Buckle up, people. It's going to be a looooong ride.
Her eyes opened. A faceless sky of gray welcomed her upon wakening. The silvery heavens reminded Akali of the rain droplets that would drench her pristine green uniform as she pranced her way through the damp meadows and back to the temple. She loved how the invigorating rain cleansed her skin and washed away the impurities and sins that she committed as an assassin for the mighty Kinkou Order. It was the only way she could feel partially human, like she wasn't a barbarian capable of mass slaughter.
But this was no ordinary rainy sky. There was not a cloud in sight, nor were there pellets of refreshing rain drizzling on her face.
Akali sat up. Her eyes roamed the expanse of the area. Her surroundings were still and bare, as if a conflagration had scorched an entire civilization to the ground and left nothing but charcoal ashes and eerie peace. Wisps that left trepidation in their wake crawled the length of her spine.
Where was she? And why was she here?
Her curious yet timorous irises caught sight of her wrist. Four gashes adorned the skin, blood oozing out of the wounds. Choosing to look at something more compelling than her bloodied arm, Akali rose her head in an attempt to find some sense of direction as her fingers delicately dabbed away the blood. Around her was literally nothing, save the gray horizon that seemed to expand forever. The equally bleak ground she sat on was just as perpetual. From what her naked eye could see, there was no life to speak of. She would just have to rely on her instincts to choose any of the infinite paths to travel on.
Akali returned her attention to her injury. Astonishment with a twinge of fascination and horror stunned her as she held her wrist to her face for closer inspection. The blood that was supposed to pour out of her wounds completely defied the laws of gravity and remained suspended on her forearm, as if it was trapped in time.
She smudged the wound daintily with her thumb, but the sting that should have followed never came. Smudging slowly evolved into hefty patting, but it seemed as if there was no wound on her arm at all. How did she even manage to acquire such a nasty wound? Her lips curled into a scowl as she scrutinized the lacerations. Whoever gave her this must have despised her dearly.
Images flooded her mind. Syndra's purple lips curled into an unseemly sneer. An explosion of agony in her shoulder that made her vision turn black. The way the leaves bent under the will of the wind. Syndra had thoroughly marred her wrist in their fight; Akali remembered the terror that sluiced down her spine as her talons pierced her skin. She had tried to grab her kamas once she wrenched free of the grip, but Akali wasn't able to because—
Syndra killed me.
She was dead.
Her bewilderment became trepidation. She had to get out of here, wherever this place was. It took no effort to scramble onto the balls of her feet, something that Akali duly noted. It was impossible to discern which way was left and right, so blindly she ran forward as hard as she could. Minutes passed, but her lungs weren't begging for oxygen. Her quadriceps didn't burn from the buildup of lactic acid. Her body couldn't feel any more dead. The stark atmosphere of this place only seemed to grow more vacuous the farther she futilely fled. It was only after Akali collapsed onto her knees hopelessly that she finally accepted the fact that this world was just as inescapable as death itself.
If Akali was still alive, she'd be able to feel a lump forming in her throat, practically demanding her to cry. Right now, she'd give anything to just feel the familiar sensation of teardrops stinging her eyeballs and rolling down her cheeks. This was how she was going to spend the rest of her afterlife, stuck in a godforsaken desolate desert, crying to herself for the rest of eternity because she had no one to talk to. If she weren't dead already, insanity definitely would have completed the job.
This place was her new home for the foreseeable future. This place that no other dead-life had seemed to have stumbled upon like hers had. As these forlorn thoughts sank into her mind, so did her knees to the frigid ground. Surely this was hell, to be damned to an eternity of solitude in a barren wasteland. Maybe this was even worse than hell. Her contemplation strayed; given the choice of a wasteland and hell, which would she prefer?
A cry in the distance jolted her out of her reverie. It was so soft that Akali dismissed it as a figment of her imagination, but the cry came again, ringing in her ears. Her head snapped in an earnest attempt to locate the source, but it seemed to come in every direction.
"Hello?" Akali called out, the echoes of her voice sounding cringingly desperate and lonesome, but she paid no heed. Maybe this person could help her escape this hellhole!
