"Increase it?" Aletha repeated with a raised eyebrow. "What do you mean by increasing it?"
Beneath the warm glare of the brimming daylight, Ubel, Alai, and the girl gathered around to celebrate their victory against Nealon. Though the encounter may have been unexpected, they managed to defeat and fend off the foes with just their power alone.
Hearing Aletha's question made Alai giggle for some reason.
With her round ruby eyes shining brightly, and her raised prominent cheekbones, Alai answered while taking a deep breath, recovering from the battle.
"Haha. No, What I mean by increasing your strength is by training you more." She revealed as Ubel's glare traveled over the green hills. "After all, this is just your first phase of your training, right? You wanna' get stronger?"
"Right." Aletha said with a soft smile and an agreeable nod.
Upon their agreement, Aletha and Alai decided to thank the girl for healing all of them.
"Thank you so much for assisting us." Alai said as her red hair fluctuated vibrantly. "If it wasn't for you, who knows where we would have ended up."
"Oh?" The little girl said as her soft chin rested against the soft bristles of the grass. "The name is Shaffia. No worries! I deeply respect everyone in Linuxinia. I can't afford to see frowns in this land."
As the gentle breeze blew against her soft robe, Shaffia hurriedly pushed herself up and turned to an ever-green tree. It stood tall and proud in the hill, dwarfing the others with its sleek emerald shining leaves. A beautiful blue bird fell from the branch, touching the ground softly as it chirped.
Her eyes sparkled in awe as she watched it follow an earthworm, before snatching it with its beak. While Shaffia and Alai watch the beautiful wonders of nature, Dina slowly tip-toed over to Aletha sneakily before…
"BOO!" She screamed.
In reaction, Aletha immediately yelped and jerked her head back. Dina laughed it off and slapped her knee, watching as her attempt came into fruition.
"Did I scare ya?"
Scratching her head, Aletha's face turned red in frustration, pinching her lips together as Dina continued to laugh her pants off. Ubel, Alai, and Shaffia immediately had their attention captured by the event, walking up to her and wondering what was going on.
Yet, even despite the situation they occurred in, Dina still found a way to pull-up jokes as if what they had experienced was just some "normal, every-day thing." Matter-in-fact, Aletha found it offensive for Dina to do such a thing. And so, in reaction, she bursted up with rage.
"Grrr. What was the purpose of doing that?!" She screamed as her heart rate continued to increase. "Do you know what we experienced?!"
As Dina's laughs began to die down, the girl nodded with a smug look on her face.
"Yeah. Duh."
"THEN WHAT WAS THE PURPOSE OF DOING THAT?!" Aletha screamed, her voice growing higher and stronger each second.
"Hey hey, settle down!" Ubel requested as he stepped into the situation. "There is no need for a fight. We have just defeated an enemy from Wraileza."
"Yeah…" Alai added, slowly lowering her expression to a disbelieved frown. "Look, I know I'm all in it for fun and games. But this is just foul, ya' know? No one needs to be scared after almost dying! It's not right. It's actually pretty rude."
Now hearing the words from Alai's mouth, Dina softened her features, and drew her eyebrows together. She felt the weight of a thousand glares dagger through her soul. In response, she gulped down a breath of fear and made a clenched half-smile on her face.
"I… understand." She said with a trembling, pitiful voice. "I'm sorry for doing that."
. . .
After an awkward pause broke in-between the moment, Ubel snapped his fingers and stepped forward, announcing to all of them.
"Alright, now that situation is settled over with. Alai, should we return back to your garden and try to recover? Or should we start the next phase of Aletha's training?"
While they started to take their departure from Gushy Geysers; peacefully walking through the forest with Shuffia, Alai answered with a comment of rare and delightful flavor.
"I say, we should proceed with Aletha's training!" She answered as all the group's faces turned over to her. "Now that we know she has a lot more strength, and fired up from the fight; let's go to the training range on the shores of Linuxinia?"
"Are you sure…?" Ubel said with an uncertain squint. "I think our lady Aletha had done enough for the day."
"You think so?" Dina added as she crossed her arms. "All I saw her do was throw some punches and fight some bad guys. Don't know if that's enough to balance it out."
After they came into thought of what they chose to do next, all of them came to the decision that they should resume Aletha's training.
However, as they began their hike across a dirt trail into the wilderness and winding hills leading over to the training course Alai mentioned, Aletha started to feel dizzy. Her eyes involuntarily drifted shut. Her body swayed side to side, with her hands hanging limply. Ubel, Shuffia, and Dina didn't catch on to the problem; however, Alai was aware.
