Chapter 6: Chapter 6 – It’s not a Game

I ran with purpose, right back to where this all started.

Tears started welling up in my eyes but even though I wasn’t in front of the boys anymore, I still refused to cry. I ran back through the streets Noelle led me through the night before. There was some mild destruction here and there, but it seemed that largely the monster attack had been quelled. Other villagers dressed in some combat leathers or borrowed armors were cleaning up from the ordeal or checking on other civilians. Making my way through the streets, I encountered no further danger or resistance. I cleared the village gates and continued at a dead sprint up the hill towards the remains of the Goddess’ temple.

Dresses were not meant for running in, let alone a dead sprint. Luckily the thing was so short on me, otherwise I would have probably tripped and fallen into the dirt half a dozen different times. I also thanked the Goddess that all of my much longer hair was tied up in a neat braid, keeping it out of my face while I beat down my path towards the temple. Making the trip up the hill without having to stop, I was panting and sweating hard as I reached my destination. Despite this, I realized I still was not completely out of breath, despite my dead sprint from the moment I had left the boys in the square. While a pleasant realization, I had more important things to address, and I stalked over to the altar.

“Goddess!” I cried out to her. “We need to talk! Now!”

Nothing. Not even a whisper on the wind. 

I felt all of my emotions start to bubble over as I pleaded again. 

“Goddess please! I need someone who can even begin to understand what I am going through! I can’t talk to anyone else about my situation the way I can talk to you!”

Still nothing.

I was starting to get desperate. Feeling helpless and lost, I started to wonder if I really had experienced our conversation last night. Had I truly been so delirious after my landing that I imagined the Goddess speaking to me? 

I glanced over to my crater and confirmed it was still there. No that couldn’t be right! Last night had most definitely happened! I knew I had experienced my free fall from space and taken out the church. There was no way that wasn’t real.

Or had it been? Was I dreaming all of this?

Looking for any kind of reassurance, I slapped myself in the face as hard as I dared. 

“Ow!” I yelped. I rubbed my sore cheek and admitted to myself I was definitely awake. I turned back to the altar and the stained-glass portrayal of the Goddess.

My voice started to go raw from my screaming, “Please Goddess! I need you!” My emotions felt on the brink. I hesitated and looked down at the ground before saying, “I… I can’t do this. I can’t be who you want me to be.” Finally voicing what I had been holding back up to this point, I didn’t feel better. Instead, I was filled with despair. I truly was lost and alone. 

Suddenly I felt a warmth rush through me and then surround me before I heard that familiar voice in my head, “Had a bit of your over confidence shaken earlier, hmm?”

I shook my head. “It’s not just a confidence issue. I-” I stopped. It was so many things. Where did I begin to explain to her that I couldn’t possibly be her Champion? She had gotten it wrong.

“This is just too much! Have you seen what it’s like down there?” I waved down to Bronzemead below. Images of the young girls being paraded about in what amounted to almost their underwear at the Wish, serving drinks to drunk and lecherous middle-aged men flashed through my mind again. I shuddered as I then thought of Roscoe lurking in the back of the bar, leering at them and licking his lips like a wolf preying on it’s next meal. 

Then the smell of the rotten undead and the sight of them feasting on dead villagers in the Square hit me next. People had died this morning. They had woken up thinking today would be just another day. Or maybe they hadn’t! Maybe they had woken up thinking today would be that day they got that new job or bought that gift they finally had the courage to give to the one they love. Only to have that dream smashed into nothingness by a twist of fate. By a girl who unknowingly smashed their one line of defense from the supernatural forces in this world.

By me.

I collapsed to my knees and started bawling. Tears fell freely from my face and pooled on the ground beneath me, identical to the pools of blood back in the Square. This wasn’t a game. It was nothing like one of my online adventures. The choices weren’t real there. There were no real consequences to my actions then. No one suffered if I picked some wrong dialogue or helped the wrong person. Now everything I did mattered. 

And worse, everything I didn’t do mattered more. 

My body shook. I sniffled. I bawled. I howled with despair. I hadn’t cried this hard or uncontrollably since Mom. At least then I had Dad. He had been there to lift me up and tell me everything would be alright. 

Now? Now I was alone.

“Everything will be alright. You aren’t alone in this struggle.”

I looked up at the stained glass, again immediately furious. “You think just because you can read my mind and know my thoughts, you can just tell me what you think I want to hear? That you can magically make it all ok? That my problems will instantly vanish?”

