Chapter 90: Call of the Goddess

Page stared at the floor. Where there used to be a Lawyer was now just shoe-shaped burn marks.

“She’s not dead, is she?” Page muttered. She looked at each person in the room. “Right? Right?”

The door burst open with sword-wielding Maids taking up positions around the room. “Get the guests out!” the Head Maid shouted. Page felt a hand grasp her arm, and there wasn’t even so much as an ‘excuse me’ as she got pulled out of that room.

***

The remaining group once again convened in Shal-yen’s receiving room as soon as the panic had settled down. Page, Alsae, Deckert, and Shal-yen were all in various states of shock and fluster.

Shal-yen was staring out the window, observing the last rays of sun finally dimming down. Had it been the work demons, he wondered. He was among those privy to such information, but he couldn’t divulge it to the others in the room.

“Ah!” Page shot up to her feet from a reading couch. “Isn’t it divine intervention?”

Most people would have laughed, but these were crazy times. The Temples of Reincarnation had acknowledged the other month’s miracle as the work of Minimine, so it wasn’t in the realm of insanity to think that she did other things. Who knew what went through the mind of a goddess?

“I’ll go ask her,” Page said. She started walking, heading straight for the door.

“What do you mean?” Alsae asked, keeping her eyes on her as she passed by.

Page turned her head around as she continued walking. “I’m just asking her, be right back!”

The door opened; the door closed. Just what was going on with that girl? “Maybe she meant to go to the temple and ask the Priestess for advice?” Deckert sensibly postulated. Alsae readily nodded her head, but Shal-yen…he continued to stare out at the window, knowing that out there, somewhere, was actually Minimine herself. Arpeggio had told him about it, after all. He’d mentally filed it away as a joke with a nonzero chance of being true. Guess how that turned out, huh?

Outside, Jyn was on her toes. She had been admiring the flowers when Maids and Guards started running around, and as someone with a sword, herself, she took to standing by the keep’s giant doors. Gallant as she stood, she wished that she wouldn’t meet the would-be assailant out here. She just wanted to go home.

A smaller door opened further down, and she breathed a sigh of relief as she spotted Page rushing out in a hurry. “Page!” she shouted after her. The girl spun around. Her armor was off by now, but she’d kept Kalender’s staff in her hands like she was expecting trouble to show up at any moment.

“Jyn!” Page ran towards her, stopping in a huff. “I need to ask Minimine something. Can you come with me?”

“Does it have something to do with a while ago?”

At that, Page’s face twisted into some confuzzled expression. “Wow, you won’t believe what just happened a while ago!”

Jyn smiled. It was an odd feeling, seeing and hearing Page be excited. “Let’s talk about it on the way.”

“Sure!” Page almost jumped along with her tone.

The two strode on out of the castle’s gates, and Page happily talked about her first confrontation with a Lawyer resulting in the Lawyer’s turning into a flash of light, as if smote by some higher power. Kinda made sense she’s looking for Minimine, now that Jyn heard the whole story.

Although Jyn felt apprehensive about going such a far distance right when the sun’s gone down, she got Page to at least agree to pick up Kalender on the way, and hopefully also Lilia.

They were entering an alley, now—a particularly dark one. It was supposed to be a shortcut, but… Jyn stopped walking.

Page looked around, but she couldn’t see a thing. “W-why are we” —

“Hush.”

A hooded figure emerged from the shadows. No one could tell where the shadows ended and where the figure began.

Page clutched her staff, magic raring to go at any moment. “Jyn!” she called out in a hush, expecting the Knight to draw out her sword in a flash…and yet, her sword was only halfway out of its sheathe. “Jyn?” she called out again.

“She’s not an enemy,” Jyn said.

“So I’m not a friend, either? How hurtful,” a familiar voice called out. The figure lifted her hood for a moment, just enough for Page to see.

Her eyes widened. “Sherry!”

Maid Sherry—a character that I doubt most of us here recall, but she was, in fact, canon. “I’ve only been busy, madame.” She looked at Jyn. “A certain goddess wants to talk to you. Come with me.”

Page should be happy that the person she was looking for was also reaching out to her—if it weren’t for the fact that a shady Maid had to be the Jyn followed after her. Page fidgeted a little before following after Jyn. It’s darker in that direction, okay!

They passed through a winding mess of alleys, and it seemed as if they’d crossed the same place multiple times by now—that was, until Sherry raised a hand to stop before knocking on a door.

The door cracked open, and the eyes which peered out only had to take one good look at Sherry before the door closed again, followed by the sounds of heavy things being unbarred. The door flew open the whole way after that, and Sherry ushered Jyn and Page inside.

The woman by the door, Page realized, was a Cleric.

The Cleric gave her a sharp look. Page nodded, and the Cleric nodded back.

Page had no idea what that exchange was about just now, so she just rolled with it.