Turning her head and concerned about Aletha's state, she asked her while the others continued walking.
"Aletha, are you okay? You don't look too… well."
As her head began to droop and wobble, Aletha answered with a subdued voice.
"I'm… I'm…I'm… f…" Just before Aletha could finish her sentence, she suddenly collapsed onto the ground, losing all consciousness without warning. In reaction, Alai quickly snapped her fingers and hollered at the three ahead, saying.
"Hey! Stop!" She screamed at them as she bent over to Aletha's unconscious body. "Aletha fainted!"
Her scream quickly grabbed the attention of Ubel and Shuffia. They dashed over to Alai and Aletha, showing looks of concern on both their faces.
"What happened?!"
Alai's eyes trembled back and forth, shaking her head, clueless.
"I… I don't know. She just… collapsed."
"Then we better get her to safety." Shuffia added as she tilted over to the direction of an opening in the forest. "Although I may not know what happened, I am positive that this condition is severe. We need to bring her to Linuxinia hospital."
"And where is that?" Ubel added as Dina came over, shocked and amused at Aletha's sudden collapse.
"Linuxinia City." Shuffia replied as her eyes anchored over to Alai and Ubel. "If you want to save this girl's life, you have to escort her over to Linuxinia Hospital. From there, the doctors would take care of her."
"And just how would we bring her there?" Alai replied, crossing her arms.
As a silent wind passed through their faces, Shuffia released her hand from Aletha's cold pale arm and answered with a point.
"You three can either carry her all the way toward Linuxinia City. Or… you can carry over to a nearby village not too far from here, and I can call a horse carriage for you to ride in."
"For a young one yourself, you seem very wise." Alai added as she grabbed Aletha's arm off from the ground.
"Indeed. You should tell that to my parents." Shuffia replied with a soft smile. As Ubel and Alai co-operated together, carrying Aletha with their remaining strength, the little girl informed them as they carried the fainted body over to the direction of a village atop a tiny stream.
"Also. Don't worry if you can't pay for the hospital visit." Shuffia said with a serious look on her face.
"I'll pay for it."
With her consciousness slipping away, there was one memory that flashed in her mind before her vision went entirely dark.
:/// Aletha, have you always had this strength?://:/
. . .
Memories.
Blurry memories.
Though her consciousness may be gone, Aletha's mind flashed with a smorgasbord of blurry recollections in her mind.
A sword.
White hair.
Magenta eyes.
A stone castle floating in the clouds.
Sprinting.
Running.
Training.
These were the things that she could really point out from the discernible memories. Although blurry, Aletha can recognize one face within that compilation of recollections.
://"Asahi."://
* * * * * * *
"Don't worry. She will be fine." A humble, low-pitched voice answered from beyond the dark void before Aletha. "She just had a case of severe exhaustion. Give her a day and all her symptoms shall be recovered."
Aletha opened her half-lidded eyes to a humble nursing room with a window at the side. The sun's rays pierced through the glass and entered the room, shining on the curtains that surrounded her body. Surprisingly, the room was quiet; only her relaxed breathing accompanying her ears.
A soft and cushion-like surface supported her back softly. Her bare beet angled out, fingers lacing around her body, stretching and rolling her neck.
(Where am I?)
As her vision cleared up, Aletha noticed that she was laying on a soft white bed inside what seemed to be a singular infirmary room. The window curtains flew and fluctuated with the soft wind, flowing rapidly with hypnotizing patterns. When she slowly moved her head, she noticed a lantern hanging and hoisted above not too far from her head, rugs beneath the two stools of the bed, and cabinets and shelves filled with books and potion bottles all around.
Taking an easy smile, she tilted her head up to the ceiling and rested her head against a soft pillow, whispering.
"So… I passed out. Sigh, silly me." Aletha said as she turned her head slowly to the window.
Behind the barrier of glass was a beautiful panorama of a wooden urban forest of buildings. From one corner to the other, structures stretched high and low with paving roads winding about narrow pathways and aisles. Horse carriages bustled around, ships docked at a bay nearby. A wall of tall lush green mountains surrounded half the city, with waterfalls falling down peacefully and delighting the flora below. People roamed around and conversed along the city, while Aletha laid in her hospital room at the highest point of the hospital.
Her eyes broadened in realization as she lifted her head up from the bed.
