Everything was dark again and the shrill whirring stirred her consciousness just enough to feel the aching pain. A familiar feeling, much like the rhythmic tapping from above which helped rattle the irresponsible sorcerer from her slumber.

So heavy… With great effort, Cira managed to pull her eyelids open but everything was blurry, and the light of day burned progressively worse as she was slowly pulled back into reality. “Nina…? Cut it out.” Cira tried swatting her away, but it was like lifting stone and the pattering continued.

“Urgh…” Her stomach roared and days of hunger pangs suddenly woke up, turning her gut into a flaming void. “Ninaaaa. Go get me an apple.”

Just speaking left the sorcerer winded and she eased back into the grass. All of a sudden, her mouth felt intensely dry like their were forty miles of salt in there. The nymph was coming into focus, trying to get her attention about something. Nina’s head was no longer adorned with a sorcerer’s hat and her featureless face was as frantic as it had ever been.

“What is it?” She groaned trying to sit up to look, but her legs were even heavier than the rest of her body. Just scraping one elbow into the dirt to push herself up had her teeth clenched. She had to catch her breath to even think about her next move. “Why am I so weak…? And that noise…”

It was like a siren, whirring on and on, grating against her weary mind. Breeze Haven’s in trouble. But why? What’s even happening? Why can’t I do anything?

Fount Salt… I’m never doing that again, that's for sure. I don’t like being an island. But why am I so weak? Is it the hunger? “Ninaaaa—" Cira’s blood ran cold—rather she realized it already was. All her muscles were stiff like rigor mortis was already setting in. She couldn’t even feel her right leg, and now she knew why.

“H-holy shit!” She stammered, trying to blink it away and struggling to process the horrible sight before her eyes. One of Cira’s favorite staves, the orichalcum one left by her father, was dug into the grass beneath its massive weight, straight over her lower leg as if it wasn’t there at all and pinning her down, “Gah! Ahhh, ahhhhhh what do I do?!”

A sudden rush of adrenaline allowed her to shoot up and she helplessly pulled at the staff. It didn’t budge. “What the hell?! Move! Grrr Enhance Strength! Dammit… No!” The sorcerer stared at her hands in disbelief as there wasn’t the faintest hint of mana going through them. She felt inward and noticed her soul was in great pain. No matter how much she tried to stir the mana within herself, there was no chance. There wasn’t any there in the first place. Cira’s aura was gone without a trace.

“I overdid it…” Cira bit her lip as the full extent of the pain she didn’t notice hit her like a three-mast galleon to the face. “Is this it for me? I would have stayed longer if I knew Found Salt would be my last job…”

The pain was intense, but it was strangely dull. She was on death’s door, and no matter how much she yanked or pushed, the staff wouldn’t budge. Even the light end of the handle was too much. Hundreds of pounds of orichalcum cared not for Cira’s frail arms. She thought back to the Astral Witch. I bet she’s absolutely ripped after all those centuries. Would that old lady find herself in this situation? God dammit, I hate how badass she was. Why’d she have to be evil and mean?

“Gah, screw the Astral Bitch!” Cira clenched her fists, swearing to a strict exorcise routine when she got out of this, “There has to be something I can do. Hmm, where are you Aquon? Come forth!”

She held out her hand and there was no response in her ring. Theoretically if she burned out her aura, a staff like Aquon could still perform sorceries for her with its own residual mana. “Oh, Staff of Springs?! Come the hell forth!” Sadly, being upset about it didn’t help the staff respond.

Cira looked to the side, and she saw Prismagora laying in the grass. A stroke of luck that she forgot to put it away and the staff still existed in material form. Just like Cira, it had been spent, without the chance to recharge before its connection to the deritium was broken by Cira’s unwarranted nap.

I shouldn’t have used my aura at all… What’s the deal? It was definitely full when Cira left. And she cut off all sorceries from herself before cancelling Spring Sense, so it was truly odd.

“At least it didn’t take my kneecap. I would have thought it was poetic justice or something.” She was mainly happy that she would still have a knee after she figured out a prosthetic, though it did little to make her feel better, “There’s definitely no saving that though…”

From what was visible, her ankle and foot were nearly black, bent up at a frightening angle. Her right shoe was nowhere to be seen. On top of that, the bottom of her robes were probably mashed into her bones. She couldn’t do anything about it or look away. It was disgusting but also horrifying to realize that half of her leg was well and truly gone. Cira’s breathing became heavy, and she clenched her fists until her palms almost bled. She started hyperventilated as reality set in.

