Chapter 14:

A Life of Eternal Solitude

Isolation. Timeless. Endless. Questions.

Those were the four words that came to Leif's mind when she described her entire experience isolated inside of the empty house, on the isle floating among the stars, in a realm with an enigmatic existence. An experience where time did not seem to exist, but the world goes on with no end in sight. It left her with questions as to the existence of that place, and why she was there in the first place.

Despite it all, she resigned herself long ago to her fate of being imprisoned for all eternity, as decreed by an unknown, superior power, especially when compared to what she went through very early on.

When she first awakened inside of that house, she was completely lost and confused. She had no idea how she got there and why she was there in the first place, let alone remembering anything prior. Searching through the empty house and the floating isle did little to provide her an answer to her questions. And although there were other isles floating alongside the one that she was standing on, getting to them was impossible. Not because they were too far, but somehow, she could not physically leave, as if there was an invisible barrier that kept her in.

At first, she convinced herself that she was dreaming. The world seemed too unbelievable to even exist in reality, so she must be still asleep in the comfort of her own room, inside of her own house, in an ordinary world. She only needed to wake up in order to leave the place. She waited for a very, very, very long time, until it dawned on her that it was no dream, and she was fully awake.

She became frustrated. She became angry. Without even a tiny clue as to why she was there, she could only lash out at nothing in particular. She kicked off the dirt and tore out the grass around the isle. She punched and kicked the walls of the house. She threw rocks at the windows. She clawed into the floor of the house. But no matter how much she exerted her rage, not only did she found that the house was impervious to any kind of damage, her actions did little to bring her peace. Her only consolation, however, was that she discovered that she had supernatural powers, when she saw her eyes glow blue from looking at her own reflection through the window.

It led her to believe she had a purpose there. Perhaps the whole reason for her being stranded on that isle was because she was on a mission. And until she accomplish the task at hand, she would remain presumably for all eternity. It made sense. Why else would she be on the isle? All she needed to do was utilize her mysterious blue powers to thoroughly search through the entirety of the isle to find whatever it was that she was supposed to do. She searched for a very, very, very long time, until the reality that there was nothing to be found there sunk in. No task to speak of. No clue. No nothing. There was no reason for her being there, yet she was confined nonetheless.

She did not remember how long she cried. She was lost. Confused. Terrified. Alone. There was no one beside her. No living beings anywhere. Nothing that could keep her busy. At one point, she contemplated ending her own life, unable to withstand anymore endless loneliness. But she never went through with it. Not because of her own will, but some kind of superior power was preventing her from committing to it.

After a very, very, very long time, she simply accepted her fate. She sat down in the middle of the room and did nothing. And since then, that was all she did. She no longer expected anything different happening any time soon. It was just her, the house and the isle. Nothing else. She accepted all of that.

"Hello?"

Leif nearly jumped from her spot on the floor upon hearing a voice coming from behind her. She frantically stood up and turned around to confront the unexpected owner of the voice, her eyes glowing bright blue.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa! It's okay!" The orange-haired boy at the front quickly said, raising his hands up defensively, as if he was going to intercept an attack from her. "It's just me! Uh, you remember me, right?"

She recognized the boy right away, her fear replaced by a combination of relief and irritation.

"Sprig Plantar…" she spoke his name, her eyes returning back to normal with a single blink.

It was only recently that the boy in front of her disrupted the constant state of loneliness that she had to endure for eternity, when he suddenly showed up with little to no knowledge as to how he got to the isle, besides his explanation that he dreamt himself there. Leif had every reason to be wary of the boy who served as an anomaly to the rules set by the mysterious realm that led her to believe that she was the only person residing in there. Whatever purpose that he had there, she convinced herself that he was up to no good.

But when she gauged his nature the last time she interacted with him, she found no sign of malicious intent coming from him. In fact, he exhibited a strong desire to form a bond with her despite her hostility towards him, and he even offered to help her once he learned of her plight. Despite still putting her guard up around him, his kind nature brought a form of relief that she had not felt since she first awakened there.

"Oh good! That's a relief!" Sprig let out a sigh of relief, fully entering the house through the front door. "I mean, it's been a while since the last time I came here, so I was worried that you might've forgotten about me."

"Hmph. How could I forget about you? You're literally the second person who came on this isle besides me." Leif said, as she sat back down on the floor.

"Yeah, that's true." Sprig said, scratching the back of his head. "So did you miss me?"

"I'll let you guess as to what my answer will be." Leif said.

"Um… Is that a no?"

