-Present time-

A soft knock on her bedroom door woke her up. It was past midnight when Zeke came back to their cabin. Slowly and reluctantly, she uncovered her face. The girl blinked, closed her eyes and blinked again. The soft glow from the oil lamp penetrated and blinded her. She sat up and rubbed her eyes. Yurika then wobbly stood up, walked to the door and opened it. There she saw him leaning to the wall. Waiting for her to fully awake patiently.

“Welcome back,” she said in her husky sleepy voice.

The man just nodded, his face looked pensive. There’s something on his mind.

“What’s wrong?”

“Yurika, listen well, don’t be panic,” Zeke carefully delivering his words, but his tone made her alerted.

“I promise you no matter what happens, I will be by your side,” he paused, his eyes gazed deeply at those round fuschia eyes, “Jace… He wanted to see you in person.”

Yurika felt like someone just hit her with a bucket full of ice cold water. All her sleepiness flew off the roof and she could felt the creeping panic and fear rose up to her chest.

“W-why?” Terror-stricken, she tried to find an answer on his garnet eyes.

“That I don’t kn--.”

“NO! No!” She shouted and shook her head violently.

“Yuu?!” Zeke looked at her; surprised at her reaction

“What do you mean you don’t know?!” Her voice rose as she backed away from him, “He would never care of a random orphan if you didn’t even bring it up!"

“Yuu, calm down. Listen to me,” he reached out his hand toward her.

Slap!

Zeke stunned. It was the first time she'd ever been so angry at him.

“DON’T!“ she glared at him, “don’t touch me!”

Words left Zeke. He stared at her fuchsia eyes. He wanted to say something but his lips failed him. His mind empty. There was absolute stillness. Not a sound could be heard either close at hand or in the far off distance. Even their own breath seemed to die as soon as it left their mouth. It was as if the world were encased in a cocoon, a bubble, and there was no way out.

“S-sorry,” he finally said. He wanted to explain himself. But once more he was at a loss of words. It was true. If he didn’t say anything about her in front of Jace, he wouldn’t ever know; wouldn’t have been curious about her either.

There was another silence linger. It wasn’t as heavy as the previous one. Yurika watched how guilt seemed to engulf her best friend. Someone she cared so much. Someone that her previous life always looked up to. Her big brother even though not by blood. And her heart softened, she also knew despite the fact he had shared about her to the one person she wished he never to -when he could have at least tried to not- that it was unavoidable. Jace would demand him to report everything back.

“Yurika or Eireen?” she asked, breaking the silence.

Zeke rose his eyes and met hers.

“Who he wanted to see?”

“Yurika,” he finally answered, “Jace, he wanted to see Yurika, not Eireen and no he didn’t know you were Eireen --”

He started to explain but Yurika put her hand up stopping him.

“When are we going?”

“Soon, in a couple of hours. I need to rest a little bit, “ he replied, “all those teleporting back and forth required a lot of my magic energy. But I should be fine in two hours or so.

‘Magic energy,’ something tug her heart, ‘strange… I thought a Builderat doesn’t have magic quirk because they are not born with magic energy. Did he learn that? Is magic energy possible to study?’

She stared him once more with her brows slightly raised.

“Why?”

She shook her head and decided to tuck the question behind her mind, “nothing, I will go prepare.”

“Yuu,” Zeke called her, pausing her in the spot. She turned her head and waited.

“Is this mean… you’ve forgiven me?”

She gazed at the man for a few seconds, “No, not yet.”

And she went back to her room.

---

-The Goddess Messenger- (Eireen)

Eireen scrambled down from the guard post as fast she could, by the time she reached the ground she saw Jace along with his elite troop marched down from the palace breaking the crowds that already gathered in front of the gate into two. He quickly ordered the guard to open the gate as he jumped off from his mount. The moment the Zanj entered, the king kneeled down in front of him, which quickly followed by the people.

“I am Jace Ursa, The king of Ursa, ready to serve our Goddess Aine.”

“Rise up, Jace Ursa. Our Goddess respect your loyalties and dedication,” the Zanj touch the young king with his magnificent wings, “and that’s why She wanted me to deliver you good news.”

Jace stood up and bowed down, “I am grateful that our Goddess noticed our blood and tears. Oh, great Zanj, why don’t we step into my humble home and let us serve you.”

“That’s not necessary. I am here just to deliver our Goddess messages,” said the dark-haired ethereal beings, “now hear me out Jace Ursa, son of Ridwald Ursa the fifth king of Ursa kingdom!”

The excitement wired the air, anxious, curious and frenzy emotion mixed in one. They could feel it in every fiber of their body. The buzz, the rush of adrenaline. Coursing through their veins. The anticipation was real. They wondered what kind of good news the Zanj would bring and would that mean the war would end any day soon.

“My good and loyal servant of Queen Aine, our Goddess of light and love, Jace Ursa hear this out, this is the message given by our Queen. She will descent to your palace on the seventh day of the coming second full moon. She wanted you to gather every clan leaders and kings that swore their loyalty to her.”

Everyone on the crowd started to murmur, quiet questions buzzing around like wildfire about what would happen, why did the Goddess want everyone to gather on that day.

“Silence!!” Lugos' voice booming over the crowd which effectively silenced everyone “Hear this out! On the seventh day of the coming second full moon, our Goddess will choose a warrior. To that one person, the Goddess will grant the legendary gem. The gem and the person will lead us to victory. So gather all the strongest men and women. Be prepared to end this war with the winning in our side.”

There was a deafening silence for a few seconds then a cacophony of applause and cheering, whooping, hollering, clapping, stamping of feet, palpable excitement buzzed through the charged air, grew like a blazing light of lightning fast and infectious. Everyone shaking hands, patting one another on the back, hug each other, spontaneous outpouring of emotion.

‘Finally… the war will end.’ Eireen thought to herself excitedly.