“Oi, Estelle, are you there?”

  Mother snapped her fingers.

  My knife slipped, letting out a small screech as it scrapped the plate.

  “H-huh?” I blinked, shaking my head as I roused myself, “O-oh, yeah… I-I’m fine.”

  She frowned in concern.

  “I get that the atmosphere is bad and all, things are a bit shaky and it worries your bleeding heart a bit, but it’s not something to lose sleep over. Leave the worrying to us, yeah?”

  “N-no, i-it’s nothing like that,” I shook my head hurriedly, “I-I just stayed up late last night studying your notes, is all. I-I’m doing fine, I swear.”

  Mother furrowed her brow, letting out a sharp exhale through her nose, clearly not buying my excuse.

  “I know you grew out of that a long time ago, unlike Luna.”

  “Hey!”

  I chuckled briefly at my little sister’s indignation.

  “Swallow your food before talking, Luna,” I smiled politely, trying to divert the conversation.

  Luna shot me an annoyed look before huffing.

  “I don’t need you to keep babying me,” she rolled her eyes, speaking with her mouth still full of food, only finally swallowing afterwards, “you’ve been saying the same things for ten years now, don’t you ever get tired of it?”

  I bristled.

  Mother sighed.

  “Settle down now, girls. Luna, please don’t get heated over table manners. Also, you should listen to your sister, she probably wouldn’t be repeating herself for ten years if you listened. She’s just too soft to actually do anything about it.”

  It was Luna’s turn to stiffen.

  She blushed slightly, clearly slowing down in her next few bites, making more deliberate movements with her fork and knife.

  I smiled wryly.

  Mother could be a bit blunt at times.

  It was true that Luna was a bit rebellious and stubborn at times, and I didn’t do much to stop her, but I don’t think it was because I was being a bad older sister or that I was too lax and soft with her…

  I-... I just-

  Your crying mother, the little sister you never got to meet.

  The little girl at the orphanage, crying out for help.

  You haven’t changed, have you?

  You’re still as scared as ever.

  My eyelids drooped heavily.

  “And Estelle,” Mother shot me a stern stare, earning a flinch from me as I shot back up.

  “Get some rest, seriously. I haven’t needed to ground you for your entire life. Don’t make me start now over studying of all things. I would be more understanding if you were out partying or whatever it is teenagers do. At least then I’d know you’re actually out enjoying life, and not spending most of it as an anxious wreck. I’m only barely tolerating it with Luna because at least I know she likes what she’s doing and you can keep her in check in case it ever does get too bad. But no one’s there to do the same for you except for me.”

  I bit my lip, nodding slowly.

  I guess I wasn’t really a hard person to read.

  I was spending much more time going over Mother’s notes than usual, but it would probably be a lie to say I was actually focusing on it.

  If I was being honest with myself, I was just using it as a distraction to take my mind off things.

  All the tension and chaos surrounding Arden, the uncomfortable silence that crept into the air, corrupting it with a strange humidity.

  Just two months ago, I was complaining about how noisy and excited all of Arden and its visitors seemed to be, hoping that reprieve in any form would come back to the city.

  Looking back, I kind of wished that liveliness and recklessness could come back. It was certainly better than what we had now.

  The entire city was unnervingly quiet.

  Gone were the families bickering, gone were the couples giggling, gone was the constant air of hubbub and excitement as countless engineers and researchers argued and discussed their plans and developments for the city in broad daylight, sipping on coffee and tea as nearby residents rolled their eyes.

  There was only an uncomfortable tension.

  Those very same magi hardly talked to another anymore, choosing to simply tinker away with devices and defences, preparing for the next attack. The only time they exchanged words with one another was during routine inspections and reports.

  I couldn’t stop worrying, I guess.

  Worrying about when the next incident would be. Worrying about who got hurt.

  Worrying about all the people who were evacuated. Were they safe? Were they intercepted? What if the cultists decided to go after them? What if it wasn’t the Paradox Engine they were after?

  And for that matter, why were the cultists after the Paradox Engine? Surely it would be of no use to them if they destroyed Arden in the process, right? Was it just a matter of sacrilege, like the Church of Sol thought it to be?

  And what relation did it all have to that mark, presumably depicting the ‘god’ they worshipped?

  And it had been several weeks now, why was the Church of Sol’s search for any historical records of that symbol turning up short?

  “Oi, Estelle,” Mother called, “you’re doing it again.”

  I flinched.

  Where was I?

  Oh, right, I was eating breakfast.

  I heard her sigh.

  “I need to have a talk with you tonight. Usually being a worrywart is one of your charming points, but there’s a point where anything becomes excessive and dangerous. You can trust others sometimes, you know? It’s not always your burden to bear. Have a little faith in the capability of the others around you.”

  Remember your oath.

  If kindness is madness, then the mad riptide you will be.

  I nodded hesitantly.

  “Y-yeah, okay…”

  Luna pouted.

  “You hear that, Sister? Have a bit of faith in me.”

  “Oi, Luna, not now.”

  “R-right.”

  Luna looked a bit embarrassed, realising her remark was slightly out of place.

  “S-sorry, Sister. I-it’s just… you can take care of yourself, first, okay? You don’t need to worry so much about me. I’m not a weak little girl anymore. For Sol’s sake, I’m already done with most of the sixth-year’s curriculum! That puts me on par with you, aside from Mother’s tutoring!”

