Five days late, unfortunately, because the end/beginning of the year is pure chaos. On top of that, I took a few extra hours to get my finances in order and then took two weeks off to travel with my mother for her birthday.

I apologize for the delay.

One thing I need to mention: the next chapters will focus on Devas wrapping up the last remaining matters in Terraria. Some people said it felt “a bit tedious,” but there was no way to skip this without everything becoming confusing.

That said, if you want to read 3 / 7 / 13 chapters ahead, that’s possible on my (P)(A)(T). If not, I still sincerely appreciate everyone who reads my stories. Thank you very much!

(P)(A)(T)/CalleumArtori.

[…]—[…]

(“Huh? That’s new. She didn’t have those two extra tails yesterday.”) Jinn’s voice echoed in my mind. (“Was that the reason for her fever?”)

Wait a second… two?

(“You knew one of her tails was fake?!”) I asked, throwing the thought back at her. (“Since when?”)

I knew someone else might have noticed, but Jinn, of all people, surprised me.

Not because I didn’t expect her to notice—of course she would—but because I expected her to gossip about it with me instantly once she did.

It wasn’t hard for her to assume I already knew—she understood how the VoidBag worked, so it wouldn’t be her revealing a secret she’d discovered, but rather gossiping about a secret with someone who already knew.

And Jinn loved gossip and secrets.

A playful giggle rippled through the mental link.

(“Surprised I didn’t come running to tell you?”) Of course she’d notice.

(“Yeah.”) I didn’t bother to hide it.

(“I wanted to, believe me, but with all that serious stuff going on—dead villages, blood and rot in the air, and that creepy eye hovering somewhere in the sky—it just felt weird to bring up a conversation about our teammate’s fox-tail tail plug in the middle of that situation.”)

… I was pretty sure I was the first human in the entirety of human history to ever hear that sentence.

But she had an extremely valid point.

(“As for since when I knew? … Since always, I guess?”) She gave a mental shrug, amusement bleeding through the link. (“I mean, I noticed the instant I laid eyes on her. Sure, it’s a really well-made and realistic plug, but telling flesh apart from something synthetic is ridiculously easy for me.”)

A valid enough explanation, I suppose. My mistake for not expecting that.

Actually, Alalia was extremely sensitive to what was ‘alive’ and what wasn’t. She probably knew too—which, again, was to be expected.

Thinking about it, maybe others had their suspicions as well—or were starting to. Spending enough time around someone made you sensitive to subtle things like that…

I guess her growing a real tail now was actually pretty convenient.

While I let my thoughts wander for a moment, I noticed something.

I narrowed my “second right eye” slightly and turned my gaze toward the orange eye at the tip of Robyn’s shadowy tail.

The eye stared right back at me, unblinking. Its slit-and-round hybrid pupil fixed on me.

I could feel that the nightmare energy the tail was made of was mine—but at the same time, it wasn’t. It was like I’d taken out an organ and transplanted it into someone else—it was still mine, but it had adapted to its new host.

But what was most curious was that the little thing was testing me!

The nightmare energy in the shadow-tail crept through the air, probing my own ambient nightmare energy, as if judging whether I was dangerous or not.

Prey or not…

The audacity!

Of course, the eye—or the tail it was attached to—wasn’t truly alive, nor was it conscious.

It was just like my own nightmare energy: instinctive, obedient to the will of its “master” or “host,” which in this case was Robyn.

When I’d first met Robyn, she’d judged me dangerous the very moment she saw me, and attacked to protect Gilbert.

She knew I was dangerous—or rather, could be. Hell, she’d seen me fight the Deerclops and knew I’d faced The Eye…

But she was also extremely curious.

She knew I was dangerous—but also knew I wasn’t dangerous to her, that I wouldn’t attack her, and that gave her the freedom to just act however she wanted.

If part of the eye’s “probing” was instinctual, like an animal checking out its surroundings, the other part was Robyn simply poking at me with this new sense she’d gained—because she wanted to.

Just like a fox encountering something new—sniffing it, nudging it, pawing at it, or giving it a curious little bite.

How much of that curiosity was Robyn’s own, and how much came from her fox side, I wasn’t entirely sure.

Maybe they were one and the same, actually…

… I stared back.

Didn’t do anything drastic, just met the orange eye’s gaze and ‘poked’ it back—gently, of course.

