As the wind rushed past Renso's ears in his flight, he turned his attention downward. The blurred shapes of houses outlined in lights rushed past as soon as he saw them. If he squinted, he could just barely see the many people who still crowded the streets. The many heretics, he reminded himself. Really, he had no idea why Kione still believed in them. It would take a miracle for them to change their beliefs to the right ones.

Like with Kione's shrine, he only landed after he had circled the top a few times and found a safe spot. The sight he saw made him stop and stare. On top of the stone surface were a basket of what he assumed were fruits, a thin sheet of an unfamiliar white material weighted down by a rock, and a small piece of charcoal. He stepped closer to the shrine to expect the white sheet and found it covered in scribbles that could've been writing, most likely made by the charcoal. The fruits were fresh, which meant that someone had come recently. Did this mean...?

He shook his head and pushed these thoughts from his mind. He came here for a reason and shouldn't get distracted by something like this. In one motion he dropped to his knees and intertwined his fingers, then closed his eyes and turned his thoughts to Vudona. Even now he had reservations about praying to a god other than Ruzona, but he hoped that she would forgive him for it. His thoughts were interrupted by the sound of a crunch. He wondered if it was the mystery worshiper or Vudona in equal measure before he opened his eyes to find out.

Leaning on the shrine was a woman with a very otherworldly aura to her. She wore robes in a style that seemed old-fashioned even to Renso and hung loosely off of her form. Her hair was long and black, parted directly in the middle to expose the strange slit that resembled a closed eye on her forehead. The back of her hand which held a fruit had a similar slit. She regarded him with her two open eyes. They resembled cut, lavender-colored gems with how they shined. Her lips curled into a warm smile when she finished her inspection.

As expected, the goddess spoke first. "A follower of my wife, are you? She thought so highly of your clan in those times, Shiroken. I have much to teach you, though I am not sure if you are ready to know it. Before I get into that, I should give you what you came here for."

Vudona set the fruit down on the shrine's surface, then held her hands up and pressed her fingertips together so her hands were in a pointed shape. The eyes on her hands and her forehead suddenly opened and glowed like they were full of starlight. Renso flinched and brought his hands up to his head. A dull pressure had started within his skull and he subconsciously knew that it was knowledge being poured in. It only lasted for a few more seconds before fading. He rubbed his temples before he turned his attention back to the goddess.

"Now, I must ask if you think you are ready for what I can teach you. It concerns what happened to your people and how long ago it was. Such knowledge may be overwhelming for someone who feels as if they were living normally yesterday. I will only give it to you once you are ready." She sat back on the shrine and idly twirled a strand of hair.

Renso narrowed his eyes in thought. It probably had something to do with the worship of the gods stopping, which Kione told him before that the people living here had nothing to do with. If he could know what happened without it tainting his opinion of them, it would surely mean he was ready to take on Kione's task. He took a deep breath to clear his thoughts before he spoke. "I'm ready. Teach me what happened."

Vudona frowned lightly and stared into his eyes. Whatever she saw in them made her hesitation disappear. "Very well. Take care to remember that this happened long before the nation you see here was established, or any of its people born." Once again, she put her hands in a pointed shape and her extra eyes opened and shined.

Renso felt his consciousness fade as the events played out in his mind as the memories of a divine. The refugees from Esmus arrived in Kesshotochi and were welcomed in. Young Kessho-min workers found themselves unable to compete with the Esmusans who took lower wages than them, so they petitioned over and over again for the refugees to have their rights stripped away. They finally got the support of a few politicians and had the law passed. The Esmusans were enslaved for over ninety years before the god Sateusu took pity on them and orchestrated a plan to overthrow their masters. They told the Kessho-min of the 10,000 Year Crystals which could make a person immortal if they were encased for a week. Without hesitation, the military started a project to use these crystals to create an entire branch of exceptional soldiers with immortality. The Esmusans then staged a coup as soon as all of the best were frozen and faced little resistance. They took over the entire nation and cast aside Kessho-min technology and gods. The frozen soldiers were forgotten. Ten thousand years then passed, and countless nations rose and fell where the Kessho-min had once lived.

He pushed himself up as soon as he woke up again and looked around. Vudona was gone, and he could see the sun rising to the west. He shifted so that he was in a sitting position, then stood up. Grief and anger lapped at the surface and a scowl formed on his face. He wouldn't be able to call himself a warrior if he let them free, so all he could do was control his breathing and push these emotions down. Neither the Kessho-min nor the Esmusans had been in the right back then, which made it that much harder to swallow. His thoughts were interrupted when he heard footsteps coming up the stairs of the pyramid. He wheeled around to face whoever it was.

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Coming up the steps was a korine woman, her gaze downturned and locked on a strange object that seemed to be full of many white sheets. She had bluish-grey hair in a bob and dark brown eyes. It seemed like she spent a lot of time in the sun, so her skin was rather tanned. A patch of milky white crystals adorned the right side of her jaw.

