With Xamiliere already out of the city and Emilia in a seemingly passable shape, the list of people Anastacia wanted to have a word with had been shortened to just two names: Holly and the one of Amora. She also wondered if she should have a word about the crown with Armaata and the blacksmith, but it didn’t take much internal debating to decide that it could wait until she came back from the quest she was leaving for soon enough. Even if it seemed like the relations between her and the beast of legend secretly lurking in the city were amicable for the most part, every thought of the muse still rang each and every warning bell in her head thanks to some primal instinct all mortals shared. Of the two people on the list, Holly happened to be the easier one to find, as she had been resting in the inn for the day, and found her way into the kitchen on her own before the necromancer even had the chance to check on her.
Anastacia waited as patiently as she could as the owl constructed a sandwich for herself, taking great care to place every single topping in exactly the right place and retrying when needed. Eventually, after numerous attempts, the chicken sandwich was completed and Holly sat down besides the necromancer to proudly display her creation before taking a small bite that was more of a peck than an actual chomp.
“Feeling alright?” Anastacia inquired to start the conversation.
“No. Very tired, and sore all over.” Holly responded frankly without removing her unnerving gaze from her meal for an instant.
Though she didn’t exactly blame herself for what had happened, Anastacia still felt bad that someone as innocent as Holly had to suffer for her sake, even if it was just aches and pains. “Ah… That’s my fault, isn’t it? Sorry.”
“Mmm…” The owl responded, not blaming her by the sound of it but it was difficult to be certain. “Told you many times to not go in danger.”
“Oh, trust me, I’d love to stop! It’s just that the universe has other ideas.” Anastacia sighed. “I want nothing more than to stick to just normal dangerous stuff, like maybe go fight some vampires… or trolls, vampire trolls… no idea if that’s a thing but I could really go for one of those instead of being stuck dealing with this sect nonsense. I hate that I need to be the one dealing with them, I hate that it’s dragging everyone I know into it, I hate that it’s dragging me back to Mournvalley’s business, I hate I need to be constantly wary of them…”
“None of it was meant to be.” Holly commented with a darker shade in her tone, but kept eating the sandwich.
The words caught Anastacia by surprise. She was now aware of Lady Saga, but still the tone felt extremely off coming from the ditzy owl. “Excuse me?”
“The veil was not meant to be seen behind, not by gods, not by immortals and certainly not by mortals. The blindness to what writhes there was written as the last and perhaps the only act of mercy to us all, to allow us to not worry of what’s to come – be it eternity or extinction. The fates meant as written laws to follow without a failure, now mere approximations at best. There is no throne high enough to punish the fateless for their crimes, so now only those that still follow theirs as best they can are punished for the smallest mistakes… mistakes only made because of the callous and uncaring actions of those who dared to peer into the nothingness.
“This quill writes naught but drivel, joy turns to hate, an insatiable hunger looms in the heavens, one by one ancient things which slept for a reason awaken, the night sky fulfills its promise, the regime changes above and below, the library burns, pieces arrange themselves across the board, whispers of warnings and promises in courts across the world, silent battles waged daily and their outcomes too varied to record… all of it by no design.
“And the recourse? The arming of our little champions and sending them to battle! Some watchmen we are, eons asleep in our duty and expecting our charge to solve our messes for us. There is little need to look further than the mortal faith in us when seeking definition for wasted effort. Much time and good stone could have been saved by simply pissing in the wind instead of building our temples and shrines.” The spite so very unfitting for Holly trickled from each word. Though the voice was unmistakably hers, it felt different in ways Anastacia had trouble pointing a finger at. She could see the lines being spoken by the owl, but all of them resonated in her head as if they were advice given to her in the past that she only just recalled.
Though the situation had her almost speechless, the necromancer still managed to utter a single word. “What...”
Holly furiously pecked at the sandwich a couple of times before continuing. “The moment my quill lifts from the page with another unscheduled change transcribed, two more lift their heads from the following page. With all but two of my countless hands tied behind my back, it falls upon my scribes to keep some sense of the records – bless their vain efforts. But to its natural end I vowed to hold together this little life, otherwise unfairly cut short. No manner of cataclysms lessen my resolve though on that.” As she spoke, Anastacia could have sworn she saw strings of words appear on all surfaces around her, but as soon as she tried to read or so much as look directly at them, they vanished. “But it wasn’t my intention to rant, little one, I approached you with a purpose. The records of the current state of the world are… lacking, and to mend this I offer you the same bargain my scribes do. An answer for an answer, a fact for a fact – within reason, of course.”
