This was it. I was on the verge of a breakthrough, I was sure of it. Like a word on the tip of my tongue, the gears were so close to clicking and I would finally be able to see. Just a bit more…

“Crimsonnn! Where are you? Come out~!”

I was forcefully snapped back to reality. Part of me tried to pick up the broken pieces of my concentration, but I forced myself to give up, with a heavy heart. It was simply an unavoidable fact that I would not be able to achieve the breakthrough I wanted so desperately right this moment, I told myself. While trying to comfort myself through my disappointment, I leapt off.

“Where are you– Aah! Don’t scare me like that! Where did you even come from!?”

I landed a bit too close to June, who leapt up off the ground in surprise from me virtually appearing out of thin air right in front of her. The truth, which May seemed to put together, was that I leapt off from one of the thick branches of the General, where I had been doing upside down crunches and pull ups from as I processed the information in the books I read. When I pointed to the branch I had been using, after looking puzzled for a second, June seemed to show a look of understanding.

“Haaah, I used to play on him too,” June said, breathing a sigh of reminiscence and resignation. “You didn’t find anything, right?”

Picking up the slate I had left by one of the tree’s roots, I quickly wrote my reply.

They were yours?

June covered her face with her hands. “Ughh, they’re embarassinggg…”

I noticed May gazing at June suspiciously, perhaps maybe a bit curious herself, but that was only for a second before she returned back to her normal state. As May did so, she caught my eyes and spoke.

“What have you been doing here?”

Just some physical training and reading. I also tried exploring a bit.

“Exploring?” The two sisters looked at each other.

I went a little into the woods. I didn’t get far, though, before I ran into some kind of invisible wall.

The two girls looked nervously at each other.

“Oh, yeah, we never really got the chance to tell you about that…” June said sheepishly, a look of guilt on her face. Once again, as June got like this, May quickly spoke up resolutely.

“We’re trapped in here. There’s no way out, since the barrier is completely spherical, with no holes or openings. The both of us have looked pretty hard, so we’re fairly certain about this.”

It was a sudden and unexpected thing to hear, but a part of me kind of appreciated May’s direct and blunt nature. In my opinion, this kind of delivery was the best way to be told bad news. Still, though, once again, I was a bit unsure of how I should respond. June looked a bit lost for words, as well. At some point, though, I gathered the resolve in my heart, and wrote a few words.

I will escape

The two of them were baffled.

I’ll find a way

The two exchanged looks at each other.

“Haha, unfortunately, I don’t think that’s really an option.”

“Wait, Sis. I think it is.”

“But didn’t we agree that it wasn’t?” June stated, the pitch of her voice slightly rising.

“No, Sis. Crimson will do it.”

June glared at her sister, as if she was taken by complete surprise at this sudden betrayal. That was the feeling I got, but I didn’t understand the reasoning behind this reaction.

“Sis… I don’t think you realize just how fast Crimson is learning and improving. As usual, you’re just blind to everything except your own progress.”

June now was doubly taken aback and shocked at her sister’s words. She clearly had things she wanted to say, but glancing at me, she just let out a frustrated Arghh before walking away. This was all so sudden to me. I didn’t understand how, in just a handful of sentences, these two could get so frustrated with each other. I realized there had to have already been tension between the two, but they really did a good job not revealing any of it to me. A couple things were certain, though: my escape was a very touchy topic for the two, and these two were in disagreement about something.

After standing still for a bit, I wrote, now more uncomfortable with being in the dark about things than ever.

May, can you tell me more about the barrier surrounding us?

“...Let’s talk inside.”

Still worried about June and what was going on between her and her sister, I sat down at the table, along with May who sat in what I noticed now to be her usual seat, one by the corner. I had ended up sitting on the side adjacent to her, the two of us on both sides of the corner of the table.

After a short pause, as if thinking about what to say, May opened her mouth.

“I know you must have a lot of questions. The truth is, at this point in time, me and June aren’t sure how to approach this whole situation. June’s tendency is to conceal and hide the truth, and mine is to simply say what needs to be said and get it over with. However, the reason why I don’t just tell you everything right now is, one, I don’t want to hurt my sister’s feelings, and two, certain things I say may cause mental and or physical harm to you. Both of these things I don’t want, thus our uncertainty.”

