[Blessing of the Silver Moon: Moonlit Covenant]

“Rise, follower of the Night. For today, you have earned your place at your master’s side.” The Lord of Night announced stately, then muttered on the side. “Even I’m surprised,”

Kira didn’t seem to notice as her eyes were positively glowing with stars, moonlight reflecting off her widened eyes as she silently marveled at the cool sensation enveloping her that was the divine blessing.

The Lord of Night was amused by her drastic shift of attitude from a couple of minutes ago. Those who had earned his blessing in the past—which were honestly so much more qualified and worthy than the girl that he still lamented that his options were so limited—had had the same awestruck expression, such that the Lord of Night himself wondered how it felt to be blessed. To be granted the transcendent protection of unparalleled strength as a measly mortal.

The Lord of Night’s train of thought crashed when Kira smashed her forehead on the branch under her repeatedly, kowtowing as best as she could while keeping her balance.

“Thank you thank you thank you!” Dull thuds and creaking wood intersected the pause between her words.

“Ok…alright, uh…you can stop now.” The Lord of Night was slightly perturbed, but his concerns were unfounded as there was not even a single scratch on Kira’s forehead—the Lord of Night couldn’t really say he was surprised at the girl’s tough head—so he should’ve really been concerned that the poor beaten branch they were both on would snap in Kira’s zealous frenzy.

“Sorry. I’m just so happy,” Kira panted enthusiastically, cheeks rosy as she looked up at the Lord of Night with pure adoration, so much so that he could imagine a fluffy puppy tail wagging behind her. “I didn’t know the Shadow Pillar could grant blessings through vessels,”

“Ah, that.” He coughed. The Lord of Night didn’t expect Kira to notice. “I’m sure you are aware that the Lord of Night heavily regards this mission, it is to eradicate our greatest bane, the Ebonblight after all, so I am temporarily granted power to recruit agents on his behalf.”

“And this mission is highly classified, so it is paramount that you do not breathe a single word of this to anyone unless I personally agreed,” Valendor raised an eyebrow and tilted his head. “Understood?”

“Sir yes sir!” Kira immediately snapped into an awkward crouched salute, tried to stand up on the dangerously wobbly branch, thought better of it, and slowly crouched back down. All while one gauntleted hand was pressed to her forehead, and the other bare hand windmilled about to keep her footing on the mutilated branch.

The Lord of Night watched on while musing in his head. He could definitely ask Kira about the mortal realms’ current affairs, but he doubt that she could give him anything headmaster Alaric Ravencrest couldn't on the matter. So he chose to ask the half-demon girl about the nonhuman part of her lineage. The Demon Wars were definitely linked to the missing souls—the Lord of Night refused to believe that the similar time frames of both cataclysmic events were simply a coincidence.

“Kira, do you know anything about the current state of affairs of the demons and their war?” Valendor sat on a branch, a different, less damaged branch.

“Well, I know that the demons are currently in a stalemate with the Septet Pantheon, and the demons are driven back to Xal'Thaross.” Kira said. “But I know that even though the seven great Pillars try to make it seem like we're winning, my dad told me that they were unable to invade the demon realms.”

“What's the Septet Pantheon? And what is Xal'Thaross? Also demon realms? Demons don't have realms?” The Lord of Night muttered. “The Night Kingdom is a realm, but there's no way the demon realms refer to it,”

“Hold on. That's a lot of questions at once. Alright so, the Septet Pantheon is the alliance between the Seven Pillars,” Kira explained, holding her hand up to slow Valendor's flurry of questions.

“You say the Seven Pillars like there are only seven,” The Lord of Night frowned.

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“Well…not to offend our benefactor, the Shadow Pillar, but the world doesn't really like him…ya know…” Kira windmilled her wrist and rolled her words slowly on her tongue. “Cuz he kinda started the Demon Wars? And everyone calls him the Dark Lord and all that..?” She winced.

The Lord of Night grimaced, he was well aware his absence had left the mortals with more to be desired, and he didn’t blame them, but it was still disappointing to be pinned for the ruins and suffering wrought by sinful demons. He worked hard to protect the creator’s beautiful world, yet it was not enough, and his sacrificed attention did not pay off as well as it should have. The sky should be a huge help in the passive fight against the Ebonblight in principle, but the Lord of Night realised now that in his narrow minded extermination of Ebonblight, he failed to foresee that while he was distracted, the world he protected would turn on itself and eat its own tail.

