Jefferson lay half-conscious in the hospital bed, the rhythmic beeping of the monitors barely registering in his foggy mind. The room was sterile, but within the haze of his pain, memories surfaced, unbidden and vivid, dragging him back to a time when life was simple, yet unknowingly fragile.
Jefferson had been only ten years old, a boy full of curiosity and boundless energy. He lived in the small, idyllic village nestled in the shadow of Mount Celestia. The gods were revered as divine protectors, their names whispered with awe and prayers offered at dawn and dusk.
Jefferson's mother, Lyria, was his entire world. She was a woman of quiet strength and endless warmth, her laughter a balm to any sadness, her hands always busy weaving baskets or tending to their small garden. But that day, the day everything changed, her laughter was absent.