"Bingo. Congratulations. For guessing right the first time, you get nothing. So technically, you lose. Good day, sir." she sarcastically praised him while motioning her hands over to the empty room to hammer in the fact that there was no reward waiting for him there. "Unless you think my reward for you is living on this isle with me."

"Sounds like you're insinuating something, Leif." Sprig remarked with a teasing smile.

"As if." she scoffed while crossing her arms. "Don't get your hopes up. Besides, you wouldn't like it here anyway."

"Okay, okay. I can take a hint." he relented, as he sat down on the floor in front of the frog girl. "Speaking of which, what is this place, anyway?"

"This world that we're in?" she asked for clarification.

"Yeah! It's weird!" he said as he looked around the room. "A single house on a floating isle in the middle of the night sky? And you're the only person living here, for some reason? It really makes my head spin just trying to make sense out of all of this."

"Hm. I can see where you're coming from."

"So, I've been wondering. Do you know what this whole place is supposed to be? You know, since you've been living here for basically all of your life? Not that I think it's a good thing or anything…"

The frog girl frowned, as she shifted her gaze away from the boy. "… I wish I could tell you. But believe it or not, I don't know any more than you do."

"Really?"

"It is as you say." she continued. "I've basically been on my own in this strange world for what seems like an eternity. But no matter much time has passed, and how much I tried to look into this place as closely as possible, I still have absolutely no clue about it all."

"So you don't know either, huh?" Sprig commented. If the sole resident of the floating isle claimed to not know anything about the world that they were currently on, then there was not much that they could do at the moment. "Man, now I'm just dying to know what the whole deal about this place is. It would help a bunch if I talk about this to the family, a friend or someone else back in the real world."

"Hm. Now there's an idea." Leif said. "You should do just that when you leave this place. You just might be able to put a dent in this eternal mystery."

"Um… The thing is…" Sprig rubbed the back of his neck. "I can't."

"… What do you mean?" she asked, tilting her head.

"I mean, don't get me wrong! I do wanna tell the others about the world that I keep dreaming myself in!" he clarified while waving his hands in front of him. "It's just that… Well, when I woke up in the real world, every time I tried to remember what happened in here, I… I drew a complete blank."

"You couldn't remember?"

He nodded. "Yeah. It's weird. If this is like any other dream, I could remember most of it just fine. But I could barely remember anything that happened here. It's like all of my memories of this place get left behind when I wake up, and when I come back here, it all comes back to me, like nothing happened. Um, does it make any sense?"

Leif lowered her gaze, as she thought hard about what the boy had explained to her. Sprig was unable to recall his experience in this realm when he returned to the real world? If what he said was true, then there truly was no way for them to discover the strange world's true purpose even from the outside. It was as if some unknown higher power was keeping the existence of the realm a secret to everyone. Once again, the mysterious world left her with more questions than answers.

"The mystery thickens, huh?" Leif said. "But… it is to be expected, sadly."

"Wait, it sounds like you're giving up on trying to figure this out." Sprig said.

"I've already given up on it a long time ago. Like I said before, I couldn't find anything about this place even if I searched thoroughly. It's not like this place is going to give us an answer any time soon. So what's the point? I might as well just sit still and do nothing for all of eternity. It's how I live my life, up to this point."

"But… Aren't you sad? About everything?"

"I was. But I already ran out of tears long ago." Leif closed her eyes. "No need for you to sympathize with me. I've already accepted my fate of being stuck here forever. At least, in your case, you're free to leave any time you want. So consider yourself lucky that you don't share the same fate as me."

"Leif…"

Sprig could only think about how devastatingly upsetting Leif's situation was. Not only did she have amnesia, but she was trapped in there for such a long time without knowing why she was there in the first place. Was there even an end to her torment? He truly wanted to help her, but how exactly does he go about it? He was essentially backed into a corner by all of the misfortune that befell the frog girl.

"If you're done here, then it's time for you to leave before something unexpected happens." Leif said, as she turned her head away from him. "I appreciate your help in trying to uncover this world's purpose. But as you can see for yourself, we're getting nowhere with this."

"Well… Maybe I can't help with trying to figure this whole thing out." Sprig spoke. "But there is one thing that I can definitely help with."

"With what?"

"Bringing a bit of joy in your life." he smiled.

"And… How do you plan on doing that? I mean, what is there to be happy about?" she asked, confused by what he meant by it.

"You're forgetting that you're talking to the first person that you've ever met in your life!" he said as he pointed his thumb at himself. "So you must be curious about me and have a ton of questions to ask me about!"