The reaction was instant.

The orange eye flinched and disappeared into the tail. The tail itself pulled back behind Robyn’s back, out of sight.

I looked up and met Robyn’s gaze. Her foxlike eyes were wide now—surprised, and curiously frightened.

The same kind of startled curiosity as someone turning the crank of a jack-in-the-box for the first time in their life.

She might have suspected something would happen, but didn’t know what—or that something would suddenly pop out.

Her fox ears flattened against the top of her head. Her other two tails curled around her legs. She shrank slightly, as if trying to make herself smaller, and looked down, breaking eye contact.

[BlakeHuntressLive]

I kinda know the feeling. Must suck to be her right now—staring into the abyss must be terrifying, especially when it stares back.

(Black cat emote peering into a dark crack on the ground)

[(MOD)GeniusBillionairePlayboy]

Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the closest thing you’ll ever see to a dinosaur intimidating a fox. Remember, kids, bullying is wrong!

(Iron Man laughing emote)

Apparently, I was surrounded by slanderers.

Comparing me to an abyss and a dinosaur? One was absurd and false; the other, extremely inaccurate. I was far superior to a dinosaur—I could easily kill and eat one!

… I’ll jot that idea down, just in case the opportunity ever comes up.

I let the red tendrils drag the messages away after reading both.

But Stark wasn’t wrong about the intimidation part…

I snorted softly through my nose.

Intimidating Robyn was oddly fun… maybe Rin was right, and I was starting to lose my mind.

I made the tendrils move, encircling Robyn and Gilbert—and all of us—then closed my “second right eye.”

When I opened my real right eye, the world stopped looking washed out, and the red tendrils vanished.

Thanks to bringing the three of them inside the circle, Gilbert and Robyn’s fox noticed us immediately. The latter tapped Robyn’s cheek twice with a paw before leaping off her shoulder and sprinting toward me.

Sun Breathing at its finest, I guess.

The little thing didn’t hesitate to start climbing me. Lili—that was the fox’s name, if I remembered correctly—scrambled up to my shoulder.

She tried to sit on top of my head, but Alalia literally kicked her down, which, I won’t lie, was kind of hilarious. So the fox ended up curling around my neck and shoulder instead.

The next to approach was Gilbert, who let out an amused puff as he looked at the white fox curled around my neck.

Behind him, Robyn stood still for another moment—no longer staring at the ground, but her ears still flattened against the top of her head.

She had a look of betrayal on her face as she glared at Lili.

When he reached us, Gilbert bowed in a polite, courtly way to the princess.

After straightening, he didn’t hesitate to pull me into a tight hug, using his one arm to lift me a few inches off the ground for a few seconds while chuckling softly.

The moment my feet touched the ground again, I hugged him back and lifted him the same way he had lifted me. His laugh grew louder.

When I set him down, some of the tiredness had left him. He had a cheerful smile and let out another hearty laugh.

“I see you’re doing better.” He looked me over, focusing on my arm and my left eye.

They didn’t exactly look seriously injured right now—the first covered by Alalia’s leaves and the latter with its eyelid shut—but he’d seen those wounds earlier.

“Or almost.” He added after inspecting me. “I admit I didn’t really understand it when they tried to explain your injuries to me. But how are you?”

“Better than expected and worse than I’d like.” I varied my answer a little from how I’d answered before when asked the same question. I continued: “Just a headache. And you? How’s the eye and the arm?”

“I’m pretty much blind in the left eye, like you said—couldn’t be saved. My depth perception’s gone to hell and my aim is trash—I missed the trash can when I went to throw away the rest of an apple.” He grumbled a bit as he touched the eyepatch. “My title as the best archer in the group probably dropped to second place now, unfortunately.”

He paused before adding: “But I look like a pirate, and Robyn drew something on my eyepatch, so it’s all good.”

“Add delirium to the blindness.” Dylan teased lightly from the side. “Dropped to second place? You were never the best archer in our group, old man.”

“Wait until my arm heals and we’ll settle that.” The Merchant challenged, flashing a playful grin at the Guide before turning back to me.

“My arm’s still pretty sore.” He winced slightly as he moved the casted arm to demonstrate.