The land was once again bathed in harrowing silence as the screams dissipated without a trace. Akali hollered once again, but there was no response. Once more, she was all alone. How damned cruel was the afterlife to give her a semblance of hope and then just rip it away in seconds?
Hell, definitely, was her conclusive answer.
Akali's eyes fell to the floor. She buried her face in her palms, willing herself to cry, but her attempt proved to be fruitless.
The inability to feel, perennial isolation… Perhaps this was hell and Akali was finally being punished for her sins.
A shuffle of footsteps started and ended before her hunched frame, but Akali firmly fixed her attention at the cracked ground.
"If you're just another hallucination or whatever, please just leave," she all but begged.
The shuffling continued, successfully plucking a nerve.
"Look," Akali sternly said, looking up from the ground, "I said-"
Her eyes widened. Maybe it was the freezing floor she was sitting on. Whatever it was, her body began to uncontrollably shake.
"You..." her bottom lip began to quiver.
There, standing in front of Akali, was unexpectedly herself. Akali rapidly blinked as she tried to make sense of the world. The Akali standing in front of her was indeed her, just as a child that looked to be around four years old. The dress she wore was in the shade of a radiant light pink, adorned with bright and bold polka dots. Her brown hair was in two messy pigtails, fastened together with lavender hair ties embedded with several rhinestones. What struck Akali most, however, were her tearful, brown eyes; they harbored no hardship, no sin, no guilt whatsoever, just the sorrow of a child who had never experienced true misery. It was so pure, her innocence, that one touch from a murderer like Akali would surely taint it. This girl was far too innocent to have ever been Akali, but anyone could see that she was a spitting replica of her. Akali shifted onto her teetering knees to match the child's much smaller height.
"Hello," Akali began awkwardly, not entirely certain how to talk to the four-year-old copy of her. She brought her bloodied fingers to touch the girl's cheek comfortingly. Instead of cowering from her lethal, calloused hands, Akali 2.0 welcomed it, a mischievous smirk appearing on her face as she stepped away and laced her hands behind her back. Akali's brows furrowed in confusion and drew her hand back.
"What's wrong?" The child remained mute, but her simper spoke for her. "Can you speak?"
The girl unlaced her hands to show them to Akali, a happy giggle escaping her. Pinched between her tiny index and thumb was a blooming magnolia, which somehow exuded colors and lit this grim place. Akali's heart skipped a beat as the beautiful flower was placed into her trembling palms. Without a warning, the little girl took off running.
"Wait!" Akali screamed, stretching her hand out as if it would reel the girl back in.
She jumped to her feet, stuffed the magnolia in her pocket, and chased her youthful self. Her much longer legs easily gained distance on the girl, but abruptly the girl stopped in her tracks. Akali skidded to a clumsy stop, nearly tripping over her own toes.
"That wasn't very nice," Akali berated the child, a scowl obviously present on her face. She was all but ignored by the tinier Akali, whose stare was unrelentingly fixed on something. From what Akali could see, the girl was staring into space, or at least something that was only visible to her.
"What are you looking out?" she gently inquired, all traces of mild anger wiped from her mien. The girl unfurled an index forward. Akali's pupils slowly trailed along the direction until they fell upon a hooded stranger, who didn't exist just moments ago.
Nice to know that even in the afterlife, I'm psychotic.
The figure was completely veiled from head to toe in black like the grim reaper; its face was just as concealed as the rest of its body. Her gaze returned to the girl, searching for some indication of recognition on her face. The child's face scrunched up with laughter and ran to the person, arms outstretched for a hug. Akali remained glued to her spot as she watched her leap onto the person, her arms partially encircling his midriff. Akali's gaze locked onto the figure.
So it didn't seem all that evil. But Akali still wasn't taking any chances.
"Show yourself." There was no room for argument in her words, and the figure before her knew just that. The being sighed and shed the hood of its cloak, inadvertently revealing the aged skin of its pale hands. The lifeless world began to spin, and Akali's body resumed its intractable shaking.
