MidReal Story
Enchanted Secrets: Lily's Magical Awakening
Scenario: Lily is a girl
Create my version of this story
I do a quick twirl in the center of the cluttered attic, laughing as I accidentally bump into the arm of an old rocking chair.
My auburn hair whips around me as I stop and look around the small space, taking in the dust-covered trunks and boxes lining the walls.
My mom said I was grounded this weekend and assigned me the daunting task of cleaning out the attic as punishment for getting another bad grade on a geometry test.
Who knew that one of my worst subjects would be so important to my future?
Math is hard enough without the added pressure of it affecting my GPA and college applications.
I mean, it’s not like I’m planning on becoming a mathematician or anything.
Besides, who even uses geometry in real life?
It’s not like I’m ever going to need to calculate the area of a triangle in order to survive a zombie apocalypse or something.
I glance at my phone on the small table next to me and stifle a groan.
I’ve only been up here for an hour, but I’m already bored out of my mind.
I should’ve thought about bringing some music or a book with me to make the time go by faster.
It’s not even that bad up here, all things considered.
The two small windows on either side let in plenty of sunlight, and the creaky old floorboards are sturdy enough that I don’t have to worry about falling through.
They just happen to be so loud that it sounds like a herd of elephants is stampeding through the house every time I take a step.
“Ugh, this is so stupid,” I say to no one in particular, kicking at the pile of old newspapers by my feet.
“Why does Mom have so much junk up here anyway?”
In my mind, attics are supposed to be filled with amazing treasures just waiting to be discovered by some unsuspecting soul.
I look at a box in front of me labeled “Lily’s Baby Stuff,” and I snort at how ridiculous that sounds.
If there were any treasures up here, I would’ve found them by now, and I certainly wouldn’t have been the one who put them here in the first place.
I resume my search through boxes of old clothes and stacks of photo albums, but there’s nothing interesting to be found except for a few loose buttons and a moth-eaten scarf.
I pause when I see a thin, leather-bound book peeking out from underneath a pile of old sheets at the bottom of a box in front of me.
I lean down and tug on it until I can get a good hold of it in my hands, and then I pull it out to examine it further.
It doesn’t look familiar to me at all, and it definitely doesn’t belong in this attic with all these other old things.
The cover is smooth to the touch and worn in places from frequent use over the years.
The pages are yellowed with age and feel stiff as I flip through them, but they haven’t cracked or crumbled even though they’re so old.
There are no words written on the front of the book except for one word: “Mage.”
The letters are written in an elaborate script with flourishes that remind me of Celtic knots.
I turn my attention to the inside pages and my breath catches in my throat when I see what’s written there.
The first few pages contain illustrations that take up most of the space on the page, and they’re so intricate and detailed that I can’t help but stare at them in awe for a moment before turning the page again.
Each drawing is even more beautiful than the last, and they look like they were created by someone who had put their heart and soul into every stroke of their pen.
I don’t recognize any of the things in the pictures, but somehow they feel familiar to me, as if I’ve known them my entire life and just forgotten about them until now.
The drawings are made up of symbols with loops and lines and squiggles, and they’re unlike any kind of writing system I’ve ever seen before.
I run my fingers over the page, wondering what each symbol means and what kind of story the pictures are trying to tell me.
These symbols look so complicated and fancy, but maybe that’s just the way they wrote things back in the day.
I mean, this book is obviously old enough to be an antique, so maybe that’s why the writing looks so weird.
I mean, even the pictures are really detailed and fancy, so why wouldn’t the writing be like that too?
I turn to the next page and gasp at how beautiful the next drawing is.
It reminds me of a stained-glass window in a cathedral, with pieces of colored glass that reflect the light in a million different directions.
The picture is made up of a bunch of different colors, and there are so many lines and shapes that it’s hard to tell what it’s supposed to be at first.
Then the shapes start to come into focus, and my eyes widen in shock as I realize that it’s a picture of a dragon, its tail curled protectively around a large egg.
I quickly flip through the rest of the pages, looking for more pictures of dragons, but this is the only one I can find.
What is this book?
Why would my mom keep it locked up in a box in our attic?
And why have I never seen it before?
I frown when I realize that none of the pictures have any words underneath them.
There’s something written at the bottom of each page, but it doesn’t look like anything I’ve ever seen before.
The letters are tall and thin, with lots of loops and squiggles, and some of them even have dots over them like an exclamation point.
It looks like it should mean something, but if it does, it’s not anything I recognize.
But why does it look so familiar to me then?
I turn back to the first page of the book and start to read through all of the strange symbols again.
The more I read, the more my head starts to hurt a little bit, like all of these symbols are just on the tip of my brain but I can’t quite figure out what they mean.
It’s almost like my brain is trying to remember something, but it’s not quite there.
The more I read, the more of these weird symbols start to feel familiar to me, like they’re part of some long-forgotten language that I’ve never heard of before but somehow still know how to read.
These symbols are definitely strange, but maybe they’re just the way people wrote things back in the day.
Or at least, that’s what my mind tries to tell me as I turn the pages of this mysterious book and try to make sense of what all of this means.
But something tells me that these symbols are anything but normal.
They’re special in some way, just like this book is special too.
I can feel it in my bones.
There’s something important about this book, and as soon as I figure out what it is, everything will start making sense again.
As soon as I start reading again, something strange happens.
All of a sudden, there’s this weird buzzing sound in my head, and it feels like someone just flicked a switch in my brain because all of those strange symbols start to make sense now.
They form words now, and those words form sentences that are much easier for me to understand than before.
There’s still some stuff that doesn’t quite make sense to me, but for the most part, everything looks pretty normal now.
Like, almost too normal if you ask me because there’s no way any of this can be real…can it?
The first few pages of this book talk about an ancient magic, something so powerful that it binds all things together in its wake.
There’s a lot of stuff about light and darkness too, almost like they’re two sides of the same coin or something.
It sounds pretty cool if you ask me, almost like something out of a fairy tale or one of those fantasy movies Alex loves watching so much.
Even so, the more I read, the more it feels like someone just lit a firecracker in my chest because there’s this weird, fluttery feeling that starts up inside me.
My heart starts racing in my chest, and it’s almost like the words are speaking to me, telling me that the magic they talk about is real and that it’s part of who I am.
Reading through these first few pages makes me feel excited and nervous at the same time.
I’m excited because maybe this is the reason why everything feels so dull and boring all the time, and reading this book will help fix that.
But at the same time, part of me is nervous too because what if my mind is playing tricks on me and none of this is real?
What if I’m just a dumb girl from a small town, trying to make something out of nothing because my life is so boring?
I don’t know what to think one way or the other, so instead, I keep reading and hope that some kind of answer will come along soon.