“Oakwood’s girl and Miss Jinn managed to set it back for me, but even after Miss Alalia finished stitching me up, they recommended I keep it immobilized for at least a week to avoid complications.”

Keeping the arm still was probably because he wasn’t that young anymore.

Overloading it with healing would do as much harm as not healing it. Alalia could circumvent that to an extent, but there was a limit to how much vitality a body could take before it became more harmful than helpful.

I knew that from experience—my Hyper Vitality debuff in my status confirmed it.

But I was a bit surprised—I thought only Melissa and Jinn would have healed him without the dryad’s involvement. Given how Alalia had stood by my bed, I wouldn’t be surprised if she hadn’t left the vicinity at all and had ignored everything else.

While we talked, Robyn began to move forward and came closer. The short walk seemed to have been enough to bring her back to normal.

Her two tails swayed slowly behind her, the nightmare-energy texture forming a black-belt-like loop around her waist. The eye at the tip of the tail was gone, and her ears were once again pointed upright.

She lifted her head to look at me. After hesitating for a moment, she raised her gaze and stared at my right eye.

“Grew an extra tail?” I took the initiative.

She blushed slightly, picking up on the nuance in my words, but recovered quickly and improvised:

“I’m not giving it back. You gave it to me, it’s mine.” She moved the tail made of nightmare energy to draw attention to it, unwinding it from her waist and pointing the tip at my face. “Got it?”

I smiled nonchalantly and raised both hands in surrender.

“Sure, sure.” I didn’t mention that it wasn’t that tail I was referring to.

She narrowed her eyes a little and studied my face for a moment. When she found—or didn’t find, I wasn’t sure—what she was looking for, she smiled, satisfied with the “victory” she thought she’d achieved.

Her right ear folded in half. She tilted her head slightly as her gaze wandered over my face.

(“She looks like a dog, look at her tails wagging! So cute!”)

I ignored Jinn’s comment.

“You look like a beggar.”

[MoonPrincess]

Finally! I thought nobody was going to say anything! Forest beggar! (人◕ω◕)

My eyelid twitched.

[…]

After Robyn and Gilbert joined the group, we resumed our walk out of the kingdom.

Charlotte kept explaining what she thought of the situation at the palace.

The woman in the red dress was a marchioness; the square-faced man, a count. Both belonged to a progressive faction that preferred power to be more in the hands of a council of nobles rather than concentrated in the royal crown.

A faction that, in the princess’s words, was more of a nuisance than anything else. Power was already shared between the council and the crown—roughly thirty/ seventy, or twenty-five/seventy-five—with the larger share, of course, on Charlotte’s side.

This faction basically wanted a bigger slice of that “political pie.” It arose because Charlotte inherited the crown very young, so many of her duties fell to the council—with Helena being the principal “head” at the time, since she’d been friends with the former queen and treated Charlotte almost like a second daughter.

Which, given that I could vaguely sense Charlotte’s attraction to Dylan, was… kind of weird.

I guess incest came with the royal package…

When Charlotte turned fourteen and assumed the crown as regent princess, the council began to dissolve. Helena didn’t fight to keep it, obviously, and went on to help Charlotte as a provisional royal advisor, since she also had duties as a duchess and head of House Oakwood.

Many followed Helena’s opinion—those people mostly make up the kingdom’s conservative faction today, content with the current state of affairs for one reason or another.

Those who didn’t want the council to end banded together, and thus the progressive faction was born.

And, as everywhere two opposing groups exist, there were also neutrals. House Nott was one of them—at least the count was. The son, apparently, had been pulled toward the progressive side.

Political games at their worst. Just thinking about it made my skin crawl.

“They wanted information about you,” Charlotte said, her face slightly furrowed. “When the others brought you back, no one saw your face, but several people saw you standing atop the kingdom’s wall all night. That gave a silhouette to the man I mentioned in my speech—but not a face.”

We’d been out of the kingdom for a while, about two kilometers from my clearing.

This part of the forest was practically intact. Of course, there was a noticeable absence of animals—either dead and turned by the rain and Blood Moon or migrated away—but that was slowly normalizing.

Very slowly, actually…

Robyn said that one of the things she and Gilbert were doing was literally buying animals from distant places to repopulate the local fauna on the crown’s orders, meaning Charlotte’s orders.

Alalia would help make the animals reproduce faster and easier when they arrived and was already doing so with those that remained in the forest.