"Wait?! Am I in Linuxinia City?!"
Suddenly, the door to her left creaked open, revealing a beautiful woman with gray hair and green eyes, wearing a thin white coat and a stethoscope around her neck. She held a clipboard in her hand, and carried a soft welcoming smile as she stepped into the room, replying to Aletha with a soothing voice.
"Yes you are. You're in the highest room in Linuxinia Hospital." As she slowly planted her bottom on a chair next to Aletha's bed, the doctor slowly grabbed her stethoscope and asked.
"Will you please move your chest? I need to detect your heart rate."
Without resistance, Aletha slowly nodded her head and lifted them slowly. The doctor slowly placed the stethoscope at the side of her chest and neared her ear closer to Aletha's neck. After a few seconds, she slowly reeled back from the bed and nodded her head.
" Heart rate is normal." She said humbly while slowly lifting the blankets over Aletha. "Health is fine. You should be back in working condition, patient."
Although she felt uncomfortable from the gadget that was placed on her body, Aletha decided it was best not to question it. After all, she had never truly experienced what it was like to be in a hospital, let alone knowing that this exists in her world.
"So, why am I here?" Aletha asked kindly as she lowered her head back on the pillow.
"You're here because a few people going by the name of Ubel, Dina, Shuffia, and Alai escorted you to Linuxinia hospital." The doctor replied as she fiddled with her notes on the desk far at the other side of the room. "They said that you collapsed on the ground and asked for assistance. Luckily for you though, all you had just experienced was severe weakness."
As the woman grabbed a pencil and began writing down things on the pile of papers near her, the doctor continued as Aletha sat up curiously, feeling the sunshine rain down on her.
"The conditions that we have discovered in you include severe dehydration, malnutrition, and pure exhaustion." The doctor said as she turned her head over to Aletha. "I strongly suggest that you consume foods and engage in water intake daily. It is unhealthy for any human to refuse to do that."
"But… I'm not a human." Aletha replied as she scratched her head. "I'm a goddess."
"A goddess…?" The doctor replied with a raised eyebrow. "I suppose delusional thinking has also been linked to your severe exhaustion."
"No. I'm serious." Aletha answered as she lifted herself up from the bed. "I'm a goddess. A member of the Adtraic Family. Aletha Adtraic."
Rubbing her chin, the doctor scratched the back of her head, figuring out why she had familiarity within the name. That's when immediately her formal tone disappeared, leading the doctor to shout aloud.
"ALETHA ADTRAIC?!" She exclaimed, alerting the other doctors in the hospital. "No. I-I thought you're a myth. I have read books about you when I was little."
"Really, they have books about me?" Aletha mumbled with her round eyes.
The doctor hastily nodded and approached her, her eyes sparkling in awe as Aletha's long straight white hair captured her attention.
"Yes. Many books actually. Not just you, but your family." She replied with queasy breaths. "When I was still in school, I had to read five books about the origin and write a summary for each one. I had always thought those folk-lores were myths, legends. B-But it turns out…"
The doctor wriggled her eyebrows in shock and disbelief, pushing her chair and tossing her notebook to the side.
"I'm treating an actual goddess! N-Nice to meet you. My name is Dr. Talia. A pleasure to meet you!"
"A pleasure to meet you too!" Aletha replied with grinning eyes.
As the intensity of the moment ceased, Aletha scratched her chin and asked Dr. Talia.
"Um, Dr. Talia. Do you know where Ubel, Dina, and Alai are?"
Without resistance, Dr. Talia pushed herself up from the chair and replied with an enthusiastic tone, forgetting her formality.
"Why yes! They are all in the waiting room!"
"Hey, Dr. Talia. Can you keep it down there?" Said a distant, low-pitched masculine voice. "We have an ill patient in the other room."
Immediately, Dr. Talia covered her mouth and gulped down a breath of realization, keeping herself not to be fixated on the goddess that is on her bed right this instant.
"Yes. Doctor Andrew. I apologize."
However, as she kept her mouth sealed shut, Dr. Talia couldn't help but mumble in her mind.
("I can't believe it. I have an actual goddess in my hospital room now! I MUST be dreaming!")
. . .
When the doctor had left the room, Aletha stared into space for five minutes, waiting for her friends to arrive in her room.
Along this brief idleness, she wondered what had happened to her brother and the quest that she was forcefully removed from a literal train crash. She twiddled her thumbs and turned to the window, watching as her world came into motion. Her gaze caught animals roaming around, carriages bearing purple stripes rolled up and across streets around the cities.
