Symonne looked around as Pearloats Pasture gave way to Great Camelot Bridge, which would eventually set them on Zaphgott Moor, she was surprised at how close the Plitzerback Wetlands were now.
"So, Rose, going to give us a clue about the divine artifact?" Edna casually inquired.
"Nope," Rose replied, equally informal, "but I will say this: I'm pretty sure it is or could count as a divine artifact! And if it's not...well, we'll find something!"
"Fairly certain." Edna sighed, shaking her head, "Should that be 'failing certain', Rose?"
"Maybe, but I've got a good feeling about this," Rose assured, "as good a feeling as when I recommended the Sparrowfeathers mabo curry buns, you remember those, right?"
Edna crossed her arms, aghast, "You're incredible."
"Ha, ha, it's okay, I think the inn in Lohgrin has them, we'll stop there before diving into the Arctus Ruins." Rose promised.
"I'm holding you to it." Edna warned.
Alisha watched on, unsure if she should be worried or amused, "Um, is there something I'm missing, here?"
"There's something you're missing out," Rose turned around and grinned, "that all ends shortly after we arrive in Lohgrin!"
"What happened to 'I think the inn in Lohgrin has them'?" Edna teased.
Rose chuckled, "Well, Edna, I'm feeling more confident about it every step of the way!"
They ordered their meal and started away from Lohgrin, as the seating was limited.
"We'd better not take too long in finding a place to sit down," Rose advised, "mabo curry buns are best wolfed down hot!"
"Elegant." Edna breathed, "We've come to expect nothing less, from you."
"It is true, though," Lailah grew solemn as she spoke, "it's a pity that they're not the same when I reheat them."
"They smell really great." Alisha remarked, carefully accepting hers as Lailah handed them out.
"Whoa," Symonne frowned at her bun and stared at it, "that's...hmm, that's really good."
"Amazing, huh?" Lailah agreed, "Rose was asked to choose between two foods; instead she mixed them together."
"Incredible!" Alisha exclaimed, having taken a few bites.
"I'll say," Edna replied, "how Rose came up with it, I'll never know."
"N-not that," Alisha said quietly, hoping Edna wouldn't be angry with her, "I just meant that about the food, but it's amazing how no one thought of it before."
"Necessity," Rose remarked, "is the mother of invention."
"It does seem necessary now, huh?" Edna remarked.
"I agree," Lailah cried, "encore! Encore!"
"Ha, ha, I guess your mystic arte does have something about a concerto." Rose chuckled.
"Oh, oh, Alisha, you have to hear this one!" Lailah turned around excitedly, "Okay, so I just got back from a crucible, and Edna was talking about how-"
"Lailah, don't." Edna frowned.
"But, Edna, that was my best pun yet!" Lailah waited for Edna to huff and start walking faster before turning back to Alisha, "So, she was talking about how sparks were flying, and her dress almost caught fire, so I said to her, 'Sorry, I guess when you're with a fire seraph, you're in for no danger!'"
"Uh, in for no danger?" Alisha stared, dumbstruck, "In for...I'm afraid I'm at a loss, but I'm prepared to apologize with a performance of-"
"Inferno danger, inferno!" Lailah cried jubilantly.
"O-oh, sorry...but that is very funny! I just...didn't get it."
"That's okay, not a word you hear a lot of, is it?"
"No."
"You know you don't have to do the normincarena, right?"
"I'm still up to my ears in debt with Seraph Edna, though."
"Uh...n-"
"Don't!" Edna bellowed sternly, turning to face the distant fire seraph.
"O-okay." Lailah shook her head and sighed.
Symonne witnessed the spectacle from start to finish, wondering why Edna was allowed to tease the Squire, it was probably something she'd have to ask Lailah later, or speculate with Rose about.
After crossing the hot, dry desert and the warm, humid wetlands, and asking if they fought anything that may left that footprint only to get a negative, she finally stood face to face with the ruins that Rose thought held her divine artifact within.
"Rose, are you sure about this?" Lailah wondered, turning to the Shepherd.
"Yep, Symonne needs this, and everything about the Arctus Ruins seems to be long forgotten."
"So, that's what we're here for?" Edna asked incredulously.
"That's right." Rose turned to the dark seraph and Squire, "You two will see soon enough."
Symonne could tell Rose was moderately afraid, the darkness and echoes of their footsteps had her constantly looking over her shoulder, Edna noticed to, and smiled as she started to tease her.
"Scared, Rose?" Edna inquired.
"Eh, I don't mind," Rose shrugged nonchalantly, "but if you want, I could hum, or hold your hand, or maybe buy a bunch of lanterns and-"
"Ugh, you were so much more fun the first time around." Edna groaned.
"It's okay if you're scared," Alisha said, thinking this was a serious conversation, "you don't have to fight...I'll fight them hard enough for me and you!"
"That won't be necessary." Edna replied firmly.
"This should be the room." Rose muttered, leading the group inside the chamber.
Alisha gasped as she saw the large mirror in the room and turned to Lailah, "That's the one?"
"Yes, the woman who was entombed with it lived very long ago," Lailah turned her attention back to the mirror, "for the mirror itself to still be in such good condition, I can see what Rose sees in it."
"Well, what do you think?" Rose stood between the mirror and her friends, "Symonne, if you don't want the mirror, or this just seems too weird-"
"I hate that mirror," Symonne spat, "that was mine...and a reminder that even as a human I brought nothing but pain to those close to me!"
