The Foesia Raole and the crystals

“How does a plant become endangered anyway?” I thought to myself as I was rummaging trough mother’s old books. The smell of them were great, but the best were the books about flowers.

A plant becomes endangered due to multiple reasons. Lack of or destruction it’s territory, introduction of non native plants, climate change, disease, over-exploitation and so on.

I mean I could agree on several points. It’s not exactly bustling with life no matter where you go. Especially not in the closed cities. Those are completely barren, like the morale here.

“What was I looking for again?” I mumbled to myself until I found the page I was looking for. Foesia raole. A flower which most people haven’t seen before. I remember it being mentioned as a gift for the heroine by her love interest as thanks for saving the world.

Being a child who knew a lot about flowers because of her mother, I never understood why that flower was given to the heroine. It could only cure very specific illnesses, those kinds that happens twice during a decade.

The kind my friend had.

Peatlaguo, otherwise known as sinner sickness, was a very rare illness. You couldn’t even find it in the book of illnesses. No wonder because it was written before the crystals going offline. I had seen some of the closed cities with one of those crystals. They looked sick, like if they had sinner sickness themselves.

All those black markings brought me back to the moment when I saw Aen faint out of exhaustion and their bandages fell off to reveal the sickness.

I used my finger to trace the text as I was reading it. Very little text, but I needed all the info I could find.

Location: garden 12, Haell

I had moved a lot with Aen as the world started to open up. As the crystals got better. No one knew why, but I wasn’t interested in knowing why. I had to get to Haell.

I closed the book and shoved it very quickly back into the bookcase, then gliding down the ladder. I went to the biggest table I could find a shoved everything off it and running to find the nearest auto-map of my surroundings.

“You are in Ailnell, what can I help you with?” The automap spoke with its neutral voice. “Yes I know where I am, I need to find...” I searched for the search field so I could type in Haell. “Ha...ell”

I still had the habit of speaking what I was typing, but I wasn’t that used to this technology. I used to live in Myrvali-Qul, my hometown. A place with few citizens and very rudimentary technology. By the time the crystals stop working, my mother told me that was when they were thinking about getting one for the town. It was a good thing in the end, considering all the cities who used the crystals’ energyfields became closed.

The map loaded in the route to get to Haell. It wasn’t far, thank the earth, but I would have to pass through a dangerous valley if I could manage to get through in time for Aen who only had about a week left.

I decided to pack my stuff and then visit Aen in the hospital. Closing the door to my house I went out into the busy streets. Morale had boosted more since I got here, but it wasn’t high to my understanding. Grandfather used to tell me that life was better before, it was so full of life. We weren’t too careful with our plants, flowers and animals so things became worse and we had to use crystals to keep ourselves alive as they gave us the energy to carry on.

When I came in the hospital room, Aen wasn’t themselves anymore. They only looked through the windows, knowing they were living on borrowed time. Expensive time.

“Hey? Are you alright?” I asked carefully. Aen had a temper normally, but they seemed to have become calmer over the last few months. Maybe trying to stretch out their time here. They didn’t like loud voices, they already heard voices they told me.

Aen looked frail and like they had been crying. “Did, did you find it, Eriya?” They stammered. Their lips was vibrating. Were they scared of bad news perhaps?

I smiled softly “Yes, yes I did. It is in Haell though, but I will be back”. As I said the word yes, Aen started to sit up and preparing themselves to walk.

“And you’re bringing me with” Aen told me. I could have tried to fight it, but I knew they would never let me deny them. “Are you sure, Aen. It is a quite the journey” I tried to convince them, but Aen didn’t budge.

“It’s better to bring me with in case you get delayed on your way home or don’t get home at all. I want to live, you know?” Aen smiled like they used to, but weaker. “Alright, we’d need some money, no one would ever try to cross the Ejilm Valley with the normal fee”.

Aen looked down. “Anything for that plant”. They looked distressed so I approached them. “Aen?”

“Why the heck did it get endangered anyway? I know it doesn’t have much use other than helping people NOT DIE, but why don’t we take care of things?” Aen shouted almost crying at their frustration.