  I chuckled weakly.

  “Sorry, I’ll try my best.”

  The rest of breakfast was a quiet, awkward affair, no matter how much Mother tried to lighten the mood.

  I heard someone crying.

  There was a silhouette of a woman crying behind a curtain.

  She opened the door and spoke in a language I hadn’t heard in decades.

  You are just like anyone else.

  There was a little girl.

  She was crying.

  She was being taken away by someone.

  I was stuck, unable to move.

  You are not special.

  The little girl was there again.

  She was sick.

  I rattled her arm and tried to shake her awake.

  You are powerless.

  There was a woman, a different one.

  She was looking at the moon, tracing something, smiling with tears in her eyes.

  She flicked me in the forehead.

  Your life is not important.

  You will squander everything you have.

  A faceless man, with colourless, shapeless eyes that bore into my soul.

  He glared at me with all the hate he could muster, like I was a cockroach that refused to die.

  A cold, steely claw wrapped around my neck.

  I felt the warmth flee my body.

  I lost feeling in my fingers.

  My legs went limp.

  Fear.

  I was alone and dying.

  I was hungry. I was starving.

  There was an endless cold pit of emptiness lurking deep inside me.

  I was curled in a ball, stagnating on the dirt floor of a forest in the middle of nowhere.

  The world went dark.

  I felt that emptiness crawl, whispering in a mad, frenzied voice, hungry for anything, everything.

  You mean nothing.

  You will never be anything.

  I wanted to cry, but I couldn’t.

  I wanted to feel sad, but I couldn’t.

  The void inside of me continued to eat away at everything that I was.

  Remember your oath.

  ‘At any cost’.

  What would you sacrifice to keep it?

  Are you prepared to pay the price?

  I saw that little girl again.

  She was older, a teenager now.

  There was a ball of fire headed her way, powered by the essence of hate, seething anger rolling off of it.

  I reached out to her.

  Darkness.

  Form is meaningless.

  These feelings. These connections.

  Love. Happiness. Peace.

  These people. This place.

  All is impermanent.

  You will lose them all eventually.

  Love to hatred. Happiness to despair. Peace to chaos.

  “Little Lady?”

  The wheel will turn.

  “Little Lady!”

  Someone shook my shoulder.

  The darkness of my eyelids burst briefly into a field of dizzy stars as I gasped and lurched awake.

  I panted, finding myself breathless.

  What was I-...

  I groaned.

  I had a headache.

  The armored gauntlet shaking my shoulder retracted itself.

  “Is everything alright?” someone asked, frowning, “You were trembling in your nap, you look quite troubled… is everything alright?”

  Who was-...

  Oh, right.

  A scarred lion-like man, towering over me, gave me a stern, yet concerned look.

  “S-sorry, General Hywind,” I winced, staggering to my feet, using my staff to pick myself up.

  His brow creased heavily as he looked me up and down.

  His gaze landed on my fingers, which still seemed to be trembling as I got up.

  “Miss, there’s no need to be fretting over us and joining us at the walls if it is causing you nothing but ill health and anxiety.”

  “N-no,” I shook my head rapidly, “I-I’m fine, it’s just… I-I was having a bad dream.”

  It had been a long time since I had nightmares.

  Faces I once knew, words I was supposed to say.

  I thought I had put those worries to rest.

  But…

  Luna’s words towards me.

  That small moment of hesitation before the fireball consumed her.

  That faceless man.

  Sometimes, I still felt the phantom of death wrapping around my neck with its chilly hand, like it almost did that day.

  I was scared.

  And no matter how much I told myself that she would grow up to be her own person, I still couldn’t help but see Luna as that powerless little girl I had to steal away that day.

  In the end, I still really was terrible at letting things go, even if those things were just old sentiments and memories.

  Hywind sighed slowly.

  “Miss, please, if I may have a word with you.”

  His voice was low and rumbling, but still gentle. Despite his intimidating physique, he was a rather kind man underneath the scars and armor.

  “I may not have been back in my hometown for long, and perhaps it is a bit presumptuous of me to speak in their place as someone who abandoned them for decades… but I know the people of Arden care for you. You are a cherished figure in their community. Even I, as a third party who only wants to intrude now that this boring old place has become something exciting, can tell you that they would not wish to cause you worry.”

  He did his best to smile reassuringly.

  “Yes, maybe the Church doesn’t like this city, and yes, maybe that leaves its people low on healers aside from you, but that does not mean you need to spend every waking moment dedicating everything you have to them. No sane person would ask that of you.”

  Sanity is reason. Reason is procedure. Procedure is inevitability. Inevitability is the end.

  I held back the retort forming on my lips.

  General Hywind was showing me sincere concern. It was only right to let him speak his mind.

  “There is no reason for you to struggle so greatly for Arden. You do not owe Arden any debt. If anything, it is the opposite. You and your mother have given far too much to this city for them to ever be able to repay. Your mother’s invention… what was it called? Ah, right, the Paradox Engine… It has given so much life, joy, prosperity and excitement to the people of Arden, so let them protect it in turn, okay? Let them repay the debt, would you? For Sol’s sake, let me repay it, would you, Young Lady?”

  He chuckled.

  “It’s the least I could do for not coming home for a couple decades. If I let this city fall after abandoning it for twenty years, I don’t think I’d ever live it down. Hell of a Royal General that would make me, eh?”

