Chapter 158: Thus Far And So On

  THUD.

  The massive, iron-reinforced oak doors of the Kah-Kamun throne room swung shut, the sheer weight of the wood sealing the chamber with a heavy, resonant finality.

  A second ter, a sharp, metallic click echoed through the room. The Royal Guards stationed on the other side had turned the heavy iron tumblers, locking them in. The vast, opulent chamber was now perfectly isoted, providing an absolute, impenetrable space for the discussion about to unfold.

  What would be spoken today was strictly forbidden for the public ear. Every single soul present had to maintain absolute secrecy.

  The only sound accompanying the tense silence within was the rhythmic, relentless drumming of a heavy desert rainstorm shing against the high stained-gss windows. The sudden downpour—a rare occurrence in Zarateph—felt almost like the sky itself was weeping in relief after the defeat of the Living Mountain.

  Inside, the usual royal arrangements had been cleared away. The grand map table had been repced by a long, polished rectangur wooden table that stretched across the center of the room. A warm, flickering glow from the crystal chandeliers overhead cast long shadows across the faces of those seated around it.

  At the far end of the table, commanding the room with quiet authority, sat King Ahmed and Queen Aleena.

  Fnking them, radiating a heavy, undeniable presence, were the two Lords: Zhu Lihua, her crimson hair vibrant against her dark traveling clothes, and Tanvir, his broad shoulders filling out a fresh, earthy-brown tunic.

  Following them down the line were the rest of the deeply intertwined cast. Harrison Aster sat quietly, looking gaunt but remarkably alive, his faded adventurer’s coat draped over the back of his wooden wheelchair. Next to him sat Bob and Mi. Across from them were Malik and Samira.

  And stly, seated at the very opposite end of the table, were the two teenagers who somehow always found themselves at the very epicenter of these disasters: the runaways, Raito and Yukari.

  "Right," Queen Aleena started, her regal voice cutting through the sound of the rain. She folded her hands neatly on the polished wood. "Thank you, everyone, for coming here today."

  The Queen’s expression was deadly serious, the usual warmth in her eyes repced by the sharp, calcuting gaze of a ruler trying to navigate the apocalypse. "The content of today's meeting will be... frankly, paramount for the future of Zarateph. And, given what we have learned, perhaps for all of Calvenoor as well."

  She turned her gaze down the table. "Malik, dear. If you will."

  Malik jumped slightly at being addressed. "Y-yes, your majesty!"

  He nervously pushed his round gsses up the bridge of his nose and quickly stood up. He walked over to a dark corner of the room and hauled a massive, heavy chalkboard toward the head of the table. The dark ste was completely covered in frantically scribbled chalk notes, complicated timelines, and various hand-drawn picture illustrations pinned to the board with small iron tacks.

  "Wait, dear. Before we begin," King Ahmed interjected, gently pcing a hand over the Queen's. He looked around the table. "Considering the gravity of this information, I think it is best if we officially record this meeting. To ensure nothing is lost to time or memory."

  Queen Aleena nodded, her golden earrings catching the chandelier light. "Agreed."

  The King turned his gaze toward the massive caravan merchant. "Brother. Do you have it?"

  "Always prepared, brother," Bob smiled, though the usual booming joviality was dialed back for the solemn occasion.

  Bob reached into the deep, colorful folds of his silk robes and pulled out a simple, portable vinyl voice recorder—a mundane device common to households across Calvenoor. He set the wooden base on the table, carefully pced a fresh bck vinyl disc onto the ptter, and clicked the brass stylus into pce. He cranked the small side-handle a few times, and the disc began to slowly spin, emitting a familiar, soft crackle as the needle caught the groove.

  "Ready," Bob announced.

  "Then, as we start, a formal introduction of our roster is needed for the archive," Queen Aleena decred, speaking clearly and deliberately toward the recorder's small brass horn. "First is me. Queen Aleena Said of Zarateph."

  "And I, King Ahmed Said of Zarateph," the King followed, his deep voice resonating perfectly.

  "We are here to py witness to the following information," they stated in unison.

  Queen Aleena gestured to her right. "To support our discussion, we have the two Lords. First, Lady Zhu Lihua, the Bze Lord of Ruhong."

  "Here," Zhu said, her voice ft, staring intensely at the spinning vinyl.

  "Next, the Quake Lord of Zarateph, and a deeply trusted old friend of our Said family, Tanvir," the King introduced.

  "Here," Tanvir grunted, crossing his massive arms.

  "Next are our successors," Queen Aleena continued, looking fondly at the young couple. "My daughter, Princess Samira Said, the next in line."

  "Here!" Samira announced, her cheerful, melodic tone breaking through the heavy gloom of the room for just a second.

  "And her husband, the young schor Malik Khan," the King added.

  "Uh... u-here," Malik stammered, his voice wavering as he clutched a piece of chalk tightly in his sweaty palm.

  "The next individuals hold central roles in the following story," Queen Aleena said, her gaze shifting to the gaunt man in the wheelchair. "One is a world-renowned adventurer, though thought lost to time. Mr. Harrison Aster."

  "Here," Harrison said. His voice was raspy, but it carried the quiet, unshakeable confidence of a man who had faced death and returned.

  "Next, is my brother and grand merchant, Boban Said," the King introduced, revealing Bob's full name to the room, "and his right-hand woman, the mercenary Mi Kahn. They were also dragged into the belly of the beast as witnesses to the tale."

  "Here," Boban said, giving a respectful nod.

  "Here," Mi echoed sharply, leaning back in her chair.

  "And stly," Queen Aleena said, her sharp eyes finally nding on the very end of the table. "Those who somehow always happen to be in the middle of all of this chaos. The runaways, Raito and Yukari."

  Raito and Yukari exchanged a brief, entirely exhausted gnce.

  "We're here," they both answered in unison.

  Queen Aleena took a deep breath, the sound of the rain outside momentarily swelling as thunder rumbled across the desert sky.

  "With that," the Queen decred, her voice echoing with absolute authority, "I officially open the meeting."

  The Queen exhaled a long, measured breath, settling back into her ornate chair. She looked down the length of the polished table, her gaze pinning Raito and Yukari.

  "First, just to refresh our memories and establish a baseline for the record," Queen Aleena started, "what exactly were you two doing in Zarateph? Or rather, why did you two travel to Zarateph in the first pce?"

  Malik immediately stepped up to the chalkboard. The dry scritch-scratch of chalk filled the quiet room as he drew a prominent white circle around the very first pinned illustration—a crude but recognizable sketch of a rge merchant galleon arriving at a port.

  "Our arrival, your majesty, was purely an invitation from Bob," Yukari answered, her voice clear and precise. She sat with perfect posture, the disciplined warrior masking the exhausted teenager underneath.

  "She is correct," Bob added, offering a warm, affirming nod. "We had all just concluded a rather... eventful stint in the Spica region. The journey here was meant to be a joyous occasion. They came to Zarateph purely to attend my dear niece Samira's wedding."

  "And was there any issue or trouble brewing in the time right before, or directly during, your arrival to our shores?" the Queen probed, her eyes narrowing slightly.

  Raito let out a heavy, weary sigh, slumping slightly in his chair. "To be fair, your majesty... there is always way too much trouble brewing with us to even know where to begin."

