Five Arabian Nights
The Five Nights
Once upon a time- a time cast away-
A lonely god lost his way.
The memories he cherished
Had become all but bland.
The emotions he treasured
Had become all but naught.
So one day, on a bright day,
He left the world on a journey
To seek out the feelings that had
Become all but history.
He spent five days and five nights
To discover his emotions' plight.
Joy, Gloom, Hate, and Love;
The four feelings he had come to long.
He first flew to discover joy.
The bliss and happiness that brought him a smile
From the childishness he had lost a millennium ago.
Though wisdom and courage were needed to survive
To love many things demanded a passionate life.
So the god met his joy as happily as he can.
As selfishly, as jubilantly, as blissfully as he can.
Chapter 1
The First Day
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Jaune lay still in the middle of pure white, his light armor battered and dented.
He should feel troubled for his friends, whom he had left behind. He presumed that the afterlife had finally caught up to him. He caused trouble, and his friends had corrected his mistakes and built him to be a better man. But there were some things that a man could not learn with only the help of friends. Some things needed a man's will to surpass his own limits.
But Jaune could not.
And he felt at peace. It felt selfish, but he liked it here. Even though it had been about five minutes since he arrived, his heart calmed to an amazing degree. Everything was still. Nothing would bother him.
But he was not still. Therefore, that meant that something could probably bother him even in the afterlife.
His family would miss him, but Jaune had longed for an extensive rest. He hoped that he did not encounter any bullies or generally heartless souls in wherever he was. Maybe he could use a long, long nap.
"…"
Sitting up from the feathery ground, Jaune took a closer look at his surroundings.
There were no skies. Only an endless amount of clouds surrounded him.
A field of white, purer than his soul could ever be.
The world he sat in felt like an ethereal one. An otherworldly feeling of peace enveloped him. Around him sang the songs of the wind. This world- this world, clearer than any sheet of paper- was not silent, but quiet. For silence was forced, and quiet was natural.
It felt strange. All of a sudden, he felt like casting aside everything that he considered terrifying to him. His forged transcripts, the pressure upon him as an Arc- it all felt as if they slid off his shoulder. It was the best selfish feeling he felt.
And he admired how vast the clouds were. They were all shaped differently, and they completely covered what could have been the skies. They were above and below, next to his sides. He felt as if he could touch the clouds above just by reaching up, but in reality, it was too far for him to touch. The cloud he sat on felt like a puff of cool air and water- strange, but fascinating.
Jaune stood up. He felt enamored by the world around him. He did not want to leave. As selfish as it sounded, it brought him comfort.
Was it wrong to feel selfish?
Jaune walked.
He let his feet carry him across the skyless clouds. No horizon showed up as he ventured into the serene world.
As he walked, he saw something bumping out of the clouds.
He got closer, and he discovered that the bump in the road was tiny child. Like the clouds, she was pitch-white- almost colorless, even. A comforting glow emitted from her entire body, as if she were a firefly that belonged to a dark world placed in the brightest place possible.
Jaune called out to her, and she turned quickly. Her eyes were pitch-blue, and her facial features were that of a child's. A child of the clouds. Jaune could tell she belonged here.
"Hi," he said with a bit of nervousness behind his tone.
The girl stood up, revealing her tiny height. She- or "it," considering Jaune did not know if it had a gender- stood up to his waist. With Jaune in her sight, the humanoid creature floated towards him, her feet staying closely to the ground.
The blond boy saw a mouth open as it turned into an open smile.
She remained still, her eyes shining a blue only the skies had. Jaune blinked as he tilted his head in confusion. And in response, the child of light tilted her head as well, her smile remaining still.
Jaune took a step away from her. She took a step forward.
Jaune raised a hand. She clasped her hand against his.
Her hand felt cool; not cold, but cool. And it had a certain warmth behind it.
"Do you have a name?"
The girl blinked as her open smile turned into a closed one. She softly tilted her head.
The sound of a bell jingling caught the blond off guard.
A bell?
As if to reinforce her point, the girl gently bobbed her head left and right. A bell jingled each time she bobbed her head. Her short hair ever-so-slightly brushed against her bare shoulders. Her simple dress, which was the same bright color of her pitch-white skin, fluttered as the bells rang.
Bell.
He decided to call her Bell.
Bell had a very linear personality. She followed Jaune, glowed happily whenever he rubbed her head, and jingled every now and then. She was joy at its peak manifestation. Jaune found her to be pretty mindless, but delightfully joyful.
Bell did not say a single word, but Jaune could tell she was accustomed to the cloudy world. Every once in a while, she would reach for the ground and pick up a tiny portion of cloud-like foam from the ground. She would then toss it up in the air or eat it without a second thought.
An innocence that he had never seen before, let alone thought of.
The blond could only wonder if the afterlife would remain this peaceful during his presumably eternal stay in the empty and serene world.
Jaune continued to traverse through the cloudy world. Contrary to his beliefs, the world seemed to have a day and a night.
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First Day - END -