"Dad?" Akali choked out, swallowing the nonexistent lump in her throat. How many surprises could this world possibly throw at her?
"Hello, my child."
His voice was exactly like she remembered: powerful and commanding like a fierce warrior yet subliminally caring and gentle like a dedicated father. The grey beard that travelled along his chin and upper lip had droplets of blood on it, suspended in time like the holes in her arm. He whispered something into the girl's ear, to which she nodded enthusiastically and jumped onto the ground. He began to walk to her frozen frame with the girl right beside him. Nothing could stop Akali as her shaky legs broke out into a sprint, stopping right in the arms of her dead father. She flung her arms around his neck, utter elation spreading in her un-circulating blood.
"The last time I saw you, you were but just a child. And..." his words caught in his throat. "Now you're a beautiful young woman."
Her father pulled away, probably to get a better look of her, but Akali refused to relinquish her grip, even after he joked, "If I was still alive, I would definitely have suffocated to death by now."
Akali bit her lip hard, squeezing her eyes to cherish this hug for just a few more seconds, but a sharp point that surely would have punctured an organ impaled her midriff. Instinctively, she pulled back, her eyebrows furrowing. Understanding her silent curiosity, her father shed the rest of his cloak off. There were several shurikens embedded in his stomach. Rivulets of blood froze right on the point of each star, and suddenly the joyous atmosphere vanished. The little girl beside him gasped from pure horror, tears welling up in her lashes as she ran to hug him once more.
"I wear the cloak to hide this so she doesn't cry for me," he laughed, albeit sadly. Akali nodded, uncertain of what to say. "I'm sure you have many questions. Let's walk and talk, shall we?"
He retrieved his cloak and draped it around his torso, hiding the shurikens that spelled his death. The girl's shrieks silenced, and her hands fumbled to hold her father's.
Akali audibly swallowed her guilt down, forcing it to oblivion. "Is this hell?"
"I wouldn't blame you for making such an assumption," he responded, "but no. This is the place where lost souls come after death."
"Lost…souls?" The incredulous tone in her voice sounded rude, but her father didn't mind.
"Yes," was his straightforward reply. "Each life on this earth possesses a lifelong purpose. If it is unfulfilled before the body dies, the person's soul is ripped away from its corpse and sent to this wretched place."
The magnolia popped into her mind.
"So you're saying there's no way to escape this place." The planet was undoubtedly screwed, for lack of a better word, now that Akali was trapped in here for eternity.
"There is. You have to fulfill your purpose. Only then will your soul leave to rest in peace or torment."
Heaven or hell, that meant.
"How can I fulfill my purpose if I'm dead? I can't just magically revive myself."
He smiled, obviously humored by god knew what. "You don't have to be alive to fulfill your purpose. Fate will always give you a second chance if you are strong enough. Many souls are driven to insanity from an eternity of solitude, so they are never able to leave."
Talk about food for thought. Akali had always assumed that once someone died, they just…died, without having to encounter all these additional problems. How was it that dying was even more convoluted than living?
Her gaze happenstance landed upon the mirror image of herself, the child. There was so much to be answered about her, and Akali couldn't force away the dread that mauled her heart. Her dad easily read the conflicted expression on his daughter's face, and began to answer her unspoken questions.
"This child is you." Her father sighed, peering at her. "Rather, this is the child I wished you to be."
To say she was confused was an understatement.
"When your soul leaves your body, it comes here and brings with it the person's most valuable possession," he explained, interrupting her interminable questions. "Like I mentioned before, many spirits grow maniacal. These belongings serve as reminders of what our purposes are, in case we are given a second chance to fulfill them." Her father dropped his gaze to the youth beside him. Akali's face lit up with understanding as her stare travelled rapidly between the two people in front of her.
"But I was never allowed to tie my hair in pigtails due to the Kinkou temple's strict dress code. I never wore polka dotted dresses. I was never pure like she, yet despite her nonexistence, she's here."
He interjected. "Everything you say is true. In my specific case, it brought what I wanted more than anything in this world." The child looked up at her father with big, brown eyes.
