Will Bleakness Overcome?

Threads dance on needles of darkness, tenebrous as can be. The moon, barely scratching apart the darkness and illuminating the night.

    Dark as can be, a forlorn cliff, a desolate dive into the abyss. What horrors will await one should they try their luck and plunge into the bottomless pit?

    Upon the shadowed ridge, the hallowed promenade between life and death eternal. There lies one with such an intent, the murky abyss beacons them into its releasing grasp.

     This person, no, woman of such daring, looks nervously off what is intended to become her final resting ground. One foot nervously planted upon the edge of the rockface, stones crumbling down into the black mist.

    She looks back, she sees the bleak journey that has led her to such a frivolous choice. Her family is chanting her name, as if to say, "Free yourself from this torment, take the step Cordelia."

    Even so, she still hesitates, remembering the happiest moments of her life. The cheerful memories seem to lighten up the night, if only a little.

    Now is the time, the long awaited moment. Her knees bend, cringing at the joints, pleading for her to reconsider.

    Her knees spring back, pushing her thin body off the last solid ground she'll ever feel. 

    She's stopped though, a clawing hand pulls her back, tearing at her arm. It's face, the grinning abyss.

    Her death is swift, limbs flying off into the ocean of red below. A tendril-like hand reaches for her chest, her soul.

    It grasps it and darkness leaks in, corrupting the pure white visage with veins of black. Slowly, her experiences are being consumed; savored as her soul crumbles into nothingness.

    All seems lost. Even her sense of self is no more than a leaf lost upon the currents of wind and wave.

    Despite all that, despite her longingness for death's fateful grasp. She, remains stalwart.

    Among this crushing terror of total despair, in darkness void of light; arises a hope, a plea for the life she previously shunned. Determination always prevails.

    To protect the shrinking white of her soul, the last remaining vestige of hope; she does the unthinkable. She cuts off the flowing darkness, sealing away all that within for good.

    The darkness churns, screaming in rage as the lone soul is taken into the hands of a pitying deity. Sliced apart by light, the darkness fades and the sun rises once more.

    In the careful hands of the smiling goddess, Cordelia is taken far from earth. In space, she travels.

    When the destination had been reached, the benignant lady stepped down upon the new world and dived into the sea. She searches long and wide for a compatible suit, eventually dawning upon a lost corpse.

