Ascension

'It's just another bad dream...' Bell thought to herself.

She sat up, flipping her sheets off of herself, she then turned and allowed her legs to dangle off of the bed. After shaking the fresh nightmare from her mind, Bell became aware of a floating window that sat in front of her.

The floating window was made of shimmering glass with strange inscriptions etched into it. The inscriptions were hundreds of small glyphs made of various slashes and scratches in a small area.

As Bell looked at the glyphs, they soon made sense to her, strangely enough.

[To Candidate Bellona Finley]

[Do you accept the rewards of your Trial, and take up the mantle of a Challenger?]

[Yes / No]

After a moment, she thought to herself.

'It's my birthday?!' 

Whenever a person reached their sixteenth birthday, a window appears before them, each one asking the same question. If they were willing to accept the rewards of a completed Trial and the risks inherent to becoming a person who challenged the subsequent Trials.

'I thought my birthday was in August!' Bell thought with an expression of exasperated confusion.

Today marked the thirtieth day of June, just thirteen days away from her birthday. So, why was the window appearing now?

Bell examined the window a bit further, closely inspecting each word. Unfortunately, whatever deeper meaning that Bell was hoping to find didn't exist, at least, not in the window now.

'I was planning on ascending in front of the others... Should I just do that now?' Bell thought to herself, 'Will I lose my chance at ascension if I say [no] for now?'

Bell was plagued with thoughts like this for the next couple of seconds. Then, she shook her head and tapped the [yes] option before any further internal discussion.

Then, the window silently shattered into dozens of fragments that floated away like it had exploded. Afterward, a new window appeared, this one read:

[Challenger Bellona Finley has accepted her role and the risks that come with it. Beginning ascension.]

Then, a cold feeling quickly sprouted from the left side of her body while a warm feeling quickly sprouted from her right. Bell stumbled forward and off of her bed in surprise to the strange sensations.

In the next moment, the left side of her body erupted in pure black flames that absorbed light while the right side of her body erupted in radiant white flames.

'What the hell?!' Bell thought, patting the flames.

The cool and warm feelings grew into cold and hot feelings within moments, and Bell started to panic. Despite the fact that she could still breathe and didn't feel anything beyond the cold and hot.

Bell's face twisted into an expression of terror. 

"No!" She uttered out lout in fear for her life.

Her instincts shot into overdrive as she leaped onto the wooden floor and began rolling around. 

The strange sensations didn't stop, and Bell knew that the flames were still whipping around her in a frenzied inferno.

And as quickly as the flames sprouted from her body, they vanished, the crackling of flames dying down.

Still shaking from her experience, Bell looked around, observing another window that had appeared. She began to read and attempt to understand the information displayed to her.

[Name: Bellona Finley]

[Trial(s) Completed: 1]

[Shard: N/A]

'Not available?! What?'

[Fragment(s): Duality]

[---------: N/A]

[------------: N/A]

[--------: N/A]

[Strength: 13]

[Constitution: 17]

[Dexterity: 16]

[Wisdom: 8]

[Intelligence: 11]

[Charisma: 8]

'Are these numbers any good?' Bell asked herself.

There was a small addition at the very bottom of the screen.

[Preparing Shard Attunement, are you prepared?]

[ Yes / No ]

Before Bell gained a moment to think, a voice rang out.

"Are you going to sit around forever or are you going to finish your ascension?"

Bell's voice had lingered in the air of the room for a moment. However, something was strange about it.

Bell didn't say that.

In an instant, she looked around for the source of the voice, quickly finding it. 

A tall woman with long, scarlet hair stood above Bell, she wore a long, purple peplos made of silk. A claymore protruded from her sternum, despite the clear fatal injury, the woman didn't seem bothered.

Bell looked up at her and said, "Are you okay?"

"I'm fine, this isn't anything to worry about." She said with a look of slight annoyance on her face and in her tone of voice. "Now, are you going to finish the job or not?"

Bell stood up, the window tracking her bodies movement and following close by. She spared a glance towards the [Yes / No] prompt and hesitated. 