"Symonne?!" Rose was surprised when Symonne fell to the ground, "You could have told us if you-" she jumped back as the grief and rage filled sobs turned into roars and hisses from a red crested, black scaled, purple horned dragonling.
"Can't say I didn't see that coming." Edna sighed.
"She's weak to water and wind!" Lailah announced, turning to Rose, who nodded.
Rose held out her hand, the Sacred Blade appearing in her hand as she shouted, "Fethmus Mioma!"
Alisha stepped forward and turned to Edna, "Do you think I could be able to-"
"I guess you could try." Edna shrugged.
"O-okay, Hephsin Yulind!" Alisha cried, and suddenly she felt a great power surround her, "This is the power of the armatus?"
"Yeah, you should be able to instinctively know what attacks we're capable of like this," Edna informed, "so whatever you do, don't doubt yourself...maybe you could even use the mystic arte, I feel like you could use the spiritual power of earth."
"Got it!" Alisha stormed over to where a pillar of flame struck the ground, knocking Symonne back as she charged at the duo, and blocked Symonne's next attack on Lailah and Rose, and swung her fists at Symonne a few times before unleashing the mystic arte Earth Revolution.
"Now!" Rose shouted, dearmitizing, while Lailah started charging her seraphic arte.
"Wind and water are her weaknesses," Edna told the Squire, "Lailah has an arte that uses both."
Alisha was surprised when lightning struck Symonne, even more so when it had an apparent effect on her, "Again, Lailah!" Rose shouted encouragingly, "You two just keep holding her off!"
Symonne felt centuries of long buried bitterness and resentment bubbling within her, the phantom pain from her life as a human and abandonment from her seraphim friends, for centuries she fought, then she met Heldalf, and now she was back, fighting her feelings again, but she felt herself losing control as she drowned in her memories.
The last moment of her first turn on the wheel of life was a painful conclusion. She was a sickly princess who the other children often mistook as a ghost, and with the dark hair framing her pale face, her own reflection startled even her at times. Her family offered grand rewards to whoever could provide the cure for whatever caused her illness and the child lived on the hope of promises that were never to be fulfilled, even as the last of her life faded she looked forward to the day when she wouldn't be stuck indoors half the time.
Her mind drifted to later years, to the days when she met a small group of seraphim, they took to traveling together, and somehow misfortune always found them, they later learned about seraphim with cursed blessings and made a pledge to never part ways, that they'd always be together.
They broke that promise and left her alone when they discovered the dire curses she could bring upon them, curses that grew stronger the longer she was left alone, until the day she found her friends, crying she demanded to know why they left her, it was simply because her curses were deadly, they told her she should have realized that, and rebuked her for bringing her disease and famine to the town they were visiting, the malevolence generated from those suffering her curses turned her friends into the beginnings of dragons, it wasn't until the Shepherd purified them that she left.
"You're a living, breathing blight, I ought to cut you down where you stand!" the Shepherd hissed.
Symonne stared at the sharp edge resting just above her nose and started crying, she fell to her knees and waited for the Shepherd to kill her when another misfortune struck: Somebody initiated a duel with the Shepherd. Symonne turned around after the first strike to the Shepherd's blade and found the pair were smiling as they dueled, so she ran before the Shepherd decided to kill her anyway.
In hindsight, the Shepherd may have hoped to fight a dragon, and that was why the distraction was permitted instead of an announcement of a seraph's execution, whatever the case, she ran and didn't think twice about finding her friends again, if it was a hopeless case once, then it would be again, and she wouldn't be abandoned twice by the same people.
A blaze pulled her from the torrent of her thoughts, and she found silver flames dancing on her arms, and vanishing into the floor around her. She felt an arm on her shoulder and looked up to find Lailah staring worriedly at her. She saw the faces of her new companions, and she saw her own ghostly face and violet eyes. She knew she was staring at the mirror, but she smiled anyways.
"What is my name, Shepherd?" she asked, staring at the mirror.
"Um, how about Lux Tenebris?" Rose suggested.
"Irony?" Symonne growled, eyebrows twitching.
"No," Rose sat on one knee and found Symonne's eyes, "I just thought...there's a lot of light in you, it's just...in a lot of darkness. Anyways, I could come up with something else-"
"Purple Petunia." Enda suggested, looking away when Symonne and Rose turned to her, "What about you, Lailah?"
"How about...Lavender Reflector?" Lailah offered enthusiastically.
"U-um, if I must make a proposition," Alisha began, "how about...Violet Shadows?"
Symonne crossed her arms and allowed a small smile, "It's true, though."
"We can come up with some-" Rose started, when Symonne shook her head and walked past her, "Symonne?"
"Lux Tenebris has a nice ring to it." Symonne shrugged, "I'll answer to it...Purple Petunia was a close second, though."
The other three turned to Edna as the sound of an umbrella's ferrule hitting the floor resounded, Edna watched the others watching her and glared, "What, I didn't expect her to say that! Now she's just teasing me."
"You're not angry though, are you?" Rose smirked.
"N-not in particular...we should go, now that Purple Petunia has her true name." Edna retrieved her umbrella and rested it on her shoulder.882Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡX6tlJmbdS2
Rose nodded, "Right, we should investigate the odd levels of concentrated Malevolence now."882Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡRwcSV3Usgr
ANs: Alright, so, I don't know the system used for true names in Zestiria so I used Latin and Google to translate Symonne's true name, which I wanted to be Dark Light, but Lux Tenebris just rolled off the tongue better, I could imagine Rose shouting it to armatize more than I could with Tenebris Lux. 882Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡ4CBXDBBDbY