  He shook his head with mirth, just shrugging as if it wasn’t a big deal to him.

  “We’re glad to have you helping us, Young Lady, and having you around is good for morale… well, for the knights and adventurers at least. Can’t say the same for the Church or Citadel. But anyways, as happy as we are to have your aid and care, we would be happier knowing that you were healthy and happy, free from stress and worry. Don’t fret too much over us, we’re hardy folk, you know? You have to be made of tougher stuff if you wanna live out in this countryside.”

  In response, I could only bite my trembling lip.

  I wish it were that easy.

  I looked at the intimidating man standing in front of me.

  The life he lived in those twenty years away from his hometown must have been filled with peril.

  The scars on his face spoke volumes of his story.

  Surely those years were not without pain, and not without loss.

  Had he watched his subordinates pass away in front of him? How many men did he have to bury, how many funerals did he have to attend?

  Did he have to pay his respects to their families? How did he break the news?

  How could he live with that weight on his shoulders?

  Yet still, he held himself proud and tall.

  I couldn’t imagine being like that. I had never once been able to let anything go.

  I think he saw the troubled look on my face, because Hywind’s expression only softened further.

  “You said you were having bad dreams? Do you want to talk about it?”

  I hung my head, almost ashamed of it.

  “I-I don’t know, I just… every time I close my eyes, I can’t stop seeing… everything. All the people I’ve ever helped, all the people I’ve ever known, every person who’s important to me… Everything that could have happened, that both did and didn’t happen, I-... I’m sorry, I’m not explaining that very well, am I?”

  Hywind just sighed, looking side to side before shaking his head and chuckling.

  He nodded towards the bench behind me, which I had just spent the last few hours napping on.

  He thunked down onto the seat.

  “Hardly. I’ve lived too long to not understand. Sometimes it happens to me too. My grandfather and grandmother… couldn’t be there for them when they passed. Was too busy in a skirmish during that time. Going to their funerals wasn’t ever enough for me to make it up to them. Plenty of good men have gone up to the River of Heaven while still in my arms. Think about all the good times I spent with them often, and all the things I could have done differently to save them.”

  He shrugged.

  “Not just the mistakes. Think about everyone back home, too. All the friends and family. Even if they’re all alive and happy and couldn’t care less… I can’t say I don’t feel bad about running away from home. All those happy times we spent together, just… gone in the dust, left behind. I only just reunited with them, and even though they all just laughed it off and forgived me, saying ‘same ol’ Valder’... something just isn’t the same.”

  “How…” I gulped, “How do you live with it? You ran away from home, right? How did you bear the thought of not knowing whether or not they’re safe? And all the people underneath your command, how do you not just collapse under the anxiety of whether or not you’ll be able to keep them alive? Don’t you ever get scared? What if there’s some enemy out there you won’t be able to defeat?”

  “...”

  Hywind just lifted his head, staring out into the distance, beyond the walls of Arden.

  He smiled wryly.

  “I can see why the people here like you so much. Pretty young lady with a heart of gold doing her best to help people out, who just can’t stop worrying about every little thing. Ma and Pa woulda loved ya.”

  He chuckled softly.

  A few seconds of uncomfortable silence passed.

  “This is about your little sister, right? The young witch you were hovering over at the incident at the Energy Distrct.”

  I could only nod slowly.

  “I-… I told her that she had to get to safety, that it was dangerous. And she didn’t listen to me. The cultist’s leader, he was a monster. I-I would have died if I had to keep going. B-but Luna, she just…”

  Something ugly throbbed in my heart.

  The little girl at the orphanage.

  She’s the same as ever.

  It wasn’t her fault.

  She couldn’t have known.

  I didn’t know until it was too late.

  But she should have just listened to you.

  I failed to hold back the pulse of frustration.

  “Didn’t listen,” I tried to stop myself from letting those feelings out, speaking through grit teeth.

  I failed.

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  “And she almost died for it. If it wasn’t for Mother, I-... I don’t know what would have happened. And now, I just… I can’t stop thinking about it. What if he comes again, what if Luna gets in trouble again? What if Mother isn’t there this time? The thought of something terrible happening to her, to all of you, it just keeps me up at night. I can’t sleep, and even when I do, it just chases me into my dreams.”

  My hands trembled again.

  “How do you deal with all of it?”

  You know how.

  You’ve always known how.

  Just run. Run away.

  Hywind sighed and smiled bitterly.

  “I ask myself all the same questions sometimes. I doubt it’s just you or me either. I would bet your mother has similar concerns too. Hell, if I know anything about Citadel alumni it’s that she probably has it ten-thousand times worse. Those witches can’t help but come up with a thousand nigh-impossible hypotheticals and then devise a dozen contingencies for each of them. Have you ever talked about anything similar to this with Lady Symphonia?”

  I nodded.

  A long time ago, in fact.

  When we first met, before we were mother and daughter.

  A woman haunted by loss and broken dreams, drowning herself in research, trying to find any reason to hang on.

  It was that ability to hang on, to keep on finding a reason to smile and live that I had admired so much.

  “Did she ever tell you how she dealt with it?”

  I paused, pondering the matter.

  “Never directly.”

  “Hm?”

