With a flash of blinding light Ibaeran found herself in a familiar and yet unexpected place. Spotting familiar cracks on the walls along with a roof littered with open holes, and upon placing her hands on it she felt the delicate foundation upon which the home she spent a large portion of her life living as slave stood on.
Ibaeran then let out a sigh upon spotting something before walking over to the spot eyes were fixed on. And once there it felt as though time itself began to unwind and Ibaeran found herself back, standing in that exact same spot, in the most painful moment. She watched it all as it replayed before her, seeing Preyina at the break of death with her by her side before uttering her final words, a promise which she trying desperately to fulfill, and releasing her last breath.
A small tear then made its way down Ibaeran’s cheeks and all the way down to the ground as she stood on that spot next to that raggedy old bed made of different patches of cloth reliving the most painful part of her life. Ibaeran then took a deep breath before looking at the box on her hand, glowing with a faint green hue. And, upon seeing the box, Ibaeran couldn’t help but feel an overwhelming amount of guilt and shame weigh on her heart, as she stood on the place where the person she loved the most in their entire world had taken her last breath holding something literally pried out of the chest of an innocent living creature akin to ripping its heart out of its chest and living it to die.
Ibaeran, unable to bear weight of the guilt and shame weighing against her heart, decided to shift her gaze away from the sights of death before her to something else. She then spotted a nearby familiar window.
Ibaeran then made her way to the window and upon seeing the sight the laid on the other side of it, she couldn’t help but let out a deep sigh as she spotted the same old tired, sad, and hopeless faces wondering the streets, like living corpses the wondered about seemingly aimless without a hint of life or hope in their eyes. Ibaeran then sighed once more, knowing that there was once a time she shared a similar fate as those down below who are forced to, every single day of their life, to work, doing back breaking, bone cracking, and degrading labor, just to be give morsels just enough to keep them alive till the following day before having to come to repeat the vicious cycle. And they try to disobey, disrespect or irritate their masters in the slightest way possible they risked facing being stripped of whatever little they had of value be it a home or a life.
Ibaeran seeing the streets she once roamed along with her people couldn’t but feel a mix of rage, anger, and disgust, well up from within her, and along with those feelings the power of the Su Baera began to rise from within her. Ibaeran feeling the power of the Su Baera flowing through her wanted nothing more than go out and liberate her people, using the power of Su Baera to fight and free her people from the oppressive reign of the Uha Tamunarans, and for a brief moment she believed that she aided by the power of Su Baera could be enough to finally free her people. Then image of the king flashed in her mind and upon doing so, whatever prospects of freeing and liberating her people vanished and was replaced with a feeling of fear and dread. With flashes of the horrible nightmarish visions she had of seeing the four nations burnt down to ashes along with the people and all by the monster wearing the crown, Ibaeran’s feelings of anger and rage vanished and she choose to calm down, knowing that if she were to fight against the Uha Tamunarans it would most likely lead to destruction of the four nations and her people. But at the very same time, Ibaeran couldn’t help but feel ashamed of as decision as she wondered if it was made purely out of concern of her people or solely out of fear.
Ibaeran then looked at then small box on her hand, before letting out a deep sigh, recalling what she had to do to get the Dumo Stone and even though it wasn’t something wanted or even enjoyed doing, it was the only way she saw to save her people from the Uha Tamunarans without drawing blood or the needless destruction of the four nations at least that’s what she told herself.
Ibaeran then shifted her gaze back to the window, seeing as the people roamed the streets, some of them making their way to do work akin to that of torture others just roamed the streets begging for whatever scraps the others slaves to spare them, having lost everything to the Uha Tamunarans and deemed as worthless in their eyes. Ibaeran then let out a deep sigh turning away from the window, spotting a piece of cloth lying about in the house and using it to cover herself before stepping out of the house.
Ibaeran found herself roaming familiar streets of Ijawana taking in the heavy air of hopelessness and despair that can be felt in each and every breath taking. Ibaeran walked like the rest of the slaves, having long be accustomed to it, with her back bent down low and her face always on the ground seeing the familiar tracks down below. She didn’t really feel as though anything her changed all that much and it felt like all the fights and battles she had fought to gain the power she now possessed had never happened, and suddenly she was back to being just Ibaeran, another slave bound to die serving her Uha Tamunaran masters.
