Chapter 42 - Good News And Bad News

Chapter 42: Chapter 42 - Good News And Bad News

"Vinny!"

Maribelle’s anxious voice cut through the silence of the empty hall as Vincent came out the golden doors.

She and Natasha immediately took to the air and flew straight over to him, followed by the old Way-Guide who drunkenly wobbled into view, nearly tripping over his own robe as he landed beside them.

"How did it go, baby? What did Her Majesty say?"

"Well... I’ve got good news, and I’ve got bad news. Which one do you want to hear first?"

"The news about your familial link to that girl in Pristina, V! Tell us!"

"Ah... yeah. That would be the bad news."

Looking down at the dormant dragon egg in his hands, Vincent closed his eyes, took a deep breath, and looked back into their eyes.

"There is no way to unbind me from Maelle Ebony. I’m stuck as her Familiar forever."

Devastation struck the group. Maribelle covered her mouth with both hands as her eyes swelled with heartbreak. The old man dropped his flask onto the floor and fell to his knees in horror. Lastly, hot, heavy tears welled in Natasha’s eyes.

"No... V... no..."

"I... I am so sorry..." the old man stammered on the floor. "It is all my fault... I ruined everything... I am so deeply, deeply sorry..."

Natasha’s sadness mutated into a flash of pure, unadulterated rage.

"YOU!"

Before anyone could even react, Natasha tackled the old man straight onto his back. She mounted his chest, her face contorted in furious, tear-streaked agony, and began brutally beating his face in with her fists.

"YOU WORTHLESS, SENILE OLD BASTARD!"

THWACK—! BAM—! THWACK—!

"THIS IS ALL YOUR FAULT! YOU RUINED HIS LIFE! YOU RUINED OUR LIVES! YOU HAD ONE FUCKING JOB! I’LL KILL YOU; YOU HEAR ME?! I"LL FUCKING KILL YOU!"

THWACK—! THWACK—! THWACK—!

The old man didn’t cover his face. He simply lay back, his nose already bleeding, taking every violent blow she dished out as tears mixed with the blood on his broken face.

"Natasha, stop!" Maribelle cried out, rushing forward alongside Vincent.

Together, they barely managed to grab Natasha by her waist and arms, pulling her back with all their strength.

Natasha thrashed wildly in their grip as she cursed and sobbed. Her fingernails dug into their forearms before she violently broke away from them.

She glared at the bleeding old man on the floor one last time before storming straight out of the palace doors into the courtyard.

"I need fresh air."

"Natasha!" Maribelle called out softly, looking at Vincent with deep concern. "I’ll go after her, sweetie. Here, give me the egg for now. You see if Way-Guide needs help."

"Thanks, Mama," Vincent sighed softly.

As Maribelle hurried outside, Vincent looked down at the old man, who was sitting up weakly, groaning as he wiped blood from his split lip and broken nose. He offered a bitter, self-deprecating laugh, shaking his head.

"She... she has a good punch... I really am sorry, kid. For everything."

Vincent just stared at him, feeling a mix of frustration and confusion.

"Hey... can I ask you something? How come when my mama and Nat put in a request, Her Majesty responded immediately... but when you made a request, you had to sit here waiting for who knows how long?"

"I... I don’t know. Her Majesty works in mysterious ways–"

"I know why."

The front desk clerk suddenly appeared beside them, holding a glowing sheet of paper. He cast a look of pity at the old man before handing it to Vincent.

"This is a copy of the formal request he submitted when he rang us not that long ago. As you can see, he was... profoundly intoxicated when he specified what he needed of her."

Vincent took the paper and read the scrawled, messy handwriting:

"To Her Glorious Majesty, So I made a wittle oopsie-daisy on the job today. What job, you ask? I’m a Way-Man-guide obviously. Sent some random kid to the wrong world. Might be a problem, might not be! Fix it please. - Your favorite Way-Guide. PS; Can I get a raise?"

Vincent stared at the paper in dead silence. His eyes widened, his jaw clenching as a vein pulsed on his forehead.

"As you can see," the clerk said flatly, "compared to your mother’s and Lady Natasha’s formal, urgent petition, this request lacked any semblance of professional detail."

CRUMPLE—BAM!

Vincent slammed the paper down onto the floor, turned around without saying a single word, and walked straight out of the palace.

The old way-guide sat up slowly, picking up the crumpled paper and smoothing it out to read his own writing.

"Did I... did I really write ’wittle oopsie-daisy’?"

The clerk placed a gentle, pitying hand on the old man’s slouched shoulder. "I’ll put in a cancel submission on your request. Go home, sir. And please stop drinking."

Outside the cathedral palace’s area, Vincent found Natasha sitting on a white bench overlooking the vast, floating cloudscape below. Maribelle was sitting right beside her, softly stroking her red hair and whispering words of comfort while Natasha wiped away her remaining tears.

He flew over and took a seat on Natasha’s other side.

Natasha looked up to him. "V... are you... are you sure there’s no way she can break the link? Maybe... maybe you misheard Her Majesty?"

Vincent shook his head. "I didn’t mishear her, Nat. In fact, Her Majesty explicitly told me that she can break the link using her power."

"She can?!" Hope flared up in her desperate eyes.

"Yes. But if she does... both Maelle and I would die from the backlash."

That hope died just as quickly as it had appeared. She sank back against the bench, looking down at her lap in defeat.

"And it gets worse," Vincent added.

"Apparently, if she breaks the link, the gods of Pristina would become furious with her for breaking some cosmic rule, and it would start an inter-dimensional war – forcing Her Majesty to destroy all of Pristina. To be completely honest with you guys, I don’t really understand that part. She kept talking a lot about ’laws’ being broken and whatnot."

Maribelle let out a quiet sigh, sitting up straight as she looked at her son.

"That is because Her Majesty operates under divine principles that transcend mortal and immortal understanding, Vinny. And there is one sacred law that she adheres to above all else: the Law of Observation."

"The Law of Observation?"

"Her Majesty, by all technical definitions, is the creator of all things," Maribelle explained gently.

"Existence itself starts and ends with her. She creates billions of universes, galaxies, and worlds – and then, she simply observes them. In order to help ease the staggering mental load of managing all of creation, she created beings in her image to rule over each and every one of those existences. Those beings are what mortals refer to as Gods."

Natasha nodded solemnly, adding in:

"Those Gods each have an inherent understanding of who they are and what is expected of them. Some accept those roles happily. Others... not so much. Those ones come to despise Her Majesty for giving them an existence they never asked for, though they can’t do anything about it."

"Exactly," Maribelle agreed.

"All of those Gods expand upon her work – creating lesser gods, managing their realms, and eventually creating what we know as "mortals". In Pristina’s case, there are many lesser gods governing each race. But the supreme God that Her Majesty personally created to stand above that specific universe... happens to be one of the many Gods who utterly loathes her.

"Fun fