Longer Synopsis

Her mother's first tale from her past was that of a burning flame; a village alight with the dark fury of a witch whose family was tried and executed in the square. Escape from the slaughter led to another: the rise and Reckoning of a vengeful Jungle Tyrant. They barely escaped with their lives

The mother used to warn her of the dangers outside the forest, of the Leviathan in the sea, the Scourge under the desert, and the Plague of the Jungle. She taught her magic to defend herself if ever the writhing remains of those who died would reach their home. She warned her of never letting her emotions take control. She taught her never to give up hope.

She was gone now. The girl was resolved to live out the rest of her life peacefully, but it was never that simple.

From the undead shambling into her forest, to the armored forces that had sensed a trace of her hidden potential. Her tranquil solitude would be forever lost as the wheels of time began turning once more.

This is the tale of a cruel world.

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A/N

A story loosely based in Terraria's Calamity mod, and inspired by it. I do not own the game or the mod and I simply want to spin a tale that would do my experience with it justice.

My first foray into fanfiction (the site) and I am unfamiliar with the UI, so be warned that I might tweak this here and there. Schedule is...what schedule? Feel free to write a review and point out mistakes. I may not reply (for this boi is shy), but know that I am reading them and would take good criticism into account.

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Amiya

Amiya Shadespell grunted as her spell held the two wooden buckets in the air, full of freshwater from the well. She had to account for the constantly shifting mass of water that every so often threatened to tip over the floating buckets, not to mention the roots and greenery on the forest floor that managed to ruin her concentration more often than not. Around her, the forest teemed with life and song. There was so much of it that sometimes she would have to kick off a frog that had decided her boot was a nice rock to sunbathe on, or swat a fly away with her free hand whenever they landed on her nose. The hut was nearby, near enough that it wouldn't even be five minutes away if she went straight towards it, but the detour that had her walking for a wide circle around her home served as practice for control over the way she shaped her mana—the energy inside that allowed her to manifest magic.

Already, the two buckets had lost about an eighth of what she had originally started with, but this was also her second trip. The first ones had only half of their original content and wasn't nearly enough to fill the large bucket that served as her reservoir.

The girl had to blink. Rays from the sun were already bright enough to blind her momentarily if she accidentally looked towards it. It was time to head back.

Feet stomped over flattened soil as she approached the fence, made tall and with small enough gaps that only the really small animals could fit through, and strong enough that only the biggest of them could push it down. Pumpkins grew in large patches on the grass around the path. Her legs took her to the center of the encirclement, the hut of moderate size that had always been enough for the two of them to live simply in. She pushed the door open and heard its familiar creak, the nostalgia mocking her while the glow of the Peace Candle hanging above the heart of the first room dyed the wooden walls pink. The house only had three sections: a kitchen, a living room, and a bedroom. Just these had always been enough. With a wave, she directed the buckets to the kitchen.

Step inside, leave your coat by the door, and brew some tea—tea from the leaves of an insect-repelling plant that also had the added effect of relieving some of the joint pains. In a few moments, the pot was boiling, releasing a fragrance that visibly dyed the air a shade of pink. She supposed the Tranquil flowers were a result of long exposure to pink slime gel as they passed and somehow inherited the effects of peace candles, to a limited extent.

Her hands stopped when she realized that she had grabbed two cups. Soon, a tear slid down her cheek and she wiped it off.

"Sorry mother," she said, looking out the shutters, to the direction of the forest where she'd buried the woman two years ago. "It looks like I'm not that strong after all."

She sat down and let the tears come. In the isolated space where two people once lived, there was no one to listen to the now fifteen-year-old girl cry. So cry she did, and cry until her eyes ran dry. When she realized it, the sun was already a quarter of its way to its zenith. She wiped her face and brushed her silver hair that had gone unruly from her sobbing.

Should I just skip lunch?

Nothing but dry wind. She sighed.

"Right." She sniffled. "Give up and try again."

Donning her cloak once more, she set off with rope to find a Piggy. Piggies were rather rare, as one of the few animals that provide good nutrition without much hassle to be hunted. The fact that they don't react when even a rope is thrown around their necks, or even if you stick a dagger in their surprisingly thick hide must mean that they were even rarer in populated areas. Well, the forest wasn't really populated except for the slimes migrating through.

Sure, she could always just cook up a Pumpkin pie from all the ones around the house, but after spending a week and a half eating only just that, well, she'd gotten sick of it.