"I wanted to be a great father, for you to have a normal childhood bereft of destruction and war." His eyes twinkled with sadness. "However, your mother saw great potential in you and robbed you of your innocence when you were just a child. That is precisely why, when I died, my soul brought you as an innocent child." A wistful pang of regret and contempt spread through her, flaring even more viciously as her father continued his explanation.
"This child, inherently you living the life I had wished for you, is a constant reminder that I failed as a father to give you the best life possible. Ever since I arrived here, I realized my one purpose in life is to help my only child flourish and make you happy."
A string of incoherent noises left Akali's lips, sounds that even she could not understand. Emotions struck in mentally suffocating waves. Sadness for the child before her that never had a chance to exist, searing contempt for her mother who stole her life from her, sad appreciation and love for her father who thought he failed her. Akali fell to her knees and buried her face into her palms, as if it would shield her from the onslaught of information.
From her peripheral vision, she could see her father bend onto one knee beside her. He placed a loving hand on her shoulder, slightly squeezing it. She cupped his hand with her own, a novelty she hadn't experienced since his death.
I've missed this, Akali reminisced as she watched the aged lines on dad's forehead disappear and reappear. Given the many years she had spent without a paternal figure in her life, the last thing Akali expected was to have her father treat her as if she was still his little girl. He trailed his calloused palms down her arm until they stopped at her wrist, just like he used to do when she was a kid. It was soothing, to say the least.
Abruptly, all traces of joy from this untimely reunion vanished from his mien. After a moment's hesitance, her dad peeled his fingers off of her wrist slowly. A myriad of emotions flashed in his sagacious irises, all of which Akali couldn't discern. They shrunk then widened, from what seemed like understanding and hesitant delight, but, even in the afterlife, his expressions were hard to read.
"Akali..." her father's words trailed off into complete silence. The child had remained utterly quiet looked at Akali, but even she didn't seem to notice anything peculiar. That is, before she looked at her wrist, right where her father had caressed tenderly. The quietest gasp left her pink lips as she brought her hand to her mouth to suppress the noise. Their reactions struck fear and dread simultaneously in her frozen heart.
Was there something worse than death that she hadn't anticipated?
Gulping down air, Akali darted her gaze between the two figures as she queried with worrisome, "What's going on?"
A smile so radiant that it almost made him look alive manifested on her father's visage. Mirth she hadn't seen even as a child crossed his face. Akali internally questioned whether she should have been happy or worried.
"You're still alive."
God knew how she began to choke on absolutely nothing but the jaw-breaking hypothesis she had just heard. Coughing seemed to worsen the condition of her closing throat. "T-there's no way I could be alive," Akali managed to force out once she regained her composure. "I-I felt every agonizing millisecond before my heart finally stopped beating."
"Check your pulse," was her father's sole command. Her bony fingers shakily touched her frigid wrist. When Akali was still living and working at the hospital, she would often joke with her patients that they had no pulse. But right now, when she clearly had no pulse, her still heartbeat only killed the hope that had begun to blossom within her. Her lips contorted into a scowl.
"Dad, don't give me false hope."
Man, that word sounded so foreign coming from her tongue; even her father visibly tensed at the word.
"Patience was never your strong suit. Try again," he lightly urged. Wishing she could dispel the hope within her permanently, Akali brought her fingers to her wrist once more.
Nothing. What else was she expecting? Akali laughed bitterly.
She laughed, that is until something jumped beneath her fingertips. As shrouded as the sun was during the eye of a storm, the faintest heartbeat drummed against her wrist. It was so quiet, like the pulse of a fetus, but it was most definitely there. Her chest constricted with relief.
"I'm...alive," Akali reiterated, as if repeating those words would convince her fully. The steady heartbeat that echoed in her wrist was proof enough.
Unable to express her thoughts eloquently, Akali jumped into her father's embrace and burrowed her face into his shoulder blade. The tears that ran down her face only made her happier, made her feel more alive. She ripped herself away from her dad.
"How?"
