Chapter Text
“Why the frown, Yingxing? You too, Imbibitor Lunae!”
She should have known things wouldn’t last. All heroes would fall eventually. Her friends would eventually become Mara-struck and she couldn’t do anything about it. Why couldn’t she have stayed dead? Fate was a cruel, horrid thing. She was supposed to die in that starskiff. Her friends weren’t supposed to try to bring back a soul that hadn’t even moved on. Now, two of her friends become mara-struck, another was forcefully reborn, and the last had become the Divine Foresight, having to live through the fall of his friends.
All while she was still alive, trapped in her destiny of becoming the next Oracle.
“I’ve allowed you your bit of freedom. Your time has come to take your place.” The words echoed through her mind as she was confined to her new home far from the Loufu or the Express. “At least it’s furnished,” she had mumbled on her first day in the cave. Well, it was more like an apartment set inside a cave, but she didn’t care. She was trapped and she couldn’t escape.
But she tried. Baiheng tried so many times to escape her fate and to get back to her home. No matter how many times she was told the Loufu was no longer her home, to her, the Loufu would forever be her home. Each time she escaped, ghostly green snakes would wrap around her and bring her back.
“You can’t escape this life,” the spirits of the past oracles whispered in her ears. “You have a duty to fulfill. Do it with honor.”
“I don’t want this life!” Baiheng hissed, ears flat against her head and her tail swished in irritation. In a fit of rage, she threw a vase at the wall. “I should be with my friends!”
“You mean the immortal and the reborn dragon?”
“Shut up,” Baiheng snarled, tears brimming her eyes. She hated the spirits for the painful reminder of what remained of her friends. Jingliu fell and became a murderer. Yingxing is no longer himself. Dan Feng was gone. Poor Jing Yuan was left alone, and it was all her fault. But she didn’t have a choice. Everyone would have died if she didn’t pull that hail mary.
For years, she stayed alone in her cave, only visited by young demigods needing a prophecy for their quests. Most of the time, they didn’t return. She grew tired of sending young ones to their deaths—deaths she had already foreseen. She’d write out her prophecies sometimes to change things up a bit. Those prophecies she’d give to a friend to translate and send out. Other times, if she deemed a visitor too young, she’d deny a quest. She wrote letters all the time, hiding them away in a special chest.
Denied prophecies were little victories and acts of rebellion. Her way of ‘sticking it to the man’.
Sometimes she’d get visitors who’d just want to hang out with her. She didn’t mind hanging out. It was better than sitting alone all day doing nothing but sleeping, eating, writing letters, and repeating. Other times her siblings would visit. It was nice seeing her demigod siblings, even though it was unlikely she’d seen them again.
She didn’t know when she started to lose herself. Maybe the time spent alone was starting to catch up with her and drown her. Or maybe it was the fact the memories of her friends had started to fade over time. She barely remembered their voices anymore. Her only companion was the spirit, and even then, the spirit didn’t talk much outside of giving prophecies.
Loneliness ate away at her until there was almost nothing left.
Until fate gifted her a reprieve.
When Veritas Ratio showed up demanding a prophecy. She declined, not wanting to send another demigod off to their death. But his determination moved her. The light at the end of the tunnel grew brighter when he asked her to join him on his mission. A chance at freedom? She’d be a fool not to take it.
“Let’s see a smile!”