  "How about focusing on the arrival part as much as you can," the Queen instructed patiently.

  "If it's strictly the arrival, then... there was only really one small hurdle," Raito said, scratching his cheek.

  "Yeah. The Bluebeard Pirates," Yukari added, nodding in agreement.

  "Bluebeard Pirates?" King Ahmed asked, his thick eyebrows knitting together in confusion. A minor pirate crew seemed entirely insignificant compared to a walking volcanic mountain.

  "Our passenger ship got attacked by that motley crew of scavengers," Mi crified, her tone clinical and sharp as she crossed her arms. "But they themselves were absolutely no issue. I could have handled them in my sleep."

  Mi tilted her head, her gaze shifting down the table. "The real issue came from him."

  Zhu Lihua, who had been sitting quietly, reached out and pointed a firm, accusatory finger directly at Raito.

  "That incident on the ship," Zhu stated, her voice carrying the heavy weight of a Lord's observation, "was the very first time he actively manifested his bck fme powers. The Void energy."

  The room grew noticeably quieter, the soft crackle of the vinyl recorder seeming to amplify in the silence.

  "Right," Raito admitted, looking down at his own palms. He flexed his fingers, the phantom memory of the cold, devouring abyss tingling beneath his skin. "That was the first time I felt the massive power boost that came from awakening the Void within me. But back then, I still couldn't control it at all. It just occasionally surged up whenever my instincts registered I was in mortal danger. I guess my body thought those pirates were dangerous enough to warrant it."

  "Okay," the Queen noted, her sharp mind filing the information away. "But after the pirate attack, did it manifest again immediately?"

  "No, your majesty," Raito answered, shaking his head. "Not until..."

  "Oh! I know this part!" Samira suddenly interjected, raising her hand with a bright, eager energy that momentarily cut through the room's gloom. "The museum incident!"

  Malik quickly turned back to the chalkboard, the chalk squeaking as he circled the second illustration—a sketch of a grand building engulfed in stylized fmes.

  "Right. After your safe arrival in Kah-Kamun," the Queen resumed, piecing the timeline together, "you all went to the grand museum for some sightseeing before the wedding preparations began."

  "Yes," Yukari confirmed. "It was me, Raito, and Mother Zhu, accompanied by Mi and Princess Samira. We were exploring the exhibits when we stumbled into a restricted area. There, we met Mr. Tanvir, Malik, and, of course, your majesty the Queen herself."

  "Correct. The museum was entirely closed to the public at the time," Queen Aleena expined, her face darkening at the memory. "Because we were secretly using the lower archives as a makeshift discussion and research building. We were trying to understand a massive new discovery... a mysterious, silver metallic structure that our Malik had found completely buried in the deep desert."

  "And then, the fire started," Tanvir added, his gruff voice rumbling across the table.

  "A mysterious, raging fire that just suddenly erupted from nothing," Tanvir eborated, his eyes narrowing as he recalled the sheer, terrifying heat of the bze. "It burned through solid stone and steel as if they were dry parchment."

  "It was incredibly weird," Zhu chimed in, leaning forward. As the Bze Lord, fire was her absolute domain, yet the memory of that specific inferno still baffled her. "Even though my powers were suppressed at the time... that fire still completely refused to obey my inherent authority. It was like it belonged to a different master."

  Zhu’s fiery eyes shifted to Raito. "But... it was also not enhanced by the Void. I know that for an absolute fact now, because I have since come into direct contact with Raito's bck fmes. The museum fire was fundamentally different from the Void."

  "In that fire, the Queen, Samira, and I got trapped by falling debris," Malik said, a visible shudder running through his thin frame as he recalled the suffocating smoke. "The heat was unbearable. We honestly thought we were toast."

  "But Yukari and Raito came charging in to our rescue!" Samira said, looking at the two runaways with profound, sparkling gratitude.

  "More like Raito himself, to be honest," Yukari corrected, shaking her head humbly. A shadow of frustration crossed her features. "My ice... they couldn't even freeze nor control those fmes back then. The fire simply devoured the frost the moment it manifested."

  For a prodigy like Yukari, admitting her elemental impotence was a bitter pill, but a necessary truth for the record.

  "It took his bck fme to stop it," Yukari said, gesturing to her husband. "Raito had to use the Void to physically consume the mysterious fire. That was the only way the accident was finally brought under control. But even then... the damage was severe. It left your majesty the Queen in a deep coma for a week, and I ended up with a badly injured ankle from the colpsing rubble."

  "That was the second time I used the bck fme," Raito added, his voice quiet, staring at the polished wood grain of the table.

  Queen Aleena leaned forward, steepling her fingers. Her gaze was intense, piercing straight through the boy's casual exterior.

  "And how did you feel, Raito?" the Queen asked softly. "When you wielded a power that could consume a fire that defied even a Lord?"

  Raito remained silent for a long moment. The only sound in the room was the rhythmic pat-pat-pat of the rain against the stained gss.

  "It felt..." Raito began, his voice thick with a complicated, dark emotion. "It felt exhirating. Intoxicating, even. Like I was holding the absolute power of the world in my bare hands."

  He slowly turned his head, looking directly at Yukari. The memory of her soot-stained face, illuminated by the cold, devouring light of his abyssal fire, fshed in his mind.

  "But..." Raito swallowed hard, the vulnerability raw in his voice. "When I looked around... I saw everyone's faces. Especially Yukari's. I could feel it. I could see it clearly."

  He looked back at the Queen, his brown eyes shadowed with lingering guilt.

  "People were terrified of me."

  The heavy, somber confession hung in the air, the vinyl recorder scratching quietly against the silence.

  Then, Samira cpped her hands together, the sudden, sharp sound completely shattering the gloom.

  "And then the next part!" Samira beamed, leaning forward enthusiastically. "Oh, that one was incredibly fun!"

  Malik grabbed his chalk again, reaching over to quickly circle a crude, stick-figure drawing of a man holding a rge magnifying gss.

  Yukari let out a long, long groan, burying her face in her hands and aggressively massaging her temples.

  "Please don't remind me," Yukari sighed miserably.

  "The Shilook mystery group!" Samira decred proudly to the rest of the table. "We were frantically running all around the city of Kah-Kamun, searching for subtle clues and intensely interviewing any people who were present during the museum fire!"

  "Oh, that sounds like brilliant fun!" Harrison chimed in from his wheelchair, his eyes lighting up with genuine adventurer's curiosity. He turned to look at his daughter, who looked as if she were suffering from a severe migraine. "Why do you look so exhausted just hearing about it, Lin?"

  "Because, Papa," Yukari gritted her teeth, shooting a venomous gre down the table. She pointed a sharp finger directly at her husband. "Because this absolute idiot over here had to go and fully cospy the entire 'Shilook' getup."

  She gestured wildly at Raito. "He insisted on wearing a thick, heavy woolen trench coat, carrying a wooden walking cane, and chewing on a fake wooden pipe in the middle of the blistering, dry desert heat! He forced us to drag ourselves all around the entire city, completely ignoring the fact that I had a severely broken ankle!"

  Raito puffed out his chest, lowering his voice into a gritty, dramatic baritone perfectly mimicking the famous fictional detective of Calvenoorian literature.

  "Because it was absolutely necessary for the truth, my dear Ruboo," Raito said seriously, tapping an imaginary pipe against his chin.