I sat, processing these things, looking at May to show her I was following.

“One thing I want to tell you more about, though, is the barrier around us.” May paused, gathering her words. “Look, I want you to escape. I-... Just so you know, June and I cannot escape. No matter what. She seems to think that you fall under the same category as us, but I’m fairly certain that is untrue. If you get out, you should be fine.”

“No. If she gets out, you know what’ll happen.”

At some point, June had walked in, her back leaning against a wall, and the two started glaring at each other. I didn’t like the feeling of tense anxiety that had found its way in my stomach. The feeling of powerlessness to do anything about the two in front of me. I hated it. I just wanted the people I liked to get along, like usual.

“Why are you telling her these things? Why are you giving her false hope?

“It’s not false hope. She can find a way. Why are you just pretending it’ll be okay if she stays here?”

“You don’t seem to understand something, May, if she gets out, you know what’ll happen.”

“Oh? What’ll happen?”

“We’ll die, May, that’s what’ll happen!”

May stood up.

“How are you so sure?”

“They know, May, you don’t get it, they know everything, I know it! I’ve seen it already! Why can’t you just let us live this short dream, May? Why do you want to threaten our lives?”

At this, May put on a look of disgust, one that quite frankly scared me. “Stop being delusional, June!”

“What do you mean!? How are you not being delusional, how are we all not being delusional? This, this whole thing is a lie!” June slumped to her knees, at this point crying.

May, seeing this, walked towards June, but not out of aggression. She was concerned. She reached her arms out, as if to comfort her. “It’s okay! Everything’s going to be okay, Sis!”

But as May got closer, June pushed May away, causing her to tumble and fall, and screamed “You’re not my sister!” before getting up and running to the hallway out of sight. The loud noise of a door slamming resounded throughout the house.

If you spot this narrative on Amazon, know that it has been stolen. Report the violation.

Silence. I didn’t try to look at May, or even move a muscle, either. I was scared to see the face she was making. All I knew, though, was that she was very hurt.

At some point, after what truly felt like an eternity, I couldn’t bear it any longer and reached for my slate. But before I got very far, I was interrupted by a very quiet voice.

“Sorry. I’m not in the mood.”

The voice wavered before cutting off suddenly, as if her throat constricting had cut it off, as if she was trying her hardest not to cry. Then, she slowly walked out of the living room, to the hallway as well. It was so silent I could hear her soft footsteps which seemed to disappear as they went up to the second floor.

At some point, after some amount of time had passed by, the stiffness throughout my body all of a sudden let up. My body crumpled as I slouched into a nearby chair. I leaned forward onto the table, my head now resting on its side directly on the surface of the table.

Was I wrong? Was I irresponsible? Could I have avoided this? What should I have done?

No matter how hard my mind worked, no matter how many questions I asked myself, I already knew the answer. The answer was that I had, for my entire life, been absolutely terrible at social situations. I could no longer trust myself, since it always seemed to go south. This was just another time in a long list. I felt terrible. No, these people care for me. Even if they butt heads and are going through some things, they’re not like the others. They genuinely care about me. I comforted myself, telling myself this over and over, as if trying to convince myself of it. Eventually, as if in an attempt to distract my mind off of these cyclical thoughts, I opened a book and started reading.

—

Before I knew it, it was the dead of night. I had been reading the whole time. My mind paid no heed to things like efficiency and structure, it just went on complete autopilot for the past several hours, completely unperturbed. It intentionally lost itself in something, specifically so I didn’t think about certain things. Now, though, with that flow interrupted, the thoughts I had dammed up spilled out into my head.

How should I approach them, tomorrow? What do I say? What do I do? I knew already that I had no answers for these questions. I considered just delving back into my studies, but I decided I would sleep for a bit instead.