"This again?" Leif sighed, having remembered going through the same scenario the last time they spoke. "I thought that we're done with me asking you questions last time."

"Come on, Leif! You don't think that we're gonna stop with just one question, do you?"

"It's a waste of time, in case that you have forgotten."

"Maybe. But it'll make things a little less boring, right?"

"Hmm…" The frog girl wanted to argue with him, but she could not deny that his presence did bring a very small amount of life into the eternal torment that she had to endure.

"How about this, Leif?" Sprig spoke. "You just need to ask me one question, and that's it. If you don't, I'm just gonna stay here until you reconsider. Heck, I'll just keep on talking to you, if that's what it takes to get you to give in!"

"You know I can still push you out of here, right?" Leif reminded him, her eyes glowing blue for a moment as proof that it was not an empty threat.

"Oh… That's an option too, I guess…" he sheepishly said, as he had not consider she could do just that. He rubbed the back of his neck once more. "Yeah… Feels like I'm really out of luck here…"

Leif would prefer to cut their conversation short and get him out of there so that peace, however agonizing it may be, could return to her. But at the same time, she did not know when it will be the next time that she would talk to him like that. Against her better judgement, perhaps knowing a little bit more about the irritating boy would not hurt.

"Fine." she sighed.

Sprig instantly perked up, smiling. "So you'll do it?"

"Yes. I'll ask you a question." she said. "Just one, right? Will you leave this place afterwards?"

"Sure! I promise!" he vowed with his hand raised.

"… You're going to make this a regular thing between us, aren't you?"

"Maybe." The boy cheekily shrugged, his smile betraying his attempt to hide his true intention of making it a recurring thing each time he visits her. There was not much Leif could do about it, however.

"Alright… Let's go for this one." she said. "You mentioned a family earlier. Who are they, exactly?"

"Ah! Wanna know what the Plantar family is all about, huh? You're asking the right question here!" He gave the frog girl a thumbs-up.

"Just answer me and get this over with, will you?" she asked him exasperatedly, placing a palm over her face as she pondered if she should have reconsider.

"Right. Gotcha." He nodded, clearing his throat as he prepared to give his answer to Leif. "So us Plantars are a family of farmers, just like everyone else back in our hometown, Wartwood. But we're not just a farm family. We're a family with a penchant for adventure, mischief, and attracting danger to ourselves way more than others while still kicking and in one piece!"

"There's a lot to unpack related to the last part…" she noted.

"In my family, there's Hopadiah Plantar." he continued. "He's my Hop Pop, which means 'grandpa.' We tend to call him that cause it rolls off the tongue better. Hop Pop's pretty old-fashioned. Shocker, right? He's also strict and sometimes a worrywart to the point that he'll take matters into his own hands just so everything goes exactly as it should. And he's also a bit selfish."

"So he's an overbearing grandfather pursuing his own interests. Got it." Leif nodded in understanding.

"But besides that, he's a welcoming and really caring person towards us, and he can be understanding when things really matter. While he's always trying to get us to follow his example to a T, he also recognizes where he gets things wrong and makes up for it."

His interaction with Hop Pop after the Ruins of Despair incident came to mind. "So at the end of the day, Hop Pop is a great parent figure when the whole family really comes together for a common goal."

"Well, at least he sets a good example on how a parent should raise their children." Leif spoke her opinion on the elderly frog, based on what the boy had explained to her.

"Then there's my little sister, Polly." Sprig continued. "She might be a baby pollywog, but you're in for a surprise if you expect her to act anything like a regular baby. She's pretty tough and scary, 'cause in a lot of situations, she almost always resorts to violence and conquer over others when she's given the chance, so much so that we kinda have to reel her in before she goes too far."

Sprig chuckled for a bit, when he recalled what the family had gone through a day or two ago. "The funny thing is, she always acts so tough that we almost forgot that she's still a baby girl who needs to be cared for. Now that I know better, looking out for her is still one of my top priorities as her big brother."

"A very young girl with a complex character, huh?" Leif commented on the boy's description of his baby sister. "It does sound like she's one in a million."

"And finally, there's our latest member of the family!" Sprig said, his mood noticeably lightened up as he thought about the next person that he was going to talk about. "I think I told you about her before, the last time we talked to each other."

"Oh, you mean your human friend?" she asked.

"Yep! Anne Boonchuy! My best friend in the whole world!" he exclaimed, smiling widely. "You might be thinking that it's weird for a human being to be part of a frog family, but the thing about us is that blood isn't what makes you a Plantar. The bonds that you formed with the family, the time that you spent with them, and the lengths that you'd go for them is what makes you an honorary member of the Plantar family. And Anne proved to us time and again that she has more than earned her place with us."

