Chapter 83 – Where we go (epilogue)

"Now this is kinda fucked up." Is the conclusion Jake reaches after I finish explaining. "I mean, uh. Not bad fucked up. But."

"We all know what you mean, Jake." Catherine snorts when he pauses, which sounds a bit weird because her head's on Xethu's lap. "We all had similar reactions at first."

"Well, if I heard that just a month ago, I would say it's just some fantasy." Robert shrugs from his place next to the door as the only person left standing in the room. "Since it's not, it's pretty great if you ask me, even with all the drawbacks."

Jake scrunches up his face at that, but doesn't say anything. I lightly swing in his direction on the seat suspended from the ceiling I made for myself for the explanation. "Say, what power do you have?"

He looks at me with a blink. "Power?"

"Yeah?" I half confirm, half ask. "Like, you know, whatever you got in VOW?"

"Ah." He lets out and opens his mouth, but hesitates. "Uh, I got it from the random creation. It's kinda like necromancy..." He says quietly and trails off confirming my suspicions. Yep, Shiva said he received something morally questionable that doesn't really match the good person he is, and I think it fits.

I wonder, though, if it's an exception or not, in regards to matching his wishes or wants in some way? I wouldn't be surprised at all if it did match his personality, just not in an obvious way.

"Kinda?" Robert asks while I'm a little distracted. "So it's not classic skeletons and zombies?"

Jake shakes his head quickly. "No, no. It's, uh, more about spirits? Souls? The game says they're spirits, but I'm sure they connected, so-"

"Yep." I interrupt him since it's an important thing to clarify. "Spirit is the tangible housing for a soul, to put simply, and it's where actual minds are. Soul is the more metaphysical part, that travels the reincarnation cycle."

They stare at me without saying anything, until the silence is broken by Letty's snort and giggle. I glance at her as she covers her mouth with her palm and her chest shakes slightly. When I raise my eyebrows at her, she just snorts again and shakes her head.

"Say, Helia, there's one thing I don't get." I turn to Cathie again. "How do you... know all this? I mean, the way you talk about it, it feels like... you've been in it for years at least. Not... a couple of weeks."

I consider the question for a while before I nod my head. "That's a valid question that's a bit hard to explain. But there are things I just... know?" I tilt my head and raise my hand just as I see the girl taking a breath as if about to speak. "Do you know about Kant's concept of thing-in-itself? Or about Platon's vision of the ideal world?"

All of them nod their heads at the former or at the latter; Derrie and Letty at both.

"Yeah, great. That is the best comparison I can make. I don't think I can see... know, everything, and maybe I never will, but for simplicity, I can see and understand a part of that, that lets me understand what I'm dealing with, without like, studying about it." I pause and look over the group, who stare at me with varying levels of understanding.

Did they get it? I hope they did, cause I can't think of a better way of explaining it, because, well, because in truth neither of those comparisons completely fits.

...It's a little annoying how limiting words are.

"You know what, fine." Cathie says finally, sitting up straight from her position on Xethu's lap, only to lean on the girl's shoulder. "I don't need to understand everything about you. Fine with me if you're just the same person who's been with us the whole time."

"That's very debatable though." I point out. "Can you say without hesitation you're in the body you're in now because of the same person you talked with a month ago?"

She opens her mouth quickly, likely to retort, and freezes and averts her eyes.

Thought so. Because those tiny, human minds are so... beautifully limited and ignorant. I could explain it to her, I could show it to her in a way that would leave her with no questions, no doubts about who I am. That, though... that would destroy her - not in any physical way, not in the way an eldritch entity can destroy a human mind, but rather, how a god can destroy a human because of the simple difference in perspective, in thinking, that's too hard to accept for a regular human.

How Shiva destroyed who I was, and created me who I am now - only if I was no one a little special, I would have died never to come back.

I smile lightly at that and lean back in my chair, causing it to swing lightly. "That's the normal reaction, yes. If I haven't made it clear before, I will say it now. I don't expect any of you to treat me as the same person you've known. Pretending nothing's changed, that would be an unreasonable thing to ask."

There's a moment of silence before Jake speaks up. "It feels weird though. To treat you like someone else."

"Yep." Catherine and Derrie both confirm at the same moment, following which only the spirit continues. "But I do get what you mean, which brings me to a... very important question."

I raise my eyebrows at her, but she stays silent for a long while, instead sighing and frowning. "...It feels strange to ask, but... who are you? Or rather, who do you want to be? What are you going to do now?"