As I was on my way to my room, I noticed something. At the end of the hallway was a window, and through that window, I saw a person. Oh, it’s May. I breathed a sigh of relief after seeing that she seemed to be alright, but now, a bit intrigued, I walked over to the window since she seemed to be doing something. As I tried to figure out what she was doing, I began to feel the same sensations as that other time. Except this time, they felt different, in a way that was really hard to describe. This time, however, I felt equipped to try and make guesses as to what she could be doing. Words I read rang out in my mind, as if my mind had shone a flashlight on them, illuminating them for me.

Structures of the same type interact positively with each other, those of other types react negatively… All actions and reactions require energy. This energy is constantly created by all living creatures via their core… Submerge the mind, and resonate. The more one tries, the more difficult it is to sense the imperceivable… When you grasp the fundamentals of reality, your brain will perceive it and recognize it, that which it normally disregards and refuses to see… When you can feel, intimately, the space around you, when you respect and appreciate the truth behind matter, open your eyes, and you shall see…

I opened my eyes. What I saw was so fantastical and otherworldly that, before I even realized it, my jaw had dropped. The things I read suddenly made much more sense now. Structures interwoven create the space between space, akin to further dimensions. That is ether. I saw the space, the ether, around May seemingly ablaze in an inferno, but it was no fire, it was energy. Mana. It supplied energy which she wielded in some strange way I couldn’t grasp to do an array of complicated things which I had little knowledge of. Oh, that group transformed… These were reactions. The combination of various factors that, when all present, resulted in a dynamic change. Various such things flashed through my head, and it was truly enlightening and fascinating seeing the mere words and concepts I read be brought to light before my eyes.

Everything change I saw was mind bogglingly deliberate and precise. Even someone like me, who knew so little, had this unwavering sense that what May was doing was something truly incredible. I had a criminally small vocabulary to explain why, but I sensed it on some deep, fundamental level.

“Isn’t she something?”

The voice behind me would normally cause my heart to jump in shock, but right now, nothing could phase me. My attention was almost entirely devoted to what was in front of me.

“You know, she and I were two of the most promising prodigies ever seen in all of Tyraellia the past twenty years, but you know, it took us both more than 5 years to grasp mana. Granted, we were toddlers when we were selected, and, I mean, it’s pretty hard to explain complicated concepts to toddlers, but, well, the truth is, it only took you a day to grasp it… I feel a bit defeated, haha…”

I didn’t really respond, but June kept talking.

“I’’m… I’m sorry for showing you that scene earlier… I guess I felt like you and May weren’t taking things seriously, but the truth is you two very much are, maybe even more so than me. You two just show it in different ways.”

A bit of time passed. I wanted to talk to June, or at least acknowledge her, but I just couldn’t tear my eyes away from what was before me.

“Oh, pay attention, this is where the real fun starts.”

I did as she told me, not even blinking so as not to miss a single detail, which admittedly was a feat I just couldn’t manage, what with so many things occurring simultaneously. But I still tried, nonetheless, to imprint as much of what I was seeing in my head as I could for later review.

It was extremely sudden. The whole landscape shifted. Literally. The ground rippled like an ocean, and trees were uprooted like toothpicks. But it wasn’t surprising, considering that the ether in the air had grown just as chaotic and violent. Structures and chains violently ripped apart as chaos and destruction ensued. I could feel it, the sheer amount of power behind this surreally fast chain reaction. It was like being in the presence of a large tsunami, as tall as a mountain. In fact, it truly was becoming a tsunami, as the earth shifted in response to particles that seemed to uproot and churn the ground. This literal tsunami radiated out from the house, traveling through the forest which quickly couldn’t even be recognized as a forest. It was hard to see through the dust that was being kicked up, but at some point, an unimaginably loud crashing noise could be heard, as if I was standing right next to a massive waterfall. It continued for a while, before eventually settling down. My heart raced. I was in the presence of things larger than self. Like a speck of dust in a raging river. And somehow, May was entirely unaffected by the mad destruction in front of her, as if the house and the land she was standing on were completely immovable.

“Distortion refers broadly to certain instances of harsh manipulation of any structure. May was creating Voids, or absences, basically creating pockets with no ether whatsoever in certain spots, which serve as a very unique form of disruption, a famously violent kind. At this scale, it’s kind of like trying to create and wield a natural disaster. Protecting yourself from it and actually utilizing this power in a meaningful way are often the hardest parts of utilizing Voids, funnily enough.”

