image [https://i.postimg.cc/QMynpNMt/Vol-2-Card-25.jpg.jpg]

-Hibernation period ended-

My systems were coming back online. I had a super bad headache and I felt sick.

Gah…my head feels like it's going to explode…

Everything was blurry as my eyes fluttered open. This was due to my optical receivers needing to recalibrate. Five minutes later, I fully had vision again.

Bad news was that I couldn’t move my eyes or body at all. Just stare up to the ceiling and blink. It was driving me nuts.

So, this was actually expected. My body was operating at about 30% efficiency. It was going to take a while for everything to fully recalibrate and function properly. My motor functions were low on the priority scale, since I wasn’t in any danger.

How long have I been in this room anyways?

Let me check my calendar…

Great. I've been in this room for a whole week!

My systems did warn me about this. I must have really overworked my body to sleep for a whole week straight. It was unbelievable.

Well, nothing I can do about it now. Might as well think about what happened back at the forest.

My combat systems were pretty cool, but they were incredibly taxing. If they hadn’t activated though, who knows what would have happened? I doubt that we would have gotten out of there as easily.

'Easily' is not the right word. We barely got out of their with our lives. Heck, I don't even know what happened to the others. I pray they made it out alright.

Why did it even need to happen at all? Melpomene attacked us, all for nothing. I don’t know what evil those spirits of her’s saw in Yamin, and I don’t think I wanted too, but they won’t take her life as long as I’m around.

-Motor functions restored-

Oh, that was a good message to see. I could move around again. At first all I could do was wiggle, but as the pins and needles worked out the numbness, I could sit up.

The first thing I noticed was my bed was at the very center of a large round room with a single fancy window and door across from each other. It almost felt like a stadium with everything aimed at me. There were even stands circling above the floor I was on.

There were candles floating in the air, all with a blue glow suspiciously similar to the glow of my crystal heart. They gave off a sweet, but slightly burnt smell. Not very good ways of lighting up the room, but they definitely set a mood.

If my legs weren’t still getting their feeling back, I could have probably walked around and got a better idea of where I was by looking out the window. From the looks of it though, I must have been in some city based on the skyline I could barely see from here.

CREEEK!

The door off to the right opened. A girl holding a little basket of blankets walked in. She was dressed in black, so she was probably a nun.

“Fresh sheets, just like I promised!” she called out. “These ones are more comfy, so I hope you…”

Finally she reached me, and our eyes met.

“Hello,” I said.

She was stunned, like she was seeing a ghost.

The basket of blankets hit the floor and she went running out of the room. Screams could be heard from outside.

Did I really scare her that badly? I’m not that scary looking, right? Maybe Samael scared her.

Speaking of which, where was that silly snake?

Oh no! Was he okay? I totally wasn’t even thinking about him during the battle!

“Sammy…Sammy!” I called out a few times.

“Sssss…” Samael slithered out from under my pillow and tangled up into my hair.

Thank God! I was so worried for a second there.

If I get into another battle, like the one with Melpomene, I’d need to keep him safe. I might be made out of indestructible metal, but he wasn’t. Still, it’s good to know he made it through.

“We should go find the others,” I said to him.

“Ss…” he hissed, agreeably.

Without a clue about where I was, finding them was going to be tricky.

I got out of bed the moment my legs decided to cooperate with me, then wrapped one of the blankets around my body since my dress seemed to be missing. Then I walked right over to the window to get a little peek outside. We were pretty high up in some gothic looking building.

Marek mentioned a cathedral before, so I’m guessing that’s what this place is.

On that note, I also assume the people who saved us were the inquisitors. I didn’t see much of them, but if they scared off Melpomene, they must have been pretty tough.

Just beyond the cathedral I could see a city skyline. Lot's of old buildings around, some of them were pretty tall.

Hey, there were three big spires in the distance. They looked like the mana pylon towers back in Elysium. Could they have those here on the surface too?

