Mana was awake, holding on to consciousness by sheer willpower alone. Gairma's lifeless body was still slumped over her chest, but the monster was finally gone.
Fighting through her pain that electrified her body, starting at the gaping hole in her back, she managed to gently move Gairma's body off herself, placing her sister onto the ground beside her. She sniffled quietly as she fought back her tears attempting to be as quiet as possible to prevent the creature from hearing her and exposing her to the same fate as her sister.
She sat up slowly, her tank top heavy from saturation, before balancing herself into a sitting position. She glanced at her sister from the corner of her eye, holding her breath for a second, hoping to see Gairma take a sudden gasping breath as she came back to life; but to no avail. Mana began to sob.
She wasn't dumb, but she didn't want to accept it. Gairma was dead. Her heart was turning white as it drained itself slowly, and her body was already cold, the blood having emptied completely.
Her heart...
Mana knew what needed to be done; you didn't need to be a guild member to know. Gairma was killed by a rotted human, she was infected, and now she can turn. She began to cry uncontrollably at the thought of having to destroy her own sister's heart; it was something she never thought she would have to do.
She knew leaving the city was going to be dangerous, but Gairma was so happy...
The image of her sister's smiling face flashed in her mind, and she smiled back as if she was seeing her again; alive and well. Mana began to cough loudly, spraying blood over her legs as she did so, reminding her that she was still dying.
She quickly looked around to try and find something to use as a weapon, but the only knife that she had was still with the creature. There weren't any rocks on the ground or fallen branches or sticks; the only thing that littered the ground was still just the leaves.
She had no choice...
Unable to move her legs, she twisted her torso around in such a way in order to move herself onto her belly, before beginning to drag herself towards the heart of her sister. The red-painted leaves around her started to crunch underneath the weight of her lower half as she slid over them, fighting through the pain that radiated throughout every inch of herself.
"I'm sorry this happened to you, Gairma," she said, talking to her dead sister through her tears as she tried every way she could think of to keep herself awake.
She extended one of her arms towards the heart, barely being able to touch it with her fingertips. She sighed, groaning as she once more started to drag herself a few more inches forward until she could grasp it fully.
The feel of her sister's heart was both relieving and gut-wrenching. She was not about to let her own sister become rotted, but she knew what she was about to be forced to do.
She placed the heart close to her body before bending her arm and raising it up as far as it could go, then bringing it back down hastily, smashing her elbow into the white heart, destroying it. Mana let out a sigh of painful relief as the tears continued to flow down her bloodied cheeks, her face hitting the ground as her wails echoed throughout the forest.
Suddenly, the ground her face was resting on began to almost boil, as it bubbled rapidly. She quickly boosted herself away from it, rolling onto her back, sending a shockwave through her spine. She turned her head to look at the ground and saw her sister's smashed heart begin to bubble along with it, before bursting with a loud pop and dissolving into the ground revealing 2 small, shiny objects.
Confused, she used the last bit of her strength and rolled back over, back to her previous position.
In the place of her sister's heart was a pair of silver, brass knuckles, each containing sharp, razor-like spikes on each knuckle. She scrunched her eyebrows together, hesitantly grabbing one of them.
As her fingers grazed the metal, a sudden, thick burst of beaming, white light blasted though the treetops onto her, causing her to squint to shield her eyes from the brightness.
As the light bathed her, her pain began to dissipate, and she felt her strength begin to return. The hole in her back closed, though her clothes remained soaked. Mana grabbed the second brass knuckle before equipping both, a jolt of power immediately electrifying her body.
"What is this?" Mana asked aloud as she stood up, completely healed from her near-fatal injuries. She twisted her arm behind her back, touching it with her hand trying to feel for her wound, but to her amazement, there wasn't even a scratch.
She looked at the weapons that sat upon her hands, before a box popped up above them. She never had a weapon before, so she didn't know how stat mode worked on them.
Name: The Withered Lotus
Level: 5
Tier: Mytho
Mytho? She asked herself. She had never seen a tier like that before.
Mana turned back around to where her sister still lay motionless. Whatever the light was that healed her, it didn't do the same to Gairma; she was never going to come back. She ran over to her as fast as she could before collapsing next to her.
"I'm so sorry, Gairma," Mana said aloud, as she pleaded for forgiveness, grabbing one of her sister's hands in both of hers and bringing it up to her forehead as she dropped her head down in sorrow.
As she sobbed alone, she started to hear shuffling quickly approach from the direction of the wall, leaves crunching loudly as the movements got closer.
She stood up, her vision blurry from crying, but she raised her arms in front of her towards the direction it was coming from. She didn't know how to fight in the slightest, but she refused to go down without some form of it.
She was a statue, barely breathing as she listened carefully.
"Over here!" she heard a faint, male voice yell out.
Humans. Mana was relieved, and she relaxed her arms, waiting for them to show up.
A group of guardsmen appeared, armed and ready as a couple branched off and immediately gathered Gairma's body before heading back towards the city, while the rest quickly approached Mana.
"What happened here?" A tall, burly guardsman with a thick, black beard asked her in a deep, stern voice.
"Neya Suki is back," Mana told him, her face cold.
She was no longer the Mana that had left the city only a few hours before. She was now a warrior, and she was going to rid Valowre of Rot using her own two hands.
She didn't want this pain to be felt by anyone else.