Divine pressure pressed down upon Denise and she overheard Nicholas say "You honor us Great Goddess Elysia."

The goddess chuckled and replied "with your actions, you honor your mother." She walked to Nicholas and leaned over Nicholas. "When I was lost in the void, I felt the pain of my statuette being surrounded by the death of unborn children. For freeing my statuette of that terrible ritual, I blessed you with greater fertility."

"I thank you Great Goddess for your gift."

"I hope you find the one to use it with." Elysia placed a hand upon Nicholas' head and continued, "I see you have changed greatly from the time you were in your mother's womb. I see you are beginning to form a spark of the divine, fed from Everlais power, then Skydias. How interesting, I wonder what you will become."

As she spoke, a soft glow appeared from her hand, a fleshy cord emerged from Nicholas belly. It rose and entered the goddess. "Feed once more from a mother's womb." She said, and Nicholas curled into a ball with a glow entering into his body as he lay on the ground.

Walking over to Frankie with the cord trailing behind her, the goddess continued "While I see potential in all of you, I can not ask you to be my followers. Each of you has another calling in life, though I will stand next to you should you bear children." She looked over Frankie and patted her on the shoulder "I see you bear a curse from my close friend Luksami. Tell me child do you regret what you did to receive that curse?"

Denise looked over at Frankie and saw she looked hesitant to answer. In time Frankie said "I'm unsure how to answer that Great Goddess Elysia. These days I find my thoughts are confused in this matter. What I find I regret is accepting the job to steal her statuette. Yet at the same time I am not quite sure I hate the curse."

"I am afraid I cannot help you clear the confusion. Only you can comprehend what you desire. Just know this child; I can see that your heart is still good, your actions have not been made in malice towards others. For you child I will bestow upon you a name. Your mother named you, so shall I name you. I can see there is a wealth deep within your soul, you just need to discover it. I grant you the last name Divitia." 

When Elysia gave Frankie the name, Denise saw Frankie shudder as a warm glow suffused her. Afterwards Frankie bowed deeply before Elysia, "Thank you for granting me a name, Great Goddess Elysia."

The Goddess continued onward and stopped in front of Denise and Debra. Looking at the both of them, she said "Ah I see your mother was gifted with twins. Two for the price of one." Elysia smiled a them "How joyful for your mother"

Debra rubbed her head and said "With the way we acted in our childhood, my mother may not agree with that sentiment fully."

Laughing the goddess said "Fear not, while it is more difficult to raise twins, I do feel her mother's love deep in the both of you. For the both of you, I see you have a unique bond. It is only for those who have shared the same womb, and the same egg. I will increase your link to that bond for your blessing. Raise your hands children."

Denise lifted her hand into the air, while her sister did the same thing. Elysia gripped her hand into her right and took Debra's in her left. The warmth of the goddess's hands strangely felt like her mothers. A strong power seemed to flow into her and a connection seemed to activate between Denise and her sister. A deep blue screen popped up as soon as the connection awakened.

You have received a Blessing of Elysia! Your bond with your sister has increased, now you can feel what she feels and knows what she knows. In an emergency you can willingly share your HP and MP with her and she can do the same with you. As a side note Jack has provided you a way to intentionally block the sensations in case you wish privacy. Emergency feelings will still get through the bond, however.

After quickly reading through it, Denise closed the window. When she did so, she discovered the goddess looking curiously at the pair of them. "How interesting, I just felt a power I don't recognize flow through the pair of you. Now that I look closer, I see that three of you hold a connection to this power." 

"That was the System God that we have signed a contract with. His name is Jack. He is also the host for Everlai." Denise replied.

Elysia nodded and reached down and cut the cord that was still between her and Nicholas. When she did so, Nicholas awoke and sat back up looking a bit dazed. The Goddess said "That is very fascinating. I will have to contact him sometime to thank him for taking care of my friend. As I see you did not come to become my followers, I must ask you why you decided to summon me?"

Denise looked over at Nicholas and saw him shake his head to clear it and said "As you have felt Great Goddess Elysia, my best friend has been cursed by the Goddess Luksami. We are currently going around and waking up your group to help convince the Goddess Luksami to lift the curse."

The Goddess gave a meaningful glance towards Frankie and said "I see. Based on the state of the curse on your friend, I can sense Luksami has passed away, so it will be a challenge even with all of the group to call her back."

Nichoals bent over and touched his head to the ground in a pleading motion. "I know we ask a tremendous boon from you, whatever price you ask I will deliver."

Support creative writers by reading their stories on Royal Road, not stolen versions.

"I see you care deeply for your friend. Do not worry, I will not ask more than what a mother would expect from her child. To be precise, what I require from you is an ordinary task, and one that will not take you out of your way. Since you have already awoken Skydia, then me. I can make a guess that the next one you will be heading to will be Croeus the God of Knowledge of Books." 

"Yes, you are right Goddess Elyrias. Though we did not know his name, only that he was a god of knowledge. His temple is the next closest to your temple. It will take at least a week for us to walk there."