Anastacia was familiar with the bargain, having met Noir and Vinca before. She didn’t really have any obvious questions on her mind, but there was a matter that had bothered her ever since she had spoken with Tekhelet. “Is it true what Tekhelet said? Am I only free because of the sect’s plots? Do I really owe all of this to them? Was I not meant to be free originally?”
The question visibly irked the owl, or the deity in control of her. “The premise of your question is flawed. It is true that you would not be here were it not for their meddling, but it also true that you would not exist were it not for them as well. Without the threat they present, there is no reason to release the ancient souls of Alabaster and Ivory, and without them, there is no Anastacia. Yet, you owe absolutely nothing to them for it! Not only is it ludicrous to even attempt to credit all causes for their effects, but of your existence you owe no one anything! Not the meddlers forcing the hand of divines, not the sorry pair of mortals who brought you into this world, not the necromancers of Mournvalley, not the sect for plotting your freedom. Be grateful for what transpired, but do not mistake it for a debt…
“As for what you were meant to be – of the countless theoreticals, two emerged as the most likely outcomes before your unscheduled escape from Mournvalley. In neither case would Mournvalley succeed in keeping you its prisoner.” Holly paused to take yet another bite before lifting up two fingers. “In what was to be two years from now, every life in the country of Mournvalley would be snuffed out overnight – no exceptions, no witnesses. Soon after, stories of a pale shade aimlessly wandering the world would emerge, solidified as more than just rumors once the first city happened to be on the shade’s path and faced the same fate as Mournvalley, no survivors, no witnesses. Any and all attempts to stop or redirect the nameless shade were hopeless, and for years it walked the lands leaving behind nothing but death and silence. The story comes to an end as the shade’s path is blocked by an ancient fortress of the Aureun. Those tracking the shade only found the fortress to be broken into, but dared not to enter – the rumors had it that the shade now continued its aimless journey along the uncharted paths deep below, but was never seen again.
“The other record tells of a time five years from now, where Mournvalley once again burns – but along with it, so does everything else. Not as works of an arbitrary wanderer… No… A brutal and merciless campaign of a self-appointed empress. Her allies are few and only made up of those who can match her madness, but together they raze all there is to the ground. She does not desire new lands to rule or people to obey her, all she seeks is death. The gods, now rotten and lazy, first turn on each other as their source of power rapidly fades, and what was left is not enough to match The Court of Madness. Finally, with only the scribes without death witnessing a lifeless world. They follow roads paved with ash and find themselves before The Empress herself, now the sole survivor of the world that could have been. As it is their duty, the scribes inquire for reasons and purposes, but receive none, and it is then that The Empress grasps one of the books from the scribes. Lacking a quill, she injures herself and smiles as she writes an ending to the story with her own blood – and then there was nothing.” The owl recited stories she knew well.
It wasn’t exactly pleasing to hear that her most likely outcomes had both involved mass murder on a scale not seen since Alabaster’s works. “So… this is as good as it gets for me?” Anastacia groaned and gestured around herself, it wasn’t that she was unhappy with her situation, but she wasn’t as carefree as she would have liked to be.
“Be content with what you have but strive for what you want is all I will say about that.” Holly shrugged at the behest of the deity. “Now then, your answer to me? You may choose, I am far from picky.”
Anastacia figured that her somewhat controversial favorite color or the nicknames she had given to all pieces of kit in her traveling pack weren’t what the god was looking for in the exchange. It would no doubt need to be an answer of substance and relevance to the current situation to have any value to the deity. Holly’s usually anxiety inducing stare became exponentially worse when there was a higher being with unknown motives and designs lurking in the darkness of the owl’s oversized pupils – but it did achieve results and an answer slipped out of the necromancer’s mouth even before she had decided on it. “I know that the sect is right.”
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The owl smirked knowingly but didn’t – or couldn’t hide the hints of surprise on her face. “Oh?”
“I mean about the world slowly dying, not the rest of it. I’ve seen a glimpse of what used to be, what’s left is… I don’t know… faded, I guess? I get that it needs to be fixed but killing everyone isn’t the way, there needs to be a better solution – and if there isn’t, I don’t know if it’s worth fixing…” The necromancer explained her answer as well as she could.