The answer hit her as hard as Syndra's spheres did. Her eyes trailed down to her midriff, her fingers untying the white sash that kept her red robe together. Underneath the cloth armor was the warm vest that Karma had so graciously given her the day before the war. White wisps emanated from the armor, floating and dissipating into the colorless sky above. It was a mesmerizing sight; the three of them silently stood stunned, staring at the disappearing tendrils. The realest part of all of this was that Akali could feel it; she could feel the warmth of life slowly but surely entering her corpse.
"It seems you had a guardian angel watching over you all this time," she heard her father's voice in the background. Words were beyond her mental capacity at that moment, so she opted to stay quiet rather than reply.
Her father gently nudged her shoulder, shifting her focus to him. "I'm afraid I have to ask: how did you die?"
Those four words brought dread amidst the atmosphere. Akali licked her lips, trying to repress the memories of her first death. "Syndra." Her father visibly tautened upon the mentioning of her name.
"She summoned the Baron Nashor. I challenged her in order to unsummon it and win the war and the rest is self-explanatory," Akali said, gesturing to the rest of her body's apparition.
Her dad nodded with a wary stare before bending down and sitting cross-legged on the floor. "You have quite some time before your soul fully returns to earth."
Akali followed his example, though she wasn't sure what he was doing.
His eyes were resolute, his voice just as confident. "I'm going to help you defeat Syndra."
Akali couldn't suppress the scoff that ensued. "Not even all time in the world can help me kill her." She lost the curse to kill, although it seemed more like a gift right now. "I-I couldn't kill her until it was too late."
Her father could detect her apprehension from light-years away. He gently "I can help, but only if you want me to." A sense of de ja vu struck her senses.
Blood rushed to her cheeks as she blushed from shame and weakness. The once great Fist of Shadow was running. "By the time my body is revived, the world might be past helping."
A small hand grasped her fingers gently. Akali stared into brown swirls of scarce sinlessness, kindness, and patience, all qualities that she had lacked for too many years. The world had been unfair to her from the very start by forcing her to live a life she abhorred and cruelly ripping away her happiness before she could even truly taste it. How could she possibly save the world? Akali hadn't the slightest clue how to save herself, let alone the world that might or might not have been destroyed at that very moment.
The grip on her fingers tightened, pulling her to safety from her grim thoughts. The girl's chocolate pupils grew misty, tears trailing down her plump cheeks. Such disappointment, fear, and sadness swirled in her innocent irises, so much so that Akali felt a sudden urge to squeeze her in an embrace and promise that everything would be alright.
Yes, it was unfortunately true that Akali had lived a miserable life by the hands of her pushy mother. Yes, she had not known gratification in a long time. But at least she had her father with her as she grew up cursing her mother. At least there were people who loved her and cared about her, even with all the physical and mental scars she bore from her past. With all the things Akali had been blessed with, she had the gall to focus only on her hardships, as if that validated her wish for death. And yes, although the guiltless Akali that stood before her never had the chance to exist, she could help create the very future that her father had envisioned for her, one far from bloodshed and strife. Her purpose was to live to protect the future and live to preserve and teach everything she had learned in her lifetime.
There would be no future to speak of if Syndra succeeded.
Akali crouched to meet the child's direct line of vision. "You don't exist," she spoke resolutely. The kid stared right back at her, confusion evident on her expression. "But if I surrender now, no one will be able to like I do."
Akali mirrored her father's pose, trying to calm her shivering frame, and turned her full attention to him. "I was given a rare second chance at life, and I'm not wasting it." Her eyes steeled. "Tell me how to kill Syndra. I won't hesitate this time."
A smile crept on her dad's face, but it disappeared as his countenance turned stony. "I want you to think of how you died. Every second leading up to your death to your final breath, show it to me now."
She didn't bother questioning how he was going to know what was on her mind, instead squeezing her eyes shut in concentration. Her mind delved all the way back to the forest, where she woke up disheveled and sore. The beacon of light she encountered, the exact steps she took until she found Syndra, the pain as she dislocated and then relocated her shoulder. The reality of everything crushed her, inhibiting her breathing until it grew erratic. She whimpered as she remembered trying to grab her kamas because she knew exactly what happened next.