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With each and every step she took, Ibaeran questioned herself as to why she was back there, walking on that same track alongside the other slaves, wondering why the wings brought her there and why didn’t choose to leave but instead chose to walk on that same path along with the other slaves. Ibaeran’s thoughts were abruptly cut short upon hearing the screams and yells of boy being struck down by an Uha Tamunaran. Ibaeran then shifted her gaze to a cave mine not too far away from where she was and spotted a young boy about eleven or twelve years old on the floor in front of the mine’s entrance cover dust and dirt due to him having to work in the mine and before him was Uha Tamunaran with blue skin that shone brightly and almost seemed as though it was glowing underneath the sun and spiky spine like hairs at that top of his head.
“You little piece of trash”, the Uha Tamunaran yelled out while looking down at the boy as bolts of lightning began to flow through his hands.
The boy then looked at the Uha Tamunaran with a look of pure dread and horror in eyes before speaking with a trembling voice, “please sir, have mercy, it was only a…” could not even complete his sentence before he felt jolting pain of hundred of lightning bolts racing through his entire body.
The poor boy screamed and yelled out in pain as lightning continued flowing in to him body like an endless streaming inflicting more and more pain in to his body until he finally collapsed on the floor with his eyes shut. The Uha Tamunaran then went to the collapsed boy, seeing as his body jittering due to the leftover shock of lightning that flowed within him. The Uha Tamunaran then began to search the boy’s body and eventually found a small blue crystal hidden within a pocket in his clothes.
“Pathetic little thing”, the Uha Tamunaran spoke with disgust evident in his voice as he spoke before lifting the boy’s body with a single arm and tossing it away as though it was nothing be discarded garbage.
The boy’s body laid their on the spot the Uha Tamunaran tossed it to motional except for the brief jitters due the shock that still remained on his body. Ibaeran then made her way to the boy’s body. Having witnessed everything that had happened as nothing more than a spectator like the rest of the slaves around her and making no attempts to even try to save the poor boy, Ibaeran now stood before to his body staring at his pale dead eyes.
Ibaeran looking at the deceased boy before her couldn’t help but feel a mix of emotions ranging from anger, rage, and sadness but above all else, the emotion Ibaeran felt the most was shame, guilt, and regret. Looking her hands, which were now trembling and shaking, Ibaeran thought to herself, where did all her power vanish to. Recalling how faced all those monsters and beast in Kiri Dumo, defeating them all with a single blow, and yet, despite being the very person with such incredible feats, Ibaeran still found herself trembling when faced with a single Uha Tamunaran.
Ibaeran recalled that as a slave grim sights like this were a norm as Uha Tamunarans often made it a habit of ending the living of most slaves in an instant if they didn’t like the way they looked, to them, their lives were meaningless and worthless, and they would never think twice of ending them right at the spot for nothing more than breathing the same air as them. And all the slave could do was watch it all happen, helpless and powerless to do anything but simply be a spectator. But Ibaeran wasn’t like the other slaves, not anymore, she actually did have the power to fight, she could feel it in her finger tips, the power to shake the entire earth and spilt the sky in two, all that power resided in her and she could feel, but yet, she did nothing just the other slaves, and simply watched as another one of their own lost their lives in the hands of the Uha Tamunarans.
Ibaeran then bowed down her head, closed her eyes for a moment before finally opening them back up until to see that the body of the boy was gone and was now replaced with a familiar one, the body of someone she loved and cherished with all her heart but still couldn’t save from the clutches of the Uha Tamunarans and, just like the other and that boy, had to watch as nothing more than a spectator she closed her eyes shut. Ibaeran then felt a tear make its way down her eyes, and as it did, Ibaeran wiped it away before turning away from the body and walking away, returning back to the familiar track she was following.
Ibaeran felt as though her body was moving on its, almost as though her entire body had been automated to follow a specific path so much so that she felt as though she could still walk the path with her eyes sealed shut without stumbling once. She continued walking through the familiar roar along with the other slaves before finally stopping when she reached her destination.
A large field that stretch out for miles on end as far as the naked eye could see, filled to the brim with crops of all kind waiting to be harvested and tended to by the slaves. Ibaeran, upon seeing the field just there stood their motionless, as memories agonizingly painful labor flooding into her mind. Recalling how she worked during each and every day in those bloody fields and soiling the earth underneath her feet with both sweat and blood from bleeding wounds inflicted upon hear by her masters.
“Hey *grunt* you there” a voice Ibaeran instantly recognized called out to her.
She then felt a large hand grad her by the shoulder.
“Shouldn’t *grunt* you *grunt* be in *grunt* the fields *grunt* working” said the voice once more.