I don't say anything for a moment, in the peculiar, tense silence, and dispel my seat, then step down and extend a hand to Letty. She takes it with a smirk, probably anticipating the outrage I'm about to cause, and lets me pull her up into my arms.

I turn around with a step that takes me just a bit outside the room so I have a good view of everyone in it. Catherine, the Wolfkin, Derrie, the spirit, Robert, or Hellcarver Vulcan, David, or Blood Elf Crimson, and finally Jake... Quasi-Lich Jake.

Just like that, it's that simple for me to know who he is, the living human with a phylactery. It's pretty symbolic, that the phylactery, what should have required him dead, can house the soul of a living human creating a being that functions in much the same way, merely whose power works on the living, not on the dead.

Another fun little move by Mom, I guess... I sometimes feel it's all a bit needlessly complicated. On the other hand though, for her this is all a simple game.

For me, now, it is as well.

And in that regard, "I am a Primordial." I tell them simply. "I am Helia. This is what matters."

"As for the rest of the world though, I'm going to be a Goddess."

I would have said that Mom wouldn't mind if I nabbed her playground... but she had long anticipated that, hadn't she?

...

Eli sat down heavily, and a cliff under her bum broke off and she went sliding down before she jammed her hand into the ground behind her. She stopped amidst the general rumbling, then pulled herself back up a little and sat down with a sigh. This time she leaned on the slope she unintentionally created, and she remained in place.

Mostly. Her body slid down a bit again when she sighed.

"This isn't how I anticipated this to go." She whispered - or she would have in a human body, but as it was the sound resembled the hiss of a steam engine rather than anything remotely quiet.

She heard someone clearing their... her throat, and she turned her head to the side to see a woman she recognized.

Eli's eyes widened, and her body tensed, but she stopped the reflexive reaction moments before she actually caused another earthquake. Ave'A would have survived, but her new seat not so much.

"Hey. It's been a while." She said instead, addressing the Grand Priest of Viell'Heirr, whose spiky stony hair and unusually smooth stoneskin distinguished as one of the oldest, generation-wise, among her people. "What's up?"

Ave'A remained silent for a long while, her sharp face scrunched up in a frown as she looked the girl up and down. Up and down in more ways than one, as the girl had about thirty meters in height and even sitting made the woman standing not that distance away raise her head noticeably.

"Nothing important has happened over the past two months, after the series of attacks on human towns you helped stop, and I feel that is fortunate. However, I have to say, Elisora, I cetrainly did not anticipate that." She looked up and down pointedly. "Am I right in assuming the Primordial that recently visited this island has to do with it?"

"Helia, yes, it was her." A peculiar light shone in her eyes before she paused, thinking. "You wanna hear what's gotten me worked up? It's also about her."

The woman raised her eyebrows, waving her hand upwards, a motion of which caused a pillar of stone to shot up in the air, bringing her to the level of Eli's comparatively massive jaw. "I am unsure if we know each other well enough to casually share information of that caliber; I doubt it is a trivial matter, seeing your power and how easily you can deal with most problems now. If you wish to share, however, I will not stop you."

The girl smiled widely, what would have been cute on her human form, but only revealed the obsidian teeth lining her jaws with molten bits of lava dripping in between.

"I'm gonna be a gatekeeper between worlds."

"...This and Wayfarers'?"

Eli rumbled in confirmation. "And more. But those two are the most important, because they are inhabited by intelligent species."

There was a long while of silence after her words, until Ave'A finally sighed. "I do not suppose I will be able to understand her actions. She is mysterious just as she had been when I first met her, even more so now. I would like to ask, are the worlds going to be connected by permanent portals?"

"...Was that a guess?" Eli asked after a moment, raising her crusted eyebrows at the High Priest.

"I prefer to say that great minds think alike." She opened her mouth to continue, but paused and cleared her throat, as if in embarrassment. "Or so I would like to say, but I do not think I can match any Primordial in that department."

The fiery giant huffed in amusement and slid down a bit on the shifting rocks. "I don't know, I don't wanna know. I can tell you what you said was partially right, but Helia specifically told me I'm not supposed to talk about it." She rubbed her nose. "Well, I'll probably get a scolding once I see her again either way."

"But she's not that strict, so it should be fine with what I told you already. She's a little bit evil, but she's reasonable."

...

"Are you religious, Derrie?"

The girl, sitting her hovering chair, turned to her uncle and stared blankly for a long while. "Where did that come from?" She asked finally.

