It has been a week since Zafira started her journey back to where she entered this world. She thought she was the queen of the world with her newfound magic. However, she quickly learned just how wrong she was. When she left, she used the magic that allowed her to travel faster, and rushed straight for her goal. Now, she was walking very carefully, focussing only a bit on the direction she needed to go, and directing most of her attention to the world around her, and how to avoid encountering any dangers. Her clothes were no longer brightly coloured, but died in a camouflage pattern that blended well with the background. Runes were drawn on the thin fabric, giving it a strength comparable to leather. And in her hands she held a staff, ready to strike at all times.
It had only taken a single day, before she had realized how lucky she had been up till then. And how foolish she had been for believing she could take on anything the world could throw at her. She had barely encountered any animals or other dangers on her first trip, and while gathering food till then. But now it felt like the world had decided that it was time to take off the training gloves. She had been forced to use her decay powers 5 times that first day, and she was injured in every single one of those fights. Learning to her dismay, that the gradual healing she could do over time while resting was not as unlimited as she thought it was. And that even her more powerful instant healing couldn’t remove poison from a wound. That was a particularly painful lesson, as she had no other choice, than to bear the effects, and let her body recover from it naturally.
She had adapted to this new reality though, and switched from carelessly traveling the wilderness, to doing everything she could to avoid danger. And to increase her chances of not getting hurt if she would be forced to fight anyway. Even if she no longer had any powerful spells left she could cast.
As soon as she felt there was an enemy nearby that she couldn’t avoid, she would climb into a tree, and use her decay ability from a distance to either finish it off or scare it away. If she didn’t feel an enemy coming, she would try to whack it on the head with a sturdy branch when it attacked. She had managed to strengthen her clothes that kept getting ripped, by drawing runes on them. It took the sap from a plant that her senses had told her was quite valuable. But she used them without a second thought, as she felt that doing so would increase her chances to survive this ordeal. It didn’t disappoint, not only were her clothes getting ripped less now, sometimes they even managed to prevent her from getting wounded when an animal managed to hit her. A very welcome reprieve considering the limited amount of times she could heal a day. Making her clothes blend in better with the forest and smearing her exposed skin with dirt had also made it easier to avoid fights completely. As long as the wind wasn’t blowing in the wrong direction at least. She hadn’t found a solution yet that would prevent animals from tracking her scent.
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However, the biggest increase in her safety had come from learning to observe more than just the one thing she focussed on. She now didn’t just focus on her intuition, but sent her awareness outwards into the world as well. Listening to the rustling of the leaves, looking at the ways the trees swayed in the wind, how the snails were crawling, the birds flying or chirping, … Taking in everything, and letting her feelings guide her to what was important, and what it meant. It was extremely taxing, but the first time she had attempted it, had revealed another ability, one that made it possible to use this technique while traveling.
When she first started to truly take in the world around her, she was quickly overwhelmed. It was as if she had left the quiet forest, and was suddenly standing right in front of the sound system of a heavy metal festival. She couldn’t turn it off, the sensations kept coming, each one hitting like a hammer on her mind. She collapsed into a ball on the ground, begging and screaming to make it stop. And suddenly, it did, everything just stopped. She couldn’t even hear the normal sounds of the forest anymore now. When she opened her eyes, she was standing in a small room, one that she was very familiar with, but had never expected to see in reality. It was her sacred space, the place she visualized when she needed to recover from overloaded senses in her old world. Where she sent her mind to calm down, when the world was too much to bear. And now, it was real. She moved her fingers over the wood of the rocking chair, warmed her hands by the open fire, and looked outside the window to the forest beyond. The carpet was as soft and fluffy as she had always dreamt it to be. The only thing missing was her … she yelped, as suddenly part of the carpet moved and opened her eyes. A big black cat looked at her, and then lazily closed her eyes again. Zafira smiled, and joined the cat on the soft floor covering, snuggling up against her as she fell asleep, just as she used to imagine.
When she woke up, she was back in the forest and the sound level was back to normal. Looking up at the sun, it didn’t appear that any significant time had passed. While back at home, she would have needed to isolate for a long time to recover from such a severe sensory overload. With tears in her eyes, she thanked whatever entity had brought her to this place for this ability. And for the coming days, she practiced opening up to the world step by step. Retreating to the safety of her sacred space when it became too much.