The trees and plants were also bent and trampled from the zombie army that had marched through, ignoring everything in their path. But, overall, the place was basically intact. I had dragged the fight with “The Eye” far away from here and from the kingdom.

I didn’t even want to know what had happened to the place where I’d created the Hallucination Storm to generate the Proto-Planetary Core… or the site where I detonated my pocket nuke.

Even using uranium-238 and not 235—much less unstable—which allowed me to control the blast radius to some extent, plus the improvised barrier I’d made, everything inside there must have turned to dust. Everything nearby, melted. And everything after that probably reeked of radiation.

Which, of course, wasn’t my problem. Alalia could deal with that crap herself.

I turned my gaze back to Charlotte.

“And since you saw me faint and fall, you must’ve seen that you carried me to the palace,” I guessed, stating the obvious. “And even if you didn’t see anyone actually move me, it’d still be obvious I’d be recovering there—the safest place in the whole kingdom.”

Charlotte shook her head—at least, partly.

“No, you didn’t fall. I didn’t see it myself, but they told me your body just stayed there, eyes open, staring at the horizon without moving a muscle. Like a statue.”

As she spoke, her voice carried an admiration she didn’t bother to hide. Her eyes looked at me as if I were some kind of hero.

I scratched the back of my head. Honestly, it made me a bit embarrassed…

“But you’re right about people seeing you being taken to the palace. It’s just that the way it happened was kinda…” She glanced to my left.

Jinn blushed under the princess’s look—her blue cheeks turning a faint shade of purple and dark indigo. She looked upward and muttered:

“I may or may not have panicked a little when you passed out, grabbed your body, dragged you into Proto-A, pushed the ship to max speed, and sort of crashed it into the palace front yard without caring much about, you know, public property.”

…So that’s why the side of the palace garden was all fucked!

“Send me the repair costs later, I’ll pay.” I ruffled Jinn’s black hair lightly as I spoke to Charlotte.

I didn’t have that much Terraria currency, but three or four tons of gold? Easy.

Worst case, I’d just mine more.

“You really think I’d charge you for that? Ignoring the fact that the kingdom’s standing only because of you, the crown isn’t starving. I can pay for the garden repairs myself.” Charlotte huffed, paused, and corrected herself: “And the palace is private property of my family. It’s just open to the public.”

Robyn, standing to Jinn’s left with Gilbert, muttered under her breath, “Pay for it yourself? Didn’t Dylan say the cost was around a few dozen thousand Royal Gold coins?…”

The white fox was on her lap now. She’d yanked it off my shoulders right after hugging me and saying she was glad I was awake and okay.

Obviously, everyone heard her. No one there was exactly normal, or had normal senses.

“Anyway, back to the progressive faction,” Charlotte said, ignoring Robyn’s comment. “They wanted any piece of information about you. Not just them—everyone did, really. From the moment I woke up, I was bombarded with questions and more questions.”

She didn’t hide her frustration. In fact, I think she was just letting herself relax in our company, without wearing any of her ‘masks.’

“I’ve had several meetings these past days, and in all of them there were two or three nobles from the progressive faction—probably one of their scapegoats in each, too.”

“So it wasn’t like they just got lucky finding me. Well, partially.” I mused. It was luck that I’d shown up at that meeting, but with several meetings happening every day, the odds were good something about me would surface eventually.

“They basically saw an unknown face surrounded by important people and decided to gamble to see what would come of it.”

“Pretty much. Any info was better than none.” She agreed, not the least bit surprised that I’d reached the same conclusion.

Why did I get the feeling people were starting to overestimate me?…

“The door you came through also led straight to the palace’s private wing. Only authorized personnel had access to that area.” She added with a sigh. “There was no way you could’ve been just some random person, even if you weren’t, well, you.”

“In the end, I got carried away and gave them some information just by reacting.” Her eyes grew tired as she looked up at the light blue, cloudless sky. “Don’t mistake wisdom for knowledge… I’m still very inexperienced, really.”

A third phrase that completed the other two—easy enough to see.

Don’t mistake kindness for naivete.

Don’t mistake gentleness for weakness.

Don’t mistake wisdom for knowledge.

Two meant to be said to others, one meant to be said to oneself. All three, reminders.

