Shaira hurt. From the moment she woke up, the mermaid had found herself on the receiving end of a pain so egregious that she couldn’t even come up with the words to describe it at that moment. It was deep and frigid and jagged and she just hurt, and felt empty, alone and empty in a way that she had never even begun to think possible, and the worst part was that she didn’t even know why.

Her familiar, an unassuming snail which was as crucial to her as her own sisters, and strong enough to match as well, was taken from her, and she didn’t know how. Things were going so well, they had avoided the floors which they had deemed a poor match up, rushed through those they couldn’t, and were all around tired but successful before the heat. The wyvern was tougher than expected but they were on track to get their spell off, to finally steal and seal that speed it is so vicious with, but then there was nothing but pain, loss, and a fear that wasn’t her own.

It was so abrupt, like someone had made an unbroken canvas of her life’s story, then decided to punch a hole through that specific moment. She could remember, if only barely, the feeling of having what should have been a nigh unbreakable link between two creatures was so casually snapped by… something. But what she could never possibly forget is what that something felt like. She knew, vaguely, what it was like to sense another being through a mental bridge. She’d tried it with Shasas early in their apprenticeship, and it had, at one point, been the most thorough connection with anyone or anything she had ever felt.

Not anymore. Whatever it was that shunted her familiar bond aside had also briefly formed a bond with her and it was enlightening, terrifying, euphoric, and hateful, and so much more. It was immense and it was wrathful towards her, but it also brought forth a feeling of satisfaction that soaked into her very being. She was content, more than that. She was shown just how small she really was and then shown the joy in what it was like to be a small part of something incomparably vast and grand, and then she was found lacking, and cast away.

Now was not the time to mourn, however, nor could she. Whatever it was that had made this titan so hateful towards her was very clearly her own shortcomings, and that meant that she could correct them, maybe even enjoy its favor rather than its ire when next they met. And she sincerely hoped that would happen again, too. So caught up in reliving the slivers of joy she had gotten from her encounter along with the pangs of guilt and misery that struck like bricks, that she failed to even notice her sisters floating beside her for several minutes.

But notice them she eventually did, the delirium that was clouding her mind finally receding, the pain that wracked every bit of her body despite being utterly unharmed slowly abating, and the primal emotion she had felt was slowly becoming a dull feeling rather than raw grief and terror and euphoria. She looked around at her two mirror images, as well as the sea elf who was lazily drifting back and forth through the open room, their own form of pacing.

Upon seeing their sister finally awakening, all three swarmed around her apparently blind to the internal crisis she had just gone through along with a decision made in haste that would change her life completely. The foreign elf actually tried to shove aside Sharah because she was ‘too close’ and ‘stressing’ her sister, but the small mermaid proved shockingly immovable, as any good Bulwark should. On top of that, the firm hug was more than welcome to Shaira, though not nearly enough.

It seemed even the intense kinship of a sister’s affection would not sate the desire, the need to have her mind itself connected to something many and to something more, and she needed this, this belonging. She shook off the intrusive thoughts, finally relaxing into her sister’s embrace, and taking a moment to listen to the steady but urgent voice of her apparent healer.

“-feeling? Shaira, Shaira! Please, I really need to know what happened. I’ve never seen such extensive soul damage from a familiar’s death” Sharah gave a pained look at that, one that the elf didn’t catch “and there might be something more that you can tell me that your sisters couldn’t.” She explained, rather loudly and emphatically.

And so, she tried to tell the healer who had treated her and her sisters everything she could, leaving out a few details she felt would only muddy the waters further. All the while, she learned a bit more about her own state upon being rushed to the field clinic, and then taken back to the town itself. A little surprisingly, none of the damage that the elven nurse had treated was physical, and beyond a bit of exhaustion, the mermaid was entirely unharmed. The same could not be said for the state of her mind and even possibly her soul, from what the healer could infer. In her own words, it “was like someone had scooped out a part of your soulscape and left a lump of something foreign in there.”

Shaira was confused by this explanation, she was familiar enough with the idea of a soul, in fact it was the first thing any proper mage should learn, as well as something any good healer should know how to treat, even if only a little. It was simple enough in theory, every living being had some form of soul, but apparently her nurse thought her confusion was a sign of not understanding even that much.

“All it takes to form one is some form of conscious thought, usually just a handful of neurons firing, and ambient mana would be drawn to it. Over time, as the mind develops and grows more complex, it pulls in more mana, too.” Shaira had heard that explanation plenty of times, but that still didn’t explain how something foreign could be placed in hers, which was a terrifying thought.

“In the end, a soul is just a mass of electricity and mana that have merged to become something a little different, and a creature’s innate affinity is whatever element that ambient mana happened to be while developing, as well as how much it could draw in to determine the strength. By the time a creature is born, however that may be, their soul is mostly fully developed, and never before have I seen or even heard of a soul having something new added in this way.

“The best I could do was stabilize you, since there was nothing technically wrong to be healed, my two spells Mending Light and even Rebirth did basically nothing. The good news is, this means that this thing isn’t considered harmful, at least not in any way that you or I would understand.” That was comforting enough to hear, both those spells were near the best when it came to treating soul wounds someone could get. “But the bad news is that whatever it replaced is probably not coming back, and maybe more that I’m just not aware of. I’d say take it easy for a bit, try to figure out what you’ve lost, and more importantly, what you’ve gained, before you go about actual combat again.”

That was certainly good advice to the mermaid, too. She was already well aware that she was missing more than just a few hours of memories and a familiar bond, and she also knew she had gotten something in the exchange. She’d found her purpose, now, gotten a taste of the place she belonged in the world and now she just had to puzzle together how to find it again. One idea came unbidden to her, a flash of inspiration that just seemed right.

All she would have to do is get another familiar to start. Maybe even a few, though she didn’t want to start out too ambitious, and wind up hurting herself or them if she couldn’t handle it. Still, she had an odd confidence, even arrogance, about her capabilities for mental and bonding magic now, and she couldn’t fathom why that was. She’d never particularly excelled at that branch, in fact, she was hardly good for much outside of using her considerable mana pool to augment either of her sisters’ abilities. Elemental magic escaped her, and she simply couldn’t get Intent down to even slightly charge a spell with Sacred or Desecrated aspects.

Suddenly feeling like the best in the world at using mind magic, something that relied on precise mana control, the use of electric and life element to make their own tier three element, and giving it intent so it can actually do anything, was weird. But that was exactly how she felt, and after suddenly realizing this, she was desperate to try it out. In doing so, she once again stopped listening to the elf, and even her own sisters seemed a little concerned with how unfocused she was, though they didn’t mention it yet.

She hurried the conversation along as quickly as she could, now dead-set on the idea of finding a familiar to replace that which was lost and hopefully even bring back a sliver of that sense of purpose, and hurried out of the clinic as soon as a lull in the conversation happened to find the nearest creature supplier. If she was really lucky, they might even have a few creatures taken straight from the dungeon she could bond with.

And so she raced towards the shopping district, trying to ignore the dull ache in her heart over the loss of a dear companion, to push aside the intense loneliness she sought to soothe, and to not get caught by either of the two other forest green mermaids trying to drag her back to the clinic, she was startled when she almost slammed directly into a rather large sea lionkin, startling him and the group of three others behind him.

Thankfully, he laughed it off, and after hers, Sharah’s, and Shasa’s profuse apologies were rebuffed, the groups began talking in earnest, somehow following behind Shaira as she was drawn to the markets.