— POV Mathias —

I’m on fire. My body is turning to ash right in front of my eyes. My is shrinking rapidly. I came in here to retreat from the pain, and to better decide how I can live. However, nothing is coming up. I have my back to the giant crystal in the center, with several displays floating around me, showing various viewpoints that I can see from my body. Most of them are blinking red or completely dead and black.

Hopelessness. It’s all I can feel right now.

The dragon has almost completely burnt my network of grass and roots down. My GP is below 1000 and sinking to recover the area around my main body. My fire shiled is being drained at an extremely fast pace. I’ve lost access to a lot of my mana crystals.

*Crash!* *Crack* *Tinkle, Tinkle*

I can hear the crystal shattering behind me, large chunks falling off. I seem to be hearing something too…

“I’m almost free! A little more!”

Yes, yes… I guess I will finally be free once this is over. Sigh. I’m in a daze due to the huge amount of pain I’m in. Livily should be here soon, but I need to convince her to leave soon. Don’t want to take others down with me.

Shit, I’m really going to die, aren’t I? I’m at my wits end here. I’m trying to convert my remaining energy to do something, but my Sage class isn’t giving me any good abilities. I don’t know any drugs that can help me, there isn’t any plant life I remember that can live through something like this. Damn it…

The only consolation I have is that as I’m losing limbs, my nerves are being cauterized and I’m slowly losing feeling in my body. The only defense I have right now is I’ve covered my main body with a fake rock for fire protection, and I’ve made a few of them. But I think this is the last one in the field. I can’t tell though…

…

…

…

Is that TAEYA! And the CUBS! Shit! I lost control of my outer fringes, and Taeya came back! I didn’t notice them moving and getting out of my cover I made for them. Dangit. And she’s holding my two cubs and crying. Why is this happening? Do the Gods really want me dead this badly? Was my struggle truly worth nothing!?

I still have a ton of mana crystals, but most of them are burnt up or empty. I need to save my new family, but it’s obvious my protection magic and abilities are basically zero. The best thing I can think of now is to fire an extremely large, focused blast of magic at the dragon and try to hide myself. Hopefully I injure the Dragon and scare it away, letting Taeya live. Fuck!!!

Maybe a good ‘ol neutron blast could save the day! Plasma maybe? I just don’t know how much mana it will take to create those things… DAMNIT!

*Pop*

Oh good, Livily, you’re here! Come over here, quickly! What can I do!? Taeya is out there!

…

What about my magic? Can I hurt it with this?

…

No? Then what!? I don’t know what to do!

…

That’s crazy! I can’t let you all die too!

…

Ok Livily. I’ll trust you. What do I need to do?

…

Revert back to a seed? Give up on what I’ve gained, what I’ve taken? Not again! I can’t!

…

I’ll still be me? Just the me when I first came alive? So I won’t lose my memories?

…

I see…

…

And you promise you’ll keep them safe?

…

Ok. Do it. Also, thank you.

…

ARRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

— POV Livily —

It took me a bit to harmonize with his being before I could enter. Normally, I’m brought to a blank, black space with a floating crystal in the middle. But this… Is different.

I seem to be in a white, wide room, with the edges slowly crumbling inwards. And in the middle there is a large, green, pink, and … black? Crystal hanging or floating above something. Sitting infront of the crystal is a green, humanoid being. I suppose that’s Mathias. He has floating squares that are showing him the images from outside. It looks even worse in here. He seems to be dazed, just sitting there looking at the screens, out of energy. The crystal is… oh no, cracking and crumbling. This is bad! I don’t have time to lose!

“Mathias! Mathias! Hey!” *smack*

Geez, he’s really out of it. I had to hit his shoulder before he turned around. He looks like a mess. His cheeks are sunken in, his eyes black, and a large part of his body is black. Really, not good.

…

Oh no! Taeya! I told her to stay put! She needs to leave ASAP!

“Mathias! Can you reach her? No? Shoot. We need a plan. We need to drive the dragon away, keep you safe, and somehow keep Taeya safe too.”

…

Wow. That’s amazing, but there is no way he will be able to make that type of magic in time. The circle would be way too complicated, you need to also be in a good state of mind and have practiced before.

