Illusion ~ A Short Story

Injustices Corrected

Aziza's prayers reached the gods above, shocking them all as they realized just how much things had taken a turn for the worst at the twins' home. None of them could believe that Mira's routine murder of every single traveler that arrived at their doorstep had gone unnoticed by everyone for an entire decade. Even though a decade was like a simple passing moment to the immortal gods, a decade was significant enough to them when it came to the lives of mortal humans. Thus there was a substantial outcry from the majority of the gods above as they demanded to know how none of them had known about the situation till now and how Mira had gotten his illusion abilities in the first place. Yet, one god seemed to possess a slightly higher level of understanding when it came to Mira's abilities.

Due to their existing high rank in the immortal hierarchy, the god was easily able to gather together the other gods in a conference of sorts in order to divulge the knowledge they knew regarding Mira's abilities. Ultimately after they shared everything they knew, the other gods decided that since this god was already familiar with Mira and had similar abilities to their own, they would be the one sent down to the mortal realm to correct the injustices that had occurred. Knowing their own involvement in making Mira the way he was, the god humbly agreed without complaint to deal with the matter as swiftly as possible.

Upon arriving at the twins' home in the mortal realm, the god hid their presence from the twins in order to observe firsthand what was occurring. They watched as Mira welcomed a group of travelers into his home and led them to the Dining Room, where he presented them with the grandest feast imaginable, full of wondrous foods replicas of the ones other travelers told him about. The god's eyes widened in surprise at Mira's apparent ease in creating such a high volume of illusions filled with intricate details, far beyond anything a mortal with illusion abilities could possess. Without wasting another moment, the god hurried through the rest of the house in search of Aziza in hopes that watching her would lead to some kind of answer as to what had gone wrong.

The god finally located her in the Solarium, making a simple meal for herself from the bland ingredients she harvested, a far cry from the grand illusioned foods Mira created for the travelers. It was then that the god was able to start piecing together exactly what had gone wrong to lead them to this point in time. Still hidden behind their own illusions, the god briefly went throughout the house looking for any last-minute clues they could identify that would help fill in their missing gaps of knowledge. Finally, they returned to the Solarium just as Aziza was finishing her meal and decided it was time to get to the true bottom of things, once and for all, so they removed the illusion that hid them from view.

Aziza yelped and practically jumped out of her skin at the sudden reveal of the god's presence standing across from her in the Solarium. Once she calmed down, she immediately became suspicious of the god, unsure if they were real or just yet another of Mira's creations. This only made the god pity Aziza further, realizing that she had been affected far more than she had let on in her prayers, and knew that revealing their true identity was the only way to get her to trust them. So they stood before her and revealed themself to be Llew, High god of Illusions and current Head of the Illusions Council.

As much as Aziza's mind was screaming at her that this had to be just another trick by Mira, she also knew that there was no way Mira could think of this on his own, so it couldn't be anyone other than who they were claiming to be. Aziza took a deep breath and motioned for Llew to take a seat in the chair opposite of her at the table, knowing they most likely had a lot to say and questions that needed to be answered. Llew asked about Aziza's family, why their parents didn't seem to have any kind of presence in the house, and what had happened to set Mira off down the path he was stuck in. So Aziza sorrowfully told them about her parent's murder and the events that had occurred during the first year after that, and as she spoke, she realized that Mira protecting her from the travelers was at the center of each incident that seemed to push him further down the path of darkness.

They continued to talk for what seemed like just mere minutes, but rather, the sun slowly dipped further in the sky until darkness covered the Desert Sea. Llew had to repeatedly reassure Aziza that even though her safety from the travelers might have been the catalyst in Mira falling into the darkness of his illusions, ultimately, it was his decision in the beginning to use his illusions the way that he did. Eventually, Aziza worked up the courage to admit to Llew that if the gods above hadn't responded to her prayers for help, she was prepared to take the shameful exit from the mortal realm in order to get away from Mira's worsening manipulations. Llew sighed sympathetically, now knowing the horrible experiences she had been forced to live through and be complacent of in the past decade. Purposefully removing oneself from the mortal realm, regardless of the reason why one pursued that course of action, was viewed as the most shameful and cowardly way of dying. For Aziza to admit her thoughts of that magnitude to them, Llew realized that it was only fair to reveal information to Aziza of similar weight.

Llew opted to divulge the intended history of Mira's abilities. They told Aziza how, as twins, both Mira and Aziza were meant to equally share the illusion abilities they had been gifted while in their mother's womb. Aziza's jaw dropped slightly in surprise but ultimately held her tongue from commenting in order for Llew to explain further before interrupting. Llew continued to say that they were the one responsible for giving Mira his abilities as they had chosen Mira and Aziza to gain illusion abilities in order to one day join the Illusion Council of the Gods. They admitted that they weren't entirely sure how Mira ended up with all of the illusion abilities, leaving Aziza with nothing, as they were unable to monitor the twins' childhood due to other commitments that unfortunately took priority over keeping an eye on them.

With that being said, Llew offered to Aziza to take her rightful place on the council as she had been expected to and ascend above as goddess herself, but instead, she would take the position alone. Despite Mira's impressive mastery of his illusion and compulsion abilities, he had chosen to use his abilities to purposefully deceive and harm the travelers who arrived at their home asking for hospitality. Aziza hesitated to agree, concerned that the illusion abilities would twist and destroy her mind as they had done to Mira, but Llew assured her that her ascension as a goddess would prevent her abilities from ever trying to control her mind.

After a few moments of consideration, Aziza agreed to ascend as a goddess to take her place on the Illusion Council. Not only was it an easy way for her to escape Mira's deceitfulness and manipulations, but it also gave her an opportunity to use her abilities to do good as they were meant to. Her ascension stripped Mira of his illusion abilities, effectively preventing him from harming any more travelers, but as an added measure, she used her new abilities to create an illusion around the home to prevent travelers from ever finding it. While this may not have been a true, fitting punishment for his decade of murders, Aziza couldn't bring herself to harm him any more than that.

In the end, after Aziza had joined the council in her full goddess state, she took the concept Mira had created of people chasing that which they couldn't reach despite knowing it wasn't real and made it so that they weren't forced to chase it. Instead, those affected by the illusion could make the conscious choice on their own whether or not they wanted to chase the illusion since they would know it wasn't something attainable. She decreed that her type of illusion abilities would be called Mirages in memory of her brother, who shouldn't have had to go through having the abilities on his own.