“What did you think this task I appointed to you was going to be like? I warned you there would be challenges along the way, and not just the simple ones such as monster slaying. I know I warned you there would be monsters but,” She sighed heavily. “Monsters come in many forms, as I am sure you learned today.”

It wasn’t a hard stretch to connect the dots on that comment. Roscoe easily fit the bill as an unexpected monster to overcome.

“Indeed.” She acknowledged, again reading my thoughts. “And it’s only going to get worse if you continue down this path. Roscoe is just one of many men with power and the freedom to abuse it.”

I stopped for a moment.

“If I continue?”

“I told you I could send you back. That wasn’t necessarily contingent on you completing the task I summoned you here for. If you wish to return home… if you feel this task is too great for you, then I can grant your wish.” Gone was the cheeky Goddess from last night. She had been replaced with a more somber toned deity that seemed to understand my despair and my outlook of hopelessness. One that, despite her desire to help her people, would actually fulfill my request to send me home if I asked, no matter how much it may pain her to do so. She was very much like a mother attempting to console her grieving child. 

“What would happen if I said yes?” I turned and gestured down to the village again, but the Goddess understood it wasn’t just Bronzemead I was implying. It was all of the people she had brought me here to save. The lives she wanted to change for the better.

“They will continue to suffer. I cannot tell the future, so I know not how mankind will fair with the return of the forces of darkness and a rekindled war between the Gods. “Her voice turned to one of disdain as she considered what would happen if the Gods had their way, “Man would be a mere tool in their stupid games at best, an afterthought at worst. There would be suffering and death for those who call Eitania home before it would end, assuming it ended at all.”

“Couldn’t you just summon another Champion? I’m sure you had a laundry list of choices to pick from, right? There has got to be someone more suited to this task than me!”

“There is none better. I searched far and wide before deciding on you, Amelia. You, alone, I have chosen. There will be no other.”

“Goddess, I know I told you this was something I could do, but I’m just a seventeen-year-old girl! This isn’t just saving the world from warring gods and monsters oppressing humans! This is politics and cultural and class divides and…. and I was wrong.” I clinched my eyes shut so tightly they burned. “So very wrong!” I started crying again and punched the ground in frustration. I kneeled over further to rest my forehead on the ground, now wet from my tears. 

“I’m nobody’s Champion.”

I felt a warmth touch both of my cheeks, like two hands softly caressing them, and I felt my face being lifted back up. I opened my eyes with my gaze again resting on the stained-glass Goddess. There was no one there caressing my face, yet the feeling of warmth remained as I was lifted to my feet. 

“That is why I picked you. I can sense the selflessness in your heart.”

I could hear her smile as she said these words and my heart ached to hear that she still had faith in me.

“You know what it is like to experience love and loss. You know the courage it takes to stand, even when all you wish to do is fall. Yes, the challenges you are realizing exist now are far greater than you originally perceived, but I know you can overcome them. You are my Champion.”

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She paused while I brushed the tears from my face. Her words were warm and encouraging. 

“And as I told you before, you aren’t alone….”

I turned and beheld Chad, Dorian and Ash all standing at the threshold of the temple, watching me. Each of them looked in awe while gazing at me, but their stark white faces told me they were seeing something beyond their imagination.

It was in that moment I realized I was no longer standing in front of the altar. I had thought when the Goddess clasped her hands to my cheeks to lift me from my kneeling position of despair and self-destruction, she had actually lifted me off the ground! 

I was not only floating a few feet off the ground, but I was also glowing brightly. My limbs felt weightless and were floating effortlessly in the air. In the corner of my eye, I caught the sight of celestial looking wings that had materialized from me. They did not have a physical presence and I could not feel them as a part of me but based on the face of my audience I must have been quite a sight. 

The wings and my glow faded slowly, and I felt the presence of the Goddess fade with them. Drifting back down to the ground, they slowly approached me. Ash immediately bowed his head and again addressed me, “Goddess.”

Dorian and Chad were speechless, an oddity for both of them. Chad started looking around me for any other explanation of what he just saw while Dorian gently touched one of my hands and then ran his hand up my arm, confirming if I was still real.

I smiled awkwardly as I addressed Ash, “I told you before. I am not your Goddess made real. I am just Amelia.” I smiled sweetly at him this time, attempting to make up for our previous conversation. He smiled back.

