Chapter 134: Revelations – Chapter 126: Ambivalence and Assorted Answers

GamingWolf

Looks like 2021 thought 2020 chaos wasn't enough. Stay safe everyone.

Aperio fixed her gaze on her daughter, offering Ferio her undivided attention as she repeated her question. "What did they do?"

Her daughter hesitated for a moment longer before a table and a few couches appeared in the room. "Please, sit," she said, gesturing towards the nearest sofa. "It will take some time to explain."

The All-Mother sighed as she sat herself down, spreading her wings and draping them over each end of the couch. Am I the only one that makes wing-friendly furniture?

A small weight leaning against her caused Aperio to briefly look away from her daughter and sling an arm across Caethya's waist. She wanted to lift her disciple into her lap and just hug her, but that was not appropriate at the moment. Offering her wing as part feathery embrace, part backrest as she did right now was the most she was comfortable with at the moment.

Caethya responded in kind and gently brushed her hand over Aperio's back, her touch a good distraction from what the All-Mother assumed would soon come. A thought darkened the room slightly as Aperio brought a bit of her Void into the Court. Just in case…

The comfort her Void gave her was always appreciated, but when Ferio asked her to promise to not get angry — something she could not do — taking the small extra precaution could not hurt. Not that my Void really prevents me from being angry.

The silence stretched onwards, and there seemed to be no answer forthcoming. Perhaps Ferio did not want to talk about what happened in the presence of the Judges or — something Aperio considered far less likely — she thought that it would reveal that Aperio forgot. If she was honest with herself, however, she did not really care if the Judges figured that out. At one point or another, people would figure it out anyway. The Repens Nabu probably already knows…

"What did they do?" Aperio asked again, her voice only a little less calm than before. Why do I always have to repeat myself?

"Have you encountered a Demon since your return?" Ferio asked.

"I did," Aperio replied with a small nod. "Pesky thing. Mindlessly attacked me until I… purified it." I guess that's the best description.

"Do you know why they exist?"

"No." Didn't really have the opportunity to question it at the time… "But I have a guess. One I do not like."

Ferio shifted a little, glancing at the two Judges who — to Aperio at least — looked as confused as mostly expressionless glowing figures could. "After you left, the Souls of the dead would not always pass on. Some would just sit, stuck between your Void and the realm of the living, doomed to slowly forget without a chance at a new life.

"Some Necromancers," her daughter continued, "took it upon themselves to fix this — have been at it for almost a century now, actually. They bring their own Soul into the space between the realms and either bring the Souls they find back with them, or pass them on to the River."

Ferio rubbed her neck, looking at Aperio. The All-Mother merely tilted her head and moved her free wing a little, asking her daughter to continue. She realized a moment later that her wing-gestures might not be as understood as easily as she had thought but, before she could say anything, Ferio seemed to have gotten the idea.

"Not everyone thought of this as the crisis it was," her daughter said. "Some saw it as an opportunity to test their theories. After all, if the soul never comes back to your Void, it means that it's still alive."

"What did they do?" Aperio asked, her voice coming from every corner of the Court instead of merely her mouth. Weird.

It had not felt any different. She had merely spoken like always, but letting her aura manifest itself a little more seemingly meant manifesting herself more strongly as well. An unwelcome reminder that she was not like the other people in the room.

"Well," Ferio began, her voice growing a little quieter. "They tried to make the most loyal of followers, ones that would stay with them through every life." She paused, waiting for a reaction that did not come. "Everyone knows that the River of Souls cleanses a Soul of everything, but if they never get there?"

"When it's suddenly possible to have followers remain with you, life after life, the forbidden lure of modifying someone's Soul suddenly starts to make sense," Caethya offered after Ferio simply let the question hang in the air.

"To them it did, yes," Ferio said, keeping her eyes fixed on her mother. "But they didn't exactly succeed with what they wanted. Instead, they created the first of what we now know as Demons."

"How fitting," Aperio said in a mocking tone. "The mortals they wanted to force into eternal servitude turned into senseless beasts. Ones that only wish to die, almost as if they would rather forget what they are than serve them."

"Doesn't this make you angry?" Ferio asked, the confusion apparent in her voice when Aperio said nothing further.

"It does," Aperio replied, her voice as neutral as she could manage. While her anger was not as pronounced as she thought it should be, there was still a slow rage that had started to bubble deep within her. "But I do not wish to subject anyone here to my anger." And I can hide it. A little.

