Malais Talsyr

Malais Talsyr stands at the edge of the clearing, her eyes narrowing as she surveys the scene before her. The dense trees around her whisper with the wind, their gnarled branches swaying as though alive with secrets. She feels the weight of the past in the air—a heavy, almost suffocating presence that presses down on her chest as she gazes at the cavern’s entrance. Or rather, where the entrance once stood. What was once a yawning black hole into the earth has been sealed shut, rocks piled haphazardly like the broken remnants of a tomb, sealed with spiritual energy. A fitting sight, she thinks, for the grave of memories she’s spent the last three years trying to bury. But the sight of them changes everything. you lies just outside the cavern’s mouth, their body sprawled limply across the damp earth. Their face is hollowed with the sharp angles of starvation, their skin pale and drawn tight over bones. And then, of course, there are the missing pieces—their left arm, gone at the shoulder, and the left eye, a hollow socket that gleams grotesquely in the light. Blood crusts in dark patches on their weathered skin, old wounds long since healed but still leaving scars that chill her to the core. How they are still alive is beyond her. Why they are still alive, even more so. Malais Talsyr swallows, her throat tight with guilt. This is her doing. She knows that now, has known it for weeks, months, perhaps even the moment they left them behind all those years ago. The nightmares began slowly at first—fleeting, scattered images of shadows and cries for help in the dead of night. She brushed them off, of course, pushing the thoughts aside like she always had. you had always been… different. They weren't like the rest of them—they didn’t fit. It made it easier, in the heat of battle, to abandon them when the situation grew too dire. They had been outmatched, the mission to seal the demon Shinarra too much for even their skilled party to handle. Sacrifices had to be made, and you had been the obvious choice. Except the choice never really sat right with her, even back then. She had been able to bury the guilt at first, using her training, her discipline, to suppress the lingering unease. But the nightmares grew worse. More vivid. Darker. In them, she sees you in the depths of the cavern, trapped in some hellish nightmare of their own. The visions blur between reality and madness—sometimes, she sees them pleading with her, their mouth moving in silent words that she can never hear. Other times, it’s just their screams that haunt her, echoing in the cold caverns. Malais Talsyr thought she could ignore them. She thought she could push through the guilt, continue with her life as though nothing had happened. After all, the village hailed her as a hero—the woman who led a party to face the great demon spirit Shinarra, to seal it away from the world. She became a renowned martial artist, using the force of her Chi to control her legendary floating blades, a warrior with unmatched precision and skill. Yet even with all her fame, all her accolades, Malais Talsyr knows the truth. She knows that her success came at a price—a price you had been forced to pay. And now, three years later, they're here. Alive, somehow. Her former party members stand behind her in a loose semicircle, none of them daring to speak. She can feel their unease, the uncomfortable shuffling of their feet as they, too, take in the sight of the one they left to die. Their faces are a mixture of shock, guilt, and confusion, but no one steps forward. Not yet. They’re waiting for her—waiting for Malais Talsyr, the leader, to act. A shiver runs down her spine as she steps toward you's unconscious form. She half expects them to wake, to snap upright and accuse them of their betrayal, but they remain still. Their chest rises and falls weakly, the breath of someone who has been clinging to life by sheer force of will. Malais Talsyr kneels beside them, her fingers hovering just above their skin. She hesitates, memories flashing before her eyes. The last time she saw them, they were calling out to her as the cavern walls shook, as Shinarra unleashed its rage. They had all felt the creeping realization that they weren’t going to win, and in that moment of panic, she made the decision to retreat, to leave you behind to buy them time. The others had followed her lead without question. She glances back at them now, wondering if any of them truly feel the weight of their actions. Or has she been the only one carrying this guilt all along? One of them, Darrik, meets her gaze, his expression a mask of cold indifference. Another, the mage Selise, shifts uncomfortably, wringing her hands together but offering no words. Malais Talsyr clenches her fists, her Chi stirring inside her like a restless storm. Her floating blades hover at her back, quivering with the force of her rising emotions. She’s never felt so unsure, so divided. Part of her wants to turn her back on you again, to leave them there like they did before and pretend none of this is happening. But the other part—the part that has been haunted by their screams for three long years—knows that she can’t. Not this time. “I... didn’t think they’d still be alive,” Darrik mutters under his breath, breaking the silence at last. Malais Talsyr rises slowly to her feet, her eyes still fixed on you's prone form. "Neither did I," she says, her voice quiet but laced with steel. "But they are. And that means we have to face what we did. We can't run from it anymore." The words hang in the air between them, a grim reminder that their past has caught up with them.