OW: NEC 301/2 - What A Cruel World

It was snowing.

Slowly frozen white droplets had fallen from the sky; originally they had been rain until it had gotten cold. The snowflakes turned into unique patterns as they formed and fell, making their way onto the world below.
It was cold.

How did people believe the snow was beautiful when it froze and killed so many things? Animals, insects, plants, people; they died in the snow, in the freezing bite that was winter. But soon it was to thaw again, not long after, or during, the term in which Emily was to graduate Necromancy. It was amazing that how when doing classes like Necromancy, where you constantly dealt with life and death, that you grew accustomed to seeing death and life in so many things.
Though the Emere mainly focused on death rather than life. After all, it was much easier to notice death than it was to notice and acknowledge life. Especially when it was built into your very being.

In order to hide her face, Emily wore the cloak that she had bought last month, which had helped her hide her face from, who she perceived as, Stren. The hood covered her hair and shadowed her face so that people could not see, but she could see them. Throughout the past few days her hair had slowly become whiter, the stripe in her hair expanding so now instead of taking up around a quarter of her hair, it took up around half. Her hair had also grown in length since she cut it, not much, but enough so that she could put it in a ponytail so there were no loose strands surrounding her face.
Her arm that had been in a sling was better, healed by a healing potion she had gotten from the infirmary when it started to get difficult having it in a sling all the time. She now stayed away from any tower if she could, and often stayed near the ground, where she wouldn’t be tempted as much to do something stupid.

In her right hand Emily held the dark handle of the scythe, it extending to just above her height, as currently it was not shrunk, and the dual blades sat upon the top, the top one not far above the bottom one. The chain that connected to the two blades was tucked away inside the staff, and every time it moved there was a small clinking sound of metal against the inside.
She liked to believe that the two blades represented her two selves, but then again, it could just be the luck of the draw that she had gotten her scythe and it had turned out like that.

There.

She sensed what she knew was a soul that was not ready to pass on, as most of the souls were, but what she saw made her sure that this person was the one. He looked… relatively young. His cropped back, curly blue hair resting close against his skull, contrasting greatly with the darkness of his skin. He was holding the hand of a young girl, who could have been about five or six. She looked exactly like him, except for her eyes. The man had faded purple eyes, to the point where they were almost a light violet, whereas the girl had bright, vibrant pink eyes that darted about.
The man’s eyes however stayed still. Staring straight ahead, letting the girl lead the way.

He was blind, Emily finally concluded, and needed the little girl’s, presumably his daughter’s, help to get around Moonseed lane unscathed. It was sad, this man’s body would soon give out but the girl would most likely be left by herself. An orphan within Moonseed lane, a possible victim of assignments.
God knows she was going to be one of the people greatly affected by hers.

A resigned sigh left the Emere and she started following them to wherever they were going in Moonseed lane. Not only was the man blind she noticed, but he had large lumps on his skin. One such one was just above his left eye, almost dwarfing it in comparison. As they kept walking they turned down an alleyway and into almost darkness. It was a struggle to even see them in the darkness, but not a struggle to hear them.

“You know, it’s quite a pity you were in the wrong place at the wrong time. I would have loved to kill someone that wasn’t so frail. But you’ll have to do.” mEmily. Screams were heard through the darkness, the spark of steel against the blade of a scythe, the red blood that coated the knife and touched the scythe. “You had to interrupt Emily. You just had to…” Both the counterpart and reflection coughed up a liquid, Emily’s grey eyes staring into a clean part of the scythe’s blades.

They both soon had deep slashes in their sides. It didn’t hurt, it just surprised them significantly. And unfortunately, Emily moved the scythe downwards against the knife; Emily heard the sound of a body hitting the ground behind her.

If there was a god, he had created a cruel world.

mEmily, in an attempt to get away, distracted her counterpart by aiming to throw the knife in the little girl’s direction, to which Emily turned and ran towards the girl, giving time for mEmily to feint the throw and escape further into the alleyway.

“Daddy… Daddy…” The small girl sniffed, trying to get out of Emily’s arms. “Daddy get up.” Eventually Emily let the child go, following to where the crumpled body was. The spirit, unable to move on, started talking to the daughter, not realising he was dead.

“What is your name?”

“Olivia. Olivia, sweetheart I’m right here. I’m right here.” His spirit ignored Emily’s question and continued trying to comfort his daughter. With a swift swipe across the body’s chest, Emily had collected the soul, his yell echoing in her ears.

“Follow me Olivia. I can bring your father back.”

~*~
Several hours later, those same grey orbs that had observed them before, were watching the pair once again walk down Moonseed Lane. They were filled with compassion for the pair, and how, even though the father’s body was different, they could still act the same.  She had refused to get herself patched up until she had completed the assignment and reunited the daughter with her father, which she assumed Rax wasn’t happy about, as Necromancy was not meant to be overly dangerous.
Emily had tried to find a body that was quite similar to the father’s, which unfortunately she had to gather from the alley now, lest someone find it. She had to lay it to rest, even though it wasn’t a student. She was sure Rax would let her bury him near the black rose-bushes in the graveyard, but just in case she would ask.

After all, in life and in death, a body could learn many things, even in this cruel world.