Inside

"Mana is all around us. It is the air we breathe and the water we drink." The preacher paused for a moment before resuming, "It was made by a lone soul. It was a great magician, the first and the greatest to ever exist. Its creation allows us to live and the nature to thrive, all the while the great soul still lives on in all of us. We are but a piece of it, yet we are granted a part of its powers. I hope you will all turn to the great soul. Come to us and you will learn true magic, divine magic. The kind our great soul still uses every day to make life."

The red sunlight flowed across the crowd, into the garden and through the church's large windows. Viney plants visibly lived inside parts of the hardened soil brick. The magically constructed building towered above the rest of the village.

Inside, a soul was about to be split.

"You need to stay awake!" The church maiden held onto Vivian's hand. The older maiden looked over to the priest, he continued using light magic.

Vivian was trembling, her body felt cold. She had been ill for as long as she could remember, but she felt worse than ever before. If everything went right, she would birth a child that day. If it went wrong, if she was unable to survive before the baby was born, she would give birth to a demon.

The soulless were cold, apathy was their common trait. If the mother's soul were to dissipate before birth, the baby would live without a part of the great soul. It would not be considered a living beeing. They were puppets, the soulless fit themselves into society only to take everything from it. Their selfish nature was the evil of the world, it was no rarity to wish for their bodies to stop moving. They existed without a soul, without beeing alive. They fed of their greed, of what they stole and took from others or not.

Vivian was determined to birth a human, she would make sure of it. And yet, she struggled to keep her eyes open, her breathing was rapid and shallow. Through her blurry vision, she noticed a man in red robes walking into the small backroom. He walked over to her bed before putting a glistering silver dagger on the table beside her. Without a word, he smiled and left the room.

The maiden looked at Vivian's face, then over to the priest with worried eyes.

Suddenly, her heartbeat fastened. Vivian could feel her fatigue worsening. She felt colder and closer to death. Panicked, she lifted herself up instantaneously.

"Brother?!" The maiden screamed. The man had just left the door. Within seconds, he appeared back in the room.

"Is she dying?" He quickly asked. The man walked towards her bedside table, "We can't let that happen, I'm sorry."

As he reached for the knife on the table, Vivian snagged it away.

The sun was setting, red rays reached her eyes. In cold blood towards herself, as careful as she could, she started to slice open her stomach. She tensed her jaw and face up.

The people around her froze up. They were not supposed to stop her, she just fulfilled their purpose by herself. They looked on as she sawed open a last bit before throwing the dagger away.

She had little time, her vision was already useless. She grabbed into her large stomach and slowly pulled her child out. It was alive, crying and moving. But it went black like everything else around her.

She continued holding it, she could feel the child laying on her chest.

Vivian was calm, the feelings of pain and the touch of her child slowly disappeared.

She woke up. Alya felt the cool sweat on her back. Her face was cold from the night wind.

She tensed up. The nightmares she had been getting never woke her up during the night before, but quickly, she calmed down. Joy was quietly sleeping in front of her, a small fire burned behind him. Light danced around the trees and a few men could be faintly heard talking.

Her dreams always ended with happy endings. The protagonist got what they wanted, even if they hurt themselves in the process. They all shared a slight madness in their methods, but always achieving the melancholic happiness they wanted.

Alya smiled, "They act like the villains in fairytales." She thought.

They reminded her of the locks, the king and everyone else that supported him. They were giving their lives away over the right to abuse other people. They seemed to simply be too stupid. Maybe it was pride, but the lack of introspection was truly wondrous to Alya.

"Maybe the money makes your mind cloudy." She imagined the clouds floating around in the locks' empty heads, "Maybe the church is right and soulless exist, but that would mean the cause for becoming one was different from what they imagined." She continued pondering.

They showed no empathy towards the ex-slaves. Alya was sure through their religious belief in the great soul, the locks found some way to justify their actions. Their most important teaching is that humans have imbued in them a part of the great soul, yet Alya knew they cared little about the islanders.

"They are crazy. Morally controlled by their emotions. Stupid idiots." She turned to her back to look at the stary sky, "Why do they even exist? Would be great if they all just disappeared. Turned into dust. I hope a demon beast hunts them down. I hope murderers kill every single one of them."

She audibly sighed. "For their lives to end quickly, that is my only wish." She watched a star shooting past the others.