  SMACK.

  Yukari didn't even hesitate. She leaned over and delivered a sharp, stinging sp directly to the back of Raito's head.

  "Not one more Ruboo," she threatened, her silver eyes narrowing dangerously.

  "Oh, Ruboo!" Harrison gasped, snapping his fingers in delighted recognition. "The mystery-solving, talking hound dog from the novels! Yes, I read those extensively during long sea voyages. Honestly... I can actually see the comparison."

  "Papa! Not you too!" Yukari compined, her cheeks flushing a bright, furious red.

  Harrison chuckled, ignoring his daughter's profound embarrassment as he turned to his son-in-w. "Tell me, Raito, my boy. Does she bite?"

  "Absolutely, sir," Raito answered instantly, rubbing the back of his head. "Viciously. And without any warning."

  "Then it makes perfect sense you would cast her as Ruboo," Harrison concluded with a solemn nod.

  SMACK.

  A second, significantly harder sp nded squarely on the back of Raito's head.

  "Ow!" Raito yelped, rubbing the fresh sting. "What was the second one for?!"

  "For deliberately putting my father into your ridiculous delusion!" Yukari hissed.

  "Fine, fine. I apologize," Raito muttered, raising his hands in surrender. A sudden thought occurred to him, and he looked over at Yukari with genuine curiosity. "By the way, what actually happened to that costume? I haven't seen the coat or the pipe since we returned to the pace."

  "I burned it," Yukari answered nonchantly, adjusting her cuffs. "The ashes are scattered to the desert winds. It was a cursed set of garments, and now we are finally, blessedly freed."

  "What?!" Raito cried out, completely devastated. "I spent a massive amount of cals on that coat!"

  "Sucks to be you," Yukari stated ftly, cking a single ounce of sympathy for his financial loss.

  AHEM.

  Zhu Lihua cleared her throat loudly, a sharp, commanding bark that echoed across the long wooden table. "Kids," she scolded, tapping her index finger against the polished surface. "We are supposed to be having a serious, historically recorded debriefing here."

  Yukari immediately straightened her posture, looking appropriately chastised. "Right. The story. My sincere apologies, everyone."

  AHEM.

  This time, it was Malik who coughed. He stood somewhat awkwardly next to the massive chalkboard, waiting for the family dynamic to settle before he continued his presentation.

  "Right... well," Malik began, adjusting his round gsses. "Despite the unconventional methods of the... 'Shilook group', the investigation successfully concluded. The true culprit who set the museum fire ended up being Mr. Kadiem. He was the supposedly esteemed Sacred schor who had initially come to help us decipher the excavation pns for the silver ruins."

  Malik drew an 'X' through a small portrait of the schor. "However, we quickly discovered that was merely his stolen identity at the time. His real name was Kaden. And he was a half-Sacred, not a full-blooded one."

  "He was the son of Tseh," Malik eborated, his tone turning somber. "Tseh was the former head of museum security. A few months ago, he died in what the city guard had officially ruled a suicide. But, obviously, our investigation uncovered that it was actually another one of Kaden's brutal cover-ups."

  "His motive, your majesty," Tanvir chimed in, taking over from the schor. His deep voice resonated with a heavy, bitter truth. "Was absolute, unadulterated revenge against the Royal Family."

  King Ahmed let out a long, heavy sigh. He closed his eyes, the weight of the crown suddenly looking unbearable on his brow.

  "Apparently," King Ahmed added, speaking directly into the recording horn, "his young daughter was killed in a horrific structural accident within the museum several decades ago. My father—the previous King—and a select few of the high-ranking ministers chose to completely bury the truth of the accident to save political face and maintain the museum's prestige."

  The King clenched his hands into tight fists. "It was entirely despicable. They destroyed the official records and silenced the grieving family. But Tanvir and I managed to salvage some of those dark, suppressed truths from the restricted archives, along with evidence of several other simir injustices."

  SLAM.

  King Ahmed suddenly smmed his fist down onto the table. The heavy thud made the vinyl recorder jump, the needle emitting a sharp, static squeak.

  "I thought they were good men," the King growled, his voice vibrating with raw, deeply personal betrayal. "My father. My mentors. I truly believed they were guiding Zarateph into an era of prosperity. But beneath it all... they were rotten."

  A tense, uncomfortable silence bnketed the room as the King fought to regain his composure.

  "Unfortunately, the sins of the past bred the monsters of our present," Tanvir said gently, providing cover for his old friend.

  The Quake Lord looked around the table, his expression hardening as they approached the most terrifying revetion of the entire ordeal.

  "And Kaden was absolutely not working alone," Tanvir stated. "When we finally confronted him, he had powerful backup. A nameless, hooded man who immediately intercepted me."

  Tanvir leaned forward, tracing a rough, jagged scar on his own forearm.

  "That man... he was heavily, grotesquely modified," Tanvir recounted, a rare trace of genuine concern bleeding into his voice. "He looked far more like a machine than a living person. He had thick, translucent tubes running completely over and through his flesh, aggressively pumping raw, votile electric elemental energy directly into his nervous system."

  "I managed to win the engagement," Tanvir added quickly, assuring the room. "The fight itself was not an issue. But it is the specific energy signature he used, and his dying words, that have left me with a profound sense of concern."

  Tanvir looked directly at Zhu Lihua. "The electric element he utilized... it bore far too much simirity to the raw authority of one of our missing siblings."

  "Missing siblings?" King Ahmed asked, his head snapping up in confusion. "Old friend, what do you mean by missing siblings?"

  Zhu Lihua uncrossed her arms and sat up straight. "Your majesty," she addressed the King smoothly. "Do you know exactly how many Lords there are in Calvenoor?"

  "Six, of course," King Ahmed answered immediately, as if reciting a childhood lesson. "Everyone knows it. It is written in the oldest mythological tales. Six Lords for every region of the continent. They each govern their own fundamental elements, or so the legends say."

  "Right," Zhu nodded slowly, her fiery eyes casting long shadows. "That is how it was. But currently... two are missing."

  "What?!" King Ahmed gasped, exchanging a shocked look with Queen Aleena. "How is that even possible for a mythological being to go missing?"

  "We don't know, your majesty," Zhu admitted, the frustration evident in her tight jaw. "But the Freeze Lord of Norval, and the Static Lord of Volnear... they were just suddenly gone. They vanished a few decades ago, leaving behind absolutely no words, no signs of struggle, and no residual presence. Tanvir, myself, and the remaining Lords have been desperately trying to track them down through our elemental networks for years, to no avail."

  "Let us leave the terrifying issue of missing demigods aside for a moment," Queen Aleena interjected, raising a hand to steer the rapidly spiraling conversation back on course. She looked at Tanvir. "You mentioned something about his dying words. 'Master W'. Do we know who this was? And what exactly was the final fate of our infiltrators?"

  "We don't know who they were referring to, your majesty," Tanvir shook his massive head. "This 'Master W' is also a complete, terrifying mystery. But based purely on the hooded man's fanatical ramblings, they are someone who is exceptionally, unfathomably good at complex machinery and biological modification. And they likely possess a massive, overarching god complex. The hooded man cimed his master had 'broken the realm of the gods'."

  Tanvir sighed, crossing his arms. "I originally thought they were just the desperate, empty ramblings of a dying madman. But... I believe there are deep, dark truths behind his words."

