Estella was the last to cross the threshold into the ruined church of Aurora, and here, her status as a favored champion of the Goddess was made obvious. A mysterious light source, like an invisible sun, seemed to shine from behind her, shrouding her in a golden halation that was difficult to spot, but undeniably present. The glimmer in Estella’s eyes also took on a shape of a cruciform, partially obscuring her pupils and iris. Although, in detail, this influence was subtle, when they were all put together it was beyond obvious.

Estella was blessed. More than that, she was a saint. She was a warrior chosen by her patron Goddess and given the means and tools to wage Her wars and carry Her crusade.

As the others watched the blessed warrior enter, the clicking of her heels stopped halfway into the main chamber and, without a word, she raised her right hand towards Aren, closed her eyes, and lowered her head.

Aren had seen this before, but he didn’t quite understand it then. He understood Estella’s intentions, however; It was easier to show than to explain.

From somewhere in the distance, despite the hardship that Rakab had to endure recently, faint music reached within the hallowed halls with jubilant, yet lingeringly haunting tunes.

An arcane manifestation appeared in front of Estella’s outstretched hand, similar to Aren’s [Arcane Territory], but it was entirely golden in color and shone with the brilliance of the sun. Within this two-dimensional, disc-shaped construct of esoteric principles were not the arcane symbols of magic most might be familiar with, but the symbolism of the divine themselves.

This was not magic. Although most people called it magic — of the Divine type — it was the act of working miracles. Most priests who relied on divine energies to work spells treated it as arcane magic, and for the most part, this was sufficient and it was an invaluable resource to any group or party that faced dangers every day.

But Estella’s magic was not that. The way that Yan Li blazed the path for full casters to follow in his steps, revealing the true inner workings of the caster type, so too Estella may one day teach all those who follow the will of the Divine how to use their unique connection to the Divine.

This was not magic. It was the very act of wielding Aurora’s power to defy reality. If arcane magic was the act of working within the laws of reality, then divine magic was the act of writing new laws.

At least it looked that way, and it felt that way.

A bright ray of light fell upon Aren, and he could feel Aurora’s presence behind him — although he knew she was not actually standing there. It was the sensation of being in her presence and her warmth, and this sensation penetrated beneath the skin and crawled up his spine, inching ever closer towards touching his very soul. And when it did touch his core and spirit, he felt the kind of happiness that was unattainable in real life. He felt as if he was beloved by the world.

And in that moment, he was beloved. The air sang with a hymn to his beauty and uniqueness. The ground stopped offering resistance, and the sensation of weight evaporated — as if he was floating, yet standing. Estella’s light did not hurt his eyes — light itself no longer hurt — and he could see her as if she stood between a shadow and a glare; she was a silhouette of divine glory.

A golden aether began to gather around Aren’s stump and though the sensation was not that of pain, it was just as uncomfortable. He had experienced it once before, not that long ago even, and to Aren, it felt like it was the pain of rebirth. Even with the pain limiters turned on — and they governed other sensations as well, not just pain — he could feel an intense coldness as his missing hand began to appear within the golden aether. The initial ‘pain’ of life, the coldness of vulnerability, and the sensation of inevitable loss comprised this pain of rebirth, including some other inscrutable sensations that Aren could not describe.

But the result was the same. Though it was and was not magic — rather, a new way of working with divine energies — when the aether evaporated to nothingness, Aren’s missing hand was restored. It was fast — usually, injuries of these types would take days to heal while under constant monitoring of priestly types. An adventurer could say that over their entire active career, between a third and a half of their time is invested entirely in healing. The fact that Estella could restore Aren’s missing limb in a matter of minutes was absurd.

Aren could tell by the expressions of his companions that something like this could deeply upset the balance of Singularity. This did not just give adventurers more time to adventure, but it could change the very strategies employed to conquer dungeons. Deep dungeon dives were campaigns that lasted for months and they included such risk-management strategies to avoid injuries — and healing times — as much as possible. With Estella’s gifts and divine magic, those campaigns could potentially be reduced to weeks if not days, inevitably resulting in a profound change to the economy and geopolitical landscape.