After so many years suffering the idiocy of mortals, the Lord of Night really ought to know their self-destructive nature. However, the fact that the other Pillars, pardon him, the Septet Pantheon—he rolled his eyes internally at the pompous moniker—were currently in a stalemate with the demons. Powerful, but ultimately mere mortals, were giving the Septet trouble. Whether it was due to the weakness of the newer generation of Pillars, or the demons somehow gained access to strength paralleled only to the Pillars’, the weakened Lord of Night definitely had his work cut out for him. A huge stinking chunk of it.

“Guess my–I mean, the Lord of Night’s reputation is currently in the gutter then.” Valendor sighed, and twirled a tuft of his sable hair idly. “At least we now know this all beforehand and will be more careful about announcing our affiliation.”

Kira nodded. “Although all shadow affinity creatures are not widely liked due to mainstream bias and bigotry, not even the Dark Lord is more ostracized than the demons.”

“Indeed? How come?” Valendor tilted his head.

“I guess compared to the demons who actively kill and pillage, the Dark–ah! Sorry, I mean the Lord of Night, had not shown his face at any historical Divine Conclave or made a visible move even once in the War,” Kira looked up at the moon apologetically. “So, uh, pardon me, sir Lord of Night, but most people say–not me!–that the Shadow Pillar is a coward and even some believe that the Shadow Pillar doesn’t really exist at all, but it's disproved as the demons very obviously have Sigils of the Chosen, otherwise they wouldn’t be so strong. But yeah, compared to the demons, the Shadow Pillar wasn’t hated for the War, he’s hated for not helping in the War.”

That statement was only too valid, but the Lord of Night was too tired to feel bad about it every time his failure came back and slapped him, so he brushed it off for now and focused on new revelations.

The other Pillars of Creation were probably mad at him for dismissing the summoning for the Conclave. It was true that he had ignored the divine summoning of the Pillars, also known as the Divine Conclave, not once, but twice, which wasn’t too bad if you ignored the fact that only two Conclaves had ever been called in this world’s history. Divine Conclaves are rare and the only type of world-endingly urgent situation where even Pillars had to drop everything and run to. But in his defense, the Lord of Night was too occupied. He lamented that he had not thought to at least send them a messenger with some excuse on paper. It probably wouldn’t help much but at least it could help smooth things over a little.

“Also, about Xal'Thaross,” Kira took the Night Warden’s silence as an opportunity to answer the rest of his burning questions. “It's a large piece of land cobbled together from various countries that were conquered and seized by demons a long time ago, around the front half of the war. That’s why they call them the demon realms, with an ‘s’. The capital of Xal'Thaross is the original lands of demons, but everywhere else was pillaged and stolen in the earlier parts of the War.”

“And why were the Septet unable to invade? They should be able to shoot a few fireballs or whatnot at the border at the very least.” Valendor mused.

“My dad said that the border was a large stretch of dead and rotted plains corroded with Ebonal energy, and that the demons did it in desperation at the fall of Gravehallow,” Kira tapped her chin. “That’s one of their cornerstone cities by the way. Now it's just an Ebon-infused hellhole. My dad said he’s seen it before, and that there’s black gunk and miasmic fetor surrounding the area. And that the Ebonic poisons’ reached deep below ground too, not just in the air. Maybe that’s why the Septet Pantheon can’t just invade with their troops.”

That really didn’t answer the question, and the Lord of Night was now left with even more questions, most of them too focused on the nitty gritty details on technicalities the Pillars could’ve used to skirt around the problem, but those questions were best left for him to ask said Pillars in person. Not that he could just waltz up to their door and knock anytime soon in his condition anyways.

The Lord of Night wasn’t too sure about the extent of his fouler-than-Ebon reputation, but he could definitely say for sure that his face stood no chance to be greeted with flowers and tea. To be honest, he would’ve very much done the same himself.

There wasn’t much else the Lord of Night could ask Kira except one last little thing, who had been surprisingly helpful and was obediently awaiting judgement with puppy dog eyes.

“That was quite helpful, Kira,” Valendor watched the young girl puff up with pride. “One last thing before you go to bed, since you are a half-demon, how are your demonic relatives?”

“I’m a what?”