My Bothersome Life

Witch Hunt

I almost cried when my I looked down at the newly changed colour of my hair. The strands of metallic silver shined like a rainbow under the dazzling sunlight coming through the window. Maybe if I wasn’t so used to my former brilliant red hair that used to gain attention whenever I walked by, I would be less somber. But, this ugly, muddy grey just reminded me of the people of this house where I was staying, captive in my cell.

I used to be enchanted by this colour when I first met Luke, a shining angel with the most captivating celestial appearance that couldn’t possibly be a human being. However, I soon discovered that this colour was common place in the district I resided in. And now this colour would not exist anymore in this district. My mood became more dejected when no memory of my former crimson red existed on anyone I passed by through the school halls.

I curled up inside my bed, covering myself with a large, fluffy blanket, full of the richest feathers of a rare creature inside a magical forest. The bed itself was portable with attached wheels on the bottom that were normally hidden. The IV machine attached to my left arm annoyingly beeped every minute, which almost drove me crazy from the otherwise silence.

In front of the bed were various medical equipment laid out in the open like they were cheap tools. This room was almost a mini hospital itself with the amazing layout of how everything was carefully placed. Jars of medicine properly organized on the shelves stuck on the wall and needles stuffed in the locked drawers.

The unmatched paintings of lovely wild flowers occupied the empty spaces on the wall while the wallpaper was a pattern of strips of rotating pastel green and blues. To fit all this stuff in meant the room was at least fifteen metre squared, more than five times bigger than the average room from an ordinary family. But, this was unsurprising to me by now as I have stayed in the most luxurious rooms throughout most of this life.

I always stayed in five-star hotels and the most beautiful castles while eating at the most exclusive restaurants. My numerous closets were usually filled piles of formal party dresses and semi-formal causal clothes all made from the famous designers in the country. I had rooms full of precious metals polished into various jewels that were accessorized into my earrings, necklaces and gloves in various mansions. But also, rooms of shoes that were cleanly lined up into shelves and drawers of modern cabinets.

I attend the top ranked school in my country, known for producing the most powerful leaders who rule the world with their power, status and wealth. The uniform itself is not affordable to many while the tuition is skyrocket high. The admission process is even more brutal to funnel out the desperate parents of the candidates that all want their children to attend the school. Some hidden aspects of admission require you to be born with a certain feature that outclasses all the others, which is mana.

I, who possess an unlimited amount of mana, was brought into this house from my ordinary, middle class family at a young age. I, who never wanted all these riches, but freedom from all the obligations I had. However, my dream wasn’t ever possible now as I stared outside the window where the lovely garden bloomed beneath me.

It all started in the class assignment where Luke and I was assigned to do a project in the fifth district. The fifth district was where time stopped after a certain period of development. The land was developed as much as the middle ages or otherwise known as the medieval times. The people there were all traditionalist and the various monarchy existed to rule the land. No mechanics existed and everything was done by hand as if they did not know what to do otherwise.

Knights fought with rusty swords during war or with wooden bows dipped with wild poison from mountainside plants. The area was fairly split into where the extravagant castles filled with treasures of gold where the nobles lived. Compared to the dreary homes of the villages who were expected to pay unfair taxes where they survived on hard bread. People who stood out or didn’t conform to the traditionalist values or ideas were known as heretics or witches.

I was captured and put onto a stake to be lit on fire as part of the ongoing witch hunt conducted throughout the land. I had to do something. Anything to be saved, to live under the village chief who had placed me here for rejecting the marriage proposal with his son. The girl, around the age of thirteen, didn’t dare to meet my eyes inside the crowd.

She stood there unmoving inside the jeering crowd that screamed for me to be killed. The girl who loved to fix various things with her scrapped tiny tools. The silent, cold eyes of the girl in a worn-out dress mended with various rags patched into the cloth stared at me like she had no feelings. She was the reason for my demise.

The villagers thought she was a witch, being able to fix almost anything with the metals they threw out after they have gotten unusable with the molten iron after the constant rainfall. But the girl had found out a way to make the rust go away in a split of a second while grabbing up many riches in the process.

Her services soon became famous through the northern territory of the feudal lord who taxed the land heavily after the flood. Her neighbors whispered of her fast success as the gossip soon reached the ears of the old village chief. His fat belly spanned out, jiggling with his every step as he slightly tinged his chin from the window of his large house shown through the crystal globe.

He rubbed his hands, full of anticipation as he called upon his aid, requesting to investigate the talented village girl who was dexterous with any broken object. He was running out of money for himself these days after gambling in the feudal lord’s house alongside the other village chiefs. The girl was the perfect tool to become the next ‘witch’ where no one would be suspicious of his real objective as his subjects already had wavering thoughts.

I tried to save his girl was around the same age of me. It was too pitiful for such a brilliant girl to be labelled as a witch to have an early death. It wasn’t part of my mission to interfere with the village chief’s plan, but I couldn’t be another bystander. I was never someone to clench my teeth and droop my head toward the ground, ignoring the scene of a blatant crime in front of me. But, I wished maybe this time, I had been another bystander among the crowd of villagers below me.

I gritted my teeth with hurt and betrayal as I was roped tight on my wrists and ankles. I felt my mana starting to go whack and out-of-control inside the deepest part of my body as the shouts got louder and louder. Apparently, I was the seventh ‘witch’ in the village to be put up on a pedestal while all the villagers gathered to watch. It served as a means as a warning for all the other young girls who dared to go against the kingdom’s regimes of ideas and values.

‘Control Rika,’ I mumbled inside my head as my heart thumped rapidly as the blacksmith tried to make a small fire with the dry, wooden branches.

When the sparks of fire slipped onto the tip of one brittle branch, the village chief patted the blacksmith before putting the burning flame onto an oiled torch. The fire instantly screamed into the hottest blues as it shot up from eating the animal fat. The crowd clapped and cheered as the old man lifted the torch into the mounting sky.

The event was decorated into an elaborate festival with tables full of beer and booze a few miles away in the village chief’s house. A buffet full of meat made the children’s eyes shine as they followed their parents who equally looked forward to the feast. Once the ceremony was over, the village would get a bag of gold for helping the kingdom’s mission of getting rid of all the ‘witches’.

The village chief who promised to share the reward with all the villages through the feast at his house quickly gathered the support of all the starving villagers. He lowered his hands and time seemed to slow down as the torch was dropped onto the stake. I fiercely closed my eyes with grave anticipation of being lit on fire, alive.

My last vision was filtered through a wall of blurry orange under the hot, wavering heat of the everlasting sun that fueled the fire stronger by the second. Drops of sweat drenched my most filthy dress littered with dirt and stains from being dragged on the ground as the air was soon washed with hot magma.

‘Why did it turn out this way?’ A single bead of sweat landed on my foot.