The Lore of Enchanter Sondra of the Brambles
Chapter 1
I’ll never forget the day Alchemist Hestia of the Hall #738 crashed back into my life, her once-familiar face now an otherworldly shade of emerald, her wild eyes blazing with a volatile mix of desperation and triumph. I’d known her since we were children, back when I was just Sondra of the Brambles #3439—before this curse warped my existence into a fog of unrelenting pain and despair, branding me of my treacherous future. She’d been my anchor then, a noble girl with a rebellious spark, always slipping free of her gilded prison to roam the woods with me. That was before the curse dug its venomous claws into my soul, before I became a burden too heavy for the world to bear.
It happened on a day like any other—or so it seemed. We’d been foraging for ingredients, Hestia’s latest potion brewing in her relentless mind. As we rounded a bend beneath a low-hanging halo of branches, a monstrous black slime lunged from the shadows, its oozing maw aimed straight for her. Instinct took over. I shoved her aside, my body a shield between her and the beast. But the slime’s hatred—its blight—latched onto me instead. I collapsed, motionless, agony searing through every nerve. Hestia, frantic yet resolute, scrambled to my side. With trembling hands, she uncorked a teleportation potion, and in a blinding flash, we were gone—whisked away to her secret sanctuary nestled deep within the Frogmaster Marsh.
That house was her rebellion made manifest, a haven hidden from her disapproving family. They scorned her alchemy, her refusal to embrace the noble life they’d carved out for her. She’d kept it from everyone—everyone but me. As I lay there, wracked with pain, she threw herself into saving me, her worry etched into every line of her face. She tried everything—potions, incantations, desperate pleas to forces she barely understood. But the curse was relentless, a poison too deep to purge. All she could do was dull its bite, suppress the symptoms that gnawed at my spirit. With tears in her eyes, she swore an oath that day—a debt she vowed to repay, no matter the cost.
Years passed, each one heavier than the last, until one day her familiar, Yuna—a squat, croaking creature with knowing eyes—found me. She nudged me toward the marsh, insistent, until I stood once more before Hestia’s hidden door. When I stepped inside, I barely recognized her. Her hair, her skin—every inch of her shimmered with an eerie green glow, as if she’d been forged in some fevered dream. Without a word, she pressed a vial into my shaking hands, her voice steady despite the storm raging in her gaze. “Drink it,” she commanded. “Don’t worry about me.” I stared at the liquid swirling within, a strange, luminous brew that seemed alive. Hestia had always been reckless, teetering on the edge of brilliance and madness, but this felt different—dangerous, even for her. Yet I trusted her. I’d trusted her when we were kids, sneaking into forbidden groves and laughing at the consequences. I trusted her now, green skin and all, with Yuna croaking softly at her heels.
The moment the potion kissed my lips, I felt it—a violent shudder tearing through me, as if the curse’s tendrils were being ripped from my core, thread by agonizing thread. The pain that had devoured me for years dissolved, replaced by a surge of strength I hadn’t known since before the poisonous curse claimed me. I gasped, my eyes locking onto Hestia’s. “This must be shared,” I whispered, the words spilling out before I could hold them back. She’d done it. She’d saved me.
Later, as the fire crackled in her marshbound hideaway, she told me everything. How she’d turned her back on the courts and titles her parents had shackled her to. How she’d spent years cloaking her obsession with alchemy from everyone but me, pouring her soul into forbidden experiments. Every sleepless night, every risk, every sacrifice—it had all been for me. That green hue staining her flesh? A price she’d paid, a mark of the lengths she’d gone to. And as I sat there, whole again, I realized the debt she’d sworn to repay had never been hers alone—it was ours, bound by a friendship that defied curses, time, and the world itself.
Entered by: 0xD9f7…1b90 and preserved on chain (see transaction)