“Ok, Amelia.” 

I touched him gently on his head and stroked his hair as a big sister might, then turned to Chad and Dorian with an obviously puzzled expression.

“Why did you three follow me?”

Neither of them seemed aware I had even asked the question.

“What—” Chad started, “What was that!” His face was full of disbelief and confusion. 

“I didn’t imagine that right?” Dorian chimed in. “She was the Goddess made real there for a moment, right? I mean did you see that glow? Those wings?” He flapped his arms wildly and looked back and forth between Chad and Ash for confirmation. 

Chad still seemed unable to speak coherently, but Ash answered for him.

“She is a blessing to us, Dorian.” He pointed at the crater not far from us. “Brought here to us from the Goddess herself. Noelle investigated the site of the shooting star last night and found Amelia here. She wa— is the star!” He waved around at the destruction. “She crashed here from the Heavens above and yet Noelle found her without a mark on her.” Ash blushed deeply before adding, “She was naked…”

I rolled my eyes. They didn’t need to hear that part. Why would Ash include that part?

Dorian got a mischievous grin on his face. “Damn! Why had I not been closer! That discovery could have been made by me!”

Taking advantage of their confusion about my identity, I joked to him,” Is that how you talk about your Goddess?”

He immediately waved both hands at me and attempted to apologize, clearly flustered. “I mean, I’m glad you were uninjured milady! We are humbled by your presence-!”

I started blushing uncontrollably, again feeling very awkward around him. “Relax, Dorian.” I attempted to sound convincing, “I was just giving you a taste of your own medicine.”

He looked partially relieved, if not entirely convinced that I couldn’t smite him down where he stood if the mood struck me. 

Chad had wandered off to get a closer inspection of the stained-glass Goddess behind us. He had his mouth tweaked in a confused frown, his right hand holding his face as if deep in thought. 

“Chad?” I called, “Is everything alright?” I hoped that my moment of being touched by a deity had not caused what little relationship we had to make a turn for the worst. 

He finally turned to acknowledge me, “I believe you when you say you are not the Goddess. I also believe Ash’s claim that you are still a gift from her. Your presence a moment ago cannot be explained by any other paltry means.” He started striding back towards us, his tone now shifting to one of confusion. “Unfortunately, these realizations have me faced with many internal dilemmas. I still believe your future is entwined with mine, but how exactly that will come to be is a mystery to me. It leaves me questioning a lot of things.”

He sighed and rested his forehead in the palm of one of his hands. “I apologize for my earlier actions and behavior, Amelia”.

My eyes widened and my mouth dropped open. Now it was my turn for disbelief! He had used my name for the first time! It was not lost on me what kind of implication that must have meant to him. Dorian and Ash also appeared surprised. 

He reached forward and took my hand but made no move to kiss it as before, instead placing his other hand on top of it. He intentionally met my gaze and said, “Ash appears correct that you have been brought by the Goddess to accomplish a higher purpose or task. I vow to stay by your side until that has been completed.” I started to blush at this level of seriousness and directness from him and found myself nervously wanting to look away. 

But then he continued, “You have my word as the Crown prince, Chadwick the 127th!” His signature massive grin returned to his sculpted face, and he added, “And, in time, you will see that we are indeed destined to be man and wife and that the Goddess has also declared it your destiny to remain happily with me once your trials are over.”

I sighed and facepalmed with my other free hand, the romantic moment lost.

He was so close.

Dorian lightly coughed beside us.

“Not to be overlooked over here, but I am also going to see this through. The Goddess obviously has set something in motion, with you as a key piece. If Chad believes he is a key to in these machinations, then I can’t see too many outcomes where I was not meant to help you.” He then also grinned and added, “Can’t leave Chadwick here to do all the heavy lifting!”

We all turned to Ash. 

He smiled and shrugged nonchalantly, as if it wasn’t even a question, and then bowed his head again, “I am by your side, now and forever, until the moment you declare it not so, Amelia.” 

Why must these cute boys also be so proper? 

Hearing him also finally using my name rather than a title was further catching me off guard and I blushed a bit again while staring at the three of them.

I caught them all with their eyes on me, noticing my discomfort. I then composed myself and turned back to look at the image of the Goddess once again, sunlight shining through the window and bathing us in it’s warm glow.

“We’ve got work to do.”

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