“I… I can’t grow it back with magic… Even if I had my aura.” She was in denial of what she had to do. Do I dig myself out first? There’s no point if I have to cut my leg off anyway. I could be in serious danger if I waste too much energy before I eat anything. I’m alive on Breeze Haven’s good wishes alone. “God dammit… Nina, what do I do?!”

She only fluttered above the blackened leg looking at Cira with sad eyes. “Okay, Prismagora, you’ve got enough, right?” Her hand was shaking as it pressed against the ground.

“Lost gods… How am I still alive?” From the looks of it, her staff had at least collected a week's worth of daylight, and if it weren’t for Breeze Haven’s domain barely keeping her alive, she would have definitely been dead from any number of complications that should arise from having her leg crushed for a week.

It was not wise to tap into her home’s mana well with the sirens blaring and her aura depleted. There was no way of knowing when it would reform as it hadn’t happened in years, but within her staff there unfortunately wasn’t enough to get by until it did. Still, it was enough for a single act of sorcery. Cira bit her lip, digging into the grass as she was about to send the order, “Wait, I better think about this for a second… I should get a tourniquet ahead of time since I know it’s coming off.”

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She shook, trying to discharge the intense pain she was feeling somehow as it wracked her body. Cira couldn’t access her ring and scavenge the last drops of her dimnut elixir to quell it either, but she could at least dig into her bag of holding. Let’s see here… great. Just great.

Deciding against ripping apart her clothes, Cira wrapped her last ribbon of void gazelle hide around her leg just below the knee and tied it off as tight as she possibly could. She wasn’t sure if it was enough, so she bit down on the end and ripped her face away, screaming through her teeth.

She lurched to the side, heaving. “At least… I can still feel that…” Cira allowed herself a moment to breathe before returning her attention to the dreadful staff of light in all its convenient glory, not excited for what followed.

“Prismagora…” Now Cira clenched her fists again, breathy heavily, “Shearing Light—! Grrrahhhhhh!!” Her teeth nearly shattered as they ground together and she pounded her fists into the ground, letting out a guttural cry. She clawed into the grass, ripping it up as every nerve in her body seemed to burn with pain like someone was pressing brands into her flesh with each heartbeat.

She screamed until her voice started to crack, collapsed on her back and staring at the sky with wide eyes. Nina came over and hugged her face, but Cira didn’t notice until she started coughing on the prima salt, rolling over.

“That was… the worst… Holy… shit…” Cira had never felt such intense pain as severing her own limb. The last shreds of light she could muster burned hotter than any flame. Any wounds she’d ever suffered in the past were bolstered with magic and quickly healed, so she was not at all ready for this level of pain.

Cira scooted away from the staff as her pristine robes tore, now stained with blood on the frayed edges. Then she stared at the rest of her decapitated ankle, and at her stump as her heart beat relentlessly in her chest. “I seriously lost my leg… Some of it at least. That counts right? I only have one foot!”

The pain told her that it did count and she fought to stay conscious, but the empty aches coming from her stomach wouldn't allow her to pass out. Food… I need to get to the garden. It was a primal pull—the need for sustenance. Cira started getting up and immediately mashed her stump into the grass, again screaming through clenched teeth and collapsing on her chest. Already…?

Cira clawed her way over to Prismagora. Empty… Dammit. That was the last of her mana. The pale mithril ring she crawled past held none, as it was only a conduit. Aquon had melted into a cerulean goop, lacking any of its luster or jewel-like beauty. They better be happy down there. This sucks.

“And won’t that gods damned alarm shut up?!” Cira scrunched her face and tried to hide in her shoulder, unable to cover her ears as she crawled.

Finally, she managed to hoist her weight onto the staff as a crutch and get her other foot planted firmly. “Whoa… We are not quite standing upright…” Breeze haven was tilting ever so slightly as she regained her balance. She still swayed, but it was enough to move.