“Priorities, Aen. People priorities those things that help the majority and people like having fertile land just to brag over how rich they are to have afforded it” I put my hand on their back. Aen seemed to accept the fact, not liking it of course.

We managed to get an excuse out the hospital. Saying that Aen wanted to spend their last days outside seeing as they would die anyway.

We got someone to drive through the Ejilm Valley, hurt our pockets though. We had to take a short stop through a closed city. He gave us a discount not to ask and we didn’t.

The land outside the open cities are barren liked the closed cities. A never ending desert-like landscape. Stories from my parents and grandparents led me to believe there was tons of crystals in the area, but like Foesia Raole, it became endangered. Not to loss of territory, but to overexploitation.

Aen stretched their hand out in the wind as we drove through the landscape. They used to be somewhat tan, but now they were paler than the sand. Oh how I worried for Aen. It would be fine I told myself, it would be fine.

We neared the Ejilm Valley and all we could see was mutated animals. Luckily the carriage we were riding had a small crystal protecting us. The small crystal wasn’t effected by the sickness so that was why it was so expensive nowadays.

The earth was hurting, we were all aware of, but really what could we do with the crystals not working and it being dangerous just traveling between cities.

We got through eventually and we reached the closed city that the carriage man was talking about. He seemed older than us so maybe he lived there once I thought to myself. An old sign spoke of the town’s name. Eccatri-her-qul. These town names always spoke of some story, but I never payed attention in the language classes.

It spoke something about a hero, but nothing more I could get from that. He stopped the carriage and there was nothing dangerous nearby he assured us.

And there we saw it, the hugest crystal we have ever seen, covered with the same marking that Aen had. The carriage man went for a house. I suggested to Aen that it was maybe were he used to live, they agreed that that might was the case. Aen felt more drawn to the crystal more than my small talk.

As I was about to tell them not to touch it, Aen did. They started to cough more, their marking spreading to their face and becoming more intense, but the crystal’s marking became less intricate and started disappearing and lighting up.

The man, with a handful of pictures in his hand, came out to see the sight. A crystal like that, online.

But that moment was over for me because I had seen Aen falling to their knees and I shouted for the carriage man to start the carriage and going at full speed. We needed the Foesia Raole.

Two hours went by and we arrived in Haell. I shouted for anyone, for anyone to help find the gardens of plants. We got directions from people seeing as we were desperate.

Garden 11 was right in front of us, closed. We asked people nearby as to who owned it and eventually found her nearby.

“No. I am not opening it up for you” she told me. She had probably said it more nonchalantly, but all I heard was no, I won’t help your dying friend. I saw her key, and I stole it. I was desperate.

The carriage helped me by carrying Aen and I broke into the garden. Foesia Raole, Foesia Raole, Foesia Raole. I kept muttering until I found it. I heard the owner shouting for help seeing as I had broken into her garden, but I didn’t care and there is it was.

Just like I thought, it was very few here, but they wouldn’t miss one. I made Aen eat the flower’s seed and pedals. Their breathing calmed down and the black markings started to disappear, turning into scar-like markings instead. “Hey” I smiled at Aen. “Hi” they smiled back.

We heard shouting in the streets, cheering. Me and the carriage man helped Aen out to see the sights. Nearby abandoned big crystals started lighting up. Aen had absorbed the bad energy to the crystals. “So the illnesses was linked?” Aen asked. “Perhaps it was” I smiled bright as we watched the sky glittering.

We got arrested of course, we couldn’t just break in and steal something without any punishment, but it was lightened after we proved that the crystals was connected to Aen. This meant that all the Foesia Raole flowers had to be grown more of, giving them to people who had the sickness so the crystals could get connected to more people, becoming stronger.

As for me and Aen? We moved to Haell seeing as it was closer to the closed cities. The crystals helped the landscape and the animals. It will never been the same as it was, but it is better.

We started our own garden with endangered plants just to make sure that stuff like the Foesia Raole won’t happen again.

I guess the moral is, take care of your environment? What do I know? Aen was the gardener out of us anyway.