  “She… she talked about her fiance. About how everything seemed so… certain in his presence. She would close her eyes and lean into his shoulders and it would all just melt away. She has this… smile when she talks about him, and sometimes… sometimes I notice she has that same smile when the three of us spend time together.”

  Hywind just chuckled again.

  “I have to say, I’m jealous. Don’t got a wife or anything to show for my struggles. Just got these scars. Makes for a good tale to tell while I’m drinking, I guess.”

  He shrugged, grinning cheesily.

  “As for how to deal with it all… I don’t know what to tell you, honestly. That’s just one of life’s big questions, isn’t it? Everyone has to figure out their own answer for themselves. Some people have it easier than others. All I can tell you is this. Maybe men have died under my command, and maybe I can hardly recognise the people back home or the streets around me anymore, but yesterday’s mistakes will not be a chain for the me of tomorrow. If I let myself be shackled by those feelings, then all that leads to is more and more things falling out of my hands.”

  He looked down at his armored hand, curling his gauntlet into a tight fist.

  “The most that I can do is do everything I can in the present to not let more of those regrets pile up. Keep my men alive today. That’s all I can do to make it up to the ones I’ve had to bury. Keep Arden safe, and spend every second I can cherishing those old bonds with the people here and restoring the ones which have been severed and frayed. I’ve been gone for twenty years, it would kill me now that I know what I missed to be gone for one more.”

  He lowered his fist, looking behind us to the now empty, lifeless city of Arden.

  “Just gotta spend all the time I can making up for it.”

  At that moment, a bright red flare shot up into the sky on the other side of the walls surrounding the city.

  The knight immediately furrowed his brow, tensing and standing at attention.

  “Sorry, miss, I’m not sure if my words were of much help, but it appears we don’t have the time to be chatting any longer. It seems we have another attempt at a raid on our hands. I have to get going now.”

  He stood back up to his full height, preparing to run off to join the skirmish that just broke out.

  “W-wait!”

  I shot up off the bench as well, almost stumbling as I tried to catch up to him.

  He stopped upon hearing me call out to him from behind.

  He put his hand out, stopping me from getting any closer.

  “Young Lady, we’ve been very appreciative of your help on the frontline over the past few days, but it’s clear to me that it is causing strain for your mental health. As the commanding officer presiding over Arden currently, this is an order. Go home. Spend time with your friends and family.”

  My lips trembled.

  My hands anxiously wrapped around my staff as I huddled it close to my chest.

  “I won’t be a burden, I promise! I can be helpful!”

  His sigh rumbled, almost making me flinch from the weight carried on it.

  “This is not negotiable. I am relieving you from active duty, effective immediately. If you are to disobey this direct order, I will inform your mother, and she will discipline you at her discretion.”

  I just shook my head desperately.

  He doesn’t get it, does he?

  No one else was there.

  You’re the only one who fought that thing head-to-head.

  I got that I was just being paranoid.

  We hadn’t had an incident from inside of Arden itself since martial law was enacted, with the cultists being forced to assault its walls directly, from God-knows-where-ever they came from; that was a decent sign that their leader, that man, wasn’t with them, as it was probably through his magic that they had managed to infiltrate the city the first time around.

  But still, I couldn’t help but worry.

  What if he was there this time?

  What would any of them be able to do against him without Selenia or Mother there to help them?

  All things in life are transient.

  This place. These people.

  Mother. Luna. Arden.

  The wheel will turn, the wind will blow, and it all scatters into dust.

  “You don’t understan-”

  My voice, slowly growing more panicked and scratchy, was cut off with a firm shove.

  “I do understand. Our conversation just now has made that evident. Young Lady, please, just one time. You are not our shepherd, and we are not your sheep. Let us prove ourselves worthy of your trust, let us protect Arden for once, in turn for the prosperity your mother has graced us with.”

  They don’t understand.

  Cruel waters and lonely tides.

  If sanity’s tide pulls all beneath it, then the mad riptide you will be.

  I staggered to the side, feeling my eyelids drop again as I felt a migraine come on.

  I just took a nap, but it seemed like no matter what, I wasn’t able to get a good amount of rest.

  “Look at yourself. You are in no condition to serve on an active battlefield. Can you really say that as you are now, you will not prove to be a hindrance?”

  I felt his voice gradually fade into a blur in front of me.

  I chuckled weakly.

  Maybe he was right.

  Is he?

  “I-... I understand,” I smiled feebly and nodded.

  Do you?

  The towering, burly knight in front of me breathed a small sigh of relief, before he rushed off, followed by a small contingent of knights to provide backup to the ongoing battle.

  I tried to tell myself it would be okay.

  The priests and nuns of Sol would be there. They would tend to their injuries.

  It was fine.

  No one was going to get hurt.

  I didn’t need to worry about them.

  Just worry about yourself for now, Estelle.

  Go check in on Luna, make sure she’s doing okay with that thing she was studying, she seemed pretty focused on it.

  Make sure she wasn’t going overboard like yourself, yeah?

  “That… that sounds good,” I whispered to no one in particular.

  Any distraction to take my mind off these current troubles would be nice.

  If you want a distraction, if you want to be free from the burden.

  You know what to do. Do as you always have.

  Despite the harsh stares of the priestly scholars around me, I strolled into the library with a small smile on my face.

  For once, I wasn’t wearing the hat and staff, but my face and garb had already become rather infamous to those left in Arden without them.