She stood out from her bed and opened her mind to the lines of people walking along the sidewalks, the ships that repeatedly moved back and forth, and the sun shining brightly across the azure horizon.
Compared to the tame wilderness beyond Linuxinia City, she preferred…
(I like the activeness of this city more than the tranquility of those forests I saw back there.) Aletha thought in her head as she gazed at the panorama. (There's so much to do here compared to outside. Hopefully, I can get out of this room soon.)
Thereafter her thoughts, the door to the room creaked open once again revealing Doctor Talia. However, instead of approaching the room alone, an unfamiliar face stood at the side of her, keeping their piercing gaze directly at Aletha before masking it with a lying smile.
He had brandy obsidian eyes, pale ivory skin with a high forehead, and a lanky figure. As the unfamiliar man approached the room, Doctor Talia informed Aletha with a formal tone.
"Patient, a visitor wants to speak with you." Doctor Talia said as she slowly stepped back to the door.
"Visitor?" Aletha mumbled with a raised eyebrow. "I don't remember having a visitor. This isn't Dina, Ubel, or Alai…"
However, before the Doctor could hear Aletha, the door was slammed shut, leaving Aletha and the unfamiliar man alone in one room.
. . .
An intimidating atmosphere brewed inside the hospital room. Aletha kept her eyes forward at the unfamiliar man, pointing out his every feature. From his chiseled, beard-filled chin, to his wobbly and fierce eyebrows, Aletha detected that nothing of the man was friendly. The sounds of outside filled the silence in-between the pauses in their breaths, waiting for anyone to speak.
The man took a deep sigh and raised his body high, slowly approaching Aletha's bed.
"You're correct. You don't have a visitor." He said with his formal, deep voice. "You are in extreme debt. And I'm here to collect it."
"Debt?!" Aletha screamed confusingly, eyes widening in confusion.
As the strange man sat on the chair, leaning his body attentively, and caging his fingers; he took a deep chuckle and answered Aletha with a question.
"I suppose you remember boarding the winged train a few days ago. Correct?"
In return, Aletha answered the man, nodding with a tight expression to show her skepticism at the stranger.
"Y-Yeah. I was with a group and we were supposed to ride the train." Aletha asked with a trembling voice, scratching her head. "B… But we experienced a crash."
Pausing in-between, the man slowly lifted himself up and hovered his intimidating gaze over Aletha.
"Yes. I know it very well. And I assume that you remember meeting a certain blonde-haired woman within the underground city of Clearstar, right?" The man said with a flare in his eyes. "The one that you sent to prison…?"
Upon the man's words, Aletha's face paled at the terrible recollections.
://: "Alright, take those barrels off that whiny, foul, and greedy shrew. Let's not kill her before we get our payback."://:?
She remembered how her body was almost crushed by the barrels.
:///: "You know exactly what you did, you repugnant twat! Stop lying with your doll-like face and pay up!":///:
The steel hard-fist she had endured, crimson scattering everywhere. Aletha remembered it as clear as day.
Concurrently, as the memories faded back into reality, Aletha bit her lips and answered with heart trembling in fear.
"Y… Yeah. W-What about her?" She answered with a queasy tone.
"You will be sent to prison as well. Astait's Prison. The worse, and most secure prison in all of the world of Gincad. Claimed rightfully where no prisoner can escape." The man said blatantly as he tilted over to the window. While the wind pushed his brown hair back, his dark eyes leered over to Aletha and continued. "That is, if you don't pay your debt within the deadline."
"Deadline?" Aletha mumbled while reeling her head back against the wall. After she took a pause, she imagined the prison the man mentioned. She thought of it to be a huge stone block of epic proportions, embedded onto an anchored ice berg with several towers overlooking it; covered in the endless drifting snowflakes. As the imagined place faded away, Aletha gulped down a breath of fear, and resumed with slurred speech.
"W…What? What deadline? How much do I have to give you?"
Rubbing his two fingers together, the man fixed his monocle on his eye, stepped forward, and answered with a stern and straight tone.
"You must pay around eight-hundred thousand Gincoins for damages. You have a deadline of around exactly seven days to provide your payment and secure your debt. If you don't pay by that deadline…" The man quickly drew up to full height and made unwavering eye contact with Aletha, expressing his warning with absolute certainty. "... we will hire hitmen to track you down and send you to Astait's Prison. Your sentence-- for life."