She followed Jyn and Sherry deeper into the building, sneaking glimpses through the cracked-open doors on either side of the corridor. Inside one room was a Cleric cleaning a Kalender-style air pistol. In the next was another Cleric holding a censer by the its chains, praying and letting the censer swing over a Kalender-style air rifle.

Oh, she knew they were Kalender-style, alright. The idea of air gunnery wasn’t too hard to reproduce, but with the attached gimmicks like reloadable magazines and air tanks? As someone who lived with the guy, there was just no way she wouldn’t recognize that functional aesthetic!

Was Kalender going into the arms trade now? Just what the heck was going on!

Jyn, on the other hand, was more rightly concerned about the fact that they were most likely inside some kind of safehouse meant for the fighters of Minimine’s Temple—or rather, the fact that they were running such a shady covert op at all!

“I’m sure you have questions,” Sherry said. “The Inquisition’s Fourth Night is closely cooperating with the Temple to Minimine.”

Jyn gulped. In truth, she only expected to have a shady meetup in an alley. Being taken into a safehouse which was, no doubt, part of some sort of big shadow war wasn’t in her to-do list. “This isn’t what I expected. I thought” —

“I also thought a lot of things,” Sherry interrupted. She looked over her shoulder, letting Jyn see—for just a moment—a slight frown. “I wish you could’ve brought Kalender as well. We live in dire times.”

“What do you” —

“The goddess wants to tell you, herself.”

Page heard it, too. She and Jyn knew, without even creating the words in their minds, that something bad had happened, and these peaceful days were coming to an end.

They steeled themselves. They’ll defend each other. They’ll defend Kalender.

They were led up the stairs, then to the door at the end of a corridor, guarded by two Clerics. Recognizing Sherry and Kalender’s friends, one of them knocked on the door. “They’re here,” she said—and the door opened for them.

Page held onto Jyn’s arm as they went through.

Inside was a gathering of all of Minimine’s Priestesses in Lyrica, including Tak and Cecilia—twenty of them, in all. They took their places around a round table, arguing over and pointing at a giant map of Lyrica and the surrounding countries sprawled over the table. The edges of the map wanted to curl inwards, if it weren’t for the thousand-year-old marble statuettes being used as mere paperweights.

Jyn and Page stood frozen there for a moment, comprehending the scene that was more like a war council. It took a moment before they realized that the person they were looking for was sitting right below them, just within arm’s reach.

Her back was against them one moment, and the next, that familiar head of mint green hair flipped around, showing them a face full of worry. Minimine hadn’t wanted to call them here under these circumstances, but the world wouldn’t wait for them. They had to get ready.

For a moment, no one said a thing, but upon closer inspection of Minimine’s face, Jyn gasped. “What—what happened?”

Jyn’s gasp drew panic from Page, and Minimine’s deepening frown wasn’t lost to all parties…but even after staring at Minimine for a long time, Page just couldn’t find what Jyn was so shocked about! So, she slowly raised her hand—steadily—getting Jyn’s attention just as incrementally. “W-what am I looking at?” she asked.

Jyn pointed at Minimine’s face. Minimine herself was a little shocked at this, as no one had ever dared to point at her like this before. Not that she felt offended; it was just sudden.

Page squinted at the point of interest, and there, on Minimine’s cheek, was a superficial scratch that was more like a slight abrasion. It was just a couple of millimeters of jagged white skin; did it even count as a real scratch? Even paper could’ve caused a deeper wound.

“A scratch?” Page said. She looked at Jyn. “S-should I dab an ointment on it?” Just, really, what was the problem here? Did goddesses have high-maintenance skin?

Jyn sighed. “No—alright…it’s alright that you don’t immediately understand.”

Page wanted to be on the edge of tears here, because damn it! Someone explain, already!

“Page,” Jyn continued, “it’s not healing.”

Page turned around and looked at the fun-sized goddess, who, by the way, had the highest defense and regeneration ability of any being currently walking the surface of Gaia.

She cupped her in chin in thought, saying “I see” like she finally caught onto what was going on, even if she definitely hadn’t. It took her slightly longer to find the issue, but when she did, she finally made a more appropriate reaction, cupping her cheeks with a slap as it fully dawned on her. _“Oh no_.”

Now that Page was on the same page, Jyn faced Minimine. “Who did this to you?” she asked, both concern and upset evident in the stern tone she used.

Minimine looked up at Jyn, then away from her. The Knight’s earnestness and sincerity, from back then and until now…it hurt her in the much the same way as one of her Clerics declaring that she’d offer up her soul for the cause.

“Value your lives more,” Minimine replied. It was such an off-track reply to Jyn’s straightforward question that the Knight had to shake her head and blink. Minimine realized the error in her answer a heartbeat later. “Sorry,” she said, “the enemy this time is extremely dangerous.”

Jyn and Page gulped. It was Jyn’s turn to hold Page’s hand, though only because she thought in advance that Page would get too nervous.

Thus, Minimine began to recount the events of just two hours ago, the same event which had almost made her lose heart…