Chapter 1

The blinding navy light that filled the cold, unwelcoming room subsided, returning to its origin in the center of the oval room, where a stone altar was placed on a pedestal. About two dozen hooded figures in blue robes were on their knees in a circle around the altar.

With the disappearance of the otherworldly light, the room returned to the dark, lit only by a dozen torches upon the granite walls. The men and women inside the room waited for their eyes to readjust to the dark after the sudden miracle of their ritual.

One of the men adjusted quicker than the others. Garbed in gold and purple, with a long, twisted staff in his hand. The topper of the staff was a cracked skull of some small, misshapen creature. That man was the first to see the shape of a girl's ***** body, laying on the altar.

"SUCCEEEEESSS!!!" the man in purple shouted as he jumped up from his knees. "The hero that has been promised is finally here!"

It was this screeching voice—bouncing from wall to wall—that awoke the girl. She opened her eyes and sat up, startled, and overwhelmed by her returning sensations.

The last time she was alive, she felt very little besides pain and cold. Her eyesight was almost gone and all her hearing did was subject her to that unending, one-note ringing noise.

In hindsight, she should have realized that she also felt very little in Luluna's realm. Certainly, no cold. But no warmth either. At least, her insides weren't continuously ripping themselves to pieces. But how could she not notice that the tea had no flavor or consistency?

It all contributed to the surreal experience of suddenly inhabiting a living, breathing, healthy, youthful body. Her sharp hearing was assaulted by the unbearable echoing of the shouting madman. Her keen eyesight quickly adapted to the dark. She saw the hooded figures surrounding her better than she ever could for the last five years of her previous life, though she did not know what to make of the strange gold symbols all over one of the men's layered robes. She felt the cold of the hard slab she was resting on. Even the strange aching, rising heat just below her abdomen.

"She's alive!" the same man in purple shouted again when he saw the ***** girl sit upon the altar. But then he froze and just stared at the girl, mesmerized. It took him several seconds to snap out of it. "Ah, Forgive me!"

The man in purple dropped to his knees, prostrating himself before the girl on the altar. The other figures followed suit—prostrating themselves as if before a deity. There was little doubt that the girl was not human. Her beauty alone would be enough for some to deem her divine. However, the small leather-like wings on her back and a thin, long tail with a heart shape at the end, suggested a more sinister origin. The color of the girl's hair that reached her shoulder blades was also unnatural. A color that some had seen in the lakes of the Forbidden Valley.

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