2 Chapter 34: Something Is Wrong

Night descended on the central continent once more, with the stars spread across the sky like a beautiful painting. The not so full moon looked down on the world, casting it's light and empowering those that thrive in the darkness. Lesser spirits of Darkness danced in the sky, the dim purple light of their bodies acting as if the stars have come down to dance on the planet themselves.

Lucilla sat in a large tree that towered over the forest below, having discarded her boots at its base since they made it hard to climb. She was once again praying to Ovana to take care of her mother in the afterlife. Her praying couldn't really be called devout since there wasn't any real religious reverence contained within her words. She spoke almost too casual when she prayed, bordering on disrespectful depending on who was listening.

"Hey, me again Miss Ovana, just wanted to, once again, ask you to take care of my mother over there." She prayed. "Lovely night by the way, the moon as always is very peaceful, um, bye I guess?"

Lucilla truly had no idea how to pray to a Celestial. Ovana and sometimes her sister Veris, were the only two Celestials she ever prayed to. It didn't help that she wasn't very religious in the first place, the Church hunting her down killed any desire to want to be religious in any compacity.

"Oh wow, didn't expect to catch someone prayin' to Ovana. Carful now, people might start targeting you if they hear ya doing that." A voice behind her said.

"I'm already a target, is there any more trouble I can get into at this point?" Lucilla countered as she turned around, seeing Cristina behind her smiling, her two fangs on display.

"True enough." Cristina conceded with a shrug. "So, what ya prayin' to her for? Thought prayin' to her was seen as a bad thing by mortals."

"It's a bad thing?" Lucilla asked with a slight tilt of her head, dodging her question. "Is it because she's associated with the dead?"

"You don't know? Well, let's just say that it has more to do with tha fact she's associated with the moon more than tha fact that she's associated with the dead."

"... The moon?"

Contrary to what one would expect, Ovana's tittle of Moon Goddess, and not her having dominion over the dead, has cause her to become extremely unpopular among mortals. Mankind, Beast folk, and Demon's all have an unspoken taboo against the moon Goddess. Which is unfortunate since the people are upset with the previous Moon Goddess and not Ovana specifically.

During Eldon Vesh's time, he was an apostle of the previous Goddess of the Moon Belle. Which cause most of the world to associate the moon with despair and misfortune. After Oliver defeated the Eldon, and his followers, the title of Moon was no longer associated with anything good, the sole exception being beauty.

Ovana, enrage by Belle, emerged from the 'Soul Relm' and challenge her to a dule, killing her in the prosses. She succeeded the title of the Moon and is now both the Moon Goddess and Soul Goddess. Over time the people have forgotten about Belle and assume the Goddess that supported Eldon was Ovana and their hate for the Moon turned to her.

"I of course remember the Day she became the new Goddess." Cristina said at the end of her explanation. "A fight between them Celestials effect the world below to a degree, and a new large crater appearin' on tha moon and a shockwave that shook the planet was hard ta miss. After the fight the God's informed us about the change in Goddesses."

"The planet shook?" Lucilla questioned, finding it hard to believe.

"Oh yeah, it was terrifyin', the night sky lit up a few times, bright as a summer day." She said as she reminisced. "Thought I was going to die when that happen to be honest."

"Okay, but how did people forget about an entire Celestial?"

"Just an example of things bein' lost to history through misinformation or just lost documentation." She shrugged. "Ya can still find records mentioning Belle, but for the most part modern people assume it's just Ovana."

"If things were going to turn out like this why does Ovana continue being the Moon Goddess? Why did she even become the new Goddess in the first place?" Lucilla asked, now thoroughly intrigue.

"No clue." Cristina shrug, killing Lucilla's enthusiasm. "I don't know how Celestial society works I just tellin' ya what I remember."

"Oh...."

Silenced settled between the two of them as the conversation died. Lucilla turned to look back at the sky as Cristina made her way over to her location and sat beside her. Glancing in her direction Lucilla wondered why Cristina was here, it definitely wasn't to talk about Goddesses. She also couldn't figure out what Cristina got out of helping her.