  I wouldn’t lie, it felt rather empty without that oaken staff in my hand, as I had gotten used to in the previous months, but what was in my hands currently was a good enough replacement.

  A pot and a couple containers stacked atop one another hung from a metal handle, shut tightly and magically sealed to keep the heat and aroma from drifting out.

  I wasn’t clueless. I knew it was rude to be carrying around food with strong smells in a public library.

  It didn’t take me long to find Luna, surrounded by hefty tomes filled with archaeological and historical records, as she always seemed to be these past few days.

  “Hey, Luna, are you doing alright?” I whispered, trying to be mindful of my volume.

  Despite her-

  Ignorance.

  Disagreement. With me, she was still my cherished sister. Something as silly as an argument or different viewpoint wasn’t enough reason for me to stop caring for her.

  And that meant still going out of my way to make sure she was eating well, something that was doubly important for someone who tended to get lost as easily in whatever they were doing as she was.

  Luna just gave me a brief look, before just giving a halfhearted grunt of acknowledgement, looking back down to flip another page.

  “You skipped lunch again, didn’t you?” I smiled wryly.

  She just rolled her eyes.

  “I made sure to eat more at breakfast, okay? I’ll be fine.”

  I sighed.

  “You know I’m not going to be here forever, right? You’ll have to take care of yourself eventually.”

  She shot me a small glare.

  “I wish you realised that when it came to anything other than my meals. I don’t need you to be constantly hovering over me. I’m a student at Nindo too, you know? I know how it goes as an Adventurer, I know what it means to put myself in danger and how to get out of it.”

  That isn’t what her reaction said when that fireball was coming for her.

  I held myself back from scolding her again.

  Now wasn’t the time to argue.

  I brushed her complaints aside and smiled weakly, dangling the pot and containers on the table.

  “Come on, let’s just have dinner, okay?”

  Dinner was one of the few remaining peaceful moments I had left.

  Eating together with family was something to be cherished.

  No matter how much she disagreed with how I treated her, this much should remain sacred at least.

  Luna just grimaced softly, but did not push me away or make any verbal disagreement.

  “Yeah, fine, just… gimme a sec.”

  She quickly splayed herself over the table, grabbing a few books from the table before hopping up, nodding towards the library’s entrance.

  “Come on, let’s go. I’d rather do this quickly.”

  I held back a sigh and just raised an eyebrow instead.

  “Reading while you eat again? What are you going to do if you get the books dirty?”

  Luna rolled her eyes in exasperation as she strolled out of the premises.

  “I’m not a civilian child, Sister. I’m a witch. I know basic spells for cleaning, okay? Even if I make a mess, it’ll be fine.”

  She sighed.

  “R-right, sorry.”

  She was right.

  To be honest, I was just a bit sad that she wasn’t the same little girl who would follow me into the kitchen, forgetting about everything as she hopped up and down the stove to see what was boiling inside the pot.

  She had come a long way since then, huh?

  But still, you think of her as the same little girl who you had to steal away.

  We sat down fairly close to the library, in the quiet and peaceful town square.

  Sometimes, in rare moments like these, the unnerving tension in the air would just fade, and I felt just a bit more comfortable. Like everything was normal and it would all turn out okay.

  I laid the pot down between us and opened it, revealing a puff of steam that popped with a sizzling broth of chicken and pork bones.

  A pile of ingredients were dumped inside, sending tiny splashes onto the grass around us. Slices of lamb, lotus roots, mushrooms, tofu, cabbage, the whole lot.

  Without looking, Luna pried open the container offered to her filled with noodles, lazily ladling in whatever she could scoop up into her bowl before slurping away, not wasting a single second.

  And all the while, she kept her eyes singularly focused on the open book in front of her.

  I chuckled at her behaviour.

  Well, there was only so much I could do.

  This was nice in its own way, I supposed.

  Despite my grievances at her lack of self-care, her dedication to her work was something to be admired.

  She was a very talented girl, and she was sure to go far in the future. I was certain that people would remember her work for decades and centuries to come.

  It was good that she had found something she both loved, and could spend all day and night and all year working on it.

  I suppose, in the long run, my worries over her habits didn’t matter that much. She would learn eventually.

  According to her stories, Mother had been the same once as a teenager. And it took her a long time to learn those same lessons.

  I suppose I cheated in this life, but it had once taken me a long time to learn those lessons too.

  I just hoped I could make the process a bit less painless then what I had to go through.

  I didn’t have forever, after all. I had already made plans with Setsuna to set off for the Eastern Continent after graduation.

  I started eating myself, much slower and gentler, taking my time to appreciate the surroundings and the food.

  In between large mouthfuls and after swallowing, I tried to break the awkward silence.

  “So… how’s your search going? Still no clues on the mark?”

  Luna just scoffed in annoyance between slurps.

  She flipped another page.

  “No, it’s still a complete dead end. The priests are starting to fight among themselves now. A few of them are doubting their judgement that it’s a symbol of an established historical or mythological figure. They’ve formed a small faction trying to prove it’s a manufactured icon. A declaration of political, religious rebellion or intent, rather than a mark of worship. And the others who still have their common sense can’t stop arguing about which era of history it might be from.”

  I nodded along, lifting myself up a bit to curiously peer at what she was reading.

  “You said you were looking into the Lightless Century yesterday, right?”