CREEEK!

The door spooked me as it opened up again. An old guy in white and red robes slowly stepped inside. Two nuns flanked him, one being the girl from earlier, and a long haired man with paper and a feather pen followed behind them.

The old guy leading the bunch carried a lantern with a star-like light at its core, smoke billowed out of it whenever he gave it a shake.

Once he had shaken it exactly seven times, he began to sing. The nuns formed a choir beside him, like a stereo of echoes.

“Graka! Graka! Na yan asta to Yahona Ka mi hasha. So be it!"

Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

-Translating Nazalian-

"Rejoice! Rejoice! The Eighth Star of God has come down! So be it!”

“So be it!” the nuns chanted.

As they prostrated themselves on the floor, all of them motioned their hands in a figure eight, just like I saw Yamin do in the car.

The sun was hitting the window in a way that my shadow cast over them. Dust and smoke floated around in the solar rays of light that traced around my form.

It took a minute for me to process that their reverence was aimed at me. When I did get the message, a humbling feeling of anxiety bubbled in my chest.

Why are they treating me so special?

Lines of blue light ran across the room as the old guy hit his lantern on the floor. All of those lines stopped when they reached me. Pulses of light flowed through the lines, creating a glowing aura around my body.

The aura surrounded me, focusing in on my crystal heart, causing my chest to tingle.

It felt like thousands of voices were crying in my head all at once, but not for fear, for joy. A joyful song of ghosts.

Yan Asta…Yan Asta. Eighth Star…Eight Star. Those were the words I could pull out of the static of vocal noise.

This wasn’t a random type of magic…it was an ethereal data stream. That’s one of the most advanced forms of information transfers out there, hundreds of times more powerful than Wi-Fi or anything else.

It’s the same thing the Hive uses back home.

Whatever was in that lantern, it was communicating with me on a very special frequency.

“So be it. The star has been found!” The old man spoke. “The lantern has declared her arrival! So be it.”

“So be it!”

They kept chanting and singing. It was beautiful, but also a little scary.

I crept closer to them. They kept their heads down as I approached.

“Excuse me,” I said. “Can you please tell me what’s going on?”

All of their heads darted up and they gave me a wide eyed stare.

When his awe struck trance finally broke, the old man in white and red twirled his hand in a figure eight again.

“Mighty angel, do you seek to test me, a servant of the Lord?” he asked.

“Huh…what?” My head tilted. “Who are you?”

His head lowered once more.

“I am Azori Iscariot, the bishop of Urnan. Beside me is Sister Ruth,” he gestured to an older nun to his left, “and Sister Connie.” She was the much younger one on his right.

Sister Connie looked not much older than me, but it was hard to tell how old she was with all those dark robes on.

“Behind us is our local scribe, Anthony.”

The scribe wasn’t really following along with their praises and such. He was just standing there and jotting things down, occasionally kneeling down and keeping his head lowered.

“We all serve our Lord with grace and have long awaited your arrival,” Bishop Azori continued.

They’ve been waiting for me? Whoever their lord was, he must have known about me coming to the surface world.

“Who is your lord?” I asked. “Maybe he can help me find my daddy.”

Both the nuns gasped in terror upon my question.

Bishop Azori also looked shocked, but adjusted his glasses and took a breath.

“Our Lord is the most powerful God. There is none other like He who created the stars.”

I see. So they worshiped God too.

Looking closer at them, they did have very similar necklaces to Yamin. It was that shield symbol with all the stars on it.

“But, surely you already knew this…?” his brow furrowed.

“Uh…yeah!” I lied. “It’s good that you worship God. Me too.” That part wasn’t a lie though. “But, can you please tell me why I’m here?”

Sister Ruth’s aged face crinkled with anger as she glared at me. “This child cannot be the Eighth Star!” the older nun argued. “She knows nothing at all!”

