Finding my Parents in Another World

The stench. The unbearable stench.

Zoe woke up, with an overpowering stench surrounding her. She was initially not able to determine where she was or what was causing that stench. As her eyes got used to the darkness, she realised she was on the floor of some sort of building.

She stood up groggily, and tried to coolly retrace her steps. She along with her husband and son were on their yearly retreat to Mulberry and then...

Yes something had struck their car. A boulder? Another car? Zoe couldn't recall exactly what, but she did remember everything going dark and then being awoken by a brown light.

I grant you the power of the earth

What was the power of the earth? As if instinctively Zoe stretched her hand out, and as if on cue the ground beneath her shook. It felt familiar, it felt....powerful. Zoe felt at ease for the first time, and immediately she felt like she could use the power granted at will.

As if to test she turned around and imagined a the earth infront of her curving up to form a ball. Immediately the floor cracked and the ground under eath burst through, forming the shape she wanted.

And then for the first time she noticed the statue.

At the very end of room she was in was a broken statue of what seemed like a woman with a halo on top of her head. In her life on Earth, even though she had been a model, her chosen subject of study at University was archaelogy. Zoe could recognise motifs even on unknown worlds and understand what it meant.

In this case, it was quite clear. The building she was in was a Church, or a religious building. The object of worship was the woman in front of her whose statue now lay in disrepair.

A dead religion? An abandoned God?

Zoe shrugged. Her first priority now was not to identify the secrets of the world, but rather to find her son and husband. As per the brown light, they would also be somewhere in this world and they could only save the being who brought them here together.

Zoe took an inventory of what she had. She was wearing a t-shirt and jeans, although the left sleeve of her t-shirt had been torn open. She went over to one of the mirrors in the room to try and fix the torn edge, and then noticed her tired face in the mirror. Even tired though, she still looked extremely beautiful and graceful. In fact her former manager had contacted her only a few days back to enquire whether she was open to coming back to the modelling industry.

"Believe me you are more beautiful now with your maturity than you ever were before." He had promised.

Zoe had just laughed then, but she would never go back to that industry. She was happy with her current job of a professor.

Correction - former

Of course the fact that she was really dead and had no way to go back to that life hadn't completely sunk in yet. Forlornly Zoe tied the end of her sleeve and then decided to step out of the church.

As she walked out and then looked back at the Church, she noticed the name written on top of the door.

The Church of Laments

What a sad name

But then again the state of the church was even sadder. Once the church would have had a huge spiral roof, but half of the spiral had fallen down and there was a huge hole right in the middle of the roof.

As Zoe stood looking at this scene, she heard the sound of wailing coming from behind her. Curious and worried she started investigating the source of the sound. The wailing rhythmically changed in severity, going up and then down, for a while.

Eventually Zoe found a group of women in white nun's clothing huddled together a little ways from the church. Hearing her approach one of the nuns looked up and then backed away immediately in fear.

"Easy there." Zoe said in a gentle voice and a smile.

"I won't hurt you."

"Who..who are you?" The nun asked, and then Zoe saw that this nun was really just a child, much younger than even her own son.

"I...I am a professor from a far off land"

"A professor? An educator?"

"Yes yes an educator." Zoe said with a reassuring smile.

One of the other nuns stood up and said, "Lorna don't talk to strangers." And pulled the child in behind her.

"I am sorry, I meant no harm." Zoe said apologetically.

The older nun looked apathetically at her. Even though the corners of her eyes were red with crying, now her face showed no emotion.

"I apologize if our crying disturbed you. We will be on our way." She said and then bowed.

Zoe saw that she was much younger than she had initially surmised as well, not more than 20 years old. The third nun was still crying on the ground but when the second nun tapped her on the shoulder, she stood up as well and bowed to Zoe before they started making their way away from there.

"Wait!" Zoe cried out.

The nuns turned back quizzically.

"Ah, well.....it seems you all are members of a religion, and I saw a dilapidated church close by here. I wonder if you could tell me something about it."

The third nun enthusiastically responded, "You are interested in the Goddess of Bounty?"

"No Simea, she is just a traveller she won't know who the Goddess of Bounty is." The second nun chided gently.

"Oh." Simea's shoulders slumped in disappointment and she looked so pitiful that Zoe was almost inclined to go and give her a reassuring hug.

The second nun faced Zoe again.

"Very well traveller. I will attempt to give you an overview. My name is Famina. As you would have surmised already, the older one of my compatriots is Simea and the younger one is Lorna. What is your name if I may ask?"

"I am Zoe."

"Very well then Zoe. I will attempt to tell you about our Goddess. Many many years ago, when there were still there Great Kingdoms, one of the Kingdoms was the Kingdom of the Goddess. This Kingdom worshipped the Goddess of Bounty, and we had several festivals every year providing offerings to the Goddess. In turn the Goddess blessed us with bountiful food and extensive resources which we traded to become the richest of the Great Kingdoms. Of course the other two Kingdoms became jealous of our riches.

Thus the Last Great War, where two of the Great Kingdoms were wiped away forever and where the Mist, the Satan made his first appearance. During the War all Churches were burned down, any monks of the Church found were burned alive and any nun of the Church were raped first and then burned alive." Here Famina gave a scornful chuckle. "You know the nuns of the Church take a vow of chastity for life. It is believed that the Goddess only welcomes those into her Garden after death who have remained chaste through life. By raping them before killing them, those brutes ensured that these nuns would get no respite, no salvation even after death." There was a glint of terrible anger in Famina's eyes for a moment but then it quickly subsided.

