~ 62: The Night of Blessings and Curses - Part 7 ~

In front of us lay a riverbed, in which lay not any normal river. It was one that would drown us and then sweep our corpses away due to its heavy current. We stood and stared at the stream in disbelief.

'How are we to cross this river?' I asked myself as I gulped. 'It would be the death of us to try our luck here.'

"Should we cross this stream like one normally would?" I asked my partner as I looked for any kind of place to create a bridge or mend an existing one. "It's quite a long way to swim through."

"I wouldn't be that easy after all the tasks we went through," he replied after surveying the water. "Maybe this is our only luck of finding out a solution."

"And may I know how you plan on making it across alive? I don't think we will be able to touch either bank before we are swept away to the doors of death."

"We will use the ropes you made in case one can't make it across. They are long and strong enough to keep the breath of life in us."

The task at hand seemed risky but our best choice was giving it a shot and seeing how far we could go. We unwound the ropes and then looked at each to ask who would be going into the stream that could literally crush people to death.

Lucas's shaky eye seemed to convey that he would rather have me test this place than him going first as he had previously. I took the lead and started to tightly attach the rope to myself, wondering what had come over him.

"Another time," he said as I opened my mouth to question his unusual judgement. He would always be the first to go unless he tried to let me be independent, which wasn't the case.

I silently passed the free end of the long rope to him, entrusting my life in him as I always had. Then I jumped into the river, landing on my legs which were swept away before they were even halfway through it.

The ice-cold water froze my legs. I couldn't feel its movement because of the sudden numbness in them. The least I could do from being pushed away by the current was clutch onto some roots nearby and try to use those to move further downstream.

On my tenth attempt to move in the direction of the current instead of across the bank, I felt something wrap itself around my shin. Before I had the time to yank it off, my whole body felt a continuous sharp pain run through it.

I never heard the screams escape my mouth, let alone anyone else's in my vicinity, as I let go of the tree roots. The roar of the water beside me was all I could hear as the waves took control of the direction of my body. In a minute, I was completely overpowered by the waves as they took me into the depths of the river.

'Stay with us,' they seemed to tell me. 'Live the rest of your life here in peace. You shall be given whatever you wish and plenty of it in return.'

'I can barely breathe,' I cried out in my head. 'How shall I live in eternal peace in a place that is bound to kill me?'

Another sharp sting ran through my whole body. I was sure that it was electricity that an eel had been commanded to do so if I questioned their judgement. But then, I should have died from electrocution as I wouldn't have been spared with water all around me.

I opened my stinging eyes and tried to see what creature had tried to kill me. I was sure that the voice of the waves was just a hallucination or a false call as it was a most mysterious summon. I thought about how my soul had not yet been shredded from my body when I noticed an indistinct red glow above my chest.

'Just how long will this thing keep protecting me?' I asked with uncertainty. 'I feel like I am losing one life after the other by continuous keeping it engaged in my wellbeing.'

'Thesia, you are missing out on a great opportunity,' the voice hissed. 'I shall give you whatever you shall desire. You only have to obey my one command.'

'Or else what will you do, you powerless creature?' I said as I tried to look at the eel that stared back at me. 'I shall not die so easily from your tricks.'

'Kill her. Torture her until she surrenders. Yield not until she is ours.'

Then the intense agony started. I gargled water, drinking some down and coughing as I choked on my screams. There was not a soul who could hear them except me, and there was not a person who could drag my body away from the waves until it smashed into the dam ahead. Despite all the disadvantages I had been put in, I could see and hear clearly yet not speak a word.

'Just why must I listen to you?' I cried out in my agony. 'Who are you even that I must obey you?'

'Who dares to retort to the Queen of all the world's seas? Would my power be needed to show you how powerful I can be?'

'Set me free. I am no slave of yours to obey. I belong to the land, not to the sea.'

'Then what if your kind fisherman of a father was at stake? Perhaps that shall turn you to obey me.'

'How do you know anything about me? I haven't done anything wrong to deserve this!'

'When you disobey the ruler of the territory you are in, you shall always pay with your life.'

The electric shocks continued to pass through me without a pause. I shrieked to the lifeless medium which neither aided me nor stopped its motion at my call.

'Lucas,' I managed to call out, despite knowing that any form of magic wasn't allowed to be used. 'Save me from my torment. I promise to pay you with my blood for it.'

A yank of the rope attached to me had my head resurface out of the cold waters. All I knew was that I clutched onto the roots and screamed yet again as I was stung bitterly. Before I could let go of them again, I was pulled up by my arms and surrounded by warmth before my body collapsed.