He shrugged. "Don't take this the wrong way, dear, I'm just curious. I noticed how you've been cursing, and I think you were praying the other day?"

The girl blinked repeatedly in response. "What? I haven't... ah, I was meditating yesterday evening, if that's what you're talking about." She paused, and he nodded with a hint of surprise on his face. "Though..." Her mouth opened, then closed, and her eyebrows furrowed.

She wondered. Religious? No, definitely not. There was no religion to speak of. Even omitting the fact there were no believers, priests, and places of worship, there was no sacred text or anything, physical or otherwise, substituting it, to follow in the first place.

A goddess though?

Oh, there was one. Annoyingly right all the time, beautiful beyond human standards, whimsical, incomprehensibly powerful, terribly unhelpful most of the time, and yet she would always show up when there was a problem you had no way to solve.

And to top it off, her mom was even worse.

"When did I start saying goddess?" Derrie finally asked instead.

"I think about two months ago."

"Huh." She scratched her head. "I didn't even notice when that happened."

A long silence stretched between the two.

"You didn't answer the question?" He probed gently.

"...No, I'm not religious." She shook her head slowly, then added in a quieter voice. "I'll just work for a goddess starting tomorrow..."

She missed the confused expression on her uncle's face, looking at the safe room planted in another dimension in the wall to her room. At her private world where she could go nuts with magic, courtesy of a certain annoying goddess.

Or should it start with a capital letter?

"You know, how do I say I'm a follower without any religious connotations?"

...

Alexander sighed, leaning back in his chair. He had been doing that for some time; he could not quite track with the rollercoaster his life had been for the past couple of months.

He rubbed his face and reached for the can on the desk. It went up weirdly easy, and he shook it lightly - almost empty. He was about to get up to get another one, but stopped himself.

"No, I've had enough of that. It's time to get things together." His voice was weak, fragile as if he himself did not have the conviction he pretended to possess.

Each time he convinced himself he did, the pair of papers in his hands made him doubt. Such a light, delicate thing, yet the weight each carried was so immense he found it difficult to comprehend.

One informed him that his... daughter - he reminded himself again - was apparently alive and well, what he had feared might not have been the case after the events of over two months back. He still doubted it when he laid restless at night, but at least he had a reason to hope. A selfish hope, he knew, as it was surely not mutual, but what other choice did he have?

Pretend he had never had a child that he loved, what he did not know how to show, he missed, what he had never experienced so vividly, and that he was afraid to face had fate allowed them to meet again?

He wanted to deny all of it, but deep down he knew, he would just be running away from the problem. Where that problem lay, he did not quite know, but if it was up to him, he would find out.

And yet...

Alexander's eyes fell to the second sheet of paper. An official document, that one, one that still did not feel real. Twenty two years of history, as if they never existed in the first place. Perhaps even worse.

He always asked himself if he was the one at fault.

He knew.

...

Letty smiled softly, her eyes trailing over the figure sprawled on a jelly cushion in their little den.

Really, she managed to look divine even in the worst ways.

Like a goddess that had learned everything mortal, saw everything material, and dove deep into the spiritual and existential mysteries no human truly grasped, leaving her body to lay twisted in an awkward position, bent in an arc and tilted to the side so her tummy lay vulnerable and her boobs peeked out from beneath the shirt she had pulled up - or down really, in her position - scratching her side.

Divine.

Letty turned on her heel, tearing her eyes away, and walked out of the room. She emerged high up in the sky, to a glorious dawning star shining violet on the horizon. Crossing the sizable balcony in lazy steps, she finally arrived at the edge and leaned on the obsidian railing.

A grin split her face again at the sight of the massive obsidian palace stretched all around her. The tall, thick, protective walls, the proud towers piercing the sky, the delicate gardens painting the castle in pink tones along with the gemstones embedded in walls.

It was the Black Palace, where The Goddess of Stars lived and welcomed guests, and most importantly, at the top of an unassuming tower somewhere in the middle of the castle, far down and away from the Garden of Stars, slept her nights and days.

With a spin in her step, Letty walked back and turned to the rest of the tallest tower in the entire structure, to the glinting and shimmering plants outgrowing from an incandescent pool made out of a single black-tinted gemstone. To the Garden of Stars, that was about to receive its first ever dose of mana.

Truly, divine.

And all of it hers.

...

Ae of the Second Ring, amused

Her child witnessed, she blinked

The girl's alone now