Flight Journals Day 6-7

So... the mimic was back, for a little bit. I heard it's dead now, but I'm worried that the ritual that we did probably started something a bit worse...

So I was in the library a few days ago, just finding different books about different subjects. There's so much here, I don't think I could read everything in here in my entire lifetime. I found a big block of books surrounding the corruption, including some firsthand accounts of even a dragon rider being corrupted, which is... horrifying to be honest.

Then everyone came running into the library, and everything went to hell.

Graecie, Ros, Sausage, Sniff, Zam, and someone else named Megi ran into the room - all super excited to try and find things! It was interesting to hear about Megi's magic too - they do growth magic, and help plants regrow. That could potentially be huge for fighting back against the pale corruption, and they seemed a little nervous but I hope I was able to help them feel a bit more confident.

There was also this other guy, Prince Cambam or something - he was talking A LOT and I think making a few of the others a bit uncomfortable, but he was wearing iron boots so I tried pulling him out of the room. I couldn't keep the spell long enough, so it didn't really work, but at least I tried. He kept talking about Giselle or someone, who had broken his heart, and after hearing as much as I did... I think I'm on Giselle's side? It feels mean to be mean to someone that I just met, but after a bit I kind of just wanted some peace and quiet.

After he left, we were looking through the restricted sections and found a few books surrounding the old wars, specifically about the Prince of Sunlight and then something about a shattered soul. The book mentioned a bunch of different elements... corruption, goodness, life, solar, iron, blessings... it described us all standing there too perfectly, which made the hair on the back of my neck stand up.

Ros found a book about another Ritual, the Double Soul, that said it could help us unlock unlimited mana - which sounds like it would be helpful, right? We thought it would be a good idea to try it, and it mainly needed chickens as supplies - which... well we have enough of that because of all of our secret chicken coops around.

We all headed in different directions to get the supplies for the ritual. I had more than enough feathers so I grabbed a few from the room and we all met back up in the ritual room. Once we started the ritual, everything felt wrong... the air started getting cold, Gadget dug into the backpack and hid, and then things just went... wrong.

Once the magic finished casting, IT was standing there, again. It swapped between all of us, and we couldn't cast our magic. At first, we thought it could be okay, but we couldn't strike it with weapons, or cast magic, and then it spoke...

We all went running in a panic. Before, when someone could talk, we knew it was us. This time though, and then Graecie dropped her bells... it was all just such a mess. I'd go through the details a bit more, but I'm going to be honest - it was chaos. I was able to eventually prove to Sausage that I was me because of my magic, and he was wearing boots. Then he was able to break through and use his ascension... so we knew another way to figure it all out.

The thing with the voices meant that it was going to be even harder to kill it. We though, maybe, if we did the same ritual that would seal it away again, but that didn't work. So - Sniff and I split off to head back to the library because she had found another secret passage leading from the library into the royal wing. When we first got there, we lost each other for a bit and by the time I found her she had already found something over in the royal wing, and from the look of it a ton of other books too. I didn't really have time to ask about that before the others burst in saying the mimic was right behind them - so we went running back down the tunnel to try to get away.

We were able to loop back around to the ritual room and trap the double back inside the circle and cast the second spell which locked it back inside and banished it away. Once we all had a bit to breathe, I thought things would be better, but then there were a few weird moments with Sniff and Sausage. First, Sniff gave me a book to put somewhere if something happened to her. I asked her... just... why me? She wouldn't really answer me, but just ran off with the book. I didn't open it, I promised I wouldn't, but I knew I'd have to figure things out.

Then sausage had a little... glitch? I don't know how to put it but his voice was wrong for a while and he wasn't answering us. We took some time to move him to the couch and it took Graecie ringing her bells to get him to wake up. After that, everything seems like it finally cooled off. Graecie was actually really hurt that her bells were taken again, or that it had her bells again... it broke my heart seeing everyone so just.... defeated. Graecie made some flower crowns to try to cheer the rest of us up, but no one had something for her, and that felt wrong.

The next morning, I knew what I had to do. I headed out into the otherworld to grab some sunflowers to make her a flower crown too. Yellow, like her bells. That didn't take super long before I was able to get that and meet up with her in the halls. We stood outside the library for a bit, I hadn't been back inside since the whole incident the day before, and I couldn't bring myself to walk back inside right now. We were invited to Jojo's room for a small show, and it definitely helped lighten the mood a bit, but I knew we should do something else.

I thought that we should get away for a bit. Sausage was resting in his room still, but I asked Zam and Graecie if they wanted to go on a little picnic, just to clear our heads. We all went to grab supplies, and it took me a bit but I eventually headed over towards the Lupine dorms to ask some of them - they seem to have a lot of nature people there so it was worth a shot. When I was there, Water and Ros came running talking about missing students and yelling for me to help.

I feel embarrassed... but I almost didn't want to go. Not that I didn't want to help people, but instead that I didn't want to leave without saying something to the others. We had promised to get away, and to take a breather, but then if I just left without saying anything...

I wasn't really given time to think before water just made me feel horrible for hesitating, so away I went! Luckily, Greacie and Zam were already waiting by the door and could come too. Sun Guard led us to a cave off the beaten path, to the left of the town, that was filled with these giant purple wraith-looking creatures. Zam was able to spear one right away, but killing something made her panic. After a bit of screaming, we found Captain and Kara trapped in cages, and I was able to bring them down and we all caught a breather.

While everyone else was helping Kara and Captain recover, I took a small look around. There was a small journal, wrapped in purple died leather, just sitting on one of the tables. I pocketed it to read later, no idea when or if we'd ever return here. On the way back, I just kept thinking about the directions Sniff had given me for her book. Left of the castle, a small mining cave... was this the same place?

We're going to head out for our picnic now. I can't believe we've only been here two weeks... it's been so much happening. I definitely need a breather.