…of Odum Regalus. Coincidentally, artifacts recording the world's earliest incarnations of witches seem to resemble the odum markings of this sect. Though information of this first generation is scarce, scholars widely accept that the Sky-Splitting Genesis phenomena was still present - on a night when the constellations in the night sky shine their brightest, a single star falls down from the heavens onto the earth below. Upon reaching the ground, one can find a witch in its place. Elements and compounds found in shooting stars reveal –
A heavy crashing sound comes from outside, startling the witch. She looks up from the book in her hands and places it onto the table in front of her. The book makes a satisfying sound as it hits the wood, causing the bowl of half-finished soup on the tabletop to shake slightly from the force. The witch gets up from her seat and lights an oil lamp.
Outside, the air is cold enough to numb her fingers, but she doesn't mind. Something stirs in her chest, and she's not sure what emotion it is exactly, only that it is a mix of the most unpleasant feelings. The witch is vaguely reminded of burnt toast and wet socks, or of hanging laundry outside only for it to rain and stubbing her toe on the door.
A low groan can be heard, and the witch frowns. It had been a long time since a villager wandered this far into the forest. Still, the witch walks towards the moonblossom tree, where the sound originated from. It is not good to stand idle while someone, even a stranger, is in distress.
Seeing the figure propped against the trunk of the tree, the witch stifles a gasp. She stumbles backwards, and her lamp falls away. Without the blaze of the lamp, the scene in front of her is only illuminated by the pale glow of the moon. The witch sees a young man covered in blood, staining the white snow a deep, gruesome hue. The black veins circling and swirling around his neck and the unmistakable color of his blood are impossible to ignore, even without her lamp. The witch hastily mumbles a spell and tries to circulate her spiritual energy into his veins, but the outcome is inevitable. With these symptoms of a late-stage infection, the witch can only brace herself for his nokroot transformation.
Seeming to sense his looming fate, the man grimaces in pain before weakly generating a hand seal. The witch does not recognize this seal, but she notes that it seems to bear a resemblance to seals of the Ruin constellation sect. The markings on man's neck recede, but his body goes limp as he runs out of energy. The witch puts her fingers on his wrist to check for a pulse. She lets out a sigh of relief, her breath freezing in the frigid air.
Despite being wary about bringing in a stranger, the witch commends this man's strong will to survive, and she gets ready to carry him back to her cabin to mend his wounds. Though her cultivation of healing magic is lacking, the witch hopes that she can at least hasten his healing process.
The witch trudges through the snow with the young man on her back, and the crisp nighttime wind playfully dances in her hair. She looks up at the starless sky. Tonight, there is a full moon.
The witch feels a little lonely.