The Princess of Wrath

Chapter 1 - Part III: Deference for Darkness

Waking up feeling the raw cold of the Iceborne Wastelands inside her bones had become Asura's new reality; though thanks to her improved health she experienced it better and with less inhibition of physical pain.

Wrapped in all the furs of wild animals, she felt the muscles of her torso and joints of her legs burning, which were insignificant compared to that unpleasant and perpetual sense of agony that proliferated beneath the scars on her arms.

As the old man had said, her arms had suffered too much punishment... His words did not censor a possible remnant of pain that she was never going to be able to get rid of.

"It doesn't matter... Why worry about these arms, if I have already resigned myself to death?" she thought, disheartened, as she felt her forearms tremble spasmodically, especially in the areas marked by the chains of the Master Wraith.

Nothing could be worse than the hardships she lived through that cursed night... That night in which she lost everything, and that her nightmares made her remember mercilessly.

Unable to resist the tears, Asura partially stood up in the darkness of that box that had become her new home, forced to crouch down. The wood from which it was made was saturated with moisture, and extremely cold drops filtered through the interstices, as if it was a cavern.

The box's small door had been attached to the outer frame by a thick layer of ice, requiring considerable effort on Asura's part to break the bond and slide it aside. Covered in the furs, she crawled out into the raw and brutal outside, like an orphaned newborn infant, with no one waiting for her on the other side.

Standing up and shaking, Asura found herself in the dense darkness of the night, broken only by the torches that marked the path to the settlement. She wondered if she had overslept again. It was as if the light of day had forsaken her.

The roar of the sea was clear behind her, loud and rumbling, as was the wind that crashed against the cliff and continued onward toward the sinister sea of ​​trees in the Forest of Tortured Souls. The flow wanted to take her in the direction of the settlement, but she had other plans in mind...

Asura walked the other way, against the invisible but deadly current. The wind covered her like an embrace; unwanted and painful, suffocating due to the great low temperature that it carried. The soles of her feet ached at the contact with the frigid ground that eventually turned into uneven stone ground.

"So cold... It hurts so much..." she whispered, almost wondering if that unending pain across every inch of skin, muscle and bone would kill any other ordinary human being. "I deserve this."

Nothing mattered anymore but that fair suffering... Cold did not matter, so she dropped those heavy cloaks that covered her, leaving her completely naked and at the mercy of the hostile nature.

Only the light of the stars guided her, towards the edge of that kilometric cliff. Once there, the exiled Princess once again had at her disposal that cosmic spectacle that descended towards the surface of the violent waters of the sea. The ocean of the Universe was indescribably beautiful and stimulated her memories.

Beyond the ghosts of her loved ones... Beyond the betrayal of her mother and Roland...

The stars made Asura remember one of the happiest days of her life. Six years ago, the day she first fell in love with her.

The day she gave Diana the title of Knightess of the Empire. The nightly celebration in the Crystal Ballroom, when the blonde knightess had the audacity to invite her to dance and surprise everyone present with the elegance and beauty that both women reflected in their slow dance.