Meaning in Life

My right arm was reborn amidst the tattered bandages. Fresh as new, no different from before I lost it. My new connection with Lyla must have allowed me to share her regeneration ability. “Thank you, Lyla!” That was the sincerest reaction I could give.

“Warriors! Stand down! He isn’t a threat,” Lyla yelled.

“You heard her. I’m not a threat.”

The warriors sheathed their swords and backed down.

I picked up the bow and arrow lying on the ground. Taking a deep breath to prepare myself, I stared at the target intensely, with a focus that blocked out all outside and inside noise, including Lyla’s inner thoughts.

My grip on the bow tightened, feeling the resistance of the hard surface pushing back at me. The bowstring was delicate, and the feather tail of the arrow brushed against my fingers. The tiniest trembling of my posture and the slight quickening of my heartbeat became palpable. I adjusted my aim subtly, as if I had done it millions of times before, although I had never touched a bow before today.

All of my present skills came from Lyla, from all her years of training and struggling. I had to prove to her that it wasn’t all in vain. That she had gained something. I had no idea what that something was, but it was here. And I would drag it out of the light.

With another breath, once the air rushed out of my throat, I let the bowstring go, and the arrow zipped through the atmosphere, tearing the still air apart, until it hit the shooting target at its very edge.

I barely got a hit, and that marked my defeat in the duel.

The cheering intensified, and it wasn’t to laud me for hitting the target on my last shot, but that Nephrite had emerged victorious. The demon child was completely destroyed, with pure skill alone.

But I had achieved my goal, which was to show Lyla a mirror image of herself. Among the smiling and nodding crowds, she alone was sobbing her eyes out, to an intensity that the elves around her had to pause their celebration to ask if she was really crying tears of joy.

I had a guess what she might be crying about. It was the pain and suffering that she had kept locked inside her, the times when she struggled and failed, all coming back to her. I had reminded her of her unending journey.

Nephrite also realized Lyla’s sorrow as he rushed back from the outside crowd. Unexpectedly, he made his way straight to me. His smooth hands grabbed onto my shoulders; his clutch was soft but oddly painful.

“What did you do to my dear Lyla? Can you stop her from crying? I really hope you will. Because I don't want to see her unhappy,” he said calmly, but each word was imbued with certainty.

“Thomas, what should I do?” Lyla blurted out her own question before I could think about how to answer Nephrite's.

“Lyla, what do you mean by what should you do?” Nephrite asked as he turned his head to look at Lyla, his face brimming with confusion. We both ignored him, engrossed in our private conversation.

“I don’t know,” I said to Lyla. That was the answer I came to after much deliberation. These three scary words, the surrendering of control, opening myself to the great dark void, were what I wanted to tell her. “I don’t know what the best decision is for you. No one knows. Each decision has its own consequences and regrets. But no matter what you choose, I will support you to the best of my ability. If you need help, I will help you if I can.”

Lyla lowered her head. I could hear a storm of thoughts brewing in her, too many for me to keep up. A commotion stirred in the crowd, with boos and calls to beat me up.

Nephrite glanced at the crowd, then back at me. “I don’t understand what Lyla is thinking, but that’s my problem to solve. You don’t have to be here anymore. You lost. Guards! Take him away so we can continue with the ceremony,” he spoke loudly enough for everyone to hear him.

The crowd was pleased, and the snippets of angry outcries from them converted into pleasant murmurs of agreement. The warriors moved to restrain me.

“Stop! There is another match that has to take place.” Lyla had reached a resolution inside her heart.

“Lyla, here you are talking nonsense again. Do you need to rest?” Nephrite left me in the hands of the warriors and strode to Lyla.

Lyla crossed her arms. “No. What about our match? You haven’t defeated me yet. How can we get married before that?”

“Lyla, think about what you are saying,” Cyrus cut in.

“Ask him to compete with you on shooting speed,” I shouted. An elf warrior immediately covered my mouth after a glare from Cyrus.

“What he said. We are doing shooting speed. How about we set the time limit at three minutes? Whoever shoots the most arrows wins. Go get us a sandglass, dear brother,” Lyla said, understanding the intention behind my suggestion.

“Shooting speed? What? I have never heard anyone do this for their archery proposal match,” Cyrus said.