"And so the Great War concluded, with the only winner being the Mist. Even though this Great Kingdom survived that war, it won't be long before it too succumbs to the Mist. And even though there were extreme efforts to wipe us out in the War, an idea can never die. We still survive, we still pray for the day our Goddess returns and showers us with blessings once more." Here Famina concluded her sad tale.

Zoe had been quiet throughout the tale, whether due to the extremely sad nature of it or in respect to the defiance in Famina's eyes.

"I..I am sorry, I really had no idea of the history of this land." She finally stammered out.

Famina looked at her, then quickly scanned her clothes and then sighed.

"Long ago there was a legend. A prophecy if you will. Of people who came from another world. Otherworlders. Of course it has been so long that no one believes it till now. But you..." Famina trailed off still looking at Zoe, and this time she saw there was a bit of hope hidden in that defiance.

What should I do?

Of course Zoe couldn't count Famina as an ally just yet. After all they had just met in an unfamiliar land. Famina could be as much of an enemy as anyone else. But looking at the young girl's eyes, somehow Zoe couldn't see her as an enemy.

"Yes you are right. I am from another world. I was sent here by some....being to save them. Maybe your goddess." Zoe added the last part, even though she was certain that the brown light was no Goddess.

Famina nodded, however Zoe could see that Simea and Lorna beside her both had their mouth open in surprise.

"You are too late Otherworlder." Famina said ruefully. "Our Goddess is gone. It's only us that are left."

"Then it's only you that I will save." Zoe said with a smile. Something about these girls activated her motherly instinct. The mournful look in them perhaps.

Famina looked up and was about to say something when they were interrupted by a sudden sound.

Horses.

.XX.

"Oho what do we have here?" The burly man who rode first evidently seemed to be their leader.

It had been barely a minute after they had heard horses for there to be suddenly four horsemen appearing out of the jungle and surrounding them. Judging by their demeanour and the rough clothes, Zoe surmised that they were probably the bandits of this area.

"Well Jumheart, it seems we have hit the jackpot. Four live women." The leader repeated once more licking his lips.

"We are from the Church of the Goddess, let us leave in peace." Famina said. Zoe really admired the courage of this young girl.

"Haha look at this girl Muns. She thinks being from the Church will save her." The one called Jumheart said, talking to the leader.

The leader, evidently called Muns, had however noticed Zoe among the three nuns. His face took on an unnatural leer.

"And what do we have here? An exotic foreigner hiding amongst nuns?" Muns said advancing on his horse towards Zoe.

"Let these girls go bandit. Otherwise you may live to regret it." Zoe said calmly.

"Oho feisty. I like my women feisty before I rape the shit out of them. When I have my cock in you, you will be crying just the same." Muns continued to the laughter of the other three bandits.

"We should make a run for it." Simea whispered, tugging at Famina's sleeve. Even though she was much older, it seemed that she relied on Famina to keep them all safe.

Famina pursed her lips and just as she was about to answer, Zoe put a hand on her shoulder.

"Leave them to me." She said.

At this Muns started laughing even harder.

"A brave one aren't you darling?" He said mockingly and then gave a tug at his reins causing all four horsemen to advance at once towards the group.

Zoe didn't have full confidence that what she was thinking would work. In fact she was operating almost entirely on intuition. However through her years Zoe had learned to trust her intuition, it had served her well in her career, and she had full faith in it to serve her well even now in an unfamiliar environment.

She extended her fingers in front of her. She felt the tingle of power at the edge of her fingers. She imagined the earth rising up to her call, the ground becoming a prison for the bandits. Just like in the church.

Yes exactly, just like at the Church

As she felt herself becoming one with the Earth, the ground in front of them began to shake. Then it seemed as if the ground itself began to rise up, coils of sand forming tendrils that trapped the bandit's horses and then the bandits themselves in a prison of sand.

Muns and Jumheart were the first ones to be caught in it, their horses going down into the sand and then they themselves. Once they had fallen down, the sand around them surroundes them completely, creating a globe of sand that encircled them and prevented movement of any kind. The other two bandits on seeing this, promptly turned their horses and fled.

Smart fellas

Famina, Simea and Lorna watched agape in surprise at this show of magik.

"You might be our promised one after all." Famina whispered.

However as soon as the sand prison was created, Zoe doubled over in exhaustion. It seemed she was not yet capable of using this power to its full capability.

Famina came closer and put a hand on her shoulder.

"Come with us, Otherworlder. You are our best hope of salvation." Famina pleaded.

Zoe smiled amidst panting and then nodded.

"You bitch!" Came Mun's voice from within the sand prison.

"You should have escaped like your compatriots. They atleast had the intelligence you lacked." Zoe said, now in a mocking tone.

"You'll regret not killing me you bitch. I will come back for revenge and this time your sand won't save you." Muns was shouting from within the globe.

Zoe hadn't even considered killing him yet. After all she hadn't even come close to killing an actual human being. It felt like a step too far.

Should I break his legs?

Immediately Zoe shook her head, horrified with herself. How could she casually suggest maiming a human? Had this power really changed her so quickly?

"Should we do something about him?" Simea asked, concerned.

"Leave him. The Goddess preaches mercy, and anyway a sand prison is impossible to break out from the within." Famina said.

Zoe was about to ask how Famina knew what the structure she had made was, but before she could Famina immediately changed the subject.

"So Otherworlder will you come with us now?"

"Only if you call me Zoe."

Famina smiled. "Well then Zoe let us go."

"Go where?"

Famina paused here and looked back at the direction of the Church.

"To complete the Trials of the Goddess."