She only noticed Renso when she stepped onto the shrine platform, and when she did, she jumped and dropped the object. "Eek! Who- who are you and why are you up here?!" She demanded. Then, she noticed his rather odd features. "Wait, I've never seen someone with crystallization that extreme. And I've never seen a foreigner with crystallization. That must be heavy, how do you even walk?"

Renso blinked in surprise when he understood her perfectly. Then he decided to answer. "My name is Renso, I flew up here, I'm from this area, and my wings aren't really that heavy. They're enchanted with wind magic, so they're much lighter than they look." He squinted at the patch of crystals on her jaw. "And what about you? Are those crystals part of an augment?"

The woman reached up to touch the crystals when they were mentioned, then shook her head. "No, I was born with them. My mom and grandpa had similar ones, too." She then smiled. "If you can fly with those, does that mean you're a crystal person? Like the ancient ones?" She took his hand and shook it rapidly. "My name is Minna! I've been looking for anything I could learn about this shrine, but I still don't know the name of the goddess it's dedicated to. I know that some of her domains are magic and knowledge and that she was the goddess who created us. If you're an ancient one, then you probably know her name."

"Vudona. Her other two domains are inventions and creativity. Do you worship her?" He pulled his hand away from her.

"So her name is Vudona. I wonder if she wasn't able to hear my prayers because I didn't know her name. Oh! Do you want to come back with me to the museum my family runs? After I pray to Vudona, of course. I've been keeping my worship secret from my parents for the longest time. They just think that I'm studying the ruins here." She laughed quietly.

Renso looked to the side as he considered the offer. It would definitely be a good idea to have an ally in a world so different, but her enthusiasm was rather off-putting. Finally, he nodded. "Alright, I'll join you. Just not in prayer, I'm devoted to another goddess."

Minna smiled when he accepted the invitation. "Great! I have so much to ask about you! Now, I'll be done in a bit." She promptly knelt by the shrine and intertwined her fingers.

Renso crossed his arms and looked at the white sheet on the shrine. Several names were scribbled on it, each bearing an only slight resemblance to Vudona. It seemed like Minna had been trying for a while to learn her name. He then looked at the strange object she had dropped and picked it up. The cover had "The Old Gods" written on it, and opening it revealed the many inscribed white sheets within. Reading some of it made it clear that it was a heretical piece that demonized the old gods, but as he read more, he realized that it was a cleverly hidden informational piece. It detailed the Kessho-min pantheon and what their domains were, but not all of the information was entirely accurate and a lot was simply missing. Perhaps worship of them was forbidden.

He read more until Minna was done praying, at which point she climbed to her feet and turned to him. She snickered to herself when she noticed that he was still absorbed in reading and crept forward. She grabbed his shoulder suddenly to spook him with a "Boo!". His wings quickly expanded into spikes and he turned to smack her with the object he was holding, but he stopped just short of hitting her.

"Don't try to scare me like that. I could have injured you." He glared at her and his wings shrunk again. When he noticed that she was trying her best to not burst out laughing, he whacked her gently on the head.

"Ouch. You remind me of one of those elite soldiers. Lightning-fast reflexes to repel surprise attacks. Were you a soldier?" She was unfazed by almost getting impaled on a spike of crystal, her curiosity now much more intense. "Well, let's go now. We can talk on the way to the museum."

Renso nodded in confirmation, then followed her as soon as she started walking. "Yeah, I was a soldier."

Minna looked down, obviously watching her step as she descended the stairs. "So, were you alive back in ancient times, or are you just a descendant of the crystal people who kept their technology and knowledge?"

"I was alive in ancient times. Easiest way to explain why I’m still alive is that I was frozen."

"Strange. You do look a little old because of your hair color. How do your wings work? Are they just like an arm or a leg where you can move them at will?"

"Yes. I can even reshape them if I want, but that practice is frowned upon. It undermines the work of the craftsman. As for how they work, they were fused to my essence. It's done with a spell."

"A spell? So were the craftsmen also wizards? That seems amazing, I never thought that magic and inventing could be used together. I suppose it makes sense if Vudona's domains involve both. Ooh, does this mean that most of your people's technology involves magic?"

"A lot of it does. Instead of those strange flimsy sheets, we used scribe crystals to record information. They would etch writing or illustrations into themselves if a small amount of magic was applied. There were also ones which could hold a large amount of information by changing the words shown. Most people learned how to use them at a young age. I wouldn't be surprised if they survived this long."

"Flimsy sheets? Oh, do you mean paper? Yeah, paper tears and burns easily, and gets much more flimsy if it gets wet. I guess you've never seen a book, either. What you're holding is a book!" Minna then glanced around. "Oh, the museum is this way. C'mon!" She grabbed his hand and pulled him along.

They arrived in front of a building with a grand entrance supported by pillars. A plaque proclaimed the building as the Cloudshore City Museum of the Ancients. Renso frowned at the idea of his people being considered "ancients", but wiped the expression from his face when Minna turned to look at him.