The few folks in the crowd who had their suspicions from the beginning began to raise their voices in anger.
"YOU'VE BEEN LYING TO US THIS WHOLE TIME!"
"YOU MURDERED MY SON!
The more their resentment and hatred towards Li grew, the more their shi began to crumble as it turned pitch black. The soldiers at her side began to turn on her as well when they realized what she had done to their comrades.
"No...wait...THEY'RE LYING! DON'T LISTEN TO THEM."
Unfortunately, her pleas for mercy fell on deaf ears. Frustration and anger filled her head, making her lose all sense of calm as the goal she was so close to reaching started to draw further and further away from her once more. She stumbled back. Realizing that she still had her cult, she quickly got behind her priests as the Sindarian soldiers drew their weapons toward her.
Yukimi's shi detector began spinning wildly. "Your Majesty, the levels of corrupted shi are getting out of control!"
Hearing Yukimi's cry to Illya, another idea popped into Li's head, she zoned in on all the dark shi within a certain area from her and began murmuring a spell. A beastly roar shook the crowd, drawing their attention to the people closer to Li. People with particularly high levels of dark shi were blanketed with veins of dark shi that pulsed just beneath the surface of their skin. As it spread, they began to transform into ghastly creatures that were sent into a violent frenzy. Black tendrils veined through them as their root shi became corrupted. Li's spell was able to reach as far as the docks where Gabriel too began to feel its effects.
"What's wrong?" Asked Avarice, springing up from where he was sitting.
Gabriel was in too much pain to form words. The way his veins became black with corrupted shi reminded Avarice of what his mother looked like not too long ago. When realization struck, he sprinted up the basement steps and pulled the family out of the house, just as Gabriel's monstrous form broke through the floors.
Illya and the others could see him towering over the houses from where they were. She frowned, driving her spear through the eyes of one of the beasts. "Kill them! Their root shi's been completely corrupted, we can't revert them back to normal!"
"What about the people at the docks! We won't be able to reach them in time!" Hecate "yelled" back as she too finished off one of the beasts.
"Don't worry about that! They should be getting evacuated right now!"
Red pulled his last transportation scroll out of his robes. "Illya! I'm gonna bring that big guy over there to us so he can't stop their evacuation! Round all the beasts up so you can absorb them!"
The portal opened, allowing Red to dash through. A ship with intricately carved patterns could be seen ushering people on board. Zarah and Ri-is were at the front making sure everyone got on safely.
"Looks like you managed to get the message to us just in time," she said.
Ri-is smiled. "Sin thought your conversion to a floating brothel would be convenient. I suppose he does have good ideas every now and then."
"HEY! YOUR HIGHNESS!"
Ri-is looked down to see where the shouting was coming from. Red was frantically waving at him to come over.
"HURRY BEFORE THE PORTAL CLOSES!"
Ri-is' wings burst open as he flew over.
"I need you to put him under an illusion and get him to follow us through the portal! Quickly!" he explained, pointing at Gabriel who was getting closer to them with every passing second, destroying everything in his way.
Ri-is flew up so he was eye level with Gabriel and swung his pendulum. Gabriel slowed down as he entered the illusion. Ri-is had made it so that Gabriel thought that the ship was in the other direction and so Gabriel began to chase after it. Red ran back through the portal with Gabriel close behind. Once he was through and the portal closed, the illusion broke. He roared in frustration and began to scan the area for a new target.
Egan and Isabelle were helping Illya pile beasts onto the stage around Li and her priests who were effectively trapped by them. Once they caught sight of Gabriel coming toward them, Illya summoned her chains and threw them over to Red. Hecate got the remaining survivors out of the way as Red grabbed the chains and pulled them hard, causing Gabriel to trip and slam into the stage, covering it completely and crushing many of the priests to death in the process.
Although Li was fairly shielded by them, her legs were not as fortunate and they were crushed under the sheer weight of everything. She desperately attempted to use her magic but the lack of oxygen was making her quite lightheaded and unable to think up a spell to get her out of this situation.
Once Gabriel was on the stage with the other beasts, Illya got to work. Her eyes lit up in gold and purple, her black hair briefly paled into the light violet it once was and she was swarmed by the shi as she pulled it towards her. The beats disintegrated one by one as she destroyed and purified their shi before absorbing it all. When Li was all that was left on the stage, Illya walked up to her. She leaned down so Li could hear her.