Five spheres shot for her heart, just a few inches shy from her heart until she heard a distant voice cry, "Enough!"
Her eyes snapped open, her hands clutching her pounding heart. The sound of it made the memories of her death melt away.
"That was..." her dad's words echoed slightly. "Intense." Akali mutely nodded in agreement.
"Your fighting techniques have dulled," he stated matter-of-factly, "almost to the point where it seemed as if you were hesitating to use them. During your fight with Syndra, there were many attacks you could have easily blocked. Coupled with years of disuse, it's no secret why you lost."
It felt like she as being berated, but when it came to fighting, her dad always grew this serious. "How do you propose I hone my skills with the remaining time I have in here?"
"The problem lies not with the execution, but with your mind," he explained. Akali snorted. That much wasn't hard to believe.
"Hesitation is the seed of defeat; your hesitation was all too evident. Most of that fight consisted of you running away from her. She backed you into a corner as if you were a mouse and she the cat. Fear made you fail, and if you don't find some way to dispel it, you'll lose again."
He paused. Nausea began to invade her stomach, and she suddenly wished her dad would drop the subject even though she knew it was for her own good. Intuition told her she would not like the next few words her dad would say. The tangy taste of blood that filled her tongue diverted her mind momentarily until she released her bottom lip from between her teeth.
"What is it that you fear? What caused your apprehension? Why are you scared?"
The last question rang in her ears for seconds before the echoes died. What did she have to fear? Everything. What made her hesitate? Everything. Why was she so scared? Everything.
"I'm scared of Syndra and her capabilities. I'm scared that my friends might be dead right now from her doings. I'm scared that because I was too weak, the world is now doomed. And..." her breath hitched in her throat until she swallowed and regained her dwindling composure. "I'm scared that if I successfully kill Syndra and ultimately save the world, then I will return to my murderous ways. I don't want to be a monster again."
The predicament Akali was in would just not let her emerge unscathed.
"Am I being too selfish?" she asked rhetorically.
Strong arms wrapped around her shoulders comfortingly. Instinctively, she stepped into the familiar embrace. "No matter the outcome, I will hate myself, but if it's for the sake of the world, I will do whatever it takes." Her words were muffled as she spoke into her dad's cloak.
"All the misfortune that has befallen you has never been your fault. Do not bear the blame, my child, especially since it was never yours to take." Her father's words were stifled as if he was crying. "I failed you as a father. I failed to protect you from everything that has happened. I failed to make you happy. If you are to blame anyone, blame me."
"No." Her word was resolute. "You were the only happiness in my life."
His arms patted her back gently, and without realizing it, she fell under his rhythmic lull. How Akali wished she could forever stay in his cold, lifeless embrace. Her arms squeezed tighter around his neck until she was sure it would suffocate his physical body, but her father didn't seem to mind, and neither did she.
"You were never a monster, Akali." The more he spoke, the more clouded her vision became. "You are just what we, your parents, created, nothing more, nothing less. If it weren't for us, you would never have had to harm a fly, let alone hate your existence. Alone, you are your own entity, a human with a righteous sense of judgement and morality." She could practically hear him smiling in her ear.
She pulled back, her crimson robes drenched with the tears that continually fell.
His calloused fingers softly swiped away each tear until there were none left. "Do not fear the past, for it is your guide to the future. Learn from it, and become an even greater woman, both in battle and in life."
"Thank you, papa."
His eyes twinkled unusually. "You haven't called me that since you were a toddler," he whispered dejectedly.
Warmth rushed to her core unexpectedly. A light so blinding that Akali had to shield her eyes filled the abyss, driving away the colorlessness of the sky and ground. One stray wisp orbited her torso. It floated gracefully above her head, disappearing into the air like smoke, and Akali wistfully knew this reunion would soon draw to a close.
I will not cry, she vehemently repeated in her mind as she turned to her father, but all emotions left her as her eyes fell upon his glowing spirit. One moment Akali was looking at her father, and the next she was looking through him.
