Lotus and Orchid where originally supposed to twin sisters, Nexon changed that later on though, this story is based on the original idea of them both being female. I do not own Maplestory or any of the characters in the game itself, all original property belongs to Nexon. Only my own OC characters belong to me.

Chapter 1: Lonliness

Lotus sat silently on top of the Goddess statue at the Temple of Time, watching Pink Bean scurry about bellow her, though her thoughts were in another place. Lotus had overheard from travelers what Gelimer had done to Orchid, but she was at a loss on how to feel about it. It scared her, it made her angry too, but there was one thing Lotus knew for certain; it was the first time in hundreds of years, that anything had made her feel powerless and pathetic.

"How could I have let this happen? The one time Orca really needed me and I'm stuck in this state..."Lotus sighed and shook her head, she was so mixed up inside. It felt like she was stuck in an endless whirlpool of anger, fear, sadness, and regret, it was as if there wasn't a thing for her to feel happiness over anymore.

She knew that Orchid wasn't dead, but something still made her hateful thinking about it. Lotus clenched her fist and scowled, "As if that crazy old coot could actually kill Orca"Lotus trembled thinking about how Gelimer, using her own body, had attack and left Orchid for dead, "For him to use such a cheap trick to gain an advantage over Orchid..."Lotus was deeply upset by this, but there was nothing she could do about it now, that was all over long since nights passed.

"What am I going to do now? Should I just swallow my fear and look for Orca, or..."Her though process was disrupted when a maple leaf blew right through her, she looked down at her hands, remembering she was bodiless, and that Orchid probably couldn't see her, or if Orchid would even want to after all this. "Maybe I'm like Von's wife now...? He can't see his wife any longer even though she's always with him... Maybe Orca too..."She signed, hanging her head, on the brink of tears. "What did I ever do to deserve this..."Lotus quietly got up and stared out into the sunset, watching the wind blow leaves around her.

"The only one who seems to be able to see me is that damn eyesore Phantom"Lotus clenched her fist thinking about him, he was the reason she was in this state to begin with, " He probably didn't love Aria anyway. I mean, he hits on anything that moves... who would ever believe he actuallyloved her?"

Lotus shook her head and started to walk, "I think about the past far to much I guess..."Lotus reached the opening of the old Temple and started searching through her cloak pockets, pulling out a Teleportation rock, setting her destination for the forest near Elluel. It was always peaceful there, the beauty of the forest was enough to wash away any negative emotions, making it easy to put her troubled mind and heart at ease.

Lotus wasn't especially worried about Mercedes either, for from what she could tell, the elven queen couldn't see her. This allowed Lotus to relax even more, knowing that she was safe and could take it easy on the outskirts of the elven kingdom. Passing along the usual route up towards the waterfall cave where she had been staying, Lotus noticed something sticking up out of a muddy patch of ground, she bent down and slowly pulled the object from the earth, careful not to damage it. Lotus gently wiped the mud off the object's surface, "This is... a book?"Lotus took a small cloth out of her cloak and continued to delicately scrub the mud off the book as she continued walking. The book was very old, it's pages worn and faded from the weather and earth, Lotus looked at the book admiringly, thinking about how long the book must have been buried there before the rain had uncovered enough earth to find it, "Wow, this thing must be older then Arkarium is!"Lotus lightly laughed at the thought as she looked up realizing she had reached the top of the waterfall already. She gently placed the book into her cloak pocket and slowly made her way down to a narrow ledge and into a cave that was hidden by the waterfall. Finding let alone entering the cave would have been extremely dangerous to most, but as a ghost the waterfall and ledge didn't even phase Lotus, since she couldn't be hurt by such things any longer.

Lotus walked to a far corner of the cave, setting a candle on fire and sitting down near a large stone table, gently taking the book out of her cloak pocket. Lotus held the book while carefully inspecting the cover, the book title was written in ancient symbols, with a fine golden ink. Many different symbols and pictures covered the pages inside, written in golden or light blue inks. Lotus carefully brushed her hand over the page's contents, the text was very finely written, and the pictures beautifully drawn, but the text was unreadable to her. She didn't understand the ancient symbols that were used, they where something she had never seen before.

"Ok... now I KNOW this book is older then Arkarium..."Lotus closed the book and set it on the stone table, "I wonder where it came from... and who wrote it?"Lotus got up from the table and walked to the entrance of the cave, leaning up against the cave's mouth. The waterfall was so tall, it overlooked most of the forest, you could even see the Elven kingdom from it. Lotus closed her eyes as a sweet breeze blew past her and into the vast, fading sunset. She began to sing softly as she felt the last of the sun's warmth disappearing over the horizon.

"You are the dawn of a new day that's waking,

a masterpiece still in the making, the blue in an ocean of gray..."

Lotus fell to her knees, crying softly as a final breeze swept past the cave with a cold chill announcing night had officially risen. She sat watching the first star of the evening sparkle brightly in the distance, "Please... Let her be safe and happy, where ever she ended up..."