In the deepest part of a forest lived a tribe, hidden from all.
They had large wings on their backs and were beautiful, but they were what would be called beast.
Among them was their princess, who had huge, ashen wings.
Their law said that once one turned sixteen, they would be allowed to fly outside the forest.
And on her sixteenth birthday, the princess took flight to the world beyond the forest.
She crossed the steep mountains and the surging rivers. And reached a land of humans.
The moon shone brightly in the sky.
She landed in a castle garden, where she found a young man gazing up the moon.
The princess hid in the bushes and stared at the young man, and for the first time, love bloomed from her heart.
But he was clearly a different race.
A beast and a human could never be together.
And so, the princess went to see a witch who lived in the same forest and said,
" I want to live as a human, i want to be united with him"
The witch replied like so:
"I can help you if you offer me your wings. But keep this in mind. No matter how you disguised yourself, you are a beast, and you will consume the prince's life one day."
The princess ripped off her wings and was assaulted in pain far more intense than she had ever felt. She could never fly again.
Even so, she smiled happily, with tears of joy streaming down her face.
"I'm human! I'm human! I'm the same as him now!"
The princess once again set out for the land of humans.
This time on foot. In the desert, she spotted a group of people.
"Oh, no! Is there anyone who can save him?!" There lay a young man, his leg bitten by a snake.
The princess rushed to his side and sucked the venom out from his wound.
"Thank you, o brave young lady. I am the prince of these lands." It was the same young man she had met in the castle.
"I owe my life to you, Please marry me."
A wedding ceremony was held soon after.
The priest asked the princess, clad in a wedding dress of pure white,
"Do you vow to be to him in good times and in bad, in sickness and in health until death do you part?"
"I do."
The two exchanged rings, and when the priest said so, they sealed their vows with a kiss.
And cheers rang out across the land,
"Bless the brave girl who saved the prince's life!"
The whole kingdom celebrated their marriage.
"Humans! Humans! They have neither the wings to fly nor claws to hunt. Such weak and frail creatures, but they are so, so warm. Humans are wonderful."
After the wedding, she lived happily as the princess of a human land.
She supported the prince in his work, traveled the world, and saw oceans studded with glints of sapphire, sparkling grasslands, and auroras that swayed like raging flames.
The princess took the prince's hand and said with a smile on her face.
"Grab on to me and never let go."
But the princess's happiness was short lived.
She woke up one night with a pain that threatened to rend her asunder and found her body turning into one of a beast.
"Why?" i asked you to make me human!"
On her back were jet-black wings, tearing through her flesh and skin to spread.
"Using magic comes at a price."
"You've attained plenty of happiness as a human. Now it's time for you to lose yourself and turn into an ugly monster." the witch of the forest whisper to her.
"However, if you kill the person you loved the most, you will be freed of your curse and return to the beast you originally were."
The princess gazed at her beloved prince as her claws reached her throat.
She loved him more than anything and anyone, but desire to rip apart welled up inside her.
As she desperately tried to clench her fist and stop herself, her claws dug into her skin, and blood starts gushing out.
"If i kill the prince, i will be freed of this curse..." with tears streaming down her face, she kissed the prince on the cheek.
When the prince awoke, the princess was no longer beside him.Instead, the bed was covered in jet-black feathers.
In profound sadness, the prince searched all across the land for her.
But nobody had seen the princess.
Fin...