"You can drop dead without worries now Your Majesty."
Before Li could respond, Illya began to break down her shi as well. Illya didn't absorb her shi though. She simply let it decay in her hands along with Li's resentment and rage. It all became dust to be carried away by the wind.
And when there were no more panicked screams and buildings crashing down, when children were no longer crying for their parents and Yukimi's device had gone still, they knew they had come out victorious.
•~•~•~•~•~•~•
December • 12 • xxxx
While he waited for his glasses to be ready, gossip about what was happening in Sindaria reached his ears. He was happy of course that his mother was alive but part of him cried out in loneliness not being able to be there when his family greeted her again. He was pulled from his thoughts by the clerk handing him the glasses back. He didn't need to wait very long since they had been kept in good condition. As lost in thought as he was, he did notice Yiran fiddling with something in his pocket.
"What's the matter?"
Yiran looked up, chuckling softly. "It's nothing it's just...I want you to have this." He took the glasses from Ea and attached a chain of golden beads to it. "This was a charm I got from Tah Min before I was exiled from the Summer Isle...she said it would protect me. I was just thinking...you should have it. Consider it a gift....from the both of us."
Ea ran his hands over the beads, his eyes welling up for a moment. He sniffled, putting on his glasses and throwing his arms around Yiran. "Thank you."
•~•~•~•~•~•~•
Ea and Yiran had returned to the shrine to see if Koteru had succeeded in creating the child. When they arrived, they saw Koteru cradling a child in his arms, singing softly to it.
"It worked!"
Koteru smiled at them. "It did! I can't thank you enough!"
"Don't mention it. We just stopped by to see if it went well," said Ea.
"Where will you two go now?"
Ea and Yiran looked at each other. "Hmm...we're not quite sure. We've just been wandering from inn to inn. We don't really have a plan," explained Yiran.
Koteru thought for a moment. "Y'know..." he said, "I could use some extra hands around the shrine. If you're willing to, you can always stay here with us!"
"Are you sure that's okay?"
"Of course. Think of it as my way of repaying you for the scale!"
Yiran excitedly ran up to Koteru and the baby, thanking them profusely. As Ea watched the scene unfold in front of him he couldn't help but think that even though he wasn't able to go home, he was more than happy having the family he found here with him.
•~•~•~•~•~•~•
May • 30 • xxxx
Illya smiled at the letter in her hands.
"Another letter from Sin?" asked Callisto.
She nodded. "Faustus got stuck in a tree the other day."
Callisto chuckled. "That sounds like him alright."
Illya looked out of the window, thinking back to the months prior. When she was finally reunited with Callisto and her children, they couldn't hug her long enough. Many tears and hugs later, they got to work restoring what had been lost throughout their war with Sindaria.
With the help of Tobi and Ri-is, Fionna was able to build a new orphanage that housed all of the children left without their parents after the war. Egan and Isabelle came by frequently to help take care of things.
Solarian forces had temporarily moved into Sindaria to help stabilize things while they rebuilt their government. Those who did not have the means to rebuild their homes went with Illya when she decided to move back to Aruma An, where her elder brother was. There they were able to find houses and new lives for themselves, though it wasn't a very easy transition.
The Solarian court members no longer pestered Sin about having a political marriage. Illya had put a stop to that soon after returning. In fact, many had their wealth confiscated for colluding with enemy forces and were thrown into prison.
Callisto's voice snapped her out of her reminiscing. "The weather is quite nice, do you want to go for a walk?"
Illya adjusted her eye patch as she stood and took his hand. When she re-forged her contract with Zagan and Seibel, the new contract seals took quite a while to heal. Zagan's mark on her back was still sore and occasionally bled, even all these months later and she was still unable to hide Seibel's mark on her eye. Regardless, she was happy to be with them again.
The rising sun showered over the pair as they strolled through the gardens.
Regardless of your place in history, the soft warmth of dawn often brings with it, hope.
Hope that feels unbreakable.
Hope that births happiness.
Although their story began with the silence of dusk, the sun will always rise to shine again. Be it on the crown that sits atop an Emperor's head or the beads on an exiled prince's chains, The dawn will always come and with it, new life.
New, hope.
New, happiness.
FIN98Please respect copyright.ＰＥＮＡＮＡaGos9Nj27O