Three crowns. Three phrases. Three reminders.

“You’re a good ruler, Charlotte,” I said honestly. It wasn’t empty praise—I really meant it. The last few minutes had given me a new view of her. “And you’ll be an even better one someday, I’m sure of it.”

She wasn’t the perfect ruler—and it was good that she wasn’t.

The only perfect ruler I knew was perfect only because his psyche was impartial; he’d been stripped of the freedom to sympathize with people’s joys and sorrows.

So inhuman that Charlotte—who wasn’t even human—was more human than him.

She looked genuinely surprised by my compliment. Truly surprised—as if she hadn’t expected me to say something like that. But she quickly recovered and smiled softly before simply replying:

“…Thank you.”

A few minutes later, we reached my clearing.

[…]

I stopped for a moment when I reached the center of the clearing. The place was just as I remembered it before the battle.

Curiously, it didn’t look trampled. The grass was untouched, and the trees around stood the same. Even the area I’d cleared out for the Proto-A had footprints, but not here.

It was as if the zombies had circled this exact spot without daring to set foot in it.

… Strange. Why?

Something related to the Stream, maybe? Or something else?

Whether I liked it or not, this was my respawn point in Terraria. Whenever I left this world, I came back here. It wasn’t like the game, where you could reset your spawn with a bed.

This was where I’d first arrived in Terraria—and where I always ended up returning, eventually.

I pushed those thoughts aside for now and turned to Jinn.

“I’m guessing you’ve got the Proto-A with you. Can you pull it out?” I asked, glancing at the Relic of Knowledge floating beside her waist.

“You picked now of all times to ask that?” She raised an eyebrow. “And what if I said I left the ship parked on the other side of the kingdom?”

“I’d say you’re lying. You wouldn’t—a captain never abandons her ship, after all.” I replied easily, motioning with my hand. “But if you want to prove me wrong, go ahead.”

She stared at me for a moment.

Then tapped the Relic of Knowledge twice, and the Proto-A appeared in the distance, right where I’d cleared the ground for it.

I took off my imaginary hat and bowed. Jinn rolled her eyes.

“I’ve got your armor too. Want it? Though the Bone Helm kind of melted on your face at some point while you were keeping watch on the wall.”

“The Bone Helm’s with the Shadow Puppet.” I noticed several people frown at the name, emotions stirring. I didn’t comment. “As for the armor, keep it for now…”

My voice trailed off as a thought crossed my mind.

“Actually, the armor should’ve been less affected by the void than I was—but still, at least somewhat. What’s its condition? No problems storing it inside the relic?” I asked.

Jinn shook her head.

“No, I considered that possibility. But unlike you, I only had to cut off the ‘holes’ in the armor, and the void collapsed in on itself after swallowing the leftover material.”

“Good thinking.” I nodded.

That’s what I should have done right after being bitten by that eye—it probably would’ve saved more of the armor. But I hadn’t thought of it at the time.

Well, it already happened. No point dwelling on it.

As we walked through the Proto-A toward the mess hall, I spoke with Alalia while passing through the ship’s side corridor.

“The Antlion Queen’s eggs and the baby god—where are they?”

The living wooden doll on my head stirred. Through the reflection in the window, I saw her tap her tiny hand against her chest as Alalia’s melodic voice flowed from her mouth.

I could feel everyone around me instinctively relax the moment they heard that voice.

Except for two people—Dylan and Jinn.

Dylan was affected only for a brief instant before I sensed his mana circulate through his body, his eyes glowing blue as his innate magic activated.

He frowned slightly.

Alalia spoke:

“I kept everything inside me. Well, not exactly inside me, but it’s here within.” She stumbled a little with her words before deciding to explain on her own. “My attention was split between too many things lately, so I decided to store them inside the Hollow Great Tree’s pit, just so I wouldn’t lose them.”

Before I could even ask, she clarified what that “Hollow Great Tree” was.

“The Hollow Great Tree is kind of like my own Travel Space. Only, instead of being made with Shimmerlake dust, it’s part of me—or rather, part of one of my authorities: ‘All things born in the world are natural.'”

Shimmer?… I didn’t interrupt, but I mentally noted the name to ask later where the hell that was.

If the Shimmer was anything like the one in the game, it’d help me just by tossing stuff into it.

