"If that's a joke, it's the most awful things I've heard in years."

Amelia crossed her arms, not believing a single words Orion said before.

"Orion, are you joking?"

Worried, Karteira approached anxiously.

"Well, yes. I'm partially joking."

He shrugged nonchalantly, a smile on his face.

"Partially... the symbol in your eye, right?"

With a single nod, both Amelia and Karteira breathed a sigh of relief.

"So, what is the truth in all of that? I don't think you would agree becoming a Remnant yourself."

While scratching the back of her head with frustration for somehow believing his words, she asked.

"I'll tell you about what that big spider, Silka, told me."

-

"My body is ravaged by corruption. I am barely holding my conscience together to protect the remaining children that survived."

"The golden barrier."

"Yes. That is- or was, my last action to help them. But I don't have any way to resist anymore."

"Let me show you a quick preview of my current state."

Silka opened his arms and lifted them, before they fell lifelessly at his sides.

The white surroundings turned dark purple, and his body began to show signs of a disease on his skin.

'That dark smog.'

Orion remembered the 'thing' he forced out of the body of one beastman, Crystal.

Not only did it covered the man's body from head to toes, but it only left his right eye unaffected, which showed how little strength the Remnant had to fight back.

*Crash*

The sound of something broke, and as Orion looked inside Silka's only remaining eye, who displayed the sigil of Beauty, a dark blue spider web with white outlines.

In the depth of his eye, through the sigil, he saw the vessels that made him a Remnant break.

One by one, his magic storages broke. With his very last 'life', and only remaining one, he was truly on a cliff, fighting death itself.

Everything returned to normal, before Silka breathed a very light sight out of his mouth.

"Truly pitiful, don't you think?"

"..."

"That's why I would like to request your help."

Orion stared at the human manifestation of Silka, and listened.

"This might brings you quite a few problems with that... woman? She's a woman, if I remember correctly. Yes."

"Yes, I would like you to kill me, and absorb my soul, and aspects."

"Wha- Wait! Are you trying to turn me into a Remnant?!"

Backing off from the man, Orion was ready to get out of this place by any means if that was his goal.

But Silka smiled and shrugged.

"After we've talk about your own place in this world, surely you jest."

"My own place- The new faction I belong in?"

"That precisely. I would not rob you of your future, and turn you into one of us. Yet, is that even possible? It would sure be beautiful. From your reaction..."

Orion stopped glaring at the Remnant and approached him again.

"Yes, the Remnant of Progress. It died and gave its aspects, and title to her daughter, who we've rescued."

"My~ What a fantastic thing to hear before dying! Though, we knew that woman had a few strange ideas, but dying was not one I was ready to hear. Truly, she was a wonderful being to be around."

Silka observed Orion silently, before speaking again.

"You do not show any signs of anger toward her. I would have expected anyone to shout something in the lines of 'She abandoned her child, she left her alone!', yet, there is not even the slight sign of frustration."

"My parents died for my sake, leaving me alone in this world. Amelia's mother died to protect her before vanishing in flames. I have no reason to be angry at someone else's mistake."

With a shrug, Orion turned everything around.

"If what you said is true, then before dying, she might have been the most happiest being at that moment, and hoped that her child lived in a world she herself built with her power of 'Progress'."

Opening his eyes wide, a smile so pure appeared on his face that it even shocked Orion.

"Wh-What is that smile?"

"No, nothing."

He returned to normal.

This content has been unlawfully taken from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.

"I can entrust everything to you in that case, you wouldn't misuse our power anyways."

"Let me be clear once again. I don't want your power. I don't care about the Remnant's power."

Orion was determined to walk his own path with his own strength, going as far as to reject the rare power of a Remnant.

"And that is perfectly fine. Though, you will still be forced upon it. My power isn't very useful in battle, for that matter."

Silka turned his back to Orion, and explained everything that would happen, at last.

"Time is closing on me. Orion, Child of the Forgotten, kill me with your own hands, and send my soul to the Tree of Life. At the same time, until my next incarnation returns, I will have you hold my aspects so that they don't vanish from this world."

"A world without beauty, cultural variations, languages... and honor, would be a very bleak world to live in, isn't it?"

Thinking with his chin between his index and thumb, Orion came to a simple question.

"Is that all you want?"

"..."

While looking away, Silka closed his eyes.

"I do not want to sound greedy, when you already are doing something out of the realm of possibility, but please..."

He bowed incredibly low with his hand on his heart.

"Please, protect my last children if possible."

"If you want to me to protect your 'Honor' as a Remnant, I can do that. If you ask me to protect your 'Honor' as a father, I will accept."

Orion walked to the Remnant, and placed his hand on his shoulder.

"I learned that because the Remnants exist, our world is full of wonderful things. I learned that the many factions in our world exist thanks to you, and I learned that nothing would be so interesting without you."

With a smug smile on his face, he looked at Silka.

"You can die in peace. I'll send you to Tiohr-nam without a single bit of corruption in your soul."

Silka straightened, feeling the sincerity in Orion's word burning his fear of death away.

"But..."

Orion looked perplexed after that.

"That's... crazy. The Remnants aren't doing things with mild feelings."

-

"That's how it went, basically."

Amelia and Karteira nodded, understanding everything that had happened was to preserve the aspects the Remnant possessed, and to send his soul to Tiohr-nam.

"How is mother reacting? You can feel her emotions roughly right?"

"Yes."

With a distant look, Orion looked very sad.