“I’m afraid that if you even try those types of magic, you would actually kill yourself with mana feedback or even hurt Taeya in the process! You cannot!”

…

“Let me think! Let me think!”

This is dangerous! This is crazy! But I can only think of one thing we can do! A fake death plus mana burst!

“Mathias, I think I know what we can do! You have a lot of mana, right? We can cause a mana explosion! In that moment, I’ll blast out with it, grab Taeya, and run! And when the explosion is happening, you quickly fake your death! We may get hurt from the mana, and the dragon may chase us, but it’s the best choice we have right now!”

…

“First, you need to being all your mana into your core, where your consciousness resides. Bring it here as soon as you can! You still have enough nature energy, that’s good. Bring that here too. But here’s where it gets difficult. Your crystal is critically damaged, so you’ll need to remove your outer layers, and revert back to your soul seed. It’ll reduce your mana, your very being, to a primal seed state. The rest of your body will die, but you will be safe.”

…

“Mathias! Calm down! We have to hurry. You will still be you, your memories will be the same, everything will be the same. But just back to when you were born. It isn’t true death. With enough time you can be you again. Don’t worry, after we escape, we’ll come back and nurse you back to life. You have to trust me.”

…

“Yes, you’ll still be you.”

…

“We have to hurry, it’s now or never!

…

“Of course, I’ve come to treat them as my family the past few weeks. I won’t let harm come to them!”

…

“Don’t worry about it. See you on the other side.”

Now, I believe Mathias knows what to do with a mana burst, but there’s something I have to do for him that he cannot do.

His crystal needs to be downsized. Dragons are extremely sensitive to magic, energy, and the soul. It can tell if a monster died or is feigning death. The only way to fool one is to actually die in all ways. Part of his soul needs to die, his mana, and his energy all need to die and give off energy so the dragon can tell that he really died. For that, I’ll need to trim his crystal down to the smallest size.

It’s bad. It looks like it’s been growing in an unchecked state. This should be the core of a being. But this one… Is full of cracks, and seems to be divided into 12 segments of different sizes. I have no idea how this crystal has maintained its form for so long. Usually a tree has a one robust crystal, that seems unbreakable. This must be from one of his abilities or skills. It feels wrong. What’s really worrying, though, is that there is one section that is completely black. It’s like it wants to separate. I’ve never seen something like this before. I can only imagine that somehow he is a little bit insane. What’s keeping him together.

Ah. I see. There is a small portion at the very center that is tinged pink. It’s the glue that’s binding all the segments together. It’s also desperately hooking onto the black part, not letting it leave. There must be a very strong feeling he has at his core, love, hate, anger, compassion. His soul has been dyed a similar color as the one he feels that emotion towards. Something that is keeping him all here.

Okay, good. It looks like he’s gathering all of his energy to explode. I haven’t told him yet, but this is going to hurt more than anything else he’s ever felt in his life.

Also… I’m sorry Mathias… I lied to you. The damage to your crystal is much more than I thought it could be. It’s tearing itself apart, this black portion needs to be excised. If we had more time I could help you mend your soul, for it to become one again and healthy. But I can’t fix it quickly. The black part of your crystal soul needs to be removed. The entire bit, all the way down to your soul seed in the middle. There’s no clear separation between the outside, grown part and the part in your seed.

Mathias… You will lose part of yourself, a part of yourself that you can almost never get back. I’m so sorry. We have to hope that your soul doesn’t crumble with the removal of this piece, we both have to trust in the pink segment in your soul to keep you together.

I’ll use the excess mana to form a crystal barrier around your soul seed to help heal and hold together your soul.

Please don’t hate me for what I’m about to do.

“Mathias, now!”

*BOOM* *CRACK*

A straight shot of mana sinks deeply into his soul, reaching his soul seed. It slowly chewed away at his growth in his soul, covering his seed and separating, until it reached the black portion. It tries to also grind away, but it is rebuffed at the surface. Instead, the mana has to folow the crack between segments into the deepest part of his soul seed, and separate from there. Unforunately, the pink segment in his soul and the black segment did not want to release from each other. So the mana cleaved straight through, leaving small pink hooks atttached to the black mass. The black mass felt… happy? Instead of falling and crumbling to the ground, the black mass zoomed to the side of his and faded out into the black.