"He is my third born son. I am delighted you will call him back to this world. I ask you when you do awaken him, be sure to deliver him this package." Elysia waved her hand and a large box appeared. "Don't open it; it's a surprise for him. After you give it to him, please let him know I would have him to come to visit me as soon as you are done speaking with him."

Nicholas nodded and said "That is within my power to achieve Great Goddess Elysia."

"Good, with my return I can sense there are many in this world calling me. I must go and aid where I can. Farewell children, we will meet again when you head to Luksami's temple. Know I will be with you should you decide to become mothers." Elysia waved goodbye and her form disappeared away from the temple room.

As Denise stood, she also could feel her sister standing. Debra experimented by raising her arm, and Denise could feel it as it rose. "Wow this is going to be useful when we are working together on some of the blacksmithing projects I have in mind." Debra said.

Looking down at herself, Denise rubbed the lipstick and said "This is going to get everywhere." Sighing she opened the Equipment screen and put on her armor. "Did we do everything we are required to do here?"

"Yeah, we are done here." Nicholas said. At that time he approached the large box and put inside his inventory. 

"Will we have to climb up the side of the canyon?" Debra asked.

"No, there is a switchback road if we go to the far end of the canyon, we will use that to head towards the next temple. Like I said it will take us a week, maybe more to get to the next temple. But there is a problem we might encounter as we get closer to it."

"What is it?" Denise asked.

"You may not know, but our neighboring kingdom is at war with the Empire. The Temple we are going to is very close to the border, exactly where they are currently battling from what I hear. While technically neither side should be entering our kingdom, there is a risk we might run into one of their armies."

"Will they assault us?" Debra asked.

"Maybe, depends on if they are acting in secret or not. It's best not to find out, so we may need to be stealthy at times."

"Got it. We already have Necromancers on our tail, and a monstrous Banshee that is actively hunting you. So why not add some soldiers to the mix?" Denise said.

"Will we be stopping at any towns or cities on the trip to the temple?" Debra said. "There are some supplies I would like to get."

Nicholas pulled out a map and took a look at it and nodded. "We can stop briefly at a city. It should take us four days to get there. It might not have much supply given how close it is to the war, though."

"We will see." Frankie said, pulling on her clothes. "Now let's get going, I want to get out of this canyon before night. I have a feeling it's going to get cold in here."

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While sitting on his horse, Telvin jerked his horse to a stop when Lord Attomas let out the signal that they were stopping for the day. As he moved forward again to get to the area where they will be storing the horses for the night, he could see there was a massive cave entrance on the side of a cliff of a mountain. They had gotten into the mountains early today, with the white peaks looming far over them.

Telvin dismounted from his horse and could smell a scent of magic in the air. It was so thick, it made his skin tingle. Megan frowned and said "This is way more intense then what I expected. We are not even inside, and I can feel it on my skin."

Maetrin pulled out some jars and passed them around. "We should be safe from magic overdose while we are camping out here tonight, but before we head down into the caves, we all need to apply this magic block lotion. It will last twelve hours and will allow you to handle the increased magic load, so you won't get burned."

Telvin took the jar and took a sniff. Surprisingly it didn't smell as bad as he feared. He placed it away and said "Is there a limit to how much it can block?"

"Yeah, it can only block up to ten times the average levels. At more elevated levels it will still deflect some, but we should however limit our exposure as much as possible. If there is an emergency, I do have a higher grade one, but it's of limited supply. It's only to get us to lower levels as fast as possible"

Alexia spoke up and said "Is anyone else getting a creepy feeling from that cave mouth?"

Looking back at the cave entrance, Telvin did get an eerie feeling from it. Like it was trying to both entice them to enter the cave and push them away. "Yeah, that is an unpleasant feeling." Telvin said.

"Apparently beyond the entrance is a maze. It's apparently under some illusionary spell, that might be what we are experiencing." Megan said.

Jack came along and passed out the tent supplies. He had a morose look upon his face and was quiet for the trip. Telvin got the sense that it was best to leave him alone for the moment and was setting up his tent along with Veronica when he caught sight of a pink parasol next to where he was standing.

Turning around, he found Lady Niadas was staring at him. "Can I help you Lady Niadas?"

"I believe you can. May I speak with you in private?"

"I think I learned my lesson in speaking with people in private. If you have something to state I must ask you to say it here." Telvin said.

"How about this, you bring her with us and then we won't be alone." Lady Niadas pointed at Veronica.

Veronica looked at them and shrugged "I don't mind. It's not like we have much else to do tonight."

"Fine. But this better be important Lady Niadas."

"It is." 

They walked over to a small clearing near the camp. Lady Niadas sat down on a large boulder. Telvin sat on a nearby boulder as well. Veronica decided to stand leaning against a thin looking tree.

"I will get straight to the point. As you know, I lost my servants in the attack yesterday. Given that, some of my plans are in danger of failing. Thus, I am seeking your help to help achieve them. I assure you that I will compensate you for helping me achieve them."

"What plans are those?" Telvin said.

"Quite simply I want Lord Attomas to never leave this expedition alive."