Liv tore through the streets, clutching her stolen bagel. Behind her, guards shouted, pushing their way through the crowd. Liv's eyes noted the magic passing through the bodies of guards wearing enchanted armor, hiding behind a wall ready to ambush her. Quickly, she jumped onto a barrel, and from it, a stall. Liv sized up the next jump, to a rooftop. She nodded to herself, jumping. Liv landed, getting up and running once more.

  Soon Liv was confident that she'd lost her pursuers and sat down, scarfing down the stolen bagel. Another successful heist. Her breathing heavy, Liv sat looking at the sky, waiting for energy to return to her limbs. How long would she have to steal to feed herself?

  She sighed, finally deciding to get up. Liv looked at the sun. Nightfall would come soon. She looked towards her hideout, activating her magical sight once more. Liv jumped down from the building, building herself up to a jog towards the edge of town. On the way, she passed many people, all of whom turned away from her after taking a single look at her ragged clothes. Liv was perhaps the only urchin who continued to survive in this town. The rest of them had been taken away by the guards to whatever hell they decided to put them in, and by whatever miracle, Liv had survived.

  Quickly, Liv made her way back to the hideout she had established. An abandoned house at the outskirts of town. It used to be where she had lived with her parents, but now it was just somewhere she slept. One day, her parents had left, as they usually did, but this time they had not returned. Liv still didn't know what happened to them, but she knew the knowledge of their whereabouts and what they were doing would come to her, in time. Liv stood, walking over to her bed, which used to be her parents'. Liv's bed was now too small for her, and she had sold it for a few days of being able to buy food. Liv pulled out her only entertainment, the many books her parents had kept. She pulled out her favorite one, opening it to the first page and starting to read.

  Liv lost herself in the tale of the magnificent cultivator who had destroyed evil warlords and saved the world multiple times. When she finally died, Liv felt a pang in her heart, for someone so good to the world to have died to another evildoer trying to build up their reputation and hurt more people. Liv put the book away, looking out the window. Almost midnight. Time to sleep.

  Liv jumped into her parents' bed, trying to suppress the memories, as usual. They came anyways. Overwhelmed, she grabbed them, throwing them into a dark corner of her mind. They could wait. Silently, Liv lay on the bed, trying to sleep. Soon, she stirred. "This isn't working," Liv muttered, looking at the tiny white rune on the floor.

  Suddenly, Liv's head snapped up and she scrambled away from the glowing rune, which flowed towards her. "Don't be afraid," an unmistakeable voice said from the rune.

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  "We may be dead now, but this is our final message to you. Listen," another voice said.

  Liv, still fearing the rune, said out loud, "Mom? Dad?"

  "This is a prerecorded message, child. So, you know about cultivators, right? Well, here, you have a choice. The same choice we made when we were your age. Live a normal life, or cultivate. I know what your answer's going to be, but listen. If you live a normal life, you get to live peacefully, for however long your mortal lifeforce lasts. No one will attack you, attempt to kill you, try to steal your stuff. However, if you start cultivating, as we did..."

  "Honey, let me take over, " Another voice said from the rune. " Hey, Liv, cultivation is really dangerous. The protection we put on you will stop working if you do so, and you'll have to really work hard to break through into certain stages. However, you get to help people. You get to see the world. You get to, as I call it, play with magic. There is someone hunting you, Liv. The person who killed us. They will not stop until they get you. Living a normal life, you won't ever be found. Liv, do you know why they want you? As a child, do you remember what you did with spirits?"

  Liv thought back to her past. She vaguely remembered playing with any spirits she found outside.

  "Liv, you became friends with spirits. No one does that. If you cultivate, you have two choices. Fail, or be the best. I hope you choose the right one."

  Her dad chimed in one more time. "If you choose to cultivate... be careful. The world will be after you. As soon as you make that decision, you have to move, as your position will be revealed. Our Truth will break, and you will be left unprotected." Nodding into her face, her dad turned away, walking out of the picture.

  The rune slowly faded out. Liv ran for it, trying to pick it up as the memories fell out of the corner. Images of her playing with spirits, her parents watching over her, flooded her mind as her parents gave her their final words. "Goodbye, Liv," they said, her father deigning to use her name this time. The rune dissipated as Liv managed to keep the bulk of her memories from flooding in. Her parents had left her no knowledge on how to cultivate. However, cultivation involved spirits, which meant... she would have to let her memories back in.

  Liv sat on the bed and covered her eyes. Then, she let go. Images of spirits flooded in, and she looked carefully at them all, trying to remember the feeling, how it was to speak to and be friends with spirits. Soon, she gave up. The feeling wasn't one that she could artificially make. It would come in time. For now, Liv would follow her memories of spirits and simply speak, or Whisper, to them. Liv let out a soft chuckle, butterflies rising in her stomach. She activated her magic sight, lines of power filling the world. Liv added one of her own, instinctively attuning it to wind. "come."

  A green spirit cautiously wandered over to it, and she Whispered again, this time using a Named Whisper she had read about in her books. "Wind Blade."

  The spirit formed a curved, cutting edge of wind, and Liv directed it towards a tree outside. Immediately, all her energy was depleted as it filled the template made by the spirit, a curved blade of wind she could only sense flying towards the tree. Silently, it sliced through, cutting the tree down. Liv felt more energy start to pool inside her. She was now a Whisperer.