"So that's how your family functions, huh? Intriguing." Leif said, fascinated by what was considered family for the boy.

"And that's pretty much it! To sum it up, our family consists of Hop Pop, Polly, Anne and me, of course! It would've been nice if I can somehow get you to meet them in person, but this will do for now." Sprig concluded his answer to the frog girl's question.

"Hm… I wonder…" she murmured, as she noticed that Sprig seemed to have left out something essential. "Is that really your entire family?"

"Well, yeah." Sprig confirmed, a bit confused by her question. "What, did I say something funny?"

"So you have your grandfather, your baby sister, and your adopted sister who is also your best friend…" Leif listed the family members. "But what about your parents? Your mother and father?"

"… Oh."

At that moment, Sprig's enthusiasm took a dip. He was not expecting her, or anyone in particular, to ask about his parents. That was the second time that the subject of his parents was brought up to him recently. And he was not sure how he should proceed with that.

He moved his hand up to grasp his green hat, as he thought about what to say without making things more awkward than necessary between them.

"They're… not around anymore."

"Oh…" Leif simply said, immediately understanding what he meant. In hindsight, she should have known why the boy left out his parents in the first place, and she felt bad bringing it up. "I'm sorry…"

"It's okay. I mean, you couldn't have known, since we've only seen each other three times now." Sprig reassured her, lowering his hand from his hat. "You don't have to feel bad about me. I was only a little tadpole when I lost my parents, so I don't remember much about them. And like I told you before, Hop Pop has been a great parent figure to us."

He smiled once more to make his point. "I'm happy with the people that I call family. And I wouldn't give them up for anything in the world."

"… If you say so." Leif said, as they put an end to that particular topic. However, she could not help but wonder if Sprig really was fine with the way things are for him. After all, she did saw some regret in his eyes when talking about losing his parents.

THUD!

Before they could move forward with their conversation, the front door suddenly slammed open, the doorway shining a bright light over the two people sitting in the room.

Sprig turned his head around to look at the opened door. "Uh, Leif? Was that you who did that just now?" he asked.

"Why did you assume that it was me?" Leif asked him in turn, baffled at how he came to that conclusion. "I'm sitting right in front of you and nowhere near the door."

"Well, you have that weird power of yours, right?" he explained himself, turning his head back to her. "Granted, I don't know how it works, but I just thought that you might have the ability to move things with your brain."

Leif shook her head. "That's definitely not how my powers work."

"Then how did the door-?"

Before they could figure out what really happened, the light from the doorway intensified, expending to envelop the entirety of the room, along with the human boy and the frog girl.

Leif shielded her eyes from the blinding light by raising her arm over them. The light shined brightly for a few seconds before it quickly dimmed down until it disappeared completely from the room. At that moment, Leif slowly lowered her arm down and opened her eyes.

Only to realize that the boy in front of her had disappeared.

"Sprig?" She called out his name, but she received no response. She looked around the empty room to see if he was somewhere else in there, but there was no sign of the orange-haired human anywhere.

She then looked at the opened door in front of her, as it slowly closed onto itself. She connected the phenomenon of the blinding light and Sprig's disappearance together, and came to a single conclusion.

By some kind of mystical intervention, Sprig was forced out of the strange world.

"… Huh."

The harsh vibration of the fwagon as it moved in high speed over a rough terrain stirred the orange-haired boy awake.

He winced as he slowly opened his eyes, the ceiling being the first thing that he saw. Looking around, he found himself lying down on the bed located on the platform just above the backdoor of the fwagon, remembering that he must have fallen asleep some time ago.

His body involuntarily bounced on the bed, when another sudden vibration spread across the fwagon.

"Aargh! Come on! I was almost there!"

He heard the voice of his best friend shouting in frustration. Looking down at the bottom floor, he noticed that several small pieces of a puzzle were spread out across the floor. Anne could be found sitting at the table, scratching her head in vexation, as she stared at a few puzzle pieces laying on the table next to an opened box whose cover portrayed a couple of strange creatures known as koalas standing on a boat.

"Huh… What happened down here?" he wondered, in the process of getting out of bed by moving his legs over to the edge.

Then the fwagon suddenly shook a third time, causing the boy to bounce of the bed while catching him off-guard. He yelped right as he fell to the floor face-first. "Oww…!"

"Sprig!" Anne gasped as she quickly came to her friend's side as soon as she saw him fall off the bed hard. "You okay, dude?" she asked him while lending him a hand.