“Then, I guess I’m just that special. Or am I not? As long as it is an archery match, I can set the rules however I want.”

Cyrus’s frown at the moment was worse than that from last night. With so many spectators, ignoring this public call for a match was impossible. He could only cave in. After a brief chat with Nephrite, I could see that confidence remained on Nephrite’s face, while Cyrus’s expression hadn’t improved at all.

Cyrus ordered the servants to prepare two archery ranges for the match. Lyla requested the disc shooters to remain on.

“But you just said that precision is irrelevant,” Cyrus held his head in his hands, having had enough of his sister’s antics.

“I’m the one who set the rules.” Lyla wiped away her remaining tears and gave Cyrus a mischievous smirk.

Cyrus muttered something under his breath, but he still had to comply with Lyla in the end. The setup of the match was completed in a flash. The crowd hadn’t come to a consensus on how they should react to this turn of events. Some lamented how I corrupted Lyla; others breathed a sigh of relief that traditions were followed; while there were also distinct voices complaining that speed instead of accuracy was used as the judging criterion.

Lyla got close to me to take back her bow and arrow necklaces and fitted them around her neck. She could have also told the warriors to let me go, but I felt from her inner world that she was still a little mad at me to do so.

Nephrite and Lyla were each given a bow and a magic quiver with a thousand arrows. They stepped into their respective enclosures on the archery side of the training grounds.

“Are you both ready?” Cyrus yelled.

Lyla and Nephrite nodded. And so, Cyrus raised the sandglass and yelled, “Then, the match will start in three, two, one!” He flipped the sandglass and slammed it onto the table in front of him. That marked the start of the three-minute countdown.

Nephrite loaded an arrow and waited for the discs to shoot out from the sides of the enclosure. He hit each one with perfect precision.

“Lord Nephrite! Don’t wait for the discs to come out! Just shoot!” Cyrus said, shamelessly showing his bias towards one participant.

Nephrite realized his mistake and started firing randomly at the slime walls. But he would still aim for the discs when they shoot out.

That was the beauty of Lyla’s peculiar request. An elf who was trained here his whole life wouldn’t be able to resist his habit of shooting the discs. And there was also the threat of humiliation if he missed any of the targets. As a result, the time he spent aiming, no matter how good at archery he was, would add up.

Lyla was different. She was used to rapid firing to compensate for her poor aim. Missing targets was the norm for her, so the flying discs were just noise to her, nothing to focus on. One after the other, her arms repeated the robotic motions of grabbing an arrow from the quiver, pulling back the bow, and shooting without looking.

Though her actions were monotonous, her expression certainly wasn’t. With each shot, it was like life was imbued back into her body. Her smile just kept widening. Her eyes gazed at a distant point, not at anything in particular, as if she were taking a peek at her future. I wondered what she saw there, because she seemed completely mesmerized by it.

Three minutes had zoomed by. Upon counting the arrows in each enclosure, Lyla was deemed the winner of the match.

“I… I won?” Lyla still couldn’t believe it. Tears streamed down her face again. “I beat Nephrite at archery!” Her joy was so pure that I couldn’t bring myself to correct her: she only beat Nephrite at shooting speed.

Nephrite slumped onto the ground. “How? How did this happen?”

“You can try again next time,” Lyla said in a poor attempt to console him. “Getting married is just not what I need to do now.”

“What now, Lyla? What about everything we’ve prepared for the ceremony? What about the guests’ time that you wasted?” Cyrus almost screamed. Lyla avoided his gaze; she couldn’t think of an answer, even as her inner world was using everything it had to race for one.

The crowd, seeing this unsatisfying development, gradually dispersed; even some of the wedding guests left using various excuses. With the warriors wandering off to maintain order outside the training grounds, I was free once again.

I glanced at the brooding Nephrite. “Why is he so sad? He can propose again, right?” I whispered to Sabedra, who was once again standing next to me. She briefly vanished after my match with Nephrite started, and from the fresh plate of cookies in her hand, it was clear where she had gone.

“Yes, but only after ten years, so they can’t retry a proposal and win through sheer persistence,” Sabedra said while chewing.

That revelation got me to empathize with Nephrite a little.