She knew blood wasn't what Cristina wanted and that by letting her help she was probably playing into her hands. The vampire was just too useful however, which made Lucilla hesitant to cut her off completely. Whatever the case, Lucilla would at least consider whatever Cristina wanted from her, even if she doesn't do anything in the end.

Eventually the silver haired womans curiosity got the better of her and she asked, "What do you want from me? You didn't just come here to spend time with me."

"What if that's exactly why I'm here." Cristina said with a smile. "Let's be friends, yeah?"

"What do you get out of doing something like that?" Lucilla asked leveling a suspicious glare in her direction.

The smile on Cristina's face just grew wider. "You really don't trust me, do you?"

"Not really. I don't distrust you, but I also can't trust that you don't have motives for helping me for basically nothing."

"What about the glasses wearing doctor? She definitely has her own motives for helping you."

"Of course she does. I just know her better than you, and actually trust her. To a point anyway." Lucilla said bluntly.

She knew Judieth wasn't helping out of the kindness of her heart. She also knew that Judieth did actually see her and her sisters as people and not just a means to an end. Her belief in Judieth comes from the eight years that she has known the woman. Though learning she was Sable was a shock, that still didn't affect her opinion in Judieth considering Sable was there mostly to give advice and didn't participate in most experiments. Sable actively made a lot of things better for the thirty test subjects in the Labatory.

Lucilla was willing to do whatever Judieth wanted from her... as long as it was reasonable. Which is why she listened and followed Judieth's advice, since it both helped her in the long run and was possibly exactly what Judieth wanted her to do for some reason. For now, Lucilla kept herself from asking what the doctor has planned, but she does plan to confront the red-haired woman about it one day.

"You are surprisingly untrusting." The vampire commented."

"I wouldn't say that. I'm just carful." Retorted the crimson eyed woman.

"It hurts me that ya distrust me so much."

Lucilla rolled her eyes as the vampire acted offended. Deciding that it was getting late she started making her way back down the tree. She waved the vampire goodbye who returned the gesture. Once they reached the bottom, she picked up her discarded boots and looked back up towards the tree. She couldn't really see the top from the ground, and she wondered how Cristina found her in the first place. Lucilla didn't care enough to dwell on the question before making her way back to the ship.

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---Kate and her party POV---

"Kate, something feels wrong here." The Elf Solana spoke as they ate lunch.

"What do you mean?"

"As an Elf we hold a great deal of respect when it comes to the Fey, but I also live in Human society so if Fey are causing problems, I'm more than happy to help out." She started explaining. "Most Elves that leave their homes are similar to me."

"It's just that, the closer we get the more something feels... off." She continued. "Normally I would sense some kind of malice coming from the Fey in the forest, the closer I get, the stronger that feeling would become."

"I'm guessing that's not the case here?" Ayah The wolf woman inquired as she took a bite out of her jerky.

The Elf woman nodded. " If that was what I was feeling I wouldn't hesitate to fight.... I spoke with the other Elves here and we all agree that something is wrong. Instead of Malice or anger, we are getting something closer to worry and fear."

"But the Lord said that the Fey started threatening war unprovoked and won't agree to peace." The Dwarf Ginn said.

"It could be a lie... wouldn't be the first time Humans lied to justify their selfish desires." Ayah muttered with indignation.

"We can't conclude anything yet, let's make a decision once we get there." Said Kate. "We'll just pay the job incompletion penalty if we think what's happening is wrong."

"We aren't going to do anything to fight it?" Solana questioned, anger evident in her voice.

"What would you have us do? It's not like we can walk up to the Lord and just attack him with all these people here." Kate pointed out. "The best we can do is leave and inform someone else. Possibly the Elves since this defiantly wouldn't make them happy."

"Plus, it's the Lord's son that has been pushing for this more than the Lord himself." Ginn added. "So really the person that probably planned everything was the young Lord and is only using his father's power for his own agenda."

"I guess you're right. Wouldn't help anything by becoming a criminal." Grumbled Solana.

"We'll make our decision when there, agreed?" Asked Kate.

"""Agreed."""