, you're here! Today, you're going to learn how to make a hyderoot potion!" He responded back with the same tone as me.
My smile soon dropped to a frown.
"Really? How about a bit more practice on those golden leaf potions?"
He chuckled heartily until he responded sternly.
"No. You're good at making golden-leaf potions, now you need to master the art of making hyderoot medicines."
"But-"
He cut me off.
"Hyderoot is the most important ingredient in Alchemy and Medicine. It is the hardest to master, yet the most important for healing. I left a bunch of potion-making instructions for hyderoot on the wooden table in the Potions Room."
He walked away but just before he could exit my sight, he turned back to say something to me.
"Golden-leaf is also addictive and can be used as a drug when not used in prescribed amounts given by healers"
He then exited the room to see another client who have come for medicine. I went to the Potions Room, with three big cauldrons in front of me. I turned up the heat on the middle cauldron and used water as a base for the potion. I looked at the rusty old instructions manual on making a basic hyderoot potion to cure the pox. I rolled my eyes as I looked at how easy the instructions were.
I added a lobster, snow strawberries, bitter gourd, and a roach. And then came the hyderoot.
"No more than leaf of a hyderoot plant." I muttered under my breath as I added a leaf to the boiling cauldron.
I turned to wipe my hands with a cloth before I stirred the potion. Suddenly, I heard a loud thud, and then the sound of fireworks. And then I turned around to see the middle cauldron disappear. Soon enough, the cauldron came rushing down with a large thud. Ugh.
I went to Mr. Arlo to figure out where I went wrong.
"I did exactly as the recipe says, and then the cauldron just blasted up!"
"Did you add the petiole of the hyderoot leaf?"
"Yea…."
"You were just supposed to add the leaf, not the petiole."
"Oh, that makes so much sense now Mr. Arlo."
Mr. Arlo was like a father figure to me in some ways. He and his late wife took care of me when I was younger, always bringing me bread to make sure I was nourished everyday, took me to play in the park, bought my clean clothes, took me to festivals etc.
For as long as I remember, I was an orphan till I was the age of 16, when the late Mrs. Centauri took me in. For which I am eternally grateful.
They never formally adopted me, but they were the closest thing to family I had. The closest thing I know of family anyways.
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"I'll take my leave now Mr. Arlo!"
It was almost evening when I took my leave, I wanted to enjoy the bliss of the day before comes the last night of the petrifying nightmares.
I was going to my cottage when I suddenly saw a bunch of knights standing at my door.
"Is anything wrong?" I asked them politely.
"We are looking for Aella Therinos. Have you seen her?"
I responded back curtly. "May I ask what is this regarding?"
"She has been chosen as the next Sacred Bride."
I gasped. The knight then spoke, "Are you Aella Therinos?"
I looked at him in his eyes, and then proceeded to run into the forest, into the apothecary so I can say goodbye to Mr. Arlo. I ran as fast as I could, with tears forming in my eyes. Is this really my fate? But my life has just begun. I'm just a girl.
I'm just a girl.
I barged into the backdoor to the apothecary and ran to hug Mr. Arlo tightly.
"I thought you went to take your leave Aella." He said softly while he hugged me back.
"I was chosen as the Sacred Bride." I said whimpering.
"I will never get to see you again Mr. Arlo. I am so grateful to have met you."
Suddenly the knights came, thudding on the apothecary's backdoor. They were going to soon barge in and take me away.
"Though this is my fate, I just want to say, I love you dad." I said, with more tears forming in my eyes, as they soon raced down my cheek only to splat on the wooden ground.
"I love you too, daughter." Mr. Arlo said, with tears in his eyes.
We hugged each other before we let go. The knights barged into the apothecary and took me away. If I knew this was my last day on Earth, I definitely wouldn't've made hyderoot potions. I looked at Mr. Arlo one last time. I looked at Dad one last time, before I fulfilled my fate as the Sacred Bride.