My name is Liryn Zadalvath, second youngest daughter of Lieutenant General Ayden Zadalvath. This is the story of the last night I spent in my home, Oryth. 

        But first, some backstory about my family, before anyone has a chance to ask questions. Hells, I'm sure I'm writing this to absolutely nobody, unless someone finds this after I die or something. Anyway. As you already could guess, I come from a highly respected military family.  My youngest sister and I, Orlyn, never joined up. My father tried to get me to join when I was a bit younger, about 20 or so, by starting to train me in sparring. I did enjoy that somewhat, but I more so wanted to spend time with the man. Not that he was around much, too busy with the military planning and whatnot. 

         My father was the highest rank of all of us. He spent hours and hours a day away from home, along with my older sisters, Kaelyn and Avlyn. They weren't ever home either, leaving it to me to take care of everything around the place. My mother, Rayn, is (or was, not entirely sure of her status now) a drug addict. Nettle, which, for you land-folk, is made of the Nettle Jellyfish venom, which you can inhale and get high off of. My mom was dishonourably discharged from the military when they found out she was doping, but that was years ago, before any of us were thought of. Shes 177 now, I believe, at the time of writing this. She's been addicted for as long as I can remember, her demanding care whenever she was too high to do anything for herself. 

       There's really not much to say about my older sisters, unfortunately I couldn't really get to know them, since they were gone with Ayden as long as he was, sometimes even longer depending on their current mission, patrolwoman and lookout point guard, respectfully. They both were amazing fighters, so I had heard from their colleagues, so I looked up to them a lot as a kid.

       My younger sister, Orlyn, is deaf. We communicate through sign language, derived from our home language, Primordial. She and I look very similar, although she has Rayn's hair colour and her facial structure, and I am the spitting image of Ayden, down to the hair colour and nose shape. It's almost irritating how much I look like that man. Orlyn was always the one taking care of Rayn alongside me, giving me breaks whenever I needed to hunt or even just breathe, and of course I did the same for her. She's 27 as of the time I am writing this, I always celebrate her birthday, no matter where I am, just setting out a shot for her.

     Then there's me, Liryn. As of me writing this, I am 33 years old, no military rank, little military knowledge, and just an all-around family disappointment. Or, probably enemy, at this point. I went to the College of Creation in my 20s, after Ayden practically begged me to join the military with him. I refused, not wanting to become another kiss-ass of the family. No offense, Kaelyn and Avlyn, I love you two, but you got to admit I'm at least a little right. 

        Everything at home was normal, our normal, for a little bit, until a week before I left. I heard the explosion before I saw it.