  "As for the fate of the infiltrators," Tanvir continued grimly. "The hooded man died. He intentionally self-destructed his own modified core before I could forcefully extract any further information out of him."

  Tanvir's gaze slowly slid down the table, settling on the teenage boy at the end. "And Kaden, unfortunately, also died shortly after. From his severe injuries."

  "Injuries caused by?" the Queen asked, her sharp gaze following Tanvir's.

  Slowly, hesitantly, Raito raised his hand into the air.

  "It was caused by me, your majesty," Raito confessed, his voice barely above a whisper. The pyful energy of the 'Shilook' detective was completely gone, repced by a hollow, haunting guilt.

  "I was the one who chased after him through the lower archives while old man Tanvir was busy fighting the hooded cyborg," Raito expined, staring down at the grain of the wooden table. "I caught him. And I... I pretty much beat him entirely into submission."

  He swallowed hard, his hands balling into tight fists on his p. "I don't know exactly why it happened the way it did. I was just... so incredibly angry at the time. Angry at the injustice, angry at the fire. And the Void inside me... it answered that anger. It didn't just give me fire to fight with; it gave me exactly what my darkest thoughts wanted in that moment. It fueled a desperate, violent desire to just brutally beat the man down."

  "It took the combined, physical force of both me and Lin's persuasions to finally force Raito to let the broken man go," Zhu added quietly, acting as the objective witness to the sheer brutality of the event.

  Beneath the table, hidden from the eyes of the monarchs, Yukari gently reached out. She slipped her smaller hand into Raito's tightly clenched fist, prying his tense fingers apart until she could warmly ce her fingers through his.

  "That was the absolute scariest you have ever looked to me," Yukari whispered softly, for his ears only.

  Raito flinched slightly at the raw honesty in her words. He looked down at their joined hands, the stark contrast of her pale skin against his tanned, calloused fingers anchoring him to the present reality.

  "I'm sorry," Raito whispered back, squeezing her hand tightly, holding onto her like a lifeline in a dark, unpredictable storm.

  "So, that is exactly why Lady Lihua expressly asked me to bench you for the subsequent mission," Queen Aleena deduced, her regal gaze shifting from the joined hands of the teenagers to the stoic Bze Lord.

  "Yes, your majesty," Zhu nodded, her arms crossed tight against her chest. "With his powers being so violently inconsistent and aggressive, I simply couldn't take the risk of bringing him along. At the time, I didn't even fully understand what that bck fme power was, only that it felt inherently wrong and dangerous."

  "Which brings us to the next part..." Yukari murmured, leaning back slightly in her chair, the warmth of Raito's hand grounding her. "The desert exploration."

  "Correct," Queen Aleena said, nodding.

  Malik quickly turned back to the massive chalkboard, his chalk squeaking loudly as he drew a hasty circle around another illustration—this one depicting a sprawling caravan traversing massive sand dunes.

  "It was organized in a massive hurry right after Samira and Malik's wedding concluded," the Queen expined for the archive's record. "With Malik acting as our primary guide to the coordinates he discovered, Tanvir and I contacted several local adventuring guilds to act as our main bodyguards. They ended up being the Raging Bull guild."

  "And, as I required my own close-quarters protection," the Queen added, "I personally requested Lady Lihua, Mi, and you, Miss Yukari, to accompany me."

  "Right. The long journey to the metallic structure," Yukari nodded, recalling the blistering, dusty heat of the desert trek.

  Beside her, Raito gently, but purposefully, nudged her ribs with his elbow.

  "What?" Yukari snapped in a hushed whisper, gring at him out of the corner of her eye.

  "You're not going to mention that?" Raito whispered back, a wicked, teasing grin spreading across his face. "You mercilessly dragged my Shilook outfit into the light earlier. It's only fair."

  "Because that is completely not important to the official record!" Yukari hissed, her cheeks dusting with a faint, embarrassed pink.

  "Why not? You said mine was!" Raito compined, raising his hands in mock injustice.

  "Hmm? What is it?" Harrison chimed in, his adventurer's curiosity instantly piqued as he leaned forward in his wheelchair. He looked eagerly between the two bickering teenagers.

  "Oh, it's that incredibly weird getup your daughter decided to wear during the entire expedition," Zhu answered from across the table, a merciless smirk pying on her lips.

  "It was not weird!" Yukari suddenly shouted, her defensive instincts entirely overriding her usual cool composure. She smmed her free hand on the table. "It was a fwless, one-to-one artisan reproduction of the legendary Lady Huanli's adventuring outfit! I spent a massive amount of cals having it custom-tailored! Ah—"

  Yukari's hands flew to her mouth, her face exploding into a brilliant, burning crimson as she realized she had just eagerly confessed the very thing she was desperately trying to hide.

  "A Lady Huanli cospy..." Harrison gasped, his eyes shining with pure delight. "The legendary adventurer dy from the books? Oh, Linlin, I would have paid a massive fortune to see that!"

  "And exactly why were you wearing such an eborate costume into a highly dangerous desert excavation?" Zhu asked, raising a mocking eyebrow.

  "Because..." Yukari mumbled, shrinking down in her chair, "because it felt like the only appropriate time to actually wear it out in the field. To feel like a real adventurer..."

  A sudden thought pierced through her embarrassment. Yukari sat up straight, her silver eyes narrowing suspiciously. She looked directly at Zhu.

  "That reminds me... what actually happened to that outfit, anyway? I couldn't find it in my bags after the whole ordeal with the mountain."

  Zhu simply shook her head, offering a bnk, innocent stare.

  Yukari turned her piercing gaze to Bob and Mi. The massive merchant and the stern mercenary both shook their heads in unison.

  Finally, Yukari's gaze slowly, methodically rotated to the boy sitting right next to her.

  Raito was suddenly looking anywhere but at her. He was staring intently at the ceiling frescoes, his lips pursed as he casually whistled a tuneless, incredibly guilty melody.

  Yukari didn't say a single word. Her hand shot out like a striking viper, grabbing Raito firmly by the colr of his shirt and yanking him close.

  "Talk," Yukari demanded, her voice dropping into a terrifyingly calm register.

  "I... I..." Raito stammered, sweat instantly forming on his brow as he stared into her glowing silver eyes. "I might have... or might have not... accidentally thrown it to the absolute bottom of the ocean."

  Yukari's eye visibly twitched.

  "But hey!" Raito added quickly, raising his hands in frantic defense. "You burned my Shilook coat! So technically, at least we are entirely even now, right?!"

  SMACK.

  The sound of the sp echoed through the isoted throne room, sharp and crisp. Raito's head snapped to the side, a fresh red handprint blooming on his cheek.

  "I am filing for a divorce," Yukari stated ftly, releasing his colr and elegantly smoothing out her own clothes.

  "I'm sorry!" Raito immediately apologized, rubbing his stinging cheek and bowing his head in total defeat.

  AHEM.

  This time, it was Tanvir who coughed, a booming, tectonic rumble that shook the wooden table and instantly snapped the room back to reality.

  "Anyways," Tanvir said, giving the teenagers a deeply exhausted look before turning his attention back to the Queen and the spinning vinyl recorder. "Returning to the official record. We learned that during the expedition to the metallic ruins, our caravan was actually being tailed."

