She looked around frantically, taking in as much of the world as she could. Hoping to recognize something - anything from the scene around her. She quickly realized she had nothing to use in comparison. She had been lying in dirt, she knew that at least. It was small, but having something sure to cling to pushed away some of the panic closing in on her. Rosa took a few deep breaths and twisted around to look behind her, noting the land as it came to a small taper. Beyond that was water. A large lake. She could see mountains and crags on the other bank, but they were small and far away. The land wrapped around the lake on her right side, and just off the shore where she lay was a thick, rocky pedestal standing straight out of the water. Rosa craned her neck and tried to see what was at the top, but she couldn't see from her angle. All she could see was that it was something white.

She turned back around and looked again at the archway and the grass around it. Except for the gentle lap of the water and the slight sound of moving wind, it was quiet, like it hadn't been disturbed in years. Immediately her heart clenched with the feeling that she wasn't supposed to be there. She felt as though she was interrupting the tranquility of that place, and panic shot down her hands and froze them, clenching them in tight, trembling fists at her sides.

"Where am I?" she asked aloud, and her voice disappeared, swallowed by the silence.

She climbed to her feet. Slowly. Unsteadily. Feeling like she wasn't connected to her body. Her arms and legs moved at her command, but it didn't feel real. She felt placed there in her skin rather than belonging there from the start. And she was trembling. She heard a soft sound behind her, like a small ringing, and when she turned, a yellow stone had appeared there. Rosa grabbed the bow on the ground and strapped the quiver around her waist, then snatched the staff and slung it around her back as well. It felt right before she faced whatever the stone was.

It looked like a yellow diamond, encased in spiraled stone. She took a step closer and realized it was crystal. Just like her staff. Crystals must have been important there. The stone pulsed once, its yellow light flaring, and Rosa scrambled away, afraid of what it could mean. She didn't know if it was dangerous. She didn't know what could happen to her if she touched it. And yet, looking into the soft yellow light, she felt somewhat drawn to it. Something was grabbing onto her hand and pulling her towards it, urging her to touch it. She blinked, and stepped away again when she realized she had actually been pulled towards it. She tried to turn away from it, from the glow, but her eyes refused to look away. Something about it held her gaze. She felt that something on the other side was leading her there. Her trembling legs inched her closer and closer to it. She watched her fingers stretch out, and the very tip of her gloved finger caught the stone.

The crystal pulsed again, and the light flew out towards her. It wrapped around her, holding her tight, and the floor dropped away from her. It solidified under her feet again before she could flail her arms. She opened her eyes, and her surroundings changed.

She was standing at the edge of a flat, round plain, with crops of white crystal formations rising up from the ground all around her. Rosa looked behind her, at the same yellow stone she had touched. It must have been a teleportation device. She inched around the stone, careful not to touch it again, and peered over the edge as far as she dare. She was about a hundred feet in the air, at the top of the pedestal she had noticed from below. She could see straight down to where she woke up. That archway. The mountains and grass, and a bit of the lake. Rosa returned to the front of the teleport crystal and stared down the seemingly empty area in front of her, crossing the plane to investigate. She took about twenty paces forward when something stopped her, and she bounced right off of whatever it was, momentarily confused. She didn't see anything in front of her when she was approaching. Rosa placed her hands out, and sure enough, her hands stopped again, pressing flat against . . . something. Before her eyes, it rippled under her hands, and suddenly a pattern of transparent hexagons materialized. It was some kind of barrier.

Rosa huffed in frustration, and reset her hands further apart for better leverage. She braced one foot behind her and shoved with all her might. The barrier crumbled with much less force than she thought, and she phased right through it. She staggered into the dome, running forward to catch her balance.

Rosa shielded her face from the bright white shine of the area inside the barrier. She blinked rapidly until her eyes adjusted, then she took a look around. She was standing in a shallow pool of water, no more than an inch or two deep. Rosa kicked her foot and picked some of the water up, watching the droplets as they splattered feet away from her. There were clouds above her, but instead of the ominous, rolling grey of the clouds outside, these were of the purest white. Moving across the sky, but calmly. Combined with the soothing splash of the water, the place felt peaceful. She could feel it ebbing away at her anxiety. Her breathing came easier, her shoulders relaxed from their tense positions, and her fists unclenched at her sides.

All around her there were pieces of rocks, stuck randomly around the dome. In the center of the dome was one particularly flat one, slightly elevated on two steps that rose out of the shallow water. It wasn't the particular stone that drew her attention, but the figure lying on it.

Her back was to Rosa, but from what she could see, the woman had on a white dress that matched the pure white of the whole area. She had golden-blonde hair, perhaps a shade or two lighter than . . . What color was her hair? Rosa reached behind her and took hold of her hair, loosely gathered off to the side. She pulled it out in front of her face as far as it would go and saw that her own hair was a pale, straw-blonde. The fact that she didn't even know her own hair color frightened her, but she left it alone for the moment, more concerned with the woman. The woman had a veiled tiara in her hair, and that was all the more Rosa could see of her. She was lying on her side on the pedestal, facing away.

Rosa approached slowly, trying to assess the situation but not knowing how. What if the woman was a threat? What if she wasn't? Rosa wasn't sure what she would do in either situation. She had the weapons but had no idea how to use them-

The woman stirred. She positioned her arms underneath her, and when she tried to prop herself up, Rosa saw her arms shake. The woman looked around, but hadn't seen her. Frightened by her indecision, Rosa tried to retreat away from her, but her foot splashed in the water and the woman startled. Her head whipped around and she gasped, and Rosa froze, unsure if she should run. The woman raised her eyes and looked into Rosa's. The brightest blue eyes that Rosa had ever seen stared into her, set within tired, puffy sockets. The woman's face was young and beautiful, with a sharp nose and slender jawline, and when she saw Rosa she relaxed and smiled softly, tilting her head in sincerity. All the fight drained out of Rosa quickly. The woman's eyes felt impossibly deep, like she had all the knowledge and wisdom of the universe packed into them. They were not young eyes, burdened by experience, but still peaceful. And Rosa felt warmth and tenderness spread through her whole body from those eyes. She felt the magic and serenity that seemed to halo around the woman in a wide aura.

"Rosa. Rosa Joanna Farrell."

Rosa blinked. She had said something. "W-what?"

"You are Rosa? Rosa Joanna Farrell?"

"Y-yes. Who are you?"

"Cosmos. I am the one who summoned you to this world."