“It was not a decision meant for either of our kind. As I said, the veil was not to be peered behind.” The deity finished the sandwich and disappointedly stared at her empty hands for a while. “My opinion, no more or less valid than yours, is that this world was made to be experienced. If there are none left to experience it, even as the light flickers, it may as well not exist.”
“That’s one way to put it, I guess.” Anastacia hesitantly agreed.
Whether it was because she had gotten what she wanted, or because the sandwich was now gone, the deity hid herself once more without so much as a farewell. The more nuanced expression disappeared from Holly’s face as the ancient wisdom faded from behind her stare, and what was left was the usual blank gaze the owl was known for. She looked around for a while, presumably to get her bearings after being shoved aside for so long, and seemed extremely displeased that her sandwich was gone – so much so that she began preparing another one before even saying anything.
“Everything alright?” Anastacia asked when Holly sat back down and rubbed the sides of her head in what seemed like an attempt to try and mend a headache.
“No?” The owl responded in a tone that, combined with the blank stare into her soul, made the necromancer feel like an idiot for even asking. “A lot of big troubles. Did you forget?”
Anastacia sighed. “Right… Look, I just want to say thanks and if there’s ever anything you need me to do, just say the word and I’ll handle it.”
Holly carefully scanned the room just in case someone was listening before leaning uncomfortably close to Anastacia’s ear. “I wish to look at the stars.” She whispered and quickly backed away as if it was something incredibly inappropriate.
Though simple as far as wishes go, fulfilling it would no doubt be the exact opposite. For as long as Anastacia had known her, Holly had avoided the night at all cost. Her nights were spent at the inn, safely tucked away behind the counter far away from windows and always with other people – and the small storage room she lived in was perpetually lit by enough crystal lanterns to blind a person. However, this wasn’t just an aspect of her weirdness, but something she did for a good reason. Being regrettably tangled in the mess that were the deities, Ciel – The God of the Night Sky, seemed to be attempting to catch her and had nearly succeeded at it at least once before, only managing to pull Anastacia into his nightly realm instead. In that dark place, the necromancer had met Ciel’s devotee for the second time – a woman eerily similar in looks to the owl, and had been tasked to make sure Holly remains out of the deity’s grasp.
The most obvious solution was to look at the stars through a window or a skylight, but that felt far too easy, and Ciel would no doubt get past a pane of glass with very little issues. A series of mirrors was the next thing to come to Anastacia’s mind, but trying to beat a major deity with technicalities like that seemed like asking for trouble. She decided that she needed to consult people more knowledgeable on the subject first and possibly cash in some favors to execute whatever plan she ended up going with, so it wasn’t something that would happen before she would leave for the quest with Gilbert and Solaria, but she was determined to repay the trouble she had caused for owl – not to mention that she herself enjoyed watching the sky at night, so she well understood the desire to do so.
Anastacia grabbed Holly’s hand, interrupting the meal she had resumed while the necromancer pondered her options. “I promise I will see to it that you can see the entire night sky as soon as I come back from a quest I need to leave for tomorrow.”
“Okay.” Holly stared at her blankly and shook her hand for some reason. “I want to eat now.”
“I guess I’ll leave you to it then.” Anastacia nodded awkwardly and got up. She didn’t know if she should have exchanged some kind of farewells, but Holly didn’t seem to have any intention of doing so, so she simply slipped out of the kitchen while the owl focused on her Sandwich.
And so, her list of people to check up on was down to one. The One of Amora likely resided somewhere in the guild offices, which meant getting to them was going to happen through the officials and would be an unavoidable headache, but she wasn’t going to let that stop her. Quickly fetching some warmer clothes for the walk to the offices, Anastacia left the inn and started to traverse the streets of slippery bricks with hurried steps. There was only so much daylight left and she still needed to pack everything for the quest, so there was no time to be wasted. She would have loved to stop and inspect whatever new equipment and clothing was being displayed by the shops along the main street but managed to not divert her gaze towards them through sheer determination.
Though in lesser numbers than usually, some adventurers were still present at the offices despite the weather. As all travel slowed down during the winter, the number of available quests was less than half of what it would be on even the slowest day in the summer. Many nations had some manner of a system where messengers under the service of the governing body gathered quests and other messages from any moderately sized settlement at least once or twice over the winter and delivered them all to Valor or other guild outpost at once. It wasn’t much but still more than enough to keep any willing adventurer busy around the year, though most chose to live off their savings and not deal with the ice and snow.
