The words said of deities were fake.
Gods were only creatures more magnitudinous than humans, and with their bigger size came bigger sins.
They listened to no one. Praying to them served only a mockery on your part. Every tear, every hopeful wish was like food they consumed to feed their egos. Why would they chain themselves to you and obey your beck and call like a servant? A powerful being such as a god kneeling to a mere human?
They moved only according to their own greed. Make no mistake; they never complied unless it was to their benefit. They obeyed no one, but should their sights ever be set on you, you obeyed.
When the earth was coated in blood as thick as its oceans, the crimson ink did not stand out much against the cloth of a young maiden's dress. Her silhouette was a dark onyx stain against the vibrant hue of a monstrous flame that engulfed the trees and invaded the formerly midnight sky. Strands of hair blew silently in the wind as a tired breath left between her cracked and blistered lips.
Her hand trembled, fingers losing strength and curling into their palm, before she collapsed onto her knees. The stench of burning flesh filled the night air, and numbly, Azar acknowledged that she was the cause of it.
She had killed them. A dozen, lifeless bodies scattered the area, igniting the fire as their skin melted into pearly bones.
Her face hit the ground with unfocused eyes.
The first thought that crossed her mind was that she was exhausted.
She had once wondered if death would be cold and cruel, unforgiving and dark. But she had been wrong. With the heat of the fire warming the side of her face, she believed this was the comfort that she had lacked for long.
The world which had always been too loud and demanding, slowly went mute, and the sadness buried in her heart, like an angry claw gripping tightly, finally untwined one coil at a time.
Losing strength in her frail body, her heavy eyelids finally sought rest.
"... Are you leaving without regrets?" a voice suddenly called out. She faintly felt pressure from her wrist as if someone was pulling her back.
After all this time, the weight of living finally caught up, and once it hit her, it did it with force. The sorrows she had, the hardships, the good times and bad times, the memories of a distant past, and the nightmares of a brief yesterday… Azar could feel the weight of it all sitting on top of her back like a throne.
But the most important part, as the girl looked back, was that she had released those burdens a long time ago. Yes, it had been hard, but the emotions were not strong enough to chain her to this wretched world any longer.
Though Azar's physical vessel didn't move, somewhere on the road to the afterlife, she shook her head slightly and replied back, "I am content with moving on."
The girl looked around to figure out where she was or where the voice was from, but her vision only met emptiness. It was neither black nor white. Words could not describe the dimension of nothingness.
"Won't you go on?" it asked.
"What is left for me here?"
"Then, if I questioned why you were living for this long..?"
"I would respond that I only lived because I had not died."
Her life could be described as if she was afloat a wooden, row boat in the middle of a small pond. The surface, which showed the reflection she hated so much, chased her no matter how she ran. If she tried to push the oar, the tides pulled her back. Jumping off and swimming toward the shore proved useless, since the seaweed would wrap around her ankles and throw her on board.
Despite her hardest efforts, she moved nowhere.
The land which seemed within her grasp was so close, yet she couldn't reach it.
Even if Azar returned back to life, she was only returning to endlessly gazing at something that wasn't written in her fate.
"Perhaps I did not notice it then, but my heart is worn from failing to arrive at land too many times." She had not meant to speak out these words…yet it seemed that those who were dying often found themselves with a lot left to say.
"Is your regret… never having arrived at land?"
She hummed quietly, "I suppose so."
The voice was silent for a moment before it hesitantly continued, "Then if I promised you would reach it this time, would you try again?"
Try again?
She shook her head once more. "I don't even know what the shore holds anymore."
"Tell me."
"... Tell you what?"
"Tell me what is on your mind."
It felt like she had narrowly missed her destiny-- as if she had brushed fingers but did not grasp the hands of fate that pulled everyone else with it. It left her behind, abandoned and lost.
Wasn't it fickle? Every smallest of touches mattered. Life was a tightrope and if you stepped even a fraction too far to one side, you would tumble.
Azar tumbled indeed.
Ahh, she did not want to think about these things in her final moments. Again, she needed to remind herself that she had already let go of these things so there was no reason to dig them up again.
Azar squeezed her eyes shut tightly. Her own voice was small, begging, "Please leave me alone."
Yet the god, who had not answered when she desperately called, finally looked at her when she no longer wanted its attention. When she suffered most and her heart felt like it was being stabbed, the gods did not speak out to her like this. Only when she hoped for solitude did it want to play.
That was why the deities were cruel.
As her tethered vessel was embraced- her wounds healing from the skin of her body, coarse hair turning silk, calluses smoothened, strength reverted- Azar wondered if this deity was bored. Why was he bringing her back to life despite her pleas? Maybe he wanted to watch her suffer once more..?
—
Dear God,
It's me again.
I am here to ask why I was made weak. After all, I am Azar A Sanguine, a royal princess of this kingdom. The blood within my veins flows power unlike any commoner.
And yet…
In midst of a panic, there was a faint sensation of warmth flowing down the side of her face. Though unbeknownst to her, the young girl's sharp nails had torn the flesh above her ears while tightly clenching them shut. She wanted nothing more than silence. She wished it would all end already.
Shivering from the tips of her toes to the very top strand of hair, Azar was cowered at the waist with wide, open eyes. Her breaths- she thought- she couldn't breathe.
She tried, but the faster she greedily engulfed air, the sharper her inhales became. She couldn't breathe.
"Azar!" The girl's sister, second princess of the kingdom, Lilith, gripped her shoulders when she finally noticed her among the commotion.
The older of the pair threw a sharp glance.
"Stop!" she ordered, and with that single command, the room fell quiet.
The fight between princesses came to a slow end as all attention drifted to the hunched-over Azar.
She had always been this way since she was a mere child.
The Rose Garden palace held true to its name; akin to a stroll in the park where only the most beautiful flowers decorated wherever you turned, the palace was filled by the kingdom's finest jewels.
The king, though reigning for several decades, had always failed to produce a male heir. Having changed from woman to woman, it was easy to conclude that the fault lay with the king himself. It was just not within his fate to birth a son. However, for what he was lacking, he made up in equal amount quantity and quality: 21 beautiful and highly skilled princesses lived within the palace.
What else was true about the princesses though was the precious word "jewel" that described them-- only decorative pieces that the kingdom adorned and marveled at. Should they ever want to advance from that title, it was important to understand that in society, there was a line they could not cross, and that line, of course, was the one separating them from their rights to the throne.
Azar A Sanguine was His Majesty's 15th princess.
She lived as proof that inherited power meant nothing if a person's natural demeanor was weak.
Quiet, easy to push over, and eager to please, insecure, and naive… such an existence was overlookable.
God had sent her back to this type of life.