"Ngh…! I think so…" he groaned as he took her helping hand and pulled himself up from the floor. "What the heck is going on out here?" he asked while rubbing the sore spot on his face that took the blunt of the fall.

"Urgh! You tell me!" Anne frowned. "The fwagon's been moving so much like this ever since we left the last town! I mean, I know that they have a schedule to keep, but would it kill them to just take it easy every now and then?!"

She motioned her hands over to the puzzle pieces that were sprawled all over the floor beneath their feet. "All this shaking and turning and stuff pretty much made me lose all of the progress on my jigsaw puzzle! And I was only a dozen of pieces away from finishing it!"

"Oof… That sucks, Anne." he expressed his sympathies. "Still, I wonder why we're moving so much, anyway?"

He walked over to the window next to the table, with Anne accompanying him. They opened the window and poked their heads out to see what was going on outside.

At the front, they saw two trailers interconnected to one another, alongside the fwagon, being pulled by a giant beetle. There was not much to see that could answer their question.

Looking at the back, they saw another wagon bound to the fwagon in the back…

… As well as a giant sandworm chasing after the linked caravans from close behind, snarling as it tried to take hold of them with its large mouth, only for the wagons to narrowly avoid its attack by zigzagging at high speed.

"Well, I guess we now know what's causing all the ruckus." Sprig said, as he and Anne pulled their heads back inside before closing the window. "Not much else they can do to escape that huge thing chasing us."

"Yeah, I guess…" Anne said as she sat back down at the table and placed her palms over her face, groaning in frustration. "Urgh! I was so close! This puzzle took me almost a day to complete! And now, I have to restart it all over again!"

"That really sucks, huh?" The boy said, understanding her frustration.

The brown-haired girl sighed, as she stood up from the table. "I'm gonna go pick up the pieces on the floor. Mind helping me out a bit, buddy?"

"Sure thing." he complied, as they began to collect all of the puzzle pieces that fell off.

It took them a while to pick up everything, mostly because the fwagon kept moving so abruptly that the pieces kept sliding and bouncing across the interior, which did not help with easing the human girl's irritation. After they managed to find what they believed to be every single piece, they put them all back on the table, as they sat down.

"Thanks, Sprig." Anne sighed. "Here's hoping that we didn't miss any…"

"So you really worked on this puzzle for almost a whole day?" Sprig asked, surprised to learned how long putting the puzzle together took.

"Yeah, believe it or not." she replied. "I mean, I know that there are a lot of pieces to put together, but I didn't think that it would take me this long. And knowing that I have to go back to square one just because of what we had to deal with? Giving up on it seems really tempting, right about now…"

"And you were by yourself?"

"Yep, since Hop Pop is pretty busy performing with Renee's acting troupe, Polly is hanging out with the theatre kids, and you were sleeping for quite a bit." she said. "Which reminds me. You never told me why you weren't with Polly and the others. Didn't you say that it would be cool to hang out with that Francois kid, or something along those lines?"

Sprig let out a despondent sigh, as he remembered what caused him to not join up with the theatre kids. "I don't wanna talk about it…"

"You sure? You know that I'm all ears 24/7, dude."

"I know, Anne. But I'm really not in the mood. Thanks, anyway."

Anne shrugged. "Okay. Whatever you say." she said, as she began to search through the pile of pieces, trying to determine which ones that she should start with. "So what are you planning on doing in a meantime?"

"Good question…" Sprig replied as he thought about what he should do to kill time. Since they'll be with the acting troupe for some time, at least until they reach the next area leading to Newtopia, doing basically nothing for the rest of the trip would be a death sentence for his mind.

But as soon as he saw Anne putting two puzzle pieces together, he had an idea on what to do.

"Hey, what do you think of having another person work on the puzzle together with you?" he asked, as he picked up a piece from the pile.

"Really? You wanna help me out with putting this all together?" Anne asked, surprised by the boy's suggestion.

"Why not?" he shrugged, smiling. "I have nothing else to do, and you seemed really eager to finish your puzzle, so this looks like a no brainer to me."

"Aww, Sprig…" The Thai-American girl smiled at her friend, touched by his offer. "Yeah, sure. That would help a lot."

"Okay! Then let's do this thing!"

"Spranne against the world!" Both Sprig and Anne shouted while throwing their fists into the air, before they set their sights back on the matter at hand.

With two people working together, finishing that huge puzzle before night falls would be a cinch. As long as there are no other outside factors that could delay or undo all of their efforts.

End of Chapter