"What's your name?" Bell asked the strange woman that probably found a way into her room without waking anybody in the house. "Why are you in my room?"

The woman then answered Bell's question after a moment of silence, "My name is Bellona Finley, and I'm in your room because I'm stuck with you."

Bell, still waking up, took a moment to absorb the information that the woman gave.

"Wait... I'm Bellona Finley!" Bell stated the rather painfully obvious fact.

The woman laughed heartily before rephrasing Bell's statement, "Yes, and I'm also Bellona Finley, just from a time around ten years ahead of you."

The older Bellona Finley pointed down towards Bell and the window in front of her. "Finish your ascension and get some sleep, you have a busy few days ahead of you."

Bell didn't choose to bother wondering, simply following the instructions placed upon her. Too many strange and outlandish things have happened in the past three minutes, so Bell decided to simply shut her mind off.

After giving up against the horde of mounting questions, Bell absentmindedly tapped the [Yes] option.

[Shard Attunement has begun.]

Just as a building pressure started to appear in her chest, near her heart. Bell noticed another line underneath.

[Brace yourself.]

'Too late!' Bell lamented.

The building pressure quickly rose to unbearable levels, with her heart starting to strain with each and every heartbeat.

After a moment, Bell started to be lifted from the ground slightly, and she was forced to look upward.

The older Bellona looked down towards Bell with a kind expression, "You'll be fine." The woman said before Bell heard the sound of glass shattering and her consciousness fading.

***

"Bellona Finley will be alone in the end."

Bell opened her eyes just to see the nightmare of standing atop the mountain, wind whipping every which way.

The crimson skies and blood red eclipse hanging in them made it clear to see that there were three people standing atop the mountain peak. Including herself.

'There's one person too many...' Bell realized after a moment.

A grating voice threatened to make Bell's ears bleed.

[What's wrong, princess?]

Before her mind could respond, her body entered motion.

Bell started running towards the demon, unsheathing a claymore that ignited itself in black and purple flames. Alongside her was another person that looked to be easily matching pace.

This person wore her long, scarlet hair unadorned, covering this other person's figure was plate armor and a long, aquamarine cape. The other person ran towards the demon with a pair of short swords ignited in similarly black flames, but several other colors were added in the mix of dancing flames.

'I don't know who you are, but I really want this guy dead... please help me.' Bell thought in silent prayer to this individual.

After a moment of observing this other person, Bell realized that this was the supposed older "Bellona Finley."

A look of realization and exasperation dawned on Bell's face at the same time. Then, a strange sound made Bell look towards the demon.

A pillar of salt and stone erupted from the ground, and the demon launched himself into the air in an arc that led him behind the two Bellona's.

[Quite the feisty pair, aren't we?]

Bell, the younger one, once again, wanted to strangle the demon.

The older Bell, "Oldie," as Bell would soon call the woman, entered pursuit to where she anticipated the demon to land.

Bell twisted and followed Oldie towards the demon, where upon landing, a giant stone worm emerged from the ground and shot off of the edge of the mountain.

'Was that his trump card?' Bell stifled a laugh.

[Pipe down a little.] The demon said without his normal humorous inflection.

The demon landed and immediately attempted to retreat. Unluckily for the demon, Bell and Oldie were already upon him, three blades launching deadly attacks. One had landed and made a deep gash.

'Already more than my last attempt.' Bell scoffed at the unreal situation.

Bell readied her claymore and swung at almost the same time as her older variant. One of the three blades made a deep gash appear on the demon's stonelike flesh.

[You bastards!] The demon yelled upon reaching a "safe" distance from the two. 

Rumbling shook the ground as the demon leaped into the air. The giant stone worm from earlier had caught the demon, immediately breaking his fall. 

But before the demon could say anything further, an arrow whirling in the same flames as Bell's weapon embedded itself into the demon's eye.

He screeched in pain, the very sound actually drawing blood upon Bell's ears.

With whatever hearing that Bell had left, she heard another arrow being knocked and sent, the sound of the strings release quickly followed by a dull grunt.

"Bellona Finley was alone in the end." The disembodied voice calmly stated after a moment's wait.

'What?'