  “Yeah,” Luna absently nodded, precariously balancing her bowl as a droplet of soup spilt over as she turned another page.

  “The priests are looking at me like I’m crazy, since the snake wasn’t used as a symbol of heretical worship until several centuries after human civilisation was restored, and that’s aside from the fact that looking up records or reading findings on the Lightless Century is basically pointless.”

  She rolled her eyes in exasperation.

  “But even basic logic would tell you that if the cult’s mark came from that era, their symbol would have been recorded, no? The simplest explanation is that it comes some time during that era of unrecorded history.”

  She chewed her noodles in frustration, creasing her brow in annoyance towards her… um… ‘compatriots’?

  “I know I’m right though. I can’t quite remember why, but… I just know I’ve seen that symbol somewhere before. No one else believes me though, they think it’s just the silly overactive imagination of a stupid, overambitious child trying to prove herself.”

  I smiled comfortingly.

  “Don’t worry, I believe in you. I’m sure you’ll get there soon enough.”

  “Ugh, I told you, I-”

  Luna cut herself off, blinking at me in wide-eyed confusion.

  “Y-you don’t think I’m just making it up? Y-you don’t think I’m in over my head or being delusional or desperate?”

  I frowned.

  “Why would I?”

  She flinched.

  “W-well… y-you’ve just been on my tail a lot recently with my health and safety. I kind of just assumed…” she trailed off.

  I just chuckled.

  “You’re not a very good liar. If you say that you’ve seen it before, then that’s just the truth. I’ll always believe in you, Luna. You’re my sister, and the smartest girl I’ve ever known… well aside from Mother, I suppose. You can do anything you set your mind to, I’ll always be by your side.”

  You can be by her side forever.

  But that does not mean she will listen forever.

  Luna blushed, fidgeting with her chopsticks.

  “U-umm… thanks, I guess. I-I did think that maybe I might have been going crazy, and maybe I was just getting desperate to prove myself to the older witches here.”

  I giggled.

  “You don’t need their approval, Luna. If you want entry into the Citadel’s halls, just take it. You’re a smart enough girl to do that. If you think you can uncover lost history from the Lightless Century, then go ahead and do so, Mother has done things less feasible.”

  There were a lot of names for it across Manusyara, each culture, language and region had its own.

  The more mythical ‘Myriad Moonless Nights’, the simple, scholarly ‘Lost Era’, the dreaded, unknown ‘Dark Age’.

  But for us who lived in Sangferrus, which was supposedly founded on the same land as lost Calybcor, it was the ‘Lightless Century’.

  Many thousands of years ago, for a variety of reasons still hotly contested and debated by thousands of scholars across the world, the light of the so-called ‘Halcyon Land’ of Calybcor was extinguished, and with it, human civilisation fell apart, ushering in many decades of darkness as the remnants of society were scattered across the world.

  Archaeological findings from this ancient, lost period were among the most legendary accomplishments one could laud in modern scholarly circles. To this day, less than five people could claim to have uncovered relics or information about the era.

  Well, kind of.

  There was a big asterisk on the whole debacle of how rare and valuable findings from the Lightless Century were, one that everyone silently agreed to not bring up.

  Luna sighed, pondering the matter as she flipped another page.

  “I’ve already made my way through all of Professor Sibyl’s work. After that, all the other writings become dreadful in quality in comparison. And it’s not even worth it, even after assaulting my eyes with bogus nonsense, I’m still not any closer to finding out the truth. Maybe I am going insane.”

  I giggled.

  “Don’t be like that. Maybe it’s not your fault. Arden’s libraries can’t have everything. It’s still a developing city… even if it is rapidly developing. We don’t have a particularly well-established library here even with the influx of magical talent, and the records the Church and Citadel are requesting are going to take a while to ship, especially given that we’ve officially declared the city a warzone.”

  Luna groaned again.

  “Ugh, yeah, tell me about it. I’d much rather be reading from Mother’s library. Or hell, even Nindo would do.”

  I smiled softly.

  “It would be nice if this all blows over soon, wouldn’t it? I’d like to go back to our home on Vertandhi sometime soon. It’d be nice to visit Shugokage as well, I haven’t seen Kagura or Hayate in a while.”

  Luna groaned.

  “Ugh, there you go again. Why don’t you become an honorary elven citizen if you love Tenmai so much?”

  I pouted.

  “Lunaaaa~”

  She just rolled her eyes.

  “But yeah, it’d be nice to go back to Vertan-...” she trailed off, “...dhi.”

  She froze.

  She whispered and mumbled something to herself in quick succession as her eyes gradually widened.

  Something about ‘elves’, ‘Vertandhi’ and the ‘Lightless Century’.

  “Luna?” I frowned.

  She gasped, jumping up and tossing everything aside, collecting all of her books and running off.

  “Sorry, sis, I have to go!” She ran off, shouting behind herself, “I just realised why I recognise that symbol! I have to go tell Mother!”

  “L-Luna!? W-wait!”

  I looked down at the toppled dinner, grimacing before making a decision to abandon it.

  For now, I had to prioritise keeping up with Luna.

  I stumbled to my feet, almost tripping over myself.

  Maybe everyone was right.

  I really must have been stretching myself thin if I was failing to keep up with Luna of all people.

  I was barely able to keep Luna in my line of sight as she ran across the entire city, making it all the way to the impromptu war council where Mother now spent most of her days.