Stepping into the forest path once more, she turned to the trees. "Here Piggy Piggy Piggy!" she said. Oh yes, that strategy actually works. "Here Piggy Piggy Piggy!"

Movement in the bushes. With a flash, Amiya summoned a white staff in her hand, it's tip made of diamond and glowing with an inner light. Tensely, she pointed her weapon towards the foliage. With just one charge of her mana in the staff, she could take out even the flying fishes in the rain in one shot

The critter revealed itself to not be a critter, but a slime. A green slime, but not one of the translucent ones. A Wulfrum Slime. Those were troublesome since they are immune to being thrown around, and she did not need any more of its essence. Wulfrum was not a strong material by any means, but it was easy to mold. It was what lined the clothes she wore for hunting since it could take a beating a lot better than leather. There was plenty Wulfrum left in the stores hidden underneath the kitchen, so she let the slime pass unimpeded.

It hopped off. Only when it had gone completely did she let her shoulders sag in relief. It reminded her of something she learned about the slimes, all of them seemed to head to the same direction: Northwest. Mother always called it a pilgrimage, citing a deity called the Slime God which called on all slimes across the world, and she would laugh and ask if there was also a rock god or a worm god. Mother would always just smile at her and bid her good night.

Rustling again. She turned to find a very pink Piggy walking out of a bush, it's large and rather funny-looking eyes. Too bad. With a wave, she threw the bundle of rope and commanded it to wrap around the poor creature's limbs, ending it with the Piggy hanging in the air upside down. It blinked at her.

Must…not…feel…bad…

Amiya forced herself to look away before ushering Brunch-and-Dinner back to the hut. Then she had to look away again while delivering the killing blow, and again when she put its still-staring head outside and burned it to ash with a wand enchanted with a Firestarter spell. A wand of sparking, if you will.

The girl comforted herself by chewing on the meat. At least the bacon was good.

She set about doing the day's business. Clean the house, water the pumpkins, fertilize the herbs, write on a diary, and clean the pots. Then by afternoon, she was to harvest whatever had bloomed or grown and preserve it in a box enchanted with ice magic. Replace the water again, another round of cleaning, then start the fire before nightfall. After that was probably the only kind of free time she got, and Amiya would traditionally devote it to studying whatever magic she could learn from her mother's tomes.

The evening had set. Just like before, she had finished everything and locked the hut before sitting by the fire and pulled out the tomes her mother had left from the small bookcase. Of the three she had finished reading the first two—finished them countless times but never touched the third, which was her mother's personal Grimoire. She could still remember seeing the older woman write down the first two in four or five sittings before they got started with practice. Again, her eyes felt foggy from the memory of those blissful days. She wiped off the tears that had begun to form and took a breath. Time to get started.

Suddenly, there was a familiar hiss from the sky beyond her window. Amiya looked up to see a light crashing down from the heavens, making landfall beyond the canopy and causing a tree or two thundering into the ground. She blinked, then bolted to her feet.

A fallen star!

She strapped on her boots sprinted out the door, forgetting to don her cloak. She was in essentially nightwear, but the excitement had made her ignorant of the chill. Additional mana! Her mother had helped her increase her capacity for magic, and she definitely could not forget how three stars would permanently expand it by about a dozen spells!

She quickly found the star. It was a blinding beacon in the middle of the forest despite the thick blanket of leaves. It landed on a large rock, tearing through four threes as it went. A bright orb of light that simply pulsed with power. She gingerly stepped across the torn earth and wrapped both hands around the heavenly artifact. Small bolts of light arced from its core and danced across her skin.

With a grin, she let the star on the ground brought out a pouch, its embroidery glowing with an otherworldly light. She quickly loosened it and threw out its contents. Out flew a mass of light. A Tear in Space. The Void Bag that her mother gave her had always remained useful, and she stored inside it only the most important of items. She plunged her hand inside and brought out two other stars. Immediately, the light from the one that had just landed begun to lace with the other two. She placed them together on the earth, then held her hands before them and added a bit of mana.

The light intensified. The three celestial objects began floating off the ground, spinning together—spinning faster, right until they crashed together to form a blue star. A Mana Crystal. Amiya held out her arms eagerly and the energy began flowing into her, twisting through her limbs and wrapping another layer of power around her soul like a good cup of hot chocolate going down the drain. She smiled. The only thing left was to let her new expanded mana capacity settle.