  Tanvir crossed his arms, his gaze sweeping over the table. "Who was that? Please, raise your hands for the record."

  Slowly, sheepishly, two hands crept into the air. One belonged to the massive, brightly-robed caravan leader, and the other to the boy still rubbing his spped cheek.

  "Yeah. Bob and Raito," Tanvir nodded, pointing at the two culprits. "These two completely ignored the Queen's orders and secretly followed our exploration caravan all the way into the deep desert to the dig site. Thankfully, we managed to catch them during the act before they stumbled into something worse."

  "Right," Queen Aleena nodded, weaving the narrative back together. "The real problem came next. Right when we finally reached the silver structure hidden beneath the dunes."

  The Queen looked toward the mercenary. "Two mechanical chimeras, was it, Mi?"

  "Yes, your majesty," Mi confirmed. She pulled a worn leather field journal from her belt and id it ft on the table. "Mechanical chimeras. They were horrific amalgams of cold steel and twisted biology. They had the hulking, armored head of a lion, the segmented, whipping tail of a snake, and the razor-sharp metallic wings of a bird of prey. They were explicitly called 'chimeras' by the man we met shortly after."

  "Those chimeras were vicious, highly advanced assassins," Zhu added, her voice dropping to a grim tone. "They were sent directly by Sis to permanently destroy the hidden structure. To destroy the truth from ever getting unburied."

  Zhu paused, looking down at her own hands. "And they were devastatingly effective. They were completely immune to normal attacks, and even stronger than both me and this bald shorty here combined, especially with our elemental powers heavily suppressed."

  "Hey!" Tanvir grunted at the height insult, but couldn't argue with the terrifying facts.

  "That ambush was an absolute nightmare incarnate," Queen Aleena said, recalling the sheer terror of watching her royal guards being torn apart by the metal beasts. "Even with Mi's tactical brilliance and the entire Raging Bull guild fighting at our backs, we were absolutely no match for their raw strength."

  "And once again..." Yukari spoke up, her voice quiet but resolute. "...it was Raito's bck fme that came to save the day."

  Yukari looked at her husband, who had suddenly shrunk down in his chair, avoiding eye contact with the room.

  "But this time," Yukari admitted, the guilt clear in her silver eyes, "the trigger for his rage was me."

  "We were just there to help with the fight," Raito mumbled, staring at the grain of the wood. "Our attack were barely scratching them. But then... during the chaos, Yukari got hurt."

  Raito's hands clenched into tight fists on his p. "Seeing her bleed... seeing her get thrown aside by that machine... I got incredibly angry. I completely snapped. Honestly... I actually don't quite remember what happened next. It’s a blurry, dark haze."

  "Your bck fme happened," Mi provided the objective, terrifying details. The seasoned mercenary looked at the boy with a mix of awe and deep-seated caution. "It was exactly like seeing a feral beast consumed in pure wrath. You weren't just fighting those chimeras. You were violently tearing them apart. No... more like consuming them. The bck fire ate through their impenetrable armor like it was absolutely nothing."

  Mi leaned forward, her elbows on the table. "But the worst part, Raito... is that you didn't stop after the two machines were completely reduced to scrap."

  Raito aggressively rubbed the back of his head, his breathing shallow. "I... I think I know what happened next."

  Yukari immediately reached out and held his trembling hand tight under the table, anchoring him.

  "I hurt Yukari," Raito said, the raw shame bleeding into his voice. "I finally woke up from the haze when I heard her voice calling my name. But the damage was already done. I saw Yukari... with severe frostbite and burn marks that I knew weren't from the mechanical beasts. They were from my own uncontrolled fmes cshing against her ice."

  Raito looked down, the memory of that horrifying realization still fresh. "I was a monster. So... I ran away. I fled into the blinding desert sandstorm, alone."

  "And while he ran, the rest of us quickly regrouped and retreated back to Kah-Kamun," Zhu added, bridging the timeline.

  "During that time I was lost alone in the dunes, I honestly wanted to die," Raito admitted bluntly, shocking the royals. "I thought I was a danger to everyone. But then... I met him."

  Raito gestured with his chin toward the gaunt adventurer in the wheelchair.

  "Not me, kid," Harrison quickly crified, holding up a bony hand. "As we've discussed, that was most likely Tur'uga wearing my body like a very macabre suit."

  "Right. But I obviously didn't know that horrifying fact back then," Raito sighed. "He pointed me in the right direction."

  "And back at the structure..." Yukari swallowed hard, forcing herself to say it for the record. "Because of the csh with Raito's uncontrolled void... I completely lost the function of both my arms."

  A sharp intake of breath circled the table. King Ahmed looked at Yukari in sheer horror. To a martial artist and elementalist, losing one's arms was a fate worse than death.

  "And then... this is the exact part where I was completely lost," Queen Aleena noted, leaning forward to address the true mystery of their survival. "What exactly happened next? I know that you were magically summoned deep into the metallic structure," she gestured to Yukari. "What did you guys see in there?"

  "I did get summoned into the core of the structure," Yukari nodded, confirming the Queen's timeline.

  "While I ended up taking a completely different, much more explosive route inside," Raito muttered dryly.

  "And Bob, Mi, and Lady Lihua were all there inside the structure with you two, correct?" the Queen asked, looking toward the merchant.

  "Yes, your majesty," Bob answered, sitting up straight. "We were all desperately searching the storm for Raito. But after we rendezvoused back together with you all at the entrance, we saw Yukari being pulled inside by a strange voice. We immediately followed her deep into the metallic belly of the ruin."

  Bob's face grew serious. "And then, the heavy steel entrance violently closed behind us, sealing us in. So it was only us four trapped inside."

  "Inside was a massive, circur room," Mi took over the description, her mercenary eyes visualizing the impossible tech. "It was entirely filled with glowing panes of gss that showed us perfectly clear, moving pictures of completely different pces across the continent. The person inside told us they were called 'monitors'."

  Mi crossed her arms. "The person also explicitly stated that he was only looking for Yukari. The rest of us simply got dragged into his sanctuary by accident."

  "Please, expin," Queen Aleena demanded, her regal composure completely enraptured by the tale. "Why Yukari?"

  "The person wanted me because his monitors had calcuted that I had somehow managed to conquer the brutal backsh from my Core," Yukari expined, looking down at her ring finger.

  "The backsh?" the Queen asked, tilting her head. "For example, the severe dizziness, the bloody noses, or the complete physical fatigue people experience when they heavily overuse an elemental Core?"

  "That is correct, your majesty," Yukari nodded. "This person saw that I suffered no such mortal limitations. They thought because I managed to somehow overcome this biological hurdle, I was probably the 'chosen one' they had been desperately looking for for millennia."

  Yukari offered a self-deprecating smile. "But I ended up entirely disappointing them. My powers... they were fundamentally a bit different. They came from a Core, yes, but not the specific, mass-produced ones this person had originally created."

  "And this mysterious person..." Bob interjected, his deep voice carrying the weight of ancient history. "His name was Dr. Iskandar."

  "Dr. Iskandar told us he came from a time completely forgotten by history," Bob continued, the room hanging on his every word. "He no longer possessed flesh or bone. Rather, he had preserved his consciousness and showed himself to us in the form of a flickering, blue humanoid light. Or what he called a 'hologram'. He was the one who guided us through the structure."