I feel so light… it’s not just my stomach. She looked down at her missing leg and shuddered. Strangely, she still felt very small. Even smaller now. Cira’s mind was reeling from her time spent controlling Fount Salt. She felt like she was sent adrift as a mere freckle in the sky, but the immediate phantom pain of her leg was drowning those feelings out. That’s probably not a bad thing, but I would still prefer a leg.

The closest fruits were a rare species of pomegranate called the ‘pomegranite’. It was famous for its incredibly supple juices which were contained within a shell as hard as stone that Cira would ordinarily geomance apart.

Each step felt like somebody was smacking her with a hammer directly on the skeleton and her jaw had gone sore from mashing her teeth together. As her breathing grew more labored, she limped her way past the pomegranites to the apple tree, feverishly grabbing one and ripping into it with her teeth.

“Aghhh so good…” The natural sugars assaulted her taste buds like electricity, and she was momentarily stunned before voraciously munching around its circumference, paying no mind to the unladylike noises she was making. She tossed it on the ground and grabbed another while warmth slowly returned to her belly. It rumbled and she winced as the pain intensified, but she could feel it working.

“Shut upppppp!” She yelled at the siren and finished another, wiping the apple mush from her face.

Cira grabbed a third apple off the tree and took her first breath of life, the whirring in the background was really starting to pierce her ears and cause physical pain. “Is Breeze Haven running low? What terrible timing. Hold on… Why though? That shouldn’t—” The apple fell from her hand as she finally looked up at the solid stone Breeze Haven was continuously grinding into at half speed, bearing into a nook in the cracked rock face at the same angle she left it, held off by only a thin margin by her barrier.

“That’s not good.” She couldn’t tell if Breeze Haven had been at it all week or if she drifted somewhere far away from the Boreal before crashing into an island. “That’s not good at all.”

The shrill alarm had finally achieved it’s intended purpose, and Cira realized this was something that had to be addressed immediately. Somehow, the barrier had held out, but it could give out any minute or days from now. Ironically, Cira needed mana to check how much mana it had left. “Gods, I hate this! Give me mana, holy one!” She shook her fist at the sky.

There was no response, of course. One needed an aura of any size to call upon holy mana, and sadly, Cira was but a mere whelp at present. The shrill alarm never ceased, growing quieter for only a moment at a time before continuing. What a waste of mana! Am I not supposed to notice crashing into a freaking island? For the record, she did not notice.

Where even am I? I hope I’m not too far from the Boreal. I really don’t want to get lost and have to start mapping the world over again. Who knows when I’ll find familiar skies again. There’s still a witch that has to find me… All she could see was cracked stone, and the open sky. Cira would have to venture out to learn more.

Nina buzzed over and took a perch on Cira’s shoulder again and she had to fan the salt away, gently lifting her off, “Sorry, girl. You’ll have to float around for a while. Wait a second… Why are you even here?”

She’s a salt nymph… I haven’t seen her since I left the spring, and we’re definitely not on Fount Salt anymore. Nina only offered her signature blank stare in return as she landed on a branch. What’s that noise? I keep hearing that…

There was something else she could hear between the sirens, almost like shouting. Wait, that is shouting. “Huh?”

She looked up and to the side to see people hanging off the cliffs on ropes, banging on her barrier, “Hey! Are you okay?!” Cira now stared at them blankly.

“Pirates…?” There were three of them, with a larger group above gazing down in curiosity or shock. “Damn you! Are you here to take my treasure?!”

Cira looked at her litany of mastercraft alchemy instruments and various staves strewn all over her yard, then back at them with a hateful glare as they dangled. She could see spots in Breeze Haven’s barrier growing discolored too—a sign it was growing weaker. Dammit.

“What?! No way! I’m trying to help you!” A man with an eyepatch flipped up on his forehead shouted back.

Then, another scurvy looking one shouted as well, “I’m here for your treasure, alright!” At least he's honest...?

“You son of a bitch!” Cira couldn’t do anything except give him angry eyes. Can I even trust the first guy? I really could use a hand climbing the helm spire though. She looked to the third, “What about you?!”

“I’m lookin’ for a new sponge maiden!” He looked like a smaller Don with a lazy eye, but one of them was leering insatiably.

He will certainly regret those words.