A soft “Uhm…” escaped from the doll, as if she was wondering whether to go on. She brushed my hair lightly before deciding to continue:

“This authority allows me to touch and use everything that’s natural. Everything natural belongs to me, and I belong to everything natural. Trees, leaves, wind, roots—even stones—they all recognize me the same way I recognize them. It’s like breathing. I don’t have to command them, I just… let it flow.”

“Think of squirrels. They build their nests inside hollow trees and store food there, or underground.”

“The Hollow Great Tree part of my authority is what I call it when I do the same. I am nature; I’m as much a rock by the river as I am a flower on a hill, and also a hollow tree. So, if I’m a hollow tree, I should be able to store things inside me, right?”

“It’s natural for squirrels to keep their food in hollow trees… so I can do that too.”

“So, whenever I need to store something, I just… do. Nature makes room for me. Inside me, inside the world… and I toss my stuff in there. I also kept the pearl with the fisherman’s memories there.”

She paused briefly, still absentmindedly playing with my hair. I stopped in the middle of the corridor.

“Sorry if the explanation was confusing, it’s just—wait, why is everyone staring at me?” I felt the doll on my head tilt from side to side. Her voice came out hesitant: “Was my explanation that bad?…”

I closed my eyes and brought a hand to my face, massaging my eyelids. I inhaled and exhaled slowly. Then repeated the process twice.

When I opened them again, Kazuma’s and Ainz’s messages summed up my thoughts perfectly:

[AinzOoalGown]

So… why the hell didn’t she use that? Off the top of my head I can think of at least five or ten applications that could be used in battle—or wipe out an entire city depending on how much mana it costs.

(Skeleton facepalm emote)

[AdvocateOfGenderEquality]

First that mind-breaking love authority, now this crap?! What the hell?! Seriously, who balanced these dumb authorities?! “It’s natural, so I can use it, fuck logic.” How can she be this useless when she has access to that?! Aqua 2 confirmed. We’ve got a blue one and a green one—just need a useless red one to complete the RGB Useless Trinity! (ノ｀Д´)ノ~┻━┻

Apparently, the outrage wasn’t mine alone.

I was about to speak when I froze for a moment, eyes widening as something clicked—and I forced myself to calm down.

Alongside the (CHAT), two people near me still looked furious—or, at least, very close to it.

One of them voiced it out loud.

“You had that and didn’t use it in the battle why?…” The words came out as a low growl from Dylan’s mouth.

Jinn, unlike the Guide, was keeping herself in check, but I could feel the irritation radiating from her in waves.

The others showed mild annoyance, surprise, or disbelief. But none were truly angry like Dylan was.

The innate, natural love for all things… How ridiculously terrifying that was.

Their reaction wasn’t undeserved, of course—but Dylan was wrong about one thing.

“She did use it.” I turned to him. “She used that authority. I just don’t get why she never mentioned it or explained it before—but she used it.”

I reached up and grabbed the doll from my head, setting her on my palm at face level. She looked slightly wilted—literally, branches, vines, leaves, and flowers drooping—as if expecting to be scolded.

I really didn’t want to deal with drama right now, but better to get this over with…

“It’s natural for a tree’s canopy to shield those beneath it from the rain,” I said, meeting Alalia’s eyes. “That’s how you strengthened the barrier around the kingdom during the Blood Moon, isn’t it?”

Two flowers bloomed in the doll’s wooden eyes at my words before Alalia giggled softly—relieved and happy.

“It’s natural for trees to close when the cold comes…” she said another phrase. “That’s the one I thought of at the time. The ‘I can too’ at the end can be ignored if I’m not referring to myself directly.”

“It’s natural for the wind to carry away dust and the stench of decay,” I said, letting my mind be less literal. That authority was absurd. “Would that work to dispel the moon’s madness or other mental anomalies?”

The doll nodded quickly.

“It’s natural for dawn to scatter the night’s mist… It’s something I used when Jinn, Melissa, and I were trying to find a cure for the Outer Foreigner Presence.” Her smile turned sad. “It wasn’t as effective as I’d hoped, I admit…”

“It’s natural for the earth to swallow all that dies,” I improvised. “The zombies and Demon Eyes vanished the moment they touched the green leaves.”

“It’s natural for life to return to nature to rest…” her voice softened. “They had been dead for a long time.”

