Chapter 7 - Demigods
Standing in the secret room, Lilly looked over the books, not finding a single title. The shelves were different, though; they all had words indicating what books they contained.
‘Vermilion History, Political Secrets, Great Magic, Divine Beasts and Demigods… I want to read it all!’
Lilly felt pulled towards the shelf containing ‘great magic,’ but quickly remembered why she was here. Mia was probably waiting already, so she should come back here later after checking what she came for.
She walked over to the Divine Beasts and Demigods shelf and looked through the five books on it. Grabbing one at random, she flipped it open and started reading.
‘Let’s see, “The Legend of the Little Titan, a book trying to bring light to this illusory figure in the Ripping Mountains”. Is it someone the Vermilion suspected of being a demigod? And is there a Divine Titan?’ Lilly wondered, flipping through the rest of the book.
She didn’t find anything of much interest, and she had never heard of the Ripping Mountains before, so she moved on to the next book.
‘The Naval Nation of Marolus? Do they have someone with a Divine Gift?’ Lilly kept reading, finding information about the nations suspected of having a divine gift from the Divine Leviathan. ‘No one has bested them in naval combat, and they have unusual succession rules… Oh!’
A note fell out from the back of the book, seeming like notes taken by whoever left the book there. Lilly picked it up and started reading, “Malorus has the backing of the Divine Leviathan, and the king receives the power to manipulate huge amounts of water. Let’s stay on their good side.’
Lilly wondered about the last line. ‘Is it because water might be strong against our fire? Or because Thundrel is a coastal town?’
She appreciated the note in the back, letting her skip a lot of reading. She gently put it back in the book before picking up the next one and looking for a similar note there. It had a very similar note, written in the same handwriting.
‘... Did Myndia write this stuff? Nah, it could be anyone. They all seem to be made at the same time,’ Lilly reasoned, suppressing a slight urge to crumble the note as she held it.
“We know of 7 Divine Beasts, but there might be more. Phoenix, Dragon, Leviathan, Titan, Behemoth, Kraken, and lastly, Seraphim. We don’t know much about them besides their existence and their abilities to create demigods or divine gifts.”
Other than the number and types, most of that information was information Lilly already knew. But she found herself wondering about the last one.
‘Seraphim? Isn’t that a type of angel? I didn’t know there were beasts like that... unless it created people? Elves?’
Lilly found herself pondering some heavy stuff, so she gently put the note back again and retrieved another book.
“Let’s see. ‘We believe there are several demigods in the world, often more than one for each Divine Beast. The only exceptions seem to be the Seraphim, and the Phoenix, who have only given us a Divine gift. I’d love to know why, but Myndia doesn’t tell me…”
Lilly felt a slight relief, knowing this hadn’t been written by Myndia. It was likely a different holder of the flame, communicating with Myndia through the amulet or their dreams.
‘So that’s all the important information in this book? How did she get to that conclusion, unless there’s a lot of information on other demigods?’
Lilly flipped to the beginning of the book to read the title. “Demigods Through History… Well, this should have what I need.”
She looked at the index, hoping the entries were designated by their locations. But no such luck; all 12 entries were sorted by what Divine Beast they were created by.
‘Okay then, let’s go through them one by one… I need to check this.’
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She looked up the first entry, showing her entries for Demigods of the Behemoth. There were two, and judging by the names of the nations, they both seemed to originate from lands far to the east.
‘Those might be geared towards strength, as Myndia briefly mentioned. Ah, if she hadn’t mentioned my height, I would have known more about other divine powers by now…’
She kept turning pages, getting to the Dragon next. It had three known children, but none of them had been seen in over 2000 years. It was unknown if they were alive, but demigods were supposed to be immortal in some way.
‘Then again, it says nothing about divine gifts. Perhaps it’s similar to us, where the gift…’ Lilly trailed off for a moment, feeling a question forming in her mind. ‘Would Myndia not have a flame if the divine phoenix hadn’t given her the gift? Or are divine gifts just inborn gits the demigods are born with?’
She thought it made sense: ‘If a demigod is born, then it would have some power from its parents, right? Which can be passed on to other descendants later on. Then… Are we all in the same situation, where it’s passed to our descendants?’
She realized she had been wasting time thinking about this and threw the question to the back of her head, choosing to go back to reading the book. The next part was about the Kraken, which had two demigod children.
One had been gone for a long time, and the other was in a land far to the west. There were lots of warnings about ever going there to meet them, but Lilly had no intention of doing so anyway.
The next part was the Leviathan, which had two known children. One was known to be tied to the naval nation of Malorus, while the other was unknown.
She skipped the entry about the phoenix after seeing that it was about Myndia and her supposed greatness and went right to the divine titan instead.
Like most others, he had two. One was unknown, but Lilly thought it might be the little titan from the other book. The last entry was about a demigod tied to the mountains of Skyloft.
‘... That’s… not ideal. The Skyloft mountains are above Eldoria and Dortfell, and I’ve never heard anything about another demigod in Eldoria. But we would probably know if Dortfell had him on their side, right? Especially since I’ve done a lot in this war already.’
‘And would it be the demigod himself, or a descendant with his divine gift?’ Lilly wondered, hoping it was the latter.
She was confident in her power, even compared to those who have had the flame in the past, but she did not feel confident against a demigod.
‘Well, now I at least know what we might be up against. A titan demigod would likely be tough to beat, but he might not have too many offensive capabilities. And he doesn’t have my purifying power!’
Lilly pumped her fist while infusing it with her flame, making her feel like nothing would be able to withstand her brute force or penetrate her near-perfect defenses. She knew it was naive to think other divine gifts didn’t have similar advantages, but she couldn’t think of a better one right now.
‘Oh well, time to get back to Mia and Beak. I hope they didn’t burn the house down…’
Lilly put the book back in place and looked longingly at the other shelves before walking back to the first room. She studied the wall that had sunk into the ground, wondering how she would get it back up.
Lilly didn’t plan to hand the position of Protector over to anyone just yet, but she thought it best to be on the safe side.
Something that looked like a button on the wall that had been revealed drew her gaze. She assumed it would get the wall back in place, so she pushed it gently. The wall started ascending, bringing with it the fiery emblem of gold she had infused with the flame.
‘Great, now our secrets are safe once again… I don’t know why that information is so secret in the first place, but whoever hid it probably knows better than me.’
Bringing the ball of light with her, Lilly walked back up the stairs to the library. After she pushed the button, the door opened easily, letting her back out to the dark aisle of books.
She quickly found her way back to the entrance, where she found Janus still sitting at the desk. “I trust you found something interesting down there, My Lady?”
Lilly smiled and nodded. “I sure did! I’m in sort of a hurry, but I’ll most likely be back soon to read some more down there. Hope it won’t be a bother.”
Janus smiled tiredly, but it seemed genuine. “Not at all. I’ll open it faster next time; it took me some effort to remember everything today. See you later, My Lady!” He waved at her as she passed.
She waved back to him as she walked through the door. The day had turned dark, making her feel some urgency. ‘How long was I down there? Surely it wasn’t more than an hour or so?’
With staff in hand, she started floating into the night sky, admiring the tiny lights illuminating the winding streets of Thundrel. The sight always reminded her of her first date.
‘Right, we need to plan another one… Maybe to celebrate our new house when it’s ready?’
As she flew back home, she smiled, thinking of the future date. The smile widened as the idea of Eolande struggling to care for Beak while they were gone formed in her head.
‘I hope Elly comes back soon…’