"I can't feel my lungs." Steven groaned, leaning his back against the cave wall while breathing heavily.
Steven and I were both utterly exhausted from running at full speed for the past thirty minutes. On the other hand, the girl who ran in front of us was just fine. If anything, she didn't even look like she broke a sweat. Just how much stamina does this girl have? Actually, that was the least of my concerns right now.
I took a deep breath and walked over to the girl who was standing near the entrance to the cave which was hidden by a waterfall. The girl turned her head towards me and looked me in the eyes. Just like her hair, her eyes were a bright pink.
"Is there something you want to say?" The girl asked, raising one of her eyebrows.
"A lot, actually. Like what were those monsters and what exactly is a young girl such as yourself doing in such dangerous parts?" I answered.
The girl didn't respond. Instead, she just returned her attention to the waterfall. I looked over to see what the problem was and noticed she had a scared look on her face.
"I'm not…" The girl bit her lip and went silent again.
"You're not what?" Steven asked, finally catching his breath and walking towards us.
I looked back over at the girl and saw she still had that same scared expression on her face. Steven and I both realized that it was probably for the best that we stopped questioning her and turned our heads away with apologetic looks on our faces.
"I'm not… I'm not a human." The girl said weakly.
My eyes widened for a moment and I turned my head back towards the girl, "what do you mean you're not a human?"
The girl took a deep breath and closed her eyes. After a couple seconds of waiting, bright flowers began to grow out from her hair. All of the flowers had fully bloomed after another couple of seconds had passed.
"That looks more like magic if you ask me." Steven said, giving the girl a confused look.
"I was created by the monster who placed a curse on this island. Though unlike the beasts you saw earlier, I am without malice towards humans. By all means, I am a failure in my creator's eyes." The girl said, looking downward.
"Do you want to hate humans?" I asked.
The girl looked over at me with a saddened look in her eyes, "of course I don't. In the years of my existence, I have grown fond of humans and wish nothing but happiness for them."
"Then in what way are you a failure? I mean come on, you were created with the power to feel emotions! How cool is that?" I looked over at Steven and saw that he also agreed with me.
"B-but I was made to hate humans. I failed at what I was created to do!" The girl shouted, small tears were building up in her eyes.
"Who cares what you were made for? What do you want to do?"
The girl went silent and rubbed the tears from her eyes. She stayed that way for a bit while Steven and I waited there patiently. She made one final sniffle and turned towards us with a confident look in her eyes.
"I want to stop the monster who placed the curse against the residents of these islands! I can't do this on my own so will you please help me?" The girl shouted.
Steven and I smiled at each other before smiling at the girl's response.
"Right on. If we're going to help you, we'll need to find my friends who have been scattered all around these islands. Okay, uh…" I stopped for a moment because I realized I hadn't learned her name.
The girl let out a soft giggle, "Bea."
"Pleasure to meet you, Bea." I said, extending my arm out to shake her hand.
Bea grabbed onto my hand and shook it with a wide grin plastered on her face.
"Your friends may have ended up on the mainland so if we want to meet up with them we'll have to remove all the monster lairs surrounding the small village that guards the only bridge that connects this island to the mainland." Bea explained.
"Wait, this isn't the mainland?"