It also helped that the rage she felt at the actions of the Repens Nabu somehow felt removed at the moment. Almost as if allowing even a part of herself to exist outside her body dulled her emotions. But I still feel the same about Caethya. More attached, if anything…

While that particular aspect of her emotional range was not truly connected with having a part of herself filling the Court in a misty form, the feelings did feel a little more pronounced now. Do I no longer care for mortals? Aperio tilted her head slightly at the thought. Ferio was correct that she should have been a lot angrier, would have been angrier if this had been revealed to her a few weeks prior. But now? Not so much.

No, she decided with a small shake of her head. I obviously care. Why else would I ask myself this?

"Aperio?" Caethya asked, sitting up a little straighter and placing her hand on the All-Mother's cheek. "You still with us?"

"Yes," Aperio replied, shifting her eyes to look at her disciple's face. A small smile spread across her lips for a brief moment before she schooled her expression again. "I merely thought of something."

"Something that can help us?" Ferio asked, her expression losing the slight touch of worry Aperio had noticed before. "Or did you merely get lost in thought again?"

"Mostly the latter," Aperio replied, removing Caethya's hand from her cheek and taking it into her own instead. "But I am making progress on that too. Interacting with a Dominion like this is… weird, however." At least I don't see everything again.

She still did not enjoy the idea that her normal state of being was an all-encompassing mass of practically nothing. Nothing and everything at once… weird. Aperio had noticed a similarity between her formless self and the Judges, however.

While they did have a body, inside they were just a cloud of mana. Relatively pure mana, but nonetheless just mana. But I am not really mana like they are… Her natural state of being was most definitely something more. An almost imperceptible shake of her head dismissed the thought to the back of her mind as she lifted a wing to stall her daughter's next words.

"I have a question," Aperio said, lowering her wing again and pulling the other feathered limb a little tighter around Caethya. "Is the Repens Nabu responsible for The Rage?"

"Partially, at least," Ferio replied after giving her mother an inspecting glance. "It is more of a side effect to their other experiments than something they consciously did."

"That doesn't make it better," Caethya mumbled from her position beneath Aperio's wing. "I have seen what it does to people… It's horrible."

"Having multiple souls fight over anything is never a pleasant thing," Ferio said with a sigh. "The Judges can attest to that."

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"We can, yes," the Dark Judge said. "A few of the newer deities lost their divinity, some even their lives, for knowingly triggering the condition in mortals that slighted them."

Aperio squinted at the Judges, not quite sure how she felt about their ways of judgement. Not feeling angry is weird. Caethya seemed to think so too, as a bit of her disciple's mana slowly started to dance around her. Is she worried?

The All-Mother let a bit of her own mana flow around her disciple in reply. Caethya shivered slightly as the fog of Aperio's mana brushed past her, causing the winged Goddess to stop her attempt at soothing and instead direct a mental query at Caethya, asking what was wrong.

Apparently, her mana's touch had felt almost like the time she had been formless; just a lot more intense. Because I am not spread out? Aperio wrapped her wing a little tighter still around Caethya, as well as letting go of her hand and instead slowly brushing over her arm. That did not cause Caethya to shiver. Instead, her disciple leaned herself against Aperio's side — the small weight surprisingly heavy.

"How often did that happen?" Aperio asked, a touch of her magic obscuring her disciple from the others in the room. Why Caethya had asked for that, Aperio was not quite sure. The slow heartbeat and slight red tint of the Demigoddess' ears, coupled with the slight sparkling flare of her aura, gave her a good idea. I doubt that should be the reaction to my touch…

"Only a handful of times over the centuries," the Light Judge said. "It is not exactly easy to trick Souls into a body that is already claimed, after all."

"Do you know of The Veil?" Ferio quickly asked, before Aperio had a chance to question the Judges further. "Not as in the actual Veil, but the organization that shares the name."

The All-Mother tilted her head slightly as she thought. She barely knew about the Veil that separated the worlds, having only seen it briefly as she watched Adam arrive on Verenier. Maybe I should talk to him?

An organisation that called itself 'The Veil' was unknown to her, and the only things she could think of were the two mortals she had seen in the Café she had visited with Caethya. But they weren't Gods, and this is most definitely a divine matter.

"No," she finally replied, furrowing her brow as she felt a slight tingle run down her spine.

Before she could speak her next words, her mind was flooded with knowledge not her own. The view she had gotten from the likenesses the Judges had spread across the Court did not compare what she saw now. She knew where every single thread that made up the [Court of Heaven] was; how they were intertwined to form the space every living being could see.

The inlays that depicted her also seemed to have slightly morphed, becoming a bit more real, for a lack of a better term. They were still very much made of metal and magic, but to the All-Mother herself, they felt like another body she could inhabit. Just incredibly frail, compared to what I already have.

