Alessia remembered when she was that little girl. Before she was a ghost. Razon would take her for a walk and explain the universe to her.
The little Alessia set to work cleaning and organizing scrolls. Razon winked at her and gave her one to take home.
“I had many chores, but somehow I was precocious enough to read all the books I could after my work was done,” Alessia told the team.
The little girl read by candlelight. She flipped the pages with her hand in the air, not even needing to touch them. She was making her journal.
“I was becoming quite powerful.”
A yōkai brought her some tea.
“Even had tamed many of the yōkai, learning their names and powers.”
The yōkai tucked her in.
“I made that place my home—my sanctuary. I discovered an ancient form of magic. Felt like pure joy. It was gut magic.”
A group of clergy wearing red hoods gathered.
“But a sect of the church felt I was playing with things I didn’t understand.”
The Red Hoods threw a pile of wood on the ground.
“They decided they could end the desecration of the lands by sacrificing me on a funeral pyre.”
The Red Hoods grabbed young Alessia from her bed. She screamed. One of the men lifted his red hood.
“He asked…”
His moist mouth leaned toward her.
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“Are you pure?”
They grabbed her. Young Alessia was dragged to the pyre.
“They carried me to a stack of dry wood.”
She was tied up. They were ready to ignite the flame.
“These were the people I trusted. I was supposed to atone for their sins.”
Razon swooped in with other members of the church. A bloody battle erupted.
“I was saved.”
Young Alessia fell into the mud. The Moist-Mouthed Man landed on the pyre as it started to burn. His eyes stared into Alessia’s, flesh peeling away.
“But I vowed to let the piece of myself, the weak part, die. I lost my connection to my power.”
The little girl scribbled runes under a self-portrait she’d sketched.
“I wrote my name. Put my soul into the page…”
She ripped the page out of the journal. Crumpled it up and threw it. The page transformed into a yōkai. It looked over its shoulder, sad, as it walked into the woods.
It morphed, corrupting into a dark version of the young Alessia...
Alessia finished her story, ashen with grief.
“I killed that little girl.”
It took a long time for the group to absorb that story. Finally—
“You’re still her,” Landar said.
Alessia shook her head no. Her eyes welled with water, but she fought back letting a tear fall.
Landar put his hand on hers. “There’s a story about a statue of Rone in a nearby village. It was a huge clay monument. For hundreds of years, everyone thought that’s all it was. Until one day, a monk was cleaning it and noticed a crack. A sliver of golden light appeared. Under the statue was solid gold. The monks of old had covered it with clay so that the invading raiders wouldn’t steal it. That’s what you’ve done—you’ve built a shell, a hardened exterior to protect yourself from the harsh world. But there’s still that bit of gold inside of you.”
“It’s too much pain,” Alessia said.
“You did what you had to do, but you need to forgive yourself for the clay and mud you’ve developed.”
Bam! Bam! Bam! More undead slammed into the wall.
Tears streamed down Landar’s cheeks as he looked into Alessia’s eyes. “Believe. In this mission. In us. In yourself.”
Alessia looked at the faces of the team staring at her. She swallowed. Took a breath. “We would need to find where the Queen’s grave is.”
Landar shook with excitement. “The schematic. Ex Vis—figure out where we are.”
“Hoppin’ on it.”
“Wait,” Omazz said. “What about the portal?”
Alessia sighed. “You’re gonna have to step up.”
Omazz nodded. “I can do it. I can. I think. Probably.”
Ex Vis pointed to the schematics.
“We’re here.” He slid his hand across the map. “And we need to get here.”
Alessia nodded, getting more into it. “We’re gonna have to fight across the catacombs. It’ll be dangerous.” She turned to the team. “But we’re gonna be more dangerous.” She extended a hand to Nimbus. “Aren’t we?”
Nimbus looked at the hand for a long beat. He looked broken. Finally, his good arm extended, clasping forearms.
The team stood together, ready for action.
“Time to kill some dead,” Korr said.