"What's going on?" Akali asked nervously, watching her father fade before her very eyes.
He didn't answer, but she didn't need one as she watched excitement overwhelm her father. The unholy tears of saddened delight pricked her eyes as Akali witnessed her speechless father. His stare remained on his dissipating body, a broad smile glued to his face.
"I'm found."
Akali paced forward to give him a congratulatory hug. She couldn't even tolerate being stuck here for a few hours, let alone a good portion of her lifetime, so it would be impossible for her to hold out for as long as he did. Just as they were about to make contact, their ghostly apparitions passed through each other, but both of them laughed in response, for both of them were going to a better place. They, a regretful father and his ashamed child, had managed to find each other in a realm beyond life, and now they were being granted a second life. Inevitably, of course, this meant a second chance at life without her father.
Time was nearing to an end, as made evident by the fading image of her body. There was so much she had wanted to say, like her job as a nurse, her life with Shen and Kennen, and such, but in the last few seconds that her soul remained here, her mind drew a blank.
His eyes smiled for him. His lips moved as if he was saying something, but Akali could hear nothing. Even with her poor lip reading skills, her heart warmed as she reiterated the final words she would ever hear him say in this lifetime. Flashes of light crossed her vision as she escaped the plane of lost souls; images flashed in her vision so rapidly that she couldn't process any of it, but she didn't care because her mind was still lingering on her father's last words to her.
The explosions of images that came and went in her vision culminated in pure darkness. Everything was still, much like it had been in the afterlife. But a faint and steady noise echoed in her eardrums.
Bu-bum, bu-bum, bu-bum.
Akali was well aware no one else could hear it, but to her, it rang clear as day.
I'm never going to be able to forget my heartbeat now, she joked to herself.
Akali felt every movement of her body with each breath she took: the rising and sinking of her chest, the way her chapped lips slightly parted to intake fresh oxygen. She even relished the pounding in her head. Something so simple as just being brought such immense joy to her, which astonished her.
The realization that she was alive on earth finally sunk in. Her lids groggily lifted, the familiar chirping sound growing louder as she rustled from her interrupted slumber.
Oh, the sun! The sky had color! Was it normal to be so ecstatic about seeing ubiquitous things?
As much as she would have liked to stay on the forest floor relishing nature, Akali had rather important matters to attend to. Her mind commanded her arms to move first. They flailed like a dead fish on land. Maybe her legs would function better. After much internal struggling, they too proved to be just as useless and immobile as her arms. She expelled a heavy sigh of annoyance. It seemed as if her entire body was thoroughly exhausted from her round trip to hell. Her head lulled to the side, tired of holding itself up.
Her eyes bulged from their sockets as she saw the very familiar silhouette of her arch nemesis. Syndra's back was to her, her guard completely down.
Exactly how much time had passed when Akali was stuck in the wasteland? She forced her head upright and looked to the best of her ability at the sun. It was in the exact place as it had been when she died, and this she knew because it was the last thing she had seen before her death. It was sage and sensible to conclude that only minutes, if not seconds, had passed during the hours she was spiritually lost.
Feebly, Akali drew her hands into her pocket, where the crumbled biscuit had almost gone forgotten. It was difficult to swallow it after almost hours of not drinking anything (and being dead), but she quietly forced it down her esophagus. Energy slowly began to fill her body, which she used to discreetly crawl to her kamas.
Akali stood up wobbly like a calf learning to walk, but the feeling of her kamas rightfully within her calloused palms made her surge with confidence.
"Syndra!" she screamed to the best of her ability. The sorceress whipped around, surprise and horror written all over her face.
"We're not quite finished yet."
Not gonna lie, this was an insane amount of dialogue I had to incorporate. I don't like when authors have characters say paragraphs upon paragraphs of explanation, but it was inevitable. There was so much to explain, so I hope you guys understood it (?).
All of this I wrote in school during my lunch periods, so hopefully it makes sense.
Also, for funsies, I referenced a few items in the actual game. Let's see if you guys can find them. :^)
Hope you guys enjoyed this chapter and have a sunshiny day!