  I heard her barge into the room without warning, much to the surprise and confusion of the leaders within.

  “...Luna?” I heard Mother whisper, baffled.

  “Symphonia, this… is your younger daughter, no? Why is this little girl interrupting our council?”

  “M-Mother!” Luna shouted hoarsely as she recovered her breath, “I-I found it! The mark! It’s meaning!”

  “Huh? Hold on, Luna, slow down, what are you talking about?”

  “The mark on the cultists’ hands! I know what it’s depicting! I know what god it is they’re worshipping!”

  One of the men inside scoffed.

  “Impossible.”

  I arrived shortly after, completely winded myself.

  Shit.

  Just how out of shape had these past few days made me exactly?

  If I was in top condition, I could scale the entirety of Vertandhi from bottom to top – not even from our home, I meant from the base to the peak – in a day, but now, I could barely manage running from one end of Arden to the other.

  “S-sorry, Mother, I-I was going to stop her,” I panted.

  “No, don’t sweat about it, Estelle,” Mother shook her head, “It’s fine, nothing too urgent. Luna, slow down, take your time.”

  The head bishop narrowed his eyes.

  “Symphonia, are you really paying this nonsense heed just because its your daughter? She is a simple teenager. Even if she is an exemplary student at the famed academy of Nindo as the rumours say, that does not make her more qualified than the lifelong monks under my command.”

  “Whether or not information is worth listening to is for me to decide,” Mother snapped back.

  “Surely, you’re jesting, no?” one of the robed witches drawled, “even the Citadel will admit that the Church’s archive of historical and religious records is unmatched. It is unlikely their men and women would have failed to uncover the relevant information before a single outside party, let alone a novice teenager with no formal experience or certificate.”

  “And those same ‘unmatched’ men,” Mother rolled her eyes, “have failed to report anything relevant for weeks now. And the Royal Knights have only gotten vague, mad blabberings from their interrogations. We’re shit out of leads, folks. It’s fine to admit that. I’ll decide if the information is worth acting on.”

  Another bishop clicked his tongue in disapproval.

  “Even giving her the time of day is pointless. This is not the time to spoil your children, Symphonia. Sol will look kindly upon your maternal duties and affection, but there is a time and place for such things. As it stands, we are in a war with an unknown enemy, and every second matters. Give the monks time to comb the records and focus your attention on defending your city. It will be a long, delicate endeavour to dive through the depths of human history, to be without results in a week is to be expected, they have thousands of years to filter thr-”

  “And they won’t ever find anything, no matter how hard they look!” Luna snapped, snarling as she cut in out of frustration.

  She shot a glare to the adults in the room, done with them belittling her in front of them.

  While the gathered officials of the Church displayed displeasure at her words, the witches and wizards only regarded her with a cold, methodical stare.

  Their pride was not on the line here.

  It was of no matter to them whether or not the Church’s deep archive indeed contained the relevant information or not.

  They only cared about results, efficiency and truth.

  An amused, dainty giggle emerged from the Citadel’s seats.

  “Hmm, interesting, little Luna steps up to the podium, and challenges the Church,” Selenia grinned eerily, running her finger across the edges of a teacup, “very well, little Luna, speak. You know there is only one way for a Citadel witch to prove herself. Reveal to us the truth, and it shall speak for itself.”

  Luna sighed in relief.

  “Thank you for your grace, Lady Nyxth.”

  “Hmph, absurd,” the head bishop scoffed, “why do you think you compare to the depths of the entire record of human histor-”

  “Because you’ll never find it in HUMAN history!”

  It was those words that finally shut the priests up.

  One wizard narrowed his eyes, catching the implication immediately.

  “I see. The Lightless Century, no? That is a reasonable hypothesis. I thought it illogical that the Church would struggle for so long, only to be upstaged by teenage witch, but if I recall, Symphonia’s daughters studied at Nindo, no? Certainly, if one nation in Manusyara remembers those times, it would be Tenmai.”

  Luna nodded resolutely, emboldened by the fact the Citadel magi were slowly being swayed to her side.

  “Right, it took me a while to put together, but I think it all makes sense. It isn’t a one-to-one match with the symbol I’ve read about, but… extrapolating a bit, it makes sense as the ancient pre-Sangferrian people's syncretised version of the Tenmai legend in question.”

  There was exactly one hiccup when it came to the prestige and perceived rarity and difficulty that came with the task of uncovering remains of the Lightless Century.

  That of course, being that one had to ignore the obvious elephant – or rather, tree – sticking up into the sky far out to the east.

  While humanity had all but collapsed after Calybcor’s fall, the reclusive, mysterious elves of what would eventually become ‘Tenmai’, sheltered by the seed of the Hinanhoro, flourished in their tiny corner of the world, maintaining proper civilisation throughout that era of darkness and chaos.

  There was a reason Nindo’s library was famed to be even more comprehensive than the likes of the Citadel’s or Church’s, as much as either human faction hated to admit it, and as little as the elves like to flaunt it.

  “Mother,” Luna turned to address her, “you’re aware of the origin behind the Yrd’ll Mountains and their name, right?”

  “Yeah. The pre-Sangferrian people believed three guardian goddesses to reside on the mountains, whose duty was to watch over the World Tree. They eventually named the mountains after the supposed oldest sister, Yrd, and her magical wellspring of knowledge, capable of weaving fate and guiding life.”

