Chapter Text
*Diary Exerpt*
This is a diary my mother gave me.
I'm Angela, I'm 12 years old, and near my house, there's a magical spirit lagoon;
I live close to the ocean, so lagoons are commonplace, but this is a magical lagoon.
Dragons live near it. I saw one once, it was big and green, it had horns, it had gold on its claws.
I wanted to get closer to it, but my father ran up to me and scared it away.
I'm going to go see the lagoon tomorrow, and bring some bread. Maybe then it'll come back, and maybe it'll let me pet it.
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*25 years later*
Angela sighed quietly, looking over the lagoon with a dreamy expression upon her face. This was her favorite part of the day, looking over the lagoon. She remembered seeing a dragon here; it was beautiful, and terrifying, but never again reappeared. Still, Angela always showed up at the lagoon right around sundown every day without fail, to talk, to sing, or to write, something that didn't go unnoticed amongst the people in her village.
They always thought she was crazy, touched by an evil spirit, that made her this obsessive. They whispered that meeting the dragon at so young an age had made her mad.. But she always ignored them, and helped them nontheless. Angela had a natural talent with helping the sick and injured, they always seemed to get better after going to her for help. After a while, she opened up her own apothecary, selling various medicinal herbs and solutions to help her fellow villagers; she always stayed there every day, tending to the villagers with a cheerful smile and a gentle countenance.
Angela shook her head, thinking back on the events of the day... two people with colds, demanding herbs and a "solution", a dog with a sprained paw, and strangely enough, a few young couples wanting something to help in... the affection department. She shuddered, remembering their overly-blunt inquiries. Angela yawned and stretched, pacing around the lagoon's edge slowly. After a few minutes of pacing, Angela knelt at the edge of the water and splashed some of it on her face. She sighed quietly and looked across the water's surface, feeling peaceful.
A few minutes later, something caught Angela's eye, and she stood up; in the middle of the lagoon, a bright, green light emanated from under the water..
The normally calm, blue water was suddenly bubbling and frothing, almost as if it were boiling; it continued for a few minutes, then stopped; the water turned blue, no trace of the green light.
Angela stared at the water for a long time, tensed up, waiting to see if something were to come out of it, but it never came, and it was only after many hours did she finally go back home.
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The next day, Angela locked up her little apothecary-home, and marched back to the lagoon. She wore old, worn-out clothes, suitable for swimming in, and carried a new change of clothes. She carefully set the clothing on top of a smooth, grey rock, then waded out into the lagoon itself, determined to find out what the hell happened out there the other day, whether it was some weird, mystical being, or if she was starting to go mad; as she waded in, the water going past her knees, a few seagulls flew overhead lazily, and the sun came out from behind the clouds, shining bright and hot, lighting the whole lagoon with its rays.
After a minute or so, Angela had to start swimming; the lagoon was deeper than she thought, and she struggled with staying afloat, unused to actually swimming. "Just because you suddenly got deeper doesn't mean I'm going to give up and run." She huffed, tossing her head back to try and get the hair out of her eyes; she paddled forward a few paces, then screamed as she felt something like a bird's claw wrap around her ankle and pull her down, beneath the waters of the lagoon. The only beings that noticed her scream were the birds, who merely flew off. The sun was hidden behind a cloud, and the lagoon itself darkened until the clothes were hidden in shadow, and the water turned grey.