  "Fascinating..." King Ahmed murmured, rubbing his beard. "And how exactly did Raito end up reuniting with you all inside this sealed sanctuary?"

  "It was when I was wandering the underground with Mr. Harrison... or rather, his possessed body," Raito answered, leaning his elbows on the table. "We were investigating a massive sandworm cavern that was completely crawling with Sis's horrific humanoid machines. They were also trying to find their way to the structure until we found them."

  Raito sighed, the memory a chaotic blur of violence. "I fought back. I activated the Void within me to survive, and... I completely lost control of my mind once more. In that berserk, feral state, I unleashed an explosion so massive it literally burst open the reinforced steel wall of Dr. Iskandar's structure from the outside. And then... I lost consciousness again."

  "We found him passed out in the rubble," Yukari picked up the story, her voice speeding up with the anxiety of the memory. "We quickly brought his body to Dr. Iskandar, begging for a cure."

  "He told us a terrifying truth," Yukari said, her silver eyes locking onto the spinning vinyl recorder. "He said that there is absolutely no known way to save someone whose mind is actively being consumed by Void corruption. However... he proposed a highly theoretical, incredibly dangerous solution."

  "To literally dive into Raito's mental scape," Yukari stated. "So, knowing it was the only way to save the man I love... I accepted."

  The Queen's eyes widened, completely mesmerized by the sheer, magical insanity of the narrative.

  "There, inside his deep subconscious mind," Yukari expined, her hands gesturing slightly to emphasize the abstract concept. "We discovered the root of the issue. The Void within Raito went completely berserk because he had been awoken far earlier than fate originally intended. Because of that, his mortal vessel was not fully matured enough to safely contain or control the raw energy."

  "So the proposed solution," Yukari continued, "was to forge a permanent, spiritual bridge between our souls. To actively share his crushing burden of the Void with me. And so... I did."

  She looked at her own hands, flexing her fingers. "That bridge is exactly how Raito finally managed to cage and fully control his bck fmes without losing his mind. And it is also the exact reason how I miraculously obtained my silver-steel ice. Those absolute zero powers were the direct product—the power-up—resulting from heavily infusing raw Void energy with my elemental energy."

  "Wait," Queen Aleena held up a hand, catching a minor discrepancy in the narrative flow. "You said Dr. Iskandar told you there was no way to save him. So... who is this person that proposed the mental dive solution to you?"

  Raito and Yukari looked at each other, sharing a collective shrug of total bewilderment.

  "We honestly don't know," Raito admitted. "Inside the Void space of my mind, we met someone else. A being completely wrapped in an intense, brilliant light. We couldn't see their figure or their face. We only knew that their presence felt incredibly ancient and powerful."

  "Another mystery," Queen Aleena sighed, rubbing her temples. She pointed down the table. "Malik, write that down for the record."

  "Y-yes, your majesty!" Malik scrambled, the chalk squeaking loudly against the ste. "Writing 'mystery' column... After Number One: The Two Missing Lords. Number Two: The mysterious 'Master W'. And now, Number Three: The ancient, mysterious being wrapped in light."

  "Well, hold onto your chalk, boy," Bob warned, his booming voice dropping into a deadly serious, heavy register. "Because the next part is the absolute, horrifying meat of the entire issue."

  The entire room seemed to lean forward, the only sound the relentless beating of the rain against the gss.

  "After young Raito finally woke up from his coma," Bob recounted, looking directly at the monarchs. "Dr. Iskandar realized we were not corrupted by Sis. He told us that raito were the very first humans to wake up from the brainwashing influence of the Void corruption."

  "And then... he told us everything," Bob said.

  Bob took a deep breath, preparing to shatter the foundational history of Calvenoor.

  "He told us about how he originally came from a pce, a completely different world, called 'Earth'." Bob began. "About how, hundreds of thousands of years ago, a terrifying, incomprehensible being descended from a massive, cosmic crack in the sky. And from studying that dead being, that is exactly how Dr. Iskandar first obtained the raw, votile Void energy."

  "From there, realizing the Void was too dangerous for normal humans to wield," Bob continued, "Dr. Iskandar utilized his unparalleled genius to break down that cosmic Void energy into safer, much more controlble fragments. He isoted the fundamental forces of nature. And thus... he created the Cores."

  Malik gasped again, almost dropping his chalk.

  "A device purely meant to safely utilize and mass-produce elemental energy," Bob expined. "In his ancient era, I believe Cores were not rare artifacts of war, but simple, everyday household items used for convenience."

  "He was the most brilliant mind of that entire era, or so I was told," Bob said, shaking his head in awe. "His inventions literally forced Earth into a golden era of absolute, unparalleled prosperity. But... the good Doctor didn't stop there."

  Bob’s voice darkened. "He decided that humanity still needed to explore the dangerous crack in the sky. So, he and a select few of his brightest colleagues were stationed in a massive, floating metallic fortress built entirely in the stars. A pce he called a 'space station'. They were there to research the cosmic phenomenon."

  "However," Bob said, leaning heavily on the table. "To ensure no human casualties occurred during the initial scouting, Dr. Iskandar sent an advanced, highly adaptive artificial intelligence machine through the crack first. A machine called... Project Silux."

  A collective chill ran down the spines of everyone in the room.

  "Once sent through the tear, they completely lost contact with the machine," Bob recounted the tragedy. "For a long time, they assumed the machine was simply destroyed by the cosmic forces, and they thought that was it."

  Bob smmed his fist lightly on the table. "But clearly, it wasn't. The machine eventually returned through the crack. But it was corrupted. Changed. It possessed terrifying new powers. It boarded the space station and pretty much sughtered absolutely everyone on board."

  "Except for seven people," Zhu took over the narrative, her fiery eyes burning with centuries of suppressed anger.

  "He kept six specific children alive. He held them captive," Zhu said, her voice dripping with venom. "Those six children... are us, your majesty. The Lords."

  King Ahmed's jaw dropped. The Queen covered her mouth in sheer horror.

  "Silux took us," Zhu stated, the traumatic memories fshing behind her eyes. "It kidnapped us from our sughtered families, experimented on us, and violently turned us into the immortal, elemental Lords you know today. For some completely unknown, twisted reason of its own."

  "And the st survivor..."

  The entire room—every single eye—slowly turned to look at the scrawny, exhausted teenager sitting at the very end of the table.

  "The boy who crossed the stars," Harrison said softly, a profound reverence in his raspy voice.

  "His biological parents managed to save him from Sis's destruction at the very st second," Yukari expined, reaching out to squeeze Raito's hand. "They pced him in a tiny, automated escape vessel and unched him away. But... that vessel got caught in the gravitational pull of the cosmic tear. It entered the crack in the sky."

  "And somehow..." Raito murmured, still struggling to fully comprehend his own absurd existence. "...that crack spat my vessel out here. In Calvenoor. Exactly twenty-two years ago."

  Raito looked up, meeting the stunned gazes of the Zarateph royals. "And Calvenoor itself... it is not a different pnet. It is Earth. Our world has simply been terraformed and reshaped over hundreds of thousands of years by Silux. Or, as it is now calling itself..."

  Raito spat the name out like poison. "...Sis. Our benevolent 'God'."