Aperio closed her eyes and took a deep breath, reality itself expanding a little as she did. She knew she could sever her bond to this realm with but a thought. The only thing that connected her so directly to that which was here was her more fully manifested aura that had subsumed, through means she did not know, the ambient mana that had filled the space in the Court.

"What happened?" the Light Judge asked, looking around the room just like its colleague. "The Court feels… alive."

"Because Mother is messing with it," Ferio said, seemingly unperturbed by the fact that Aperio had essentially made a physical space part of her being. "I'm surprised she allowed herself such control over this realm, though."

Aperio opened her eyes again as she slowly let out the breath she had taken. The fog of her mana that had filled the realm cleared with it as her mind shifted through the new information her connection to the [Court of Heaven] supplied.

"I merely did what felt right," the All-Mother said. And now I can hopefully figure something out. However her connection with the Court worked, it had taken another piece of her anger with it — made it feel even further removed while leaving her other feelings untouched.

"Now, tell me of this Veil," Aperio said, furrowing her brows as she let her mind's eye sweep over all the different runes that had been cleverly woven into the very fabric of this realm. "I have not heard of them before. Are they like the Repens Nabu?"

"They share members, from what I know," Ferio said, shifting a little as she eyed her mother. "But they have vastly different goals.

"While the Repens Nabu wants to replace you with one of their own," she continued, "the Veil wants to tear down the walls between worlds and have them all become one."

"We think that is the case, at least," the Dark Judge quickly added. "It has been infuriatingly difficult to get actual evidence on the issue."

"I see," Aperio mumbled, making a mental note that the slight glow beneath her skin had grown in intensity. "Anyone I would know that is in both groups?"

Ferio hesitated for a moment, opening and closing her mouth a few times before she finally spoke. "Epemirial," she said. "She is the one I currently suspect leads The Veil, and she also holds a high position in the Repens Nabu, if she isn't the de-facto leader of that as well."

"I will find her when I am done here," Aperio said, her swordstaff appearing hovering behind her. "I am sure she has a thing or two to say." Before I kill her.

While she might not feel the overwhelming anger that anything related to the defilement of Souls usually brought with it, Aperio was able to recall what had happened to the small army she had stopped from marching on Ebenlowe. She still very much wanted to punish the Goddess of Duty and Loss for it. Just like Vigil and Inanis, Aperio would strip her of her divinity and, if she also somehow stole some of her memories, let her meet the same fate. Or one worse.

Aperio knew she could destroy a soul for good — had almost done so with both Vigil and Inanis — but, a part of her reviled the idea. Another part called for vengeance, and when it came to the deities that had wanted to erase her, Aperio was inclined to give in to that anger. Some crimes cannot be forgiven.

Caethya's arms wrapping around her midsection pulled Aperio from her thoughts, a touch of her mana flowing through her disciple to make sure she had not somehow missed something happening to her. She had not; Caethya was still as healthy as ever, if a little sleepy. A fact that was underlined by a quiet mumble coming from the Elf that asked Aperio to be calm and hold her. Last time she was exposed to my formless… form, she also got tired, didn't she?

The All-Mother had no problem obliging to the request, gently lifting Caethya into her lap and wrapping both arms and wings around her as she pulled the Demigoddess closer to herself.

Ferio merely raised an eyebrow at the action, quickly schooling her expression as Aperio's swordstaff tilted slightly towards her. Neither of the Judges showed any reaction, either having a better control of themselves or not actually surprised at the happenings. Probably both.

"Are there any mortals in The Veil?" Aperio asked, leaning back on the couch and letting it support her for the first time since her daughter had made it. Having her wings swept forward around Caethya helped, but it was still not very comfortable to have them pressed against something.

Ferio took a moment to reply, seemingly not having expected the question. "Not that I know of. Most mortals do not even know of the Veil. Or other worlds, for that matter."

"The ones that do know," the Dark Judge added, "are either [Veilwalkers] from one of the New Worlds, or in the higher echelons of one of the major religions."

Aperio rubbed the bridge of her nose, the motion eliciting a small grumble from Caethya. "I have an idea for how I can solve your issues," the All-Mother began, shifting her gaze to the Judges. "We will know if it works in a little while, after which I will take Ferio and pay a visit to Epemirial." Wherever she is hiding.

"I am not sure if you will render a judgement onto her or not," Aperio continued, ignoring how her daughter stiffened at the mention of her coming along to see Epemirial. "But you should prepare nonetheless."

I just want this to be over, Aperio thought to herself, having barely caught herself from saying the words aloud. A thought and a not insignificant drain on her well caused the [Court of Heaven] to distort slightly as reality did its best to follow her will. I hope this works.

GamingWolf

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