"Zzzz..."
By the side of the road, a pile large of briars was bunched up in the shade, unmoving and holding up a small girl. Wearing a yellow sleeping gown and tightly hugging a small bundle of vines, Little Briar Rose was peacefully napping the day away, worrying only of what her next dream would be
At the moment, she had been dreaming of a wonderful landscape covered in golden fields, nightmares walking about without a care in the world while Little Briar Rose looked up to the sky, a sunhat blocking the bright sunlight from hitting her delicate skin. She yawned, sitting down and ready to take a nap to dream within the now boring dream, when suddenly
"Ow!"
Briar Rose felt something strike her head, waking her up from layers of slumber, and causing the vines under her to vanish down into the ground letting the girl fall flat on her back.
"Hehe"
A girl, one about the same height at Little Briar Rose, was beaming, with a look that screamed "content". The girl wore a red hood over her clothes and her feet were covered by a pair of red boots which kicked the groggy princess on the ground
"Hey!" Briar Rose yelled out, covering her head and making herself into a ball to protect herself from the violence of the girl standing behind her.
"Aww, that's no fun," Akazukin whined, her eyes sparkling as she reared her foot back for another kick, "let me see your pretty face so I can make it bleed!"
Before she could touch Briar Rose, a small group of thorny vines wrapped around her ankle giving the princess enough time to stand up, back away, and hide behind a tree.
"Monster..." she whispered just loud enough for Akazukin to hear
"Monster?" Akazukin asked looking around, her smile growing larger, "Where!?"
Briar Rose lifted up a trembling finger, pointing directly at the devil she saw before her
"You," she whispered, voice still weak after just waking up, "Only a monster… would hit someone to... wake them up"
"Oh, that?" The red hooded girl responded, sticking her tongue out, "Well, it looked like you wanted to rest, so I thought I should kill you"
"Kill..."
The sleeping princess was at a loss for words. The girl coming closer to her was crazy. She wanted to kill Briar Rose as though it was obvious death was the same as sleep; as though eternal slumber was equivalent to the extinction of one's life. Briar Rose felt something in her heart she had never felt before. It consumed her being, making her legs weaken and her eyes dart about, trying to focus on the she-devil that was only steps away from her
"Why don't you let me put you to rest, hm?"
"I want to sleep… not die"
Akazukin approached the princess, and raised her hand, smirking at the sight of Briar Rose raising her arms, flinching. It was a wave of joy that enveloped the wolf in sheep's clothing seeing that girl's eyes filled to brim with such a lovely emotion
Fear, it was the first time Little Briar Rose had ever felt such a thing. Never before had she thought of her own eventual death. It was always her doing the killing, ending those who woke her up from peaceful slumber. Yes, from that satisfying rest, from the world of dreams she loved so much
Little Briar Rose closed her eyes, slowly shrinking into the ground, her face pressed against the tree trunk, her mind wandering off into a state of nothing, forming an image of a cloudy castle, but was suddenly interrupted by a slap to her face, a pulsing heat growing across her cheek
"Ah!"
"Hehe, I can help you rest forever you know," Akazukin said, face to face with the shocked princess, placing her slender fingers on the girl's cheek
"No!" Briar Rose yelled out, her voice echoing through the forest of trees, startling the girl with the red hood. All hints of languor in the girl's eyes had vanished, replaced by rage spreading down to her fingertips. Her fingers twitched, making scattered briars on the gound wriggle about, growing out of the dirt and around the angry princess
"Oh," Akazukin said softly while raising her own weapon, a Warhammer, above her shoulders and saying the agitated girl, "So that's how you want to do it?"
Briar Rose lifted her right hand, parallel to the ground, and the briars on the ground slowly intertwined with one another to form her familiar club, large enough to rival the monster girl's hammer and brought it up above her head with a determined glare.
Before the two were given a chance to strike one another, however, a loud screech was heard behind the two. It was a wolf-like creature, green in color, and with a rather muscular pair of hind legs. Its head eye level with the two young girls who turned towards the nightmare in disgust angered that it had the courage, or maybe simply to stupidity, to interject between the two. Without uttering even a word, the angered princess pointed her club at the wolf, who stared wide-eyed in her direction, while the little, red hooded girl lept up high in the air and brought her hammer down before her
In almost an instant, the nightmare was pierced through the heart by innumerable thorny briars, while its head was crushed by the weight of a hammer almost half its size. It seemed as though time had stood still, the two young girls unmoving, unwilling to make acknowledge what had just occurred.
"She's strong," both thought to themselves, looking down at the pile of flesh and red-dyed fur that was once a living thing. Neither moved a muscle until it was finally the princess, who dropped her weapon and let it disappear into the ground, who opened her mouth to speak
"I'm leaving, I don't to be here with you"
Without so much as a pause within her words, the ever sleeping beauty turned around and stormed into the forest behind her, walking further and further until the shadows hid her from sight. The red-hooded girl simply sighed and stomped on the pile of flesh and bone by her feet
"If she wanted to rest," she muttered, "she could have just asked me to kill her"
Indeed, to Akazukin, the wolf in sheep's clothing, death meant an eternal rest. An excuse to escape the world, to be free from the shackled of the material plane she was living in. In fact, those she killed should be happy. Grandma's illness was cured by death. The foresters from where she lived should rejoice that the wolf was gone for good. The wolf no longer had to starve while looking for prey, it should be grateful that it was killed
Everything was supposed to die, so why run away from the truth? To live is to eventually die, why wait when you could fulfill your purpose in life sooner rather than later?
These sentiments, however, were not shared among the two girls. Deeper within the forest, Little Briar Rose was grumbling to herself while rubbing her eyes.
"Slumber… isn't the same as death!"
Truly, peace isn't a hard thing to find at all, after all, to find it all you need to do is close your eyes. You just need to sleep much longer than anyone else. You should give yourself to slumber, to languor, and hope for sweet dreams.
"I sleep," Briar Rose said to herself, "Because its the happiest… and the most… peaceful thing I can… do".
Yes, her slumber proves that the world is at peace. Her slumber is the symbol of peace, the only peace one can find in the world, especially in the world of the Library. If somebody wanted to know peace, and not anguish, torment, nor pain, then-
"Don't disturb my slumber!"
The princess' scream echoed through the forest, the sound of scurrying retreat could be heard around her, the sounds of nightmares both big and small running away from the center of the noise, where a lone girl fashioned herself a small bed of thorny vines and laid herself down to sleep, to fall into the world of dreams
To fall into a deep, and peaceful slumber