  “I-I remember reading about them in Tenmai’s libraries, or at least, the version of them that I’m certain originated that legend for the pre-Sangferrian people. Just as Yggdrasil can be understood to be the Hinanhoro, it’s likely that Yrd, Vertandhi and Skhld were real figures, evidenced by records of three sister guardians who defended Tenmai in its early, young years, when the Hinanhoro was a simple sapling that could only shelter a few settlements.”

  She gulped, trembling beneath the huge amount of pressure put on her by the gazes of the gathered factions.

  I quietly stepped closer to her and stroked her wrist, offering my support.

  She calmed down enough to continue.

  “Tenmai’s earliest chronicles contain a record of three elven sages, supposedly sisters, who fled the shelter of the Hinanhoro in the wake of the cataclysm of the Lightless Century, determined to see if civilization had survived and was capable of recovering. Eventually, they came across the mountains to our east, and after climbing their treacherous, isolated heights, discovered they were much like the Hinanhoro, residing above a leyline that imbued great mysticism into them.”

  “A serpent eating a tree,” a witch tapped a finger on her seat impatiently, eager to dive to the core of the matter, “I don’t suppose that it is the obvious answer, and the tree is meant to be Yggdrasil, no? And this serpent? I assume it was a creature who desired the energy of the leylines?”

  “Yes, I’m getting there,” Luna nodded, “because of the isolated nature of the mountains, and how dangerous trying to climb them proved to be, they were unsuccessful in convincing the elves to leave the Hinanhoro’s blessed shelter, but still, they stayed at their new home, watching over their home from afar. That is, until one day, a dragon appeared, taking on all of elven civilization, intent on consuming the leyline underneath Hinanhoro to satiate its hunger.”

  The gravity of her words slowly settled into the room.

  A dragon was no simple animal.

  It was something far, far above a simple heretical idol or dangerous monster.

  It was a creature capable of single-handedly toppling nations, erasing entire civilisations with a singular scorching breath, wiping any trace of their existence from history.

  They had only showed up in human history a single handful of times, and only once in modern history – a benchmark defined by the establishment of the Adventurer’s Guild.

  And in that singular time, a Lunatic-level disaster had been called, a threat that signified the potential destruction of an entire continent, and if unsuccessfully contained, could spell disaster for the entire realm.

  “The exact sequence of events and reason behind them remains unclear, but the chronicles all agree that the dragon seemed to find the Hinanhoro’s energy – different from the raw, unfiltered power of the leyline – to be poisonous, and it was seen flying off towards the west, heading towards the sisters’ mountains. After that… not much is known, but we can presume that since no further records of either party exists, the sisters all gave their lives to defeat the dragon, and their final resting locations remain mysteries.”

  Luna inhaled deeply.

  “In summary, the mark of the serpent eating a tree’s roots, I believe it to be the ancient people’s syncretism of this legend. It matches our understanding of how dragons evolved in religious symbols as well. The ancient people did not have the fear or understanding of what exactly a dragon was, still scattered by the Lightless Century, and as such, lacked the ability to properly depict them. It would be centuries later that understanding of what a dragon was, and the terror that came with them, properly unified, crystallizing their use as religious, heretical symbols.”

  “Hmm, I see~” Selenia’s smiled widened, pleasantly satisfied by the outcome, “So, dear Belle, do you have any thoughts on your daughter’s conjecture?”

  Mother just groaned.

  “It fits more than I would like, to be honest. Paradox Engine aside, it also makes sense why this new-fangled cult is popping up around Arden specifically, given its proximity to the Yrd’ll Mountains. Still way too many unanswered questions, like how the hell they formed and how long they’ve been staying hidden, and what exactly their plan for the Paradox Engine entails, but… it’s a start.”

  She scowled, rubbing the back of her neck and rolling her head around a bit as she looked around the council.

  “If nothing else, that almost certainly clarifies one half of their goals, doesn’t it, people of the Church? And that defines our next course of action.”

  The head bishop, displeased as he was with how Luna’s interruption had turned out, nodded and grunted.

  “Indeed. When it comes to worshipers of fallen, ancient gods and monsters, there is only one thing they desire. Resurrection of their lord. They wish to delve into the forbidden, heretical art of necromancy, and they shall be stopped. But… an uncovering of the Lightless Century? The inquisitors of Sol have faced many a challenge in the past, but even this is a hurdle we have yet to cross.”

  Mother just sighed.

  “Well, it’s a good thing I’m here, I guess. I think I know a person or two that could help. When you spend your life looking for weird shit like extraplanar anomalies, you tend to come across a few fellow weirdos who also are way too into finding weird shit. I think he still owes me a favour, guess I’ll have to cash it in.”

  Her eyes eventually landed on a representative of Arden’s local Guild.

  “Oi, send out a call for Professor Avernus Sibyl, S-Rank special wartime commission, Calaclysm+, pending an upgrade to Mythic. Tell him it’s a personal request from Belle Symphonia. If there’s one person in the world who specialises in Lightless Century archaeology, it’s him.”

  That name made Luna freeze, almost making her jaw drop in shock.

  Mother just regarded her with a simple nonplussed stare, shrugging her shoulders halfheartedly.

  “Congratulations, kiddo, guess you’re gonna meet your idol sooner rather than later.”