A twig snapped. She turned and her blissful expression quickly turned to horror.

Silver hair, caked in dirt and maggots. The half-rotten corpse walked into the remnants of the light that the stars had let off. It was dressed in black, a robe Amiya knew quite well for she had helped sew it together. The corpse took a shambling step towards her with a bony arm held out. The floodgates in her eyes broke and the tears flooded out. She must not have performed the burial ritual correctly, and now the corpse had finally been able to punch through the layer of earth it had been buried under. No. No! She was not letting her mother, Minerva B. Shadespell, roam endlessly across the land as a zombie!

As if to follow her will, her hand rose and surged with power. Between the raging headache and the lingering effects of the Mana Crystal, she wasn't sure which had triggered the spell that made her blood vessels burn. The next thing she knew, the landscape before her had become flooded by flames. Scarlet flames. Brimstone Flames. The girl felt her knees give out and let herself curl up to a fetal position. The fires be damned.

—†††—

Beyond the forest, beyond the mountains, beyond the desert, the cities, and the snow, was a throne built on a land of Wrath and Tears. The fortress of the Jungle Tyrant was a somber place, a kingdom floating on the monstrous engines that the machine brain Draedon had built. Yet despite its size, none of the people below could see it in the sky. All they would find was a shimmer or a shadow within a cloud, not something to note in a sky dotted with the occasional floating island and planetoid. The Immortal King looked up from where he rested, expression unreadable through the golden helmet that glimmered with god-slaying power.

"Calamitas?" he called.

A step, and a woman in red robes stood beside him. Her skin was grey, blackened by her use of dark magic. Her hair, white yet shimmering slightly. Amber eyes glowed, illuminating the crack-like scar that ran across her nose bridge and cheeks. She shook her head towards the Jungle tyrant, a frown on her face.

"It was not mine."

Yharim was silent for a moment. His breaths could not be heard through the Auric Tesla helmet, and his movements more sluggish than a statue. He spoke again with his clear, heavy voice:

"Your kin then?"

Calamitas scoffed. "The entirety of my family had been executed long ago, and undead cannot bear children. If anything, the child should be from a distant branch, one that had long divorced itself from the clan."

Again, the Jungle Tyrant was silent. It was not for a while when he muttered with amusement in his voice:

"Interesting."

Calamitas felt the hair on her neck stand. Amusement had been something that had become more and more prominent in the last ten years of Yharim's reign, whereas before, the only emotion he betrayed was one of cold, calculating vengeance and dry, tasteless apathy. She was not sure what this meant, but she knew that if it was this man, anything he felt would be something that could tear a rift across the land.

"Calamitas," he said, "You are dismissed."

Wordlessly, she turned and walked away. Her standing allowed her to do so; if it was anyone else, they would have been executed for their lack of acknowledgment towards the Jungle Tyrant's orders. She was the Witch of Calamity, and the only reason why she had remained subordinated to him was because of the curse he had cast upon her long ago. If it was before, she could stand before him as an equal, but the curse had taken its toll and now she wasn't sure of what realm his powers were currently in. Calamitas made her way out the dark balcony and quickly ran into a towering faceless automaton.

"Draedon," she greeted the Auric Tesla machine maker of the fortress.

"Calamitas," the robot greeted back, in monotone.

The witch tried to step out of the way, but the metal giant quickly stood in her path.

"It seems like Lord Yharim has summoned me about this child of yours," it said.

There was no change in Calamitas's expression. "There is no child of mine."

"Ah, but it has your blood." The robot's voice suddenly took on an imitation of the Jungle Tyrant's. "Whether you like it or not, this child is related to you. Perhaps the young magus could replace you later on. Or perhaps we would take it apart and figure out how it ticked. Unlike you. Unlike your failure of a clone."

Poison. Calamitas was used to that. "Then so be it. I never liked working with Yharim anyway."

Silence. The automaton's body then suddenly began trembling. Then it let out a voice, a twisted combination of shrieks and static. Calamitas had come to know this action of the machine to be laughing, and it would be at it for a while. She let it be and walked past it. This time, Draedon did nothing to prevent her escape. She quickly made it out into the courtyard, then cast the spell to take her back home. She quickly summoned a pen and scroll and began writing the spell in earnest. A plan formed in her head, one that would risk her unstable position if she was to give the child a fighting chance.