But Estella did not care about the implications of political or economical changes — she did not care if her gift would lead to renewed all-out war between Alliances for control over dungeons — she only cared about one thing, or so it seemed.

Estella turned towards Cassandra and executed a bow very reminiscent of Asian culture. “Cassandra,” she spoke, her tone low and apologetic. “I am sorry for concealing this from you — from all of you.”

Cassandra’s expression was difficult to read, but Aren could tell she was trying her best to keep it neutral. The others were stunned. Fang was overjoyed, Ame and Nissa stared in disbelief, and Damien in particular only showed concern and sympathy for his white priest friend.

“Recently, you were worried that you are no longer needed, but that is not true,” Estella said, approaching the white priestess. Estella’s hand landed on Cassandra’s cheek. “You have so much more to give than I do. Your contribution is so much more valuable than mine — both as a friend and a healer. This is all I can do. Fatal wounds and critical wounds.”

As the distant music swelled in volume, Cassandra bit down on her lower lip, and she lowered her head slightly. But Estella would not let the white priest hide her eyes from her, and she leaned to the side to meet the priest’s gaze. “You are important. The way you think about us, and the way you put others before your own self is something no one else can do like you. Even as a healer, you can do things I can’t. You are not my lesser. I am not your better. Together, we make a complete whole.”

Cassandra’s eyes shot wide open when the final words fell upon her ears, and her head nudged upwards just slightly, her gaze directly meeting Estella’s. Then a small smile developed on her lips and she surrendered a nod to Estella.

The others also basked in the warmth of Estella’s words and the healing of the invisible rift that was developing between the two. Nissa looked the most eager to jump at them, shower them in hugs and cheers, but like the others, she held back.

“Guys,” Aren spoke softly, after a few seconds of silence, taking advantage of the tender moment. “I want to invite Yen to Exalt.”

“Yen? Jennifer?” Fang asked.

“Yen is in a Clan already,” Nissa said.

Aren nodded to both. “I will ask her to leave and join us.”

Estella’s expression became inscrutable as she looked at Aren, while simultaneously intertwining her fingers with Cassandra’s. Of the others, only Fang and Nissa seemed to understand that there was something important about this unusual declaration of poaching.

“Why?” Fang asked. “What happened?”

Aren looked at Fang, then at Nissa, then swept his gaze over the others. “Yen is a childhood friend. We go to the same school,” he explained to the others. “When I last left, I went to visit her, and, to be quite frank, it was not a moment too soon.”

That specific choice of words painted alarm and concern on everyone’s expression — even Estella’s.

“She was attacked,” Aren said.

Nissa’s gasp elevated over the stunned silence in the chamber.

Though, while the others were shocked, Fang and Ame looked furious.

“I think all of you are in danger,” Aren said. “I think all of you are in danger because of me.” Aren lowered his head — a tribute of apology — and his shoulders sunk. “I am so sorry. I don’t know how to fix this anymore.”

“I have a friend,” Cassandra said. “He would know what to do in situations like this.”

Aren’s gaze swept over the others and then to Cassandra. He didn’t think things through this far — as a person, he was about honesty before he was about formulating a clear plan of action. He didn’t know how much he could say in this situation — about the nature of the danger or the pointlessness of hiding or seeking protection.

“If you want,” Estella offered, “You could all move in with me. I have enough room for everyone. If we are all together, it would be safer.”

Fang looked towards Estella and then back to Aren. “It’s a good idea, Arn,” he said, using Aren’s nickname. “You suggested it yourself, way back.”

Nissa nodded in agreement.

Aren looked at Fang and then at Estella. If anything, Estella was right. The most dangerous place, and the safest place, was wherever Aren was. He knew, without a doubt, that he was under the protection of Deucalion.

Estella smiled at Aren. “Besid… —uld be…”

Aren blinked. “Huh?”

Fang looked at Aren. “… better…”

Aren blinked again. The music… when did it become so loud? He could hear a haunting voice singing right next to his ear — it wasn’t unpleasant, which is why he hadn’t noticed it increase in volume like so — but it was so loud.

Ame’s brows furrowed in concern, an expression which many shared with him, as they looked at Aren.

“All ri…?” someone asked, but Aren wasn’t sure who.

