Fate of Pandora - Book II

Eyes Are Opening

Little Risa was scared.

Her vision blurred and she was engulfed by darkness. All the whiteness had disappeared, and, after staying in that bright place so long, it made the darkness even more frightening.

"Guys? Is anyone there?" She called for someone, looking around her frantically. "Guys?!"

"Stop yelling!" a female voice answered. In front of her, a woman had appeared. The tall woman, with her smooth dark skin and expensive short hairstyle, was beautiful. She was an astonishing and accomplished woman, well known for her successful acting career.

"Mother?" At first, Risa was glad to see her, but then she felt disorientated as she questioned how her mother could have got there.

The girl walked a few steps toward her and suddenly, the woman began yelling at a man who appeared beside her. Risa stopped and stared at the male figure. The vision was cloudy – it was impossible to distinguish any features – but she knew without a doubt that it was her father.

The scene of her parents arguing felt familiar. She remembered seeing many scenes like this one when she was very young. The arguing unravelling in front of her was a memory, which would soon develop into her parents' divorce.

The two figures turned around and walked their separate ways, leaving a five-year-old Risa behind to cry silently. That scene made the girl's heart heavy; she could remember her feelings so clearly.

After her parents' divorce, she was taken by her mother. The girl didn't remember much about her father. All she knew was her mother's bitter words about him: that he was a cold bastard who didn't care about them. Risa never wanted to believe her mother's words, but it was a fact that her father had disappeared from their lives. He didn't even come once to see his daughter.

However, it wasn't like she was in better hands with her mother. The woman put her job above everything else in her life, and had little time to spend with Risa. Whenever they were together, it was mostly due to an obligation that her mother had to comply with unwillingly.

Risa didn't have a stable, happy family background. She tried to compensate for the lack of attention from her parents by acting childish and wild. She liked the attention she would get, even if she was annoying or angering the people around her.

Those thoughts and memories depressed her. In a normal state of mind, she would have thought about her new friends, their struggle that made them join forces, and about Luna, who was like an older sister to her now... But whatever happy thoughts she had were cut off as soon as her mother appeared in front of her.

"Mom..."

"I already told you to stop yelling!" The woman raised her hand and delivered a strong slap to the girl's face.

Risa fell to the ground and looked up at her mother in shock. That was no memory. Her mother may have ignored her a lot, but she had definitely never hit her.

"Wait, Mom! What are you-?"

The woman held her shoulders and raised the girl in the air, and began shaking her.

"Look at you, all dressed up like a Greek Goddess! You're ridiculous!" The woman tossed Risa to the ground again.

"Stop it, Mom!" Risa tried to crawl away from her, terrified by her sudden violence.

As she crawled backwards, the girl touched something with the tip of her fingers and looked at it – it was her glowing, silver sword.

"Ha! I knew you hated me," the mother said at the sight of the sword in the girl's hand.