“It’s natural for animals to hide from the storm.” I remembered the lotus she created to protect herself.

“It’s natural for the lotus flower to close at night and open only at dawn…” she corrected gently, her voice now a little hoarse, tinged with bitterness. “My authority isn’t absolute…”

I nodded.

“I figured as much. The other one isn’t either—this shouldn’t be different.”

I was immune to her other authority. Jinn was, Ozma was—anything not born in Terraria and coming from beyond the world was immune. And even within it, her authority wasn’t absolute. Dylan was proof of that.

The doll stood on my palm, turning to face me, looking into my single open eye.

“I didn’t say I had this authority because…” She didn’t look away, even though I could feel she wanted to. “I’m not all-powerful, you know? I can do many things, but I have weaknesses. I have limits, just like everyone else.”

“I know how to use my authorities. Even if some here might think otherwise,” she said, her tone dipping briefly into self-deprecation. “I know how they work. I know their limits.”

“The further something strays from ‘natural,’ the less my authorities can affect it—and the more energy they consume. I also don’t have access to my full power or energy.”

“The wall,” I said. The fucking wall…

“The wall,” she echoed with a shiver. “I don’t like that thing.”

“Neither do I.” My turn to agree.

“With the world sealed, even if it’s for its own good, I’ve grown very weak,” Alalia continued. “Besides, almost all of my attention, strength, and energy are focused on restraining those two things. What I can do is limited.”

“I… was afraid.” Small drops of sap began to leak from the eyes of the living wooden doll. Her voice trembled. “So afraid…”

“It took everything from me. My family, my dryad sisters, my friends, my homeland—everything!” She wiped the tears away with her hands, but more kept flowing. “Everyone I knew died, and I thought it was happening again. I was so scared…”

“I tried, I swear I did! I kept repeating to myself that I could do it, that I wouldn’t just curl up and freeze. I prepared myself mentally, I swear!”

“But I couldn’t. I tried, but just feeling that thing’s presence, I… I…” Her voice faltered for a moment before finishing in a broken sob: “I tried… I swear I tried… I swear… I’m sorry, please…”

Her head dropped, eyes averted. Alalia fell silent, the drops of sap soaking my hand as the living wooden body trembled slightly.

I drummed my fingers against my thigh as I thought. Fuck…

I could feel everyone around us softening, understanding the situation after hearing the dryad’s words. And I liked to think it wasn’t just because of her first authority—at least for the Terrarians.

Jinn, especially. She was angry with Alalia—maybe even furious—but that anger was mostly for my sake. She was angry because of me, because of my wounds, my “near-death.”

But she’d seen something like this before, I was sure. More than anyone, she should understand how fear could paralyze a person. After all, how many Huntsmen, Huntresses, and civilians—human or faunus—had she seen react exactly the same way?

I heard a sigh escape from the blue-skinned woman’s lips as her irritation and anger drained away almost entirely.

Even the (CHAT), usually the harshest toward the dryad, had calmed down.

Dylan, who was never fond of Alalia, wasn’t any different. I felt a strange moment of ‘insight’ from him before his emotions settled.

No one there was stupid—angry or not.

Everyone could understand what it meant to freeze in fear, even if they hadn’t experienced it themselves—though I doubted that. Most of us probably had.

Most likely during the Blood Moon.

For Alalia, though, it was worse.

It wasn’t just freezing in fear. It was coming face to face with the creature—or at least a fragment of it—that had massacred her entire kind, stripped her of everything: friends, family, her entire world, everyone she’d ever known.

And despite all that, she had still helped, even if not in the way we’d planned in our scenarios.

And still, she was being blamed.

What was happening was like getting angry at someone for not fighting the monster that had slaughtered their entire family when they were a child…

A dry laugh escaped my lips. I looked around for a moment.

How absurdly funny…

My head throbbed.

“No,” I said. The doll’s trembling intensified. I continued, “You have nothing to apologize for. This isn’t your fault. The mistake was mine.”

I could feel the shock ripple through those around me. I raised my left hand to stop them from speaking, while Ozma’s laughter echoed in my thoughts.

I turned my gaze back to the small wooden doll in my palm. Her trembling had stopped, frozen in disbelief.

“Raise your head, please.” When she did, I continued, “Can I tell you a story, Alalia?”