  Both Queen Aleena and King Ahmed exhaled long, shuddering breaths simultaneously. They slumped back into their ornate chairs, completely overwhelmed by the sheer, world-shattering magnitude of the truth.

  "I... I had heard brief, frantic snippets of this story after you all first returned from the desert, Bob," King Ahmed rubbed his face, looking exhausted. "But hearing it id out entirely like this... every time, it is incredibly hard to fully believe."

  "Our God is our absolute enemy," Queen Aleena murmured, her regal facade finally cracking to reveal pure dread. "And how on earth are we ever supposed to tell our people this? If we march into the grand pza and decre that the deities they pray to are a murderous machine and six kidnapped space children... everyone will just call us completely mad. They will rebel."

  "Dr. Iskandar," the Queen asked, desperately trying to find a silver lining. "What happened to him again? Can he not speak to the masses?"

  "He disappeared, along with his underground structure, your majesty," Mi answered clinically, delivering the bad news.

  "Shortly after he revealed the truth," Mi expined, "we were violently ambushed by an entire swarm of those mechanical chimeras. Raito and Yukari, utilizing their newly stabilized powers, successfully repelled them while we evacuated the doctor's core drive."

  Mi reached behind her chair and hoisted her massive, heavy greatsword onto the table with a loud CLANG. Embedded deep within the intricate steel guard was a breathtaking, multi-faceted gem that pulsed with a vibrant, kaleidoscopic rainbow of light.

  "Before he vanished, Dr. Iskandar gave me this," Mi said, tapping the gem. "An All-Core. An absolute masterpiece of ancient technology, containing a combination of every single foundational element."

  "However," Mi cautioned, pulling the bde back. "He explicitly warned me to only use it in cases of absolute, dire emergency. Apparently, the violent, internal backsh we modern Calvenoorians experience when using Cores is simply caused by a deep genetic incompatibility. Our biology is too different compared to the humans of his ancient era. Using this All-Core too much will literally tear my nervous system to shreds."

  "And he didn't leave the Lords empty-handed either," Zhu added, reaching into her pocket. She pulled out a tiny, innocuous-looking white pill.

  "He managed to synthesize a chemical counter-agent. A pill that will completely sever Sis's neurological control over our bodies, giving us access to the absolute maximum potential of our powers without the machine ever being able to remotely suppress or puppet us again," Zhu expined, looking at the tiny medicine with profound gratitude.

  "I took one immediately." Zhu said, looking at the Queen. "And Tanvir forcefully ate one right before he leapt into the beast's stomach."

  "Unfortunately," Mi sighed, closing her field journal. "The structural damage to the underground facility from the chimera attack was simply too massive. The entire pce colpsed under the weight of the desert dunes. Dr. Iskandar... and all his ancient technological miracles... were buried with it."

  "Right..." Queen Aleena nodded slowly, digesting the heavy losses. She rubbed her eyes, trying to mentally pivot to the next catastrophic event. "And then, there is the matter of the colossal, exploding turtle."

  "Kyuui!" As if waiting for its cue, Emba suddenly woke up from its nap inside Yukari's coat pocket. The tiny, glowing volcanic turtle scrambled out, leapt gracefully through the air, and nded with a soft plop right in the middle of the polished wooden table.

  It blinked its rge golden eyes at the stunned council members, let out a massive, contented yawn that released a tiny puff of smoke, and promptly went right back to sleep on top of a highly important logistical map.

  "Emba!" Yukari gasped, her cheeks flushing bright red. She quickly reached out and snatched the sleeping reptile. "I am so incredibly sorry, your majesty! He just has zero manners!"

  "No, no, it is quite alright," Queen Aleena offered a weak, tired smile, actually finding the tiny creature's presence oddly comforting amidst the apocalyptic discussion. "For this next part... let's try to make it as concise as possible."

  "I guess it's finally my turn to take the stage, then," Harrison said, clearing his raspy throat.

  The gaunt adventurer sat up slightly straighter in his wheelchair. He began recounting his own, deeply personal tragedy to the quiet room.

  He told everyone how he originally came to the scorching Zarateph region, desperately seeking an ancient cure for Lei's terminal Frost Lotus disease. He described how he stumbled into a deep, hidden cavern and witnessed something utterly sinister: Sis, the mechanical nightmare, performing some sort of dark, pulsating ritual in the shadows.

  "I honestly didn't know that the machine was 'Sis' at the time," Harrison admitted, his brown eyes shadowed by the memory. "But my honed adventurer's instinct was screaming at me. I could tell that whatever it was doing was pure, unadulterated danger to the continent. So... I made a reckless choice. I dashed in and stole the item resting on the ritual altar."

  "The item that Sis aggressively took back from your dead pocket ter," Raito interjected, remembering the shimmering projection on the crystal walls.

  "Yeah," Harrison sighed heavily, staring down at his bony hands. "In the end... my grand, heroic theft didn't matter at all."

  "What was it?" Samira asked, leaning forward with intense curiosity, completely absorbed by the real-life adventure tale. "The stolen item?"

  "It was a key," Harrison said. "A pitch-bck key, made of a metal that seemed to completely absorb the light around it. Sis seemed to be violently infusing it with something—some kind of dark, heavy energy."

  Harrison rubbed his chest, where the phantom pain of his fatal wound still lingered. "I successfully took it, but Sis was infinitely faster. The machine struck me, gravely injuring me. I fled, bleeding out into the dark tunnels. And then... I fell. And I met Tur'uga. And the rest, as they say, is history."

  Harrison looked around the table, summarizing his centuries of limbo. "I died. Tur'uga took over my lifeless body to act as its eyes for a second... or for decades. Time lost all meaning. Then, just recently, Sis came back. The machine corrupted that innocent, lonely turtle, turning it into a massive, region-destroying bomb."

  Harrison looked proudly at Raito and Yukari. "Thankfully, these incredible kids, and all of Zarateph, managed to stop the detonation. But... Sis still killed Tur'uga in the end. It violently extracted a massive, pulsating Bck Gem directly from the beast's heart, and then completely disappeared into thin air."

  Harrison finished his tale with a soft, bittersweet smile, looking over at Yukari who was gently stroking Emba's shell.

  "And with its absolute st fading breath, Tur'uga gave its remaining life to me," Harrison said softly. "And, of course, it managed to give birth to an entirely new, miraculous species of volcanic turtle, too."

  Queen Aleena let out a long, exhausted sigh that seemed to carry the weight of her entire kingdom. She turned her head.

  "Malik, dear. Did you get all of that?" she asked.

  "Y-yes, your majesty," Malik nodded vigorously, though his hand was cramping from writing so fast. He hastily scribbled on the ste. "Adding to the list... Number Four: The mysterious Bck Key. And Number Five: The massive Bck Gem."

  Malik stepped back, adjusting his gsses as he surveyed the wildly complicated chalkboard.

  "If I may summarize the timeline," Malik spoke up, tapping the board with his chalk. "That giant turtle, Tur'uga, clearly came from the exact same ancient era as Dr. Iskandar, right? I believe in your story, Mr. Harrison, the beast explicitly stated that it swallowed a dark mass that fell from the sky—likely when the cosmic crack first opened—which caused it to mutate and become the way it is."

  Malik drew a frantic line connecting several drawings. "And furthermore, Tur'uga also met the exact same 'mysterious being wrapped in light' that Raito and Yukari met in the Void mindscape. The being that prophesied Raito's arrival."