How rude…I bet you don’t have a quantum computer for a brain…

Bishop Azori sighed at the old nun. “In ignorance, we shall be born into the truth, but as children we must discover its grace.” The man recited in an almost song-like tone. “These are words of caution written in the book of Raphael. Have patience, dear Sister Ruth, for she will learn.”

Ruth did not like that. She was about to blow a gasket, but held back from saying anything mean. If only her personality was as nice as her singing.

“Please, we beg of you to declare your name, mighty angel.” Sister Connie requested.

I drew a blank for a second, still not used to this attention.

“My name is Yalda,” I answered.

Anthony, the scribe, chuckled from behind everyone. “And so, the Book of Yalda begins," he uttered with a smirk on his face.

I was getting a book now too? Woah, this was a funky time.

“Mighty Yalda, you are the promised Krinai Inno who will protect us from our darkest hour,” Bishop Azori said. “Long have we waited, and now have been blessed to finally meet you, as the Lord promised us many generations ago.”

Krinai Inno was Nazalian for Final One. I didn't understand it though.

“You’re eminence,” Sister Ruth spoke up, “are we sure she is the true Eighth Star? If the words of Inquisitor Daniel are to be believed, then none of the prophecy has come to pass yet!”

“And what parts exactly did not come true?”

Sister Ruth said that the way they discovered me was nothing like the scriptures foretold. I remember Yamin said I was supposed to be fighting some dragon with lightning and stuff when I first arrived.

Wait, why did I just think ‘I’ was supposed to be doing that?

“Are you talking about the dragon?” I suggested, trying to look like I knew what they were talking about.

“Exactly!” Sister Ruth pointed at me with an angry looking smile. “There was no dragon!”

Bishop Azori shook his head as he stood up, prompting the nuns to also stand.

“You of all people should know that some scriptures are metaphors for life,” he said. “In this case, the Eighth Star would appear to fight the dragon, which is the spirit of the devil.”

“What about the Eighth Star being a man, and not a little girl?”

Uh…I’m definitely not a guy, that’s for sure.

“Sister Ruth, before us is the truth,” Bishop Azori said. “A heart may see the truth, but thine eyes deceive thee. She may not be as we expected, but surely there’s a reason for this.”

“If the scriptures can’t be taken literally, what can?” Ruth argued.

All this fighting was scaring me. I took a few steps and curled the blanket up to cover part of my face.

Sister Connie looked at me with sympathetic eyes, then came over to give me a comforting hug.

Anthony the scribe cleared his throat. “Whatever the truth is, why don’t you both remember that you’re dealing with a little kid. All this talk is freaking her out.”

“But, shouldn’t the Eighth Star be more mature then this?” Ruth said.

“She’s special, no doubt. Look at her,” Anthony said. “She has a star core in her chest. Only the angels have those. But she's still just a kid.”

“Star core?” I perked up.

Is that what they know crystal hearts as? Oh! Wait! I bet the lantern has one in there as well!

I let go of embracing Sister Connie and tugged her by the hand over to the lantern.

“Yep, there is one in here,” I said to myself after scanning it.

This one didn’t have much information on it, so it wasn’t worth taking out. Not yet, anyways. It’s pretty much a blank hard drive at this point. But that does explain how it was able to communicate with me.

Hmmm…that’s odd. The heart has a script that forces it only to activate when it reads bio signatures that match mine…

Now I want to know more about this religion. It seems like some of their tech here may be based on exceed designs. And if they had things that reacted to me, there’s definitely something else I needed to see.

“Er…Mr. Bishop?” I spoke up. “May I please see the holy books you guys have here?”

They’ve mentioned scriptures a few times, so I wanted to read everything they had. Maybe it will all make sense if I take a look at it. Plus, I wouldn’t look so stupid if I was a little more informed.

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Yalda in front of window [https://i.postimg.cc/4y3kMPYB/Yalda-standing-infront-of-window.jpg.jpg]

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