“Huh?”

Meanwhile Mathias fell on the ground, limp. As I grapped his soul seed to take him away, the surroundings were sucked into the seed andI burst out of our hiding spot, holding his seed.

Can’t think, that’s for later, have to run! “Taeya, hurry, run!!!!”

— Taeya POV —

“Dad!!! Why! What’s happening! I can’t feel or hear you! Dad!”

“Stupid Dragon!!! I hate you! Why are you doing this! Why did you burn Dad down!!!!”

Mew, Mew

“Oh Jard, Torgue, sniff, do you feel dad anymore?”

…

“Liv!!! Where are you!!! I saw you jump in, get out, hurry! I don’t want to lose you too!”

The peaceful glade that I’ve grown to love and live in is a sea of blackened grass and fire. And dad… where he was is only a husk of a tree, completely burned to charcoal. But the dragon is still searching, apparently he may still be alive!

*Smoosh*

The dragon destroyed another rock, there’s only one left. It’s making me nervous. Don’t tell me, they’re under the last one!

The dragon seems to be preparing one final breath. Please live. PLEASE LIVE! I can’t lose everyone!!

*FWOOOOOOOOOSSSHSHHHHHH*

When the Dragon’s fire hit the rock, a massive explosion of mana appeared! A huge hole opened up in the middle, and it seemed to be going in slow motion.

“Taeya, hurry! Run!”

Ooof!

Livily grabbed me and pulled me into running away, clutching something close to her chest.

— POV Sheal —

Finally, I found the last spot this blight can be hiding. One last good breath and it’s gone. Finally, this was a good workout too. I feel like I burned off some energy. I can start my trip immediately! I can’t wait!

*FWOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOSHSHSHHHHHHHH*

Ah, and there we go. Self-destruction to try to hurt me. Puny thing. And it’s totally dead now. I can feel the magic dying, and his soul departing.

Ah. There goes the Dryad, looks like she’s given up. Good, hopefully her mind control is gone… BUT I can’t take any chances. Well, I might as well kill the dryad girl before they get too far, then head back. I don’t want my valley polluted again.

Uggh. Fuck, she’s calling me back! I wasted too much time! Nooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooooo. Okay, you guys are free today. When I come back, my valley better be back to normal. Huff.

— POV Rose (Oracle) —

Oh no! Something’s wrong! Uggh, my heart! What’s this pain!? My soul!!!! But, it’s fine? Where’s this pain coming from?

I need to use my powers to find the source… I need to go up my fate string, and -

I need to call Sheal back! I can feel a blackening on my Fate line, like I’m losing something. And I feel… no, I was given advice by someone. I need to call her back!

— POV Gods —

-Mother

A new species is about to die off, and the counter force is already free. You all need to fix this. You've done wrong to this boy, and this planet. I'll start the ball rolling, but you'll need to see things through. Fate, here is some power. Get the dragon back. And until this is fixed, YOU NEED TO PAY ATTENTION. Sniff… I can’t believe I’;ve raised such GREAT kids.

-Father

Looks down at the kids, and shoos them away.

-Sin

We’re sorry mom. We’ll fix this, we promise!

-Karma

Yea mom, don’t worry! And we’re sorry that we didn’t watch our brother and sister well!

-Fate and Grimm

…

-Sin

To fix it though, can we just kill the counter force? Like what Father normally does?

-Mother

No, I won’t let him. The counter force has already found a body and a new race is being born now. It’s fine if he was there in the beginning to cancel it out, but it’s too late now! I won’t let you kill off a species that hasn’t shown whether it won’t become a part of the natural planet! I love all life. Unless all life is threatened, then I won’t let you step-in.

-Karma

But-

-Mother

No buts! We’ll give both sides a fair chance! It’s the least you can do to make-up for what you’ve all done. Besides, the new species is unique and doesn’t seem to be completely evil as it has been in the past. Something is different this time. SO NO!

-Father

Grimaces.