A Forgotten World

Flame

"So what are these things?" He asked as he was handed some sort of metal canister, and a necklace with a glowing amulet attached to it. He resisted the urge to squirm away as Atlas fastened a belt around his waist. He put the necklace around his neck.
"That." Harmony pointed to the metal canister, "Is a Thermos, we use it for collecting wax, which is kind of like currency around here." He'd answer, before taking the canister from his hand and hooking it onto his belt for him. He could've done that himself, he thought.
"It seems like it's kind of small- I don't imagine it holding much." He'd note that it was cylindrical and about the size of his hand.
"Magic." Atlas rolled her eyes and pointed to his necklace. "That's your flame. We're more durable, and aren't prey to flesh wounds. We can get sore, beat around, fall from extreme heights, but none of that will kill us. But if your flame goes out, you go out." She paused before adding, "You're lucky you didn't spend whatever light you got here with when you fell from the sky."
"Ah. Can't I just get a new flame?" He raised an eyebrow.
"The physical flame just allows you to carry more light, you're alright if that goes out, as long as some light is around you to replenish it. It's your spiritual flame that you need to worry about. It can go out when your physical flame is empty." Harmony tapped the necklace on his chest. "This is like an extra precaution. And we don't have these just lying around, so be careful with it." Harmony then handed him a wooden mask.
"Okay, why the masks?" He sighed and put the mask to his face, allowing Atlas and Harmony to fasten it around his face.
"If you noticed, we wear pretty much full coverage. There are dangers outside the Prairie, and our light draws them to us. This helps disguise us somewhat. Also, tuck your flame into your shirt." Atlas said informatively. He obeyed.
"Can we go now?" He asked, impatience settling in. He did in fact want to see what all the fuss was about.
"Eager are we?" Atlas said with a chuckle before gesturing for him to follow them as they began walking away from the groups of tents and huts.
"Do I get to fly?" He asked, quite eager if he was being honest.
"Assisted, yes. Your cape doesn't have any wings of light, until we supply you with enough to fly on your own, you'll fly with one of us. One thing that is beneficial about flying in groups or with other people, is that you replenish each other's light." Harmony answered. Their walking came to an end, as the land appeared to drop off into nothing but cloud.
"Oh shit." He mumbled as he peered over the edge.
"Is the man who crash-landed here afraid of heights?" Harmony asked, amused.
"No! It's just, what if we run out of.. whatever. My cape quit on me twice." He scoffed.
"First of all, as long as you're flying in clouds, you won't run out. Secondly, just trust us." Atlas said, rolling her eyes. She then developed a cheeky grin on her face.
"Atlas don-" Harmony shouted when suddenly he tumbled off the side of the land. Atlas giggled and he watched as Harmony easily regained his balance and glided gracefully into the thick of the clouds.
"Wow." He said, watching Harmony disappear in the clouds. Atlas grabbed his hand and next thing he knew they were running toward the edge, he held his breath as they jumped over the side. To his surprise, they didn't plummet to their death. Atlas guided them into the clouds, trailing after Harmony, so he presumed. He reveled in the feeling of the wind blowing past him, keeping him up in the air. He looked at Atlas, who kept them connected with her stony grip on his hand. Her cape seemed to be shimmering as they flew. He had no time frame for how long they flew, he just new that eventually they saw some land, surrounded by clouds. The land had trees shooting up from it, lots of trees, it must be a forest. Despite their claims of it being a dead land, those trees seemed very much alive. They landed, with Harmony waiting for them.
"Welcome to the Hidden Forest." Harmony said, swooping his arm in a wide gesture. The land seemed to widen out as the forest became thicker.
"Stick close to us, we don't want to get you extinguished the first time we take you out." Atlas ruffled his hair. He grumbled and attempted to fix the unruly mop of white hair as they began walking.
"All the places you'll see were once apart of something called the Sky Kingdom." Harmony began, giving him a history lesson. He once again thought the names of everything seemed to be a bit on the nose. "It started with the light Goddess, Bird, sending down stars to the land of Sky. Those stars were the Elders. And they developed the land into the Sky Kingdom." Harmony continued talking, hopping on rocks as they walked. The forest grew thicker and he almost felt as if it was getting- darker? Much darker, and more ominous.
"So what happened?" He asked.
"For what we've figured out, darkness crept up and destroyed the lands. Corrupted animals, and plant life, left some of the lands desolate and lifeless, and other lands tainted." Atlas answered. "Here's your first example." Atlas gestured to a odd looking fungus on the ground, it was dark around the edges and pulsed a blue color, clearly not normal.
"Our job, has been to cleanse the lands, fix what was broken by the darkness." Harmony grabbed his hand and put it facing the plant, palm out. "Now put your other hand on your flame underneath your shirt, and direct that energy out of the flame, toward the corruption." Harmony instructed while Atlas stood a few feet away, observing. He did as he was told and light in the form of flames erupted from his hand, burning away the darkness aggressively. He immediately felt massively drained and stumbled. "Careful!" Harmony exclaimed, grabbing his shoulders to keep him from falling over. "You'll burn yourself out. You have to be steady with it, and not draw out more than is needed." Harmony and Atlas placed their hands on their own flames, and then placed their other hands to his chest. He felt the flame heat up against the skin underneath his shirt, and immediately felt better.
"You can do the same on your own with light sources. Torches, candles, and lanterns are all around, predating the shattering. If you light them with your flame you can use the light they put off to replenish yourself. You can also collect candle wax from the candles you find around as they burn. We use them to make more candles and scatter them in places that are more dangerous and need more light sources." Atlas spoke as her and Harmony replenished his light. "Let's keep going." She told them both once he had time to recover.
Walking further into the forest, it began to rain. The drops seemed to have the same effect as using his flame. He was about to tell them in alarm, when they pulled him under the roots of a particularly large tree.
"You'll get used to the feeling. When traversing the forest, you have to stop and take breaks where you can to replenish your light. If you ever find yourself here alone, stop where those light sources I told you about are." Harmony then directed his gaze to a space underneath two large rocks leaning on each other. There was a stone basin with a torch sitting in it.
"If the world wasn't corrupt before The Shattering, why did they put light sources everywhere?" He asked.
"We don't really know, I think that light was still a source of energy for them then, just they didn't have the darkness to hide from." Atlas shrugged. They continued on, and they were right, he did eventually get used to the draining drops. While walking, he spotted a flicker of light.
"What is that?" He asked them.
"Ah, that is a Wing of Light. C'mon, let's go get it." Harmony said, sprinting towards it. When they got close however, fungus erupted from the ground, 10x larger than the fungus they had first encountered.
"Get back! Harmony, help me." Atlas shoved him backwards, before her and harmony joined hands and both of them directed their flame toward the fungus, pushing it back. He couldn't stay there, especially when the fungus started fighting back with a vengeance, regenerating faster than they can burn it. He slid his hand over his flame and shoved his other hand out, before releasing a white hot burst of fire. His ears began to ring and his vision began to blur but he held out nonetheless. His flame cracked in his hand, and hung against his skin uselessly. He was shocked when he continued to fling fire at the fungus, even without the flame. Was he going to die? His vision was tunneling, signaling he was about to pass out, he relinquished the flame and was relieved to find he had burned the whole thing away. He promptly collapsed after the fact, vision going black.