I had many questions but I truly was glued to the surreal scene in front of me, still utterly awestruck.

“Of course, even after all this, there’s really going to be nothing to show for it. The barrier they put up around this place, and around the house too, if you’re curious, is really something. It actually has to do with the Wise General outside. It’s a special tree that emits a very dense Level 4 ether, which powers an array that creates this extremely tough barrier. She and I have tried all sorts of things, but we never got so much as the smallest disruption in its chains. Maybe May thought that she had improved since the last time we tried, but it seems to have done nothing.”

At some point, the pulsing of the vicious waves of energy outside started to die down. May, who seemed out of breath, fell to her knees, panting heavily. June quickly rushed outside the house, and I followed. It was obvious that May was too tired to move much on her own.

When we got outside, there was a strange metallic, chemical like smell that filled the air, forcing me to cover my nose. I had actually read about this byproduct, but I decided to shift my focus back onto the stumbling girl in front of me. When that girl saw us coming out and getting closer, specifically when she saw June, she crossed her arms.

“I don’t need your help.”

June approached anyway, before stopping a few feet away from May.

“Look, I’m… I’m sorry, May.” June looked down, her shoulders and head drooped low. “I said something really mean. I’m sorry…”

May glanced over at June, who she could tell was being sincere. But, she kept her arms crossed, not giving in that easily to the convincing display of remorse in front of her.

“Doesn’t mean you’re going to help me with Crimson, is it? Hmph.”

“No… it, it does. I have lots to say about how we even got here in the first place, but… hah, can you believe it? She was staring the whole time when you were showing off, glued to the window. Isn’t that right?”

I felt a bit embarrassed, but that feeling was immediately replaced by admiration towards May. It was surreal, unimaginable that one person, one person’s small flame could affect things on such a grand level. It was truly awe inspiring.

May, who no doubt saw me with such a look on my face, looked away, as if not wanting to confront the shining beam that was my gaze of adoration. I couldn’t really blame her. Shortly, though, she turned to me and made an inquisitive, almost suspicious face.

“Really? You could see?” she said.

I got out my slate, which I had gotten used to carrying on me, and wrote.

It was amazing

May, seeing my reaction as a whole, didn’t doubt my words.

“Wow. Maybe you really do have a chance… this changes things, doesn’t it, June?”

The look she gave her sister was hopeful, but June reacted abashedly, instead, reacting to something May had said.

“Um, please, um, if you’re fine with it, May… call me Sis. Please.”

May, seeing her apprehensive and downhearted sister, let out a loud, exaggerated sigh, and shook her head side to side.

“You’re really hopeless, aren’t you, Sis?”

June was still hesitant, but she was clearly very happy. May, still stumbling a bit, got up to her feet, walked up close to her sister, and hugged her. I thought I saw moonlight reflecting off of June’s face, but it was none of my business, probably just my imagination. And so, the two hugged. I couldn’t help but smile, relief revitalizing me.

The two, a bit embarrassed by their show of affection, separated and turned to me. It was June who broke the silence.

“It sure has gotten late, hasn’t it? How about tomorrow, recuperate and go at this stupid wall in full force? Let’s call it… Operation Departure!”

“That’s a weird name, Sis.”

“Hey, this is the part where we cheer, not complain!”

“...ooooh.” A very weak cheer left her mouth. I tried lifting a fist in the air, but I was the only one who did that so I quickly put my arm down in shame.

“Uhh, we’ll, uh, work more on that tomorrow, haha…” Despite our laughable and pathetic display of unity, we all were in good spirits. June laughed it off, May teased her sister, and I smiled at the two. Like that, we all went back into the house and retreated into our rooms for the night. Of course, the whole way, I stared out into the sea of trees and earth, still unable to process it. When I eventually stopped and got into bed, I felt unusually happy. The two sisters made up, and I got to witness magic for the first time. My worries had left me. I knew there was some strange reason that compelled me to escape, but I honestly didn’t care. All I cared about was that May and June were doing fine and were happy, and they seemed to be. Content, and with a lot on my mind, I let myself sleep.