    She gingerly places the tired soul into the still warm flesh and smiles. With her job complete, she leaves one last gift, attaching it onto the sleeping soul, before departing with a sad smile on her lips.

~~~

    Cordelia awakes with a jolt, she opens her eyes to feel them blur. She looks around and the abyss stares back.

    Faintly, she feels her head ache. She thinks as though she's forgotten something, a huge gap present in her mind.

    She can't remember much more than her name and even that, is fading. She attempts to fill the void, to grasp at the threads and pull back that which she can.

     All of a sudden, it hits her. She vaguely remembers standing on a cliff, her legs pushing her off into Stygian darkness and then despair.

    The darkness doesn't feel so friendly now, it feels like a force, crushing down upon her soul. A grinning smile, laughing as it pulls her deeper into the embraceless deep.

    The light is nowhere to be found, just pure black tenebrosity.

    Nothing solid, nothing to affirm Cordelia that she does indeed still exist. She allows herself to slip into pure despair, the darkness leaking futher into her cracked visage.

    Then, among all that nothingness in the abyss; she hears a voice, calling her name.

*Repairment of Soul: Complete

*Validating Host: Complete

*Removal of Corruption: ...Failure

*Formulation of System: Complete

*System Greeting: Hello Cordelia

Name: Cordelia

Title(s): None

Age: 7

Race: Juvenile Abyss Strafer

Bloodline: Lesser half-demon

Level: 3

Tier: 1

HP: 35/35

MP: 13/13

AGT: 4

VIT: 6

DEF: 3

STR: 4

INT: 5

WIS: 2

Stygian Essence: 1

Active Skill(s): Thrash - LVL 1, Common Bite - LVL 1, and Dread - LVL 2 

Passive Skill(s): Enhanced Sight - LVL max, and Adaptive Hearing - LVL 3

    "What... is this? Could these be the be the words of a god?" Gasped Cordelia, her eyes momentarily blinded by the white light in this murky abyss.

    "No! Am I really alive!?" Such thrill shouldn't have been present in her voice after wanting to die for so long, but it undeniably was.

    "I remember reading about something like this before! Many stories actually!" Exclaimed Cordelia.

    "But does that mean... I'm not human any more?" Paused Cordelia as a grin slowly formed on her frail visage.

    "Yeah! I hated that life anyways!" Rejoiced Cordelia.

    "It sounds weird to say, floating in the middle of an abyss; but... sometimes, I've found it helps to be overly positive." Sighed Cordelia with a sort of grim smile, reality was really starting to set in.

*New Quest: Find nourishment to feed your dying body - Time limit: 2 days

    Cordelia winces in the system's light, though, she can understand it enough to know what she must do, "The light offers guidance through the darkness, I guess I have no other choice, but to take it." 

    Cordelia beams, "There has to be a bottom to this ocean! Things can't be that bad... at least, not as bad as my old life was..."

    Such was the thinking of our bleak and weary protagonist, staying strong amidst the abyss.

    She dives deep into the currentless darkness, searching for a bottom, for relief. Down, down, she goes, ever deeper into the surely bottomed pit of the abyss.

    Seconds turn to minutes, minutes, to hours... and still, no bottom. A day and half has passed at this point and Cordelia is very much at a breaking point.

    True despair was setting in, blurring senses, altering vision. Showing things, not quite there.

    "Bottom... there has to, there has to be a bottom!" Screamed Cordelia for the fiftieth time this day.

    Yellow eyes shone from the darkness, watching. Cordelia felt her heart burst from her chest when its body turned fully luminescent.

    Six powerful appendages draped from its mouth, each promising sure death. The mouth dripped with acid as the eyes, six to count, never left sight of Cordelia.

    Cordelia starts frantically chanting the name of her god, going completely hysterical. 

    To save her sorry soul, she attempts to play dead, trying her best not to shake with overwhelming fear.

    The creature persists on, hovering over the shaken Cordelia. She can feel its scales tear through her supple flesh as it rubs up against her.

    Acid spreads into the waters around her, slowly rotting her body as it drips from the behemoth's hallowed lips. It opens its mouth, ready to eat.

    Just as its jaws open, just as its gleaming teeth shine through the waters, it turns tail and swims away. Something else is near, something larger, something... much more dangerous.

    A creature of fiendish proportions is coming. Quickly, Cordelia dives deep into the sea, moving at an extraordinary pace for such a stature.

    Thankfully, the titanous beast seems to have its attentions elsewhere, but Cordelia doesn't feel like sticking around to find out. She continues her descent deeper into madness as well ocean; deeper and deeper she dives into the caliginous tenebrosity.

    Hunger knaws at her very bones as the pressure increases by maginitudes at a time. It was becoming harder and harder to dive into the abyss.

    Still, Cordelia persists, braving the darkness.

   She looks around. Pitch black, night's shadow; true Stygian darkness.

    She feels weak, she can't move much futher. She needs food, she needs energy and she needs it now.

    Among the closing eyes, past the hand of death reaching out for its lost quarry, lies a hopeful light. Cordelia has just lain eyes upon the Blue Reef of The Stygian Strait.

    Her body moves on impulse, dragging her closer to the blue sanctuary of light. She moves closer, reaching out for the distant haven.

    Fish swim past, leaving Cordelia to marvel at its beauty. Somehow, Cordelia has made it to the first respite, against all odds.

    She feels a growing pride and a rumbling belly, relaxation can come later; for now, she hunts.