Aren felt dizzy and disoriented. A haze lingered over his vision, distorting everything he saw. From the brightening glare of the lights streaming in through the broken mosaic windows, came darkness that conquered his vision. At first, the darkness encroached on the edge of his vision, forming a narrowing band of blindness, but then quickly progressed towards robbing him of his vision entirely.

In this total darkness, all he could hear was the song. The music — the hauntingly beautiful strings — was silent here, but the unnaturally clear, crystalline voice sang in his mind in an alien language. And that voice resonated in his body.

From the total darkness, a silhouette emerged. The silhouette was slightly shorter than Aren and possessed long hair; this silhouette also carried a warmth that was familiar to Aren. Aren’s heart skipped a beat the moment he saw the silhouette, and when the silhouette reached out to take his hand, the touch awakened recognition.

Then she became colorful.

The scent of her winter and spring filled his mind. That familiar warmth of her touch reached into his very core and filled him with content. As the wintry paleness of her skin emerged from the black and the icy cold of her blue colored her eyes, Thomas’ words came to Aren’s mind, including words Aren never heard Thomas speak.

“This world is full of monsters,” the soldier’s disembodied voice rang in Aren’s head as clear as a bell. “And some among them, are older and far more savage than anything you can imagine. If the Fragments are the Sacrosanct Thrones, then those other things are the Primal Virtues that came before them.”

As the words, and the conviction within them, left a staggeringly uncomfortable feeling in his mind, Priscilla — the silhouette — approached Aren and pressed her forehead to his. She smiled — her lips colored a faint blue, paler than her eyes — and her eyelids closed.

She did not speak a word, but Aren understood. Her happiness and joy to see him again — to long for someone’s presence like so — required no spoken words and was evident in her kind warmth.

The singing voice was coming from behind him now, and little by little, Aren became increasingly aware of some of its hidden meaning. It was calling to him. It was singing for him. Within the brutal beauty of that voice lingered an unspeakable malevolence and the song itself was about ancient wroth. He did not know why he thought so, but he simply knew.

Unnaturally compelled, Aren looked away from Priscilla — which was the last thing he ever wanted to do — and came to turn about-face, only to find himself standing in the presence of a towering mountain of silver.

The mountain glimmered with a brilliance that was not possible in the virtual world or the real one. And its shape, its irregular flattened but seemingly random faces, were akin to that of military stealth technology. Yet, this mountain of metallic silver’s most striking feature was that its skin was liquid.

Its surface trembled and swayed with waves as if someone had dropped a stone into a still lake.

[ Help me, Nineteen. I don’t want to die! ]

The words boomed in Aren’s mind. He staggered.

[ It is so dark. Is someone there? ]

[ Can you hear us? Can you see us? ]

The voices were myriad — and Aren recognized all of them. No, Nineteen knew those voices — his memories of Nineteen remembered those voices. They were his friends. Those that he could not save. Those that he could not bring with him to Ciel-on-the-sea. Those that this creature before Aren stole from him.

Then, the singing voice became understandable.

[ My blazing voice beckons all to ruin. What was once will be once more. I am the light. ]

A multifoliate star unraveled directly above Aren, transforming into one of myriad points, and shed an infinite radiance into the world of darkness, turning it from pitch black to brilliant white.

Still under the compulsion, Aren reached out to the mountain of silver, and as his hand sunk beneath the waves of the liquid metal, his fingers were shorn off by the tidal forces of tons of liquid metal, and then his wrist was unraveled, and then the rest of his arm up to his elbow. Finally, Priscilla placed both hands on his upper arm, stopped him, and pulled him back.

Concern glimmered in her eyes, and she shook her head to Aren. She did not speak a word.

[ I am Bael. ]

Upon hearing the name, the world of light and darkness, and Priscilla’s presence, disappeared. He found himself once more in the cathedral of Aurora, with all his friends standing around him, expressions twisted into that of worry.

Then Aren fell to the ground.

< Emergency exit. No heart rhythm detected. Initiating emergency medical procedures. >

Nineteen’s voice drifted into Aren’s dissipating mind.

“Curse you, Bael. Why do you exist? One day I will kill you.”