  Malik lowered his chalk, his schorly mind buzzing. "Despite everything being scattered across hundreds of thousands of years... somehow, absolutely all of it is deeply connected."

  "Ragndvor," Raito suddenly spoke up, his voice cutting through the schorly analysis.

  "What was that?" Queen Aleena asked, her sharp ears catching the strange sylble.

  "It is a name," Raito expined, his brow furrowed as he recalled the terrifying, mechanical tantrum. "The specific name that Sis screamed out while we were inside Tur'uga's heart chamber. It screamed that name with such an intense, raw, jealous anger. That name must absolutely hold some significant meaning to the machine."

  "And another term," Yukari chimed in, recalling the chilling encounter. "Prime Authority. Sis explicitly stated that Raito currently possesses it, and that Sis was incredibly jealous because it had been denied that power."

  "Prime Authority... Ragndvor..." Queen Aleena sighed heavily, rubbing her temples again. "More ancient, foreign words to add to our growing pile of impossible mysteries."

  The Queen looked around the dimly lit, rain-swept throne room. "Why does everything tely feel like we are simply actors trapped in one grand, cosmic py? And that Sis is the cruel director, orchestrating absolutely everything that we do?"

  "Like a grand experiment," Malik murmured quietly, almost to himself.

  "What was that, dear?" Samira asked, pcing a comforting hand on her husband's arm.

  "It feels like an experiment," Malik repeated, his schorly intuition piecing together Sis's bizarre actions. "Like a mad schor setting up different variables in a petri dish just to observe the violent results."

  "That could very well be true," Queen Aleena agreed, her eyes darkening. "Everything Sis has done—kidnapping the Lords, creating us, forcing a turtle to become a bomb—it all feels like it is methodically building toward some horrific, ultimate conclusion."

  The entire council turned their collective gaze toward Malik's massive chalkboard. The sheer scope of their world had violently expanded in a matter of hours, revealing horrors and histories they could never have imagined in their wildest dreams.

  "With how many incredibly dangerous questions are still left completely unanswered," Queen Aleena decred, her voice firm, "we must be extraordinarily careful with our next steps."

  "Sis is vast, networked, and clearly watching us at almost all times," Tanvir rumbled from his seat, crossing his thick arms. "That is exactly how it managed to constantly surprise us and stay five steps ahead during this entire ordeal."

  "Then..." Malik swallowed hard, voicing the terrifying doubt hovering in everyone's minds. "...isn't it completely impossible to fight a God that literally knows everything we do?"

  Malik gestured frantically to the board. "We can't warn the public, because they will simply ugh at us or burn us as heretics. And even if we miraculously manage to rally an army to fight, we don't even know the true extent of Sis's actual, physical power!"

  "That is exactly why we must bide our time," Zhu Lihua stated, her general's voice slicing through the despair. "We have to at least gather significantly more strength. We need to find powerful individuals who will actually believe in our cause without alerting the machine."

  "She is entirely right," Tanvir agreed, a fierce, defiant grin slowly spreading across his scarred face. "And besides... we actually have a wild card that the 'God' does not."

  Slowly, deliberately, Tanvir, Zhu, and the entire royal council turned their heads. They all looked directly at Raito and Yukari.

  The two teenagers were currently ignoring the apocalypse, completely distracted by trying to gently pry the baby turtle Emba away from aggressively biting Raito's nose again.

  "If the supposed 'God' of this world can still throw a tantrum and get genuinely jealous and angry at a mortal boy..." Tanvir reasoned, his grin widening. "...that means Sis is absolutely not omnipotent. It possesses fws. And it means it might still be incredibly wary of the 'Prime Authority' you hold. So... we absolutely have a fighting chance."

  "Then let us hear it," Queen Aleena demanded, her regal fire returning. She looked at Tanvir. "Our next move."

  "I want you two to immediately head north to the region of Norval," Tanvir commanded, pointing a thick finger directly at Yukari and Raito. "Your mission is to find our missing sibling, the Freeze Lord. With your incredibly bizarre luck—or unluck—you two will probably stumble face-first into them."

  "Oho!"

  Before Raito or Yukari could even process the order, two chairs scraped loudly against the marble floor.

  Bob and Mi stood up simultaneously.

  "If those two trouble magnets are heading north, then we are absolutely going too," Bob decred, spping his massive belly with a booming ugh. "They would be completely useless navigating the northern ice caps without my Tama for transport! Plus... the icy region of Norval sounds like a fantastic new business opportunity for the Said caravan! Hohoho!"

  "And these three are a logistical nightmare without me keeping them in check," Mi added dryly, resting her hand on the hilt of her greatsword. "So, of course, I am coming."

  "Then... me too," Harrison rasped, eagerly gripping the wheels of his chair, the adventurer's spirit fring hot in his chest. "I know Norval like the back of my hand!"

  "Absolutely not," Zhu shot him down instantly, pcing a firm, unyielding hand on his thin shoulder. "You are coming with me, Aster. You are basically a walking skeleton. We desperately need your knowledge, so I am going to drag you to the best healers in Ruhong and find a way to properly heal your body."

  Harrison let out a dramatic, suffering sigh, but a soft smile touched his lips. "Alright, alright. Bossed around by an angry woman. Just like old times, I suppose."

  "Then us here in Zarateph will py our part," King Ahmed decred, standing up to address his family. "We will use our vast royal connections and trade networks to secretly, slowly build up our military strength. We will find quiet, subtle ways to convince our most trusted generals and people of who our true enemies are, without tipping off the machine."

  "That sounds like a brilliant pn, Dad!" Samira cheered, jumping up from her seat with a bright, determined smile.

  "And I will remain stationed here in the capital," Tanvir added, cracking his knuckles. "In case of any sudden, mechanical emergencies."

  At the far end of the table, amidst the grand, sweeping decrations of war and resistance, Raito and Yukari simply looked at each other.

  "Uh..." Raito whispered out of the corner of his mouth, trying to maintain a polite smile. "Do we actually have a say in this grand, continent-spanning mission?"

  "I... I strongly think they are just proceeding entirely without our input," Yukari whispered back, letting out a soft, exasperated sigh. "But hey... when have we ever actually had a say in anything that happens to us?"

  "Fair point," Raito chuckled quietly.

  He turned fully to face her, the heavy weight of the world's impending doom fading away as he looked into her silver eyes.

  "Right. So..." Raito asked, a soft, incredibly genuine smile spreading across his face. "Will you come with me on our new, freezing path, my Ruboo?"

  Yukari's eye twitched at the terrible nickname, but a brilliant, warm smile broke through anyway.

  "Gdly," Yukari answered, her heart swelling with an emotion she finally understood. "But first... we seriously need to pry Emba away from your face."

  "Agreed," Raito groaned, his voice completely nasally as the tiny turtle gnawed happily on his cartige. "I am rapidly losing my entire sense of smell. Did you even feed him earlier like I asked?"

  "I did!" Yukari compined, throwing her hands up in defense. "He just likes your nose!"

  "Kyuui!" Emba chirped happily, completely oblivious to the fate of the world, continuing to happily nibble on Raito's nose as the storm outside finally began to break, letting the first rays of sunlight pierce through the clouds.