"She doesn't look very pleased because I've not told her again, but it's very little. The sadness of losing someone she maybe knew is overtaking everything. But she still feels warm, which means she will take care of his soul properly."

"Mother..."

Karteira looked somehow happy.

"Fine, if you really didn't become a Remnant, I am good with that. But now that you have the aspects of that spider, what has changed."

But Orion still looked away, without looking even a little bit toward either her or Karteira.

"..."

Amelia approached Orion.

"Look at me."

"..."

"Orion, look at me. Look at us."

"Can we not right now?"

He tried to flee back down the bridge, but Karteira understood that there was definitely something fishy with Orion, so she blocked his sole exit.

"..."

"Why can't you look at us? I thought you were thinking of Tiohr-nam previously, but in fact, you looked away from Karteira. What are you seeing now?"

Slowly, she placed her hand on his cheeks, and with a fast wrist movement, she forced him to look at her.

"..."

His eyes looked straight in her pearl eyes, before a very strong blush appeared on his face.

"For the love of the world! Are you satisfied?!"

He pushed her hands away, and hid part of his face with his forearm, blushing a red both never saw once on his face.

"Beauty. Orion now bears the aspect of Beauty, isn't he? Does that mean..."

"That he sees us more beautiful than before?"

"Shut up! Let's go!"

Unusual for him, he walked away rapidly leaving both women extremely happy. In fact, they were elated.

"That means he already thought we were beautiful, isn't it?"

Karteira asked, still a little confused.

"I think it's more than that. There's more at play here."

"Like what?"

"What other very important aspect did he receive?"

Thinking, only one had an impact at this point, so Karteira answered.

"Honor?"

"Exactly. It might be far from the truth, but I think his way of trying to distance himself and his honor of being our... boyfriend are conflicting, while the 'Beauty' aspect is making it worse for him."

Amelia wildly blushed at the word 'boyfriend'.

"When are you coming you two?"

"Looks like his fake anger faded away."

After joking about his strange behavior, they joined him back on the bridge.

The rest was pretty boring stuff, but it had to be done.

Orion, now boasting the aspect of 'Language', was able to speak with the arachnea. Though surprised, they understood what a great person he was when he said that he managed to at least save the soul of their father.

Every single arachnea showed gratitude. Yet, Orion heard the most absurd request right after.

They asked to be killed. The refusal was one thing was would remain in the records of the arachnea.

"You father asked me to save your lives, and you are actually thinking of throwing his last promise with me in the void?"

"What do I tell him if no one have managed to survive when he comes back?"

"If you don't wait for Silka, who will welcome him when he returns?"

"It's too bad for you though, I won't let you die. You're coming with us, and that's all there is to it."

In front of the man that rescued them previously, they could only follow him, who was accepted by their father.

They had no ways to know if Silka really returned to the Mother of Life, but they could only trust in his words. He wouldn't have received Silka's aspects if he wasn't accepted anyways.

The last part was probably the hardest and the wildest.

~

"Amelia."

"What?"

Orion, Amelia, Karteira, and all of the arachnea were near the broken part of the barrier, ready to escape at any moment.

"We can't let this space be occupied by the corruption. It doesn't spell anything good to let it rampant somewhere."

"Do you have an... idea?"

He tried to look at her, but dodged her gaze right before.

"An idea..."

Everyone had the same idea. What was this place? A forest.

The three of them spoke the same word in unison.

"Fire."

"But we don't have enough firepower to burn the whole corruption away."

Amelia took out Vesta and transformed.

'Even that is terribly beautiful... What as become of me?'

Orion glanced at her quickly, before looking toward the darkness in front of him.

"Can you share your fire element with me? Everyone, walk outside."

He forced himself to look at her for this request. He opened his hand, waiting for Amelia to use her ability to share her elements to him.

"I don't think Vesta likes you... but sure."

She placed her fire dagger in his hand, which turned into a sphere of pure fire, pushing the darkness away.

"I knew it, but this is one powerful element."

Orion closed his eyes.

'Don't you want to show Amelia the full extent of your power? Show her, and she will work harder to bring your full potential.'

'No.'

'You're a tough one. Don't you have an interest in firing fire as an arrow?'

'No.'

The voice was distorted by its own heat, but it sure was like hearing a child answer you.

'...'

Orion just stop bothering, before one last question appeared in his mind.

'Don't you want to erase whatever is making Amelia suffer?'

A flamboyant crossbow of blue fire appeared in his hands. Luckily for him, the fire element recognized him as a 'friend' and did not burn him.

But...

"!"

Orion wasn't able to lift the crossbow. The flames dissipated and the little voice returned.

"Weak?"

"Me?"

"No."

"Then what..."

Under Amelia's careful gaze, she managed to see the struggles she herself went through with her fire element.

For a good hour, Orion tried to manifest the perfect crossbow, but each time, it failed.

"Gah-"

Orion was out of breath, but his determination was still intact.

"You sure are a very wild element. I like you."

Sending everything at the fire element, he released his full magic. He slammed both hands on the fire sphere, and tried once again to form the crossbow.

'What do you want to be? You're powerful enough to be a crossbow, so why-'

'Wait, that's it!'

Closing his eyes, the perfect picture of the weapon appeared in his head.

'Oh!'

He also heard the little excited voice of the element.

"Sterope and Asterope."

A white fire and a blue fire. Two weapons of pure destruction, yet a single element manifested them.

Those became known as the most powerful weapon in Triazils' existence.

"But what do we do now?"

And then, Orion looked at the two crossbow, confused.