Randomly picking a guild official to bother about her request, she crept up to a vacant counter to inquire about the whereabouts of the simulacrum. Naturally, she was politely denied three times and less politely denied a couple more times before the official finally caved to a mixture of threats, attempted bribery and pointing out that she was about to leave on guild business soon. Just to get out of the situation, the poor official sent a summon for the simulacrum, who apparently was somewhere deep below the offices and needed a moment to surface. A pair of guards whom Anastacia happened to be familiar with guided her to a room where she could have a bit more privacy – and more importantly, wouldn’t be able to bother any more officials. It wasn’t the first, second or even the fifth time she had been escorted to one of these rooms to sort out some matter the guild didn’t want to air out around other adventurers, so she knew the procedure well enough. Under no circumstances was she to leave the room without a guild escort, which she had of course tried once but found out it caused more trouble to the guards outside than anyone else, so she had given up on it – though she still vowed to one day discover what secrets the guild held so close to their chest that someone generally aware of their origins wouldn’t be allowed even a bit of freedom.
She didn’t get much time for herself before the rhythmic thumping of eight heavy stone feet striking the floor through a carpet approached. Barely fitting through the double doors into the room, the one of Amora rushed inside and caught the necromancer who had immediately sprinted at the simulacrum. Using two of their feet, the simulacrum lifted Anastacia off the ground and let out an unsettling laughter-like noise that visibly shook the guards posted outside the room.
“The correct necromancer!” They celebrated and refused to let Anastacia down. “The one of Amora struggles to vocalize the delight!”
Anastacia reached out towards the intricate array of metal and stone plates, between of which the spider simulacra’s eyes burned brightly. She wouldn’t have otherwise quite been able to reach them with the tips of her fingers, but was brought closer so she could caress the machine’s head to her liking. Outside of their brief meeting earlier, the last time Anastacia had seen the one of Amora, the simulacra had crushed their own head to prevent Eminence gaining control of them – the sight of which still haunted the necromancer at times. Even if they appeared clearly handmade rather than from a uniform cast like the rest of the stone body, a lot of time and care had been put into remaking the bent and crushed pieces. It was hard so say if the slight uniqueness, flaws and intentional changes made the design better, but Anastacia found the work stunningly beautiful and hoped that she could one day be able to make something like it.
“The two left behind are very talented.” The one of Amora commented proudly. “The functions of the visual and control modules were regained fully with only a marginal loss to efficiency. All other damage was fully repaired and the one of Amora remains functional well within set parameters.”
“So you’re feeling fine then?” Anastacia asked and ran her finger along the small gaps between the finer components with a dumb grin on her face.
“Verily! All set objectives have currently been met. Given objectives: the discovery of the Avarice Core, guarding of the third children, establishment of a new base of operations for the Wrath Core – as well as unit specific objective: finding the correct necromancer. Currently operating to meet a list of unapproved minor objectives assigned by the one of Amora.” The simulacrum boasted and stomped its feet merrily.
As soon as she was released, Anastacia began to inspect the one of Amora in more detail while they introduced one another properly, without the pressure of corruption running rampant within the simulacrum. The one of Amora eagerly listened to as the necromancer explained how she had ended up in Valor, some key points of her life since, as well as the current situation with the sect. In return, the simulacrum shared what they could of the reasons for their relocation and intentions for the time being. All the while Anastacia meticulously traced the patterns of light and shapes of the stone and metal parts of the simulacrum’s body, etching them all into her mind in as much detail as she possibly could. However unlikely, she would not allow herself to helplessly watch while the one of Amora suffered for a second time.
“So yeah, that’s who I am now, crown and all.” Anastacia finished her recounting of the previous day.
“The correct necromancer’s worries are deemed unwarranted.” The one of Amora declared. “The one of Amora only possesses faulty memories of the hopeless darkness. Kindness, in touch and voice the one of Amora remembers well – kindness, in touch and voice now. Both instances are identical when overlayed in the memory module. New designation White One: Brume appears purely cosmetic and or redundant, and has no detectable effect on readings regarding subject: The correct necromancer, the necromancer, Anastacia.”
Anastacia stopped for a moment to figure out what was even being said. “That’s a very longwinded way to say you don’t think I’ve changed, but it does help…” She chuckled tiredly and resumed rubbing her cheek on what the one of Amora called the ‘vocal module.’
“The one of Amora does not think there is no change, the one of Amora knows there is no change – the margin of error is vanishingly small.” The simulacrum corrected.