While in the middle of my final battle against the demons, I rembered getting stabbed in the heart and killed when the blade exited from my shoulder.
After that mont, my vision beca blurry, and my hearing only allowed to listen to the echoes of my companions’ cries as I plumted to the ground.
The sight of all the people I had t during my ti in the world flashed in my brain, which only made it more painful for to let go, and when the image of lina appeared before , I felt a knot in my chest that sohow hurt worse than getting stabbed.
"My son... Ichiro," The soothing voice of Phelena reached my ears.
As I slowly turned around with a dejected expression, I spotted the goddess’ figure standing no more than two ters away from . However, I couldn’t bring myself to look at her in the eyes, believing she was disappointed in after getting killed.
"I-... I failed..." I muttered while looking down.
I was standing in the sa strange space where I appeared after dying in my previous life—a void surrounded by galaxies and constellations— so I was pretty sure I had died again.
"Even after I received a second chance-..." I kept muttering, but I was interrupted when a soft, warm hand held my chin and raised it.
Gently holding onto my face and lifting my eyes to make contact with hers, Phelena let out a solemn smile.
"It isn’t over yet, Ichiro..." the goddess whispered, making my eyes widen in disbelief.
Switching her hold from my face to my shoulder, Phelena turned around with and waved her hand forward, generating a virtual screen before us that resembled the broadcasting spell used by Sage Louie.
However, instead of showing what was happening with the battle, she showed her mories of the previous sages that were brought to the world by her.
Out of everything I managed to uncover about the previous sages, I could tell that Alejandro had a similar experience to what I was going through.
I had seen his mories inside the Moon’s Spire, which I was sure he left in there on purpose for another sage to find.
Like , Alejandro had beco friends with a couple of demons who possessed real emotions and empathy, so he was the only sage who tried to look for a solution that could allow his demon friends to stay while getting rid of the invaders.
On the other hand, Kyoko and Giuseppe had different experiences.
Phelena never gave her sages a clear mission. We knew that the demons were a threat to the world and that we had to do sothing about it, but the goddess never told us how to deal with them.
Alejandro tried his best to seal the evil demons, but his plan couldn’t be completed in ti, so he decided to sink the entire Lost Continent, hoping that future sages would follow his lead.
Giuseppe and Kyoko found out about his friendly relations with a couple of demons, so they tried to copy the previous sage and befriend them. Unfortunately, there weren’t any ’good’ demons for them to talk to—at least not during their ti in the world.
In the end, the best they could do was expel the demons from their world for a few hundred more years. That’s when I ca in.
To Phelena, it didn’t matter how the sages solved the problem. If I had decided to simply destroy the entire continent of G’Henna and erase the demons from existence forever, she would have been satisfied.
Still, sohow, I could tell by her expression that she wouldn’t truly appreciate such a choice.
"Ichiro... I’m glad I brought you two here," Phelena comnted while my mind was filled with all these thoughts.
I could’ve acted humble and said that it wasn’t a big deal. But, to be honest, I had done A LOT while working as a sage.
I had gone to war, fought thousands of enemies, freed entire countries from the clutches of evil demons, built cities, beca a professor, created potions and food businesses, befriended people from every race, and encountered monsters I never could’ve imagined were real... And even so, I felt like I had failed at the very end.
As I kept reminiscing about my feats, Phelena held both of my cheeks and placed her forehead against mine, closing her eyes and generating a soothing energy that made feel at peace.
Still, while my body felt warm and cozy, information started flowing from the goddess’s brain into mine.
After Sage Kyoko passed away, Phelena had to think carefully about the next sage she brought to her world.
She could only give her power to a single individual, but when she found my wife and I living our lives on Earth, she devised a way to split her power in two.
Of course, Phelena wasn’t expecting our deaths in our previous life to be such a tragedy, but that only made her want to summon us to her world even more, as the goddess was obsessed with our relationship in a healthy way.
However, Phelena’s actions had one major problem: summoning two sages at once, even if their powers were split, would prevent the goddess from summoning another one for thousands of years.
Thousands of years may have seed trivial to an immortal deity, but that was enough ti for the demons to take over the world completely. In other words, lina and I were the last sages she could count on.
The goddess never wanted to exterminate all demons. She would’ve preferred for the evolved ones to stay and create a new benevolent race in the world, though that was easier said than done, considering only one in one million demons developed emotions.
When I finally saw Phelena’s intentions, I couldn’t help but let out a smile, as my plan was to prevent my demon friends from returning to their hellish world.
I wasn’t sure if my plan was to her liking, but after she revealed all of her intentions, I knew for a fact that I wasn’t in the wrong.
"Ichiro... I must thank you. You’ve worked hard and gone through hardships because of my selfishness," Phelena muttered.
"Can I please ask you one last ti to show the world that you imagine?" she continued, lowering her head while still gently holding my cheeks.
"I want to thank you, as well..." I replied, smiling at the goddess.
"You gave a second chance to keep traveling with lina... I couldn’t have asked for a better wish," I said, making Phelena cry a tear of joy.
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