She didn’t answer aloud, just gave a slow nod.

I started telling the story:

“It’s the story of a prince. A little prince.”

“This little prince wandered through the cosmos, from asteroid to asteroid, from planet to planet. He loved traveling—not for the destination, but for the journey itself.”

“On his travels, the little prince met many people. All kinds of people, each with their own stories, their own words, their own faces.”

“A vain man, who only wanted to be admired and applauded. A drunkard, who drank to forget the shame of drinking. A businessman, so obsessed with counting and ‘owning’ the stars he thought he possessed that he never lifted his eyes to see their beauty.”

“A lamplighter, bound to an endless duty, lighting and extinguishing his lamp without rest, not even remembering why. A geographer, who wrote down explorers’ tales without ever leaving his own office to see the world himself.”

I could feel everyone’s eyes on me. No one spoke, all caught in the story. Even the (CHAT) had slowed its constant stream of messages.

I went on:

“Among those the little prince met was a lonely king. When the little prince asked what he ruled over, the king answered quite simply: ‘Over everything.'”

“This king lived alone in his world. Even without a single subject, he still called himself the ruler of all existence — the sovereign of the cosmos, who could command everything.”

“The little prince then asked, ‘And do the stars obey you?’ ‘Without a doubt,’ said the king. ‘They obey instantly. I do not tolerate insubordination.’ The little prince was amazed.”

“Taking a chance, the little prince asked for a favor: ‘I wish to see a sunset… Please, command the sun to set.'”

I paused briefly, gathering my thoughts and slightly reshaping the words I remembered before continuing:

“The king, without hesitation, replied, ‘You shall have your sunset. Wait until six forty-five this evening, and you shall see it—for that is when the sun sets on this world.'”

“The little prince, puzzled, asked, ‘Didn’t you say you could command the stars?'”

“The king, without anger or irritation, explained: ‘Indeed, I did. But the time has not yet come for the sun to trade places with the moon in the sky.'”

“Then the king gave an example: ‘If I were to command the sun to set now, or the moon to shine brighter than the midday sun, or a madman to become sane—and they failed to obey—who would be at fault? Them, or me?'”

I pulled a cloth from the VoidBag and began gently wiping the face of the wooden doll. As I cleaned, I asked:

“Who would be wrong, Alalia—the child who, terrified of an immortal monster, couldn’t fight, or the man who ordered the child to fight?”

She hesitated, pushing my hand away slightly before answering, “…I’m not a child.”

“And the monster wasn’t immortal,” I said with a faint smile.

“I was the one who was wrong, Alalia.” My voice was steady now. “You can only expect from someone what they’re capable of giving. Charlotte is the princess, you’re the strongest, Ozma and Jinn are the most experienced—but I was the leader.”

“And to whom else, if not the leader, do the failures of his commands belong?”

In the silent corridor of Proto-A, no one replied.

When I finished cleaning the doll’s face, I tossed the cloth back into the VoidBag and placed her once more atop my head. She buried her face in my hair without saying a word, and moments later, I felt it dampen.

A tired smile crept onto my face.

I didn’t say anything, just started walking again. Behind me, the only sounds were the soft steps of the two living IV supports that followed.

No footsteps, no voices.

I looked back—everyone stood still, watching me with a tangle of emotions in their eyes that even my abilities struggled to read.

“Aren’t you coming?” I asked.

No one moved.

For a moment, silence stretched. Slowly, Charlotte’s lips parted; her tongue flicked out to wet them, and she swallowed hard under my gaze.

“So… what does that make us, then?” She asked.

A question with many answers — one that could lead in many directions.

I didn’t need to think before answering.

“We are the mistakes we make, princess,” I said with a gentle smile.

“Sometimes, they’re the best things we have.”

[…]—[…]

I wish I could speed up these parts more, but I feel it would come off shallow and meaningless if Devas didn’t act the way he is currently. A time skip will happen, of course, but only after things are clarified.

Ah, and don’t blame Alalia. As some comments mentioned: “She has a lot of power, but she’s not ‘strong.'” She’s also the kind and loving part of the world; aggression is the opposite of what she represents.

It’s still impressive that she was able to do what she did despite the traumas she has with ‘The Moon.’

Well, good night and happy reading!

Source: Webnovel.com, updated by NovelKeep