Chapter 12 - Cursed

'Yes, that's right, Amanda. There is no crystal within him,' She reminded herself after Trisha pointed out to her.

"Amanda," Trisha called her out once again as she slowly walked towards her. "Destiny will make you find your way to the blue crystal… Just like how the crystals found its way to us… We have to accept it…. Accept that our lives now revolved around the circumstance the crystals have designed for us."

She seized both Amanda's hands and held it up to her chest before saying, "You have to believe in the crystals."

While looking straight into Trisha's eyes, Amanda began to look back to the time when she gradually inherited her powers; the red crystal, the element of fire.

Every two decades or so, it was said that the crystal chooses its host. It first sought a new master before progressively reducing its power and size from the current one. In her group, Amanda was the third master who came about.

Seven years ago...

Amanda grew up in an orphanage and as she got older, she saw to it to work for the said organization as a way to appreciate those who gave her a chance to live.

One day, a natural disaster struck their town where a severe earthquake took down tall structures near the orphanage. Although the place she called home still stood, not too far from the orphanage's location was a store caught on fire. It quickly spread to nearby establishments.

The police and the firemen were busy saving lives and with the town's current state, everyone was left to fend for themselves. Amanda and her co-workers brought the children to a safer location, but it was only after counting the heads they realized one child was missing.

Amanda ran back to the orphanage and saw its roof already on fire, but she did not fear to lose her life. She ran inside the institution and looked for the missing child.

"Kate! Kate - K- Kate!" Amanda called while coughing from time to time as she sped inside the building. Her vision was getting cloudy, but she persisted with difficulty, going from one room to another. "Kate!"

Smoke began to fill the place as the fire spread through each floor, but soon enough, Amanda found Kate, crying herself inside one room.

"Amanda!" cried the child as she ran to her.

Amanda was quick to study her surroundings, finding the best route to reach the road. She found a blanket and soaked it in water from the nearest bathroom, then she carried Kate with her, descending from the fifth-floor building.

However, just as she made it to the fourth level, she noticed the ceiling was ready to fall. They were too far from the exit, and the best that she could do was to protect Kate. She hurriedly covered the child with her body as they both curled down in one corner of the space.

With Amanda covering Kate, she waited for the framework above her to fall. Seconds past and she heard successive loud blows of falling fragments. She screamed and cried as she closed her eyes, anticipating pain, but instead, she felt droplets of water.

Amanda's entire body was trembling, but after realizing that she was not injured, she slowly gazed up to the ceiling and back down to where they remained. She fell utterly confused; it was evident that part of the floor above had collapsed, but instead of falling directly at them, it surrounded them.

Feeling the drops of water getting stronger, she looked up again and then came the rain, pouring heavily like it was meant only for the purpose of bringing down the flames.

As she was absorbing everything that was happening, she saw a figure of a man. A man in a red suit, who was seemingly unharmed and unworn from any debris. She swore to have seen his eyes flashed in red. She rubbed her eyes, thinking it was a figment of her imagination, but even after she allowed the rain clear the dirt on her face, the man stood not too far from her.

Even from afar, she heard the man say, "You are very brave, child."

"Sebastian, let's go," said a woman in a blue suit before looking at the direction of Amanda and Kate.

Amanda was unsure what followed after seeing the two strange individuals, but the next thing she knew, she was already at the hospital, laying on the bed with an oxygen mask covering her face.

She was told that the fire was put out by a violent rain that fell from the sky, and that she and Kate were found inside the building unconscious.

In the years that followed, she thought not about that incident any longer. When the orphanage was re-constructed, and she returned to work, it was then that she noticed the changes in her. She began to feel stronger than her usual self. She was more active and her senses heightened.

Eventually, she felt her body was warmer than before, that the children constantly thought she was sick. As a result, Amanda often showered to cool her temperature down.

Soon, it wasn't just the warmth. Amanda seemed to see fire everywhere she went. Lighting a candle at church lighted the rest of the candles surrounding her. While cooking barbecue on a picnic one day, the grills went in flames, burning the meat altogether.

Still, Amanda went on with her life as if it was the usual, until one day, everything went out of hand.

Amanda was helping the kitchen prepare for lunch. She was in charge of cooking and was stirring spices in a large saute pan when the stove went up in flames. The fire was so intense that it caught Amanda, spreading through her hands and up to her upper body.

She expected it to hurt as she screamed, but that was not the case. She was on fire, but her body remained unharmed.

"Ahhh! Fire! Fire!" screamed Amanda's colleagues.

"Amanda? What's happening to you?"

The cries became apparent from the orphanage's kitchen as Amanda's companions fled from her. Those who saw her that day, thought Amanda, became the devil. They saw her eyes turned red as she emitted fire within her body.

Amanda feared for her life. Rather, she feared that she was cursed. She just witnessed her clothes torched down. The kitchen started to burn, but her entire body was unscathed and she felt not a single pain.

The next thing she knew, her body began to fade. She appeared to be sucked on a swirling void, and the sight of everything made her lose her consciousness.

The next day, Amanda woke up, not in the orphanage, but in the middle of a cavern.. She was floating in a lighted pool of water. She began to wonder, 'What am I?'