End of a World

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(Slight angst warning?)


The blue haired woman was but a tool that everyone selfishly used without caring for its durability. No matter how rusty it would get, no one would care enough to restore it and they would continue to use it; to abuse it. The life Zoe had led was one of self-sacrifice and selflessness, loneliness and regret. There had been so much she once wanted to live for some time in the past, all of them things which she had long forgotten in solitude. Still, she continued to protect everyone for years until she broke under the overwhelming pressure.

For once in her lifetime, she had allowed herself a bit of arrogance, to do something for herself.  To be put down and taken out of her miserable life -if someone could even call that a life. Had the woman been alive, she would have compared it to the sad end of the miners' canaries; going deeper and deeper into the darkest of caves till their heart would beat faster and they would succumb before the humans. Because they were trapped in a cramped cage, unable to be free; to fly away and live on their own accord. If anyone would remain of the time of her death and were to record the event, she would be portrayed as a selfish traitor of the others' greed. But that didn't matter anymore; not to her.

Yet, even in death, they all wanted to use her as nothing but a tool. They all wanted to protect themselves, to raise her body and use it as a shield from the outside; to hide behind the dead, how terribly cowardice. No one really loved her, cared for her, nor respected her in any way or form, even though she had kept the whole forest safe for almost a century. Year after year, she would sit in that tree completely alone just to keep the blue barrier from shattering. The past didn't matter, though, because she was dead. She was but the corpse of a woman with a smile etched permanently on her pale expression, lying on the long, green grass of the bright, yellow sun.

Enfys was fiddling with dried herbs and rushed potions in her shaking hands as she tried everything she could to somehow bring Zoe back. They were that selfish; to steal a wish of the dead just to save themselves of harder labour, of harder fights and a mutual future of death and  the anxious, nerve-wracking nail biting that accompanied the thought. The witch tried time and time again, going from the kiss of life to the most effective healing herb she could find in the clearing but in the end, nothing had changed. Zoe was still in her blissful abyss of darkness and peace, her soul taken from the realm and passed onto another. And they? They were trapped in the breaking and dying memory of Blue Peace.

There were screams of horror, of absolute terror, of pain, of agony reverberating through the forest as the barrier broke and the blue glass shards fell onto the canopy of trees, smashing into the ground and booming like meteors. Except they carried no heat like those extraterrestrial forms of rock; only cold, harsh bashes to whomever would happen in their descend. The one carrying the hit was the king of the sky: the sun. The yellow rays of the star pierced through the dome of blue swiftly, licking its lips as the branches of trees started to smoke from the sudden heat.

There was more screaming, more death and yet no one could do anything to stop it. And then a ray hit the glass and went straight for the closest pile of dead leaves; and then another ray, and then another. The rays hopped on the shards of glass like wild jackalopes and then spread the heat to the rest of the forest. Fire arose, yet no one could do something to stop the wild flames from engulfing the trees. There was no cold anymore, no stability in temperature; only unbearable warmth.

"Össur!", Odan shouted in urgency. His dragon was crying, wailing as the heat attacked his icy skin. He was burning alive. Smoke, no, vapor raised from his liquid skin as his limbs stretched to the point of his wings tearing, his claws grasping and gripping at anything within reach, his muscles so tense they felt like breaking. Össur was stunned but Odan had more than him to worry about. "Össur, fly and go in the shade!"

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