"Hello again, my dear friend. It’s been so ti, hasn’t it?"
The guy in the room is in perfect physical health, well fed, and with a comfortable bed to sleep in. He has been quite well treated, in general.
Except for my visits, of course.
His eyes betray the reality of his situation. He’s at the brink of madness, and the re sight of makes his whole body tremble as he stares in silence.
I’m finally doing that belated visit to my friend paladin, accompanied by Lovelace, who has already set a sound barrier on the room.
"Why...?"
"’Why,’ you ask? Well, because you still haven’t told anything of value, of course."
It’s been a long ti since I last ca here, as the war has made focus on the countless battles and managent.
But now I need info for the next part. Info that only he can provide .
"I have a proposal for you."
The paladin keeps staring at in silence.
"You can answer what we ask, without hiding anything, and then you have my word that I will never play with you again. How does that sound?"
"The goddess wouldn’t allow you..."
"The goddess is not here, is she? Have you tried to commune with her? To listen to her words? Has she reached out to you?"
"..."
"If the goddess were able to cut down our heresy, why are we still here? And why am I winning the war? The Pontifex even fled the country."
Maybe I played with him too hard in the beginning. I confess that I might have taken out so deep anger on him, anger that should actually be directed to the goddess herself.
But he’s still sane enough to understand rational argunts and make rational decisions. So, I push forth just a little bit.
"According to the tenets of the Church, this should be impossible."
I create a small portal in front of that leads to the table at the side of his bed, where there’s a jug with water and a cup. Then I pass my arm through the portal, take the cup, and bring it back to .
"This is not an illusion. You can take the cup out of my hand and feel its reality yourself."
I offer him the cup, which he tentatively accepts. After so ti, he takes a deep breath and decides to talk.
"The last ti you ca, you cut off my arms and legs. And when I woke up again, they were reattached, with no sign of the earlier injuries."
"They weren’t actually reattached. Lovelace here simply grew new ones on you."
"..."
"To be honest, she could connect her soul to yours and read your mories, but you probably wouldn’t survive it."
Actually, she would have to forcefully go through all his mories one by one... it would be painful to both, and, with his puny mana, there’s the chance that he would die before she gets to the things that we’re after.
She can do it with with relative ease because of our mutual trust, so I don’t resist her and she doesn’t pry where I don’t allow her, and also because of the huge amount of mana I have.
"I have witnessed things that only the goddess herself should be able to do being done by both of you. That ans..."
Oh, he’s getting there.
"That ans that either what I was taught all my life was a lie, or both of you are on the sa level of being as the goddess. In other words, that would make you also goddesses."
That’s... a reasoning of all tis.
"Well, it’s the first one. We’re not goddesses."
Yet. But I won’t say that part out loud.
"I see."
He seems to reach so internal conclusion, so, after a brief contemplative pause, he speaks again.
"My na is Echeverry De Arlanda. What do you want to hear? I should reiterate that I’m a re paladin, so I’m not privy to that much knowledge the higher-ups might have."
It seems that his ti alone made him reconsider his situation under a new light. If that ans we’ll get the info we want without effort, all the better.
And with the battles I fought, I managed to blow off so steam. So it’s all good.
:::
"Aurea, can I have a chat with you in particular?"
Lovelace shot that one as soon as we left the paladin’s room.
"Okay. Let’s go to my quarters, then."
The arena’s underground complex isn’t very big, so it doesn’t take long for us to get to my room.
"Are we turning Lady Lillian into a goddess?"
"Huh?"
I wasn’t expecting that one, so I need to think a bit before responding.
"I an... it’s not the plan, so if it’s happening, it isn’t on purpose. Why? Did you notice sothing?"
"Yes. I was already feeling sothing funny happening, but yesterday I spent the day in Beaudorf and saw so things... and with our chat with the paladin, it clicked."
"Is it about the people’s prayers?"
"Yes. They are praying to Lily instead of to the goddess. So radicals even evicted the priests of the Church from the city’s temple and converted it to serve for the Saint."
"I heard sothing about it... But I didn’t give it much importance at the ti. And what happens with the prayers?"
"The ones that are being celebrated in the temple are converting the people’s mana, in a way that is very different from the mana draining we are used to."
"Isn’t it what normally happens when people pray to the goddess?"
"It is, partially. It pools above the temple, like it normally does in the Church’s temples. But then, instead of dispersing like it used to do, it’s converging in the direction of the capital."
"Where my mother is..."
"Yes. I need to see Lady Lillian directly to confirm it, but she might be receiving all the mana that would usually go to the goddess in this country."
"I see. Let’s go see her, then. It might shed so light on stuff that was cut from your mory."
:::
"Lovelace, Aurea! It’s been so long. I’m so happy to see you here!"
What the fuck is that aura? She is really emanating sothing divine, even without activating my mana senses.
"Hi, Mom! How have you been these days?"
"It’s weird that I was actually talking about it just a few monts ago with Levy. But I feel more energetic than I’ve ever been, and my brain seems to be able to process so much more information than it usually does."
I glance to Lovelace, and she nods.
"Lady Lillian, we have a hypothesis about what might be happening. And that’s actually the motive for our visit right now."
"Okay, from your tone and the expression on your faces, it seems serious. Let’s sit in my personal office. I’ll also call Levy."
:::
After we tell them everything, they both stand thinking for so ti before Mom breaks the silence.
"Well... I had my suspicions, actually. But I didn’t have anything more concrete to work with."
"So I’m married to a literal goddess, after all. It isn’t like I didn’t consider you a goddess before, though."
"Hehe, I know, silly. But the main question, Lovelace, Aurea. Is it detrintal to the people?"
Lovelace answers her without hesitation.
"It doesn’t seem to be. At least you are not sucking the mana of the land to power so artificial system. It seems that humans will always find so object of worship and feed it their mana through their prayers and rituals. If it isn’t you, it would be sothing else."
"I would just add another question, Mom. How do you feel about the whole becoming a goddess thing?"
"I an, I have already made peace with the idea of being the saint of a new era. If being a goddess will allow to help the people better, without straining them, then all that remains is to learn to use this divinity or whatever."
I guess we’ll find so answers about that in the main temple of the capital.
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