章 2: New terrain
"Da…mn that b…itchhh…," Lydia said with gritted teeth after recalling how she ended up to where she was in now.
'How dare she… do this on my birthday! I'm gonna burn her in hell once I see her again.'
'That shameless thief…'
Lydia's eyes burned with fury as her temperature rose.
'I'm gonna make her pay.'
'Argh, I'm so angry I feel like I could melt the snow around me,' she thought as the chattering of her teeth grew louder and the temperature fully registered in her mind.
'Melt?'
'Damn… It's freezing. I can't even move my fingers.'
She sighed and tried wiggling her fingers again, but the marbled hand in front of her showed no movement.
'This is annoying. It's freezing here. I want to go somewhere warmer.'
'Right, isn't it absurd that a spirit stole my body?'
'What's the percentage that I'm really in a snowy place right now and unable to move?'
'Isn't the probability extremely low?'
'Could it be that I'm actually dreaming right now?'
'That's more realistic, right?' she asked. However, she knew deep down that was not the case.
Because if she was indeed dreaming, she would have been more shocked when she saw the translucent lady.
'That thief… I knew something had been following me for the past few days, but I'm not sure if my instinct was right.'
'I should've called for an exorcist then, but I don't know how or where to contact one.'
'I thought ghosts and the like are just fairy tales after all.'
'Grrr'
'Hah, I better get moving. Whether this be a dream or not, I need to get out of here before I freeze.'
She sighed and tried to move her fingers and toes once more, but still, there was no response.
After several minutes, her pinky finger finally twitched, making her eyes brighten.
'Ahahaha, great, I must've been blessed or something.'
'Move more, my dear, beautiful marbled fingers. I'll make sure to use you guys to eat some good food later,' she thought when the rest of her fingers started responding to her.
Once she regained control of her hands, she proceeded to her feet, then to the rest of her body.
After wiggling in the snow for a while, she was finally able to prop herself up in a sitting position.
"Haa…"
"Haa..." she gasped as she looked around.
The surrounding was all white because of the fog and snow swirling in all directions.
"Haa…"
'Where should I go now?'
She searched for tracks in the limited area she could see clearly. However, there were no signs of a footprint or a path.
Creak
Creak
Crack
Creak…
Lydia eyes widened as the creaking grew louder. 'There's no way those are good sounds, especially if they are coming underneath.'
She looked down and stared at the small partitions in the snow.
Creak...
When the partition grew wider and she saw the ice underneath, she shifted her gaze ahead and scanned the surrounding quickly before propping herself on the ground.
Once her weight was evenly distributed, she gradually moved forward.
Compared to the rest of the area, the wind pattern ahead her was disrupted, so she concluded the wind must be hitting against something, probably land, an object, or a thicker layer of ice.
"Haa…" she panted as she moved.
With her body still partly numb, and her clothes thick and heavy, she had no choice but to keep pushing forward despite her body begging her to stop, rest, and take it slowly.
The farther she crawled, the louder and faster her heart beat... and the more her body resisted with pain.
However, with the creaking and cracks seemingly getting closer, combined with the ground moving lightly, she pushed through while protecting her eyes from the wind and snow.
Creak
Woosh
Whoooo
Creak
Creak…
'I know, I know, it's cracking. You don't have to creak louder, ok.'
Lydia moved faster while hoping she headed in the right direction.
When she saw a bit of water leaking from the cracked ice, she pushed her body harder.
'Oh, sweet, sweet ice, hold on for a bit more. I don't even know how this body got here.'
She crawled a bit more. When her elbow hit something curved and hard, her eyes narrowed.
The bit of terrain she could see sloped upwards, so she continued moving forward.
'Hoping this is land, hoping this is land…'
"Haa," she propped herself on the thicker slope and stopped before brushing the snow aside.
When she saw bits of soil and grass mixed in the snow, her muscles relaxed and she lied down to catch her breath.
'Damn, I can still hear the creaking, whooshing, burbling.'
'That's definitely thin ice, thin ice. Gosh, I'm lucky I'm not far from land. In case I had fallen in the water, I might have drowned cause I can't swim if the water surpasses my height.'
'Wait... what is this body even doing there?'
'This body?'
'Right, this body…'
Lydia grabbed her chest and squeezed. 'Big, definitely big…'
'Hundred percent female…'
'Mine's are big too. Who knows, this might still be my body,' she thought while reaching for her hair. However, after fumbling for a while, she had to accept she occupied someone else's body.
'My curls are gone!'
'They're gone... Sheesh, after they finally became lustrous…'
'Sigh, so I really occupied someone else body huh?'
Lydia took deep breaths in to calm herself. Then she propped herself up and stood before raising her hands to protect her eyes from the blizzard.
'I'll think more about that later. For now, where should I go?'
'I'm really going to freeze if I don't find shelter.'
Lydia walked for a bit and stopped when she saw snow-covered trees.
With the low visibility, she could not scan the area well, so she headed to the thickest tree first and leaned there to keep herself stable. Then she sat and hugged her knees to keep herself warm.
'Let's see, I was probably in a lake or a river a while ago.'
'Since this body doesn't seem to have cuts, and she's dressed in thick fine clothes, then it's likely that someone didn't throw her there or something.'
'Her clothing is odd, though,' she thought as she stared at the patterns in her sleeves. 'Besides, who would wear a dress like this when it's snowing hard? And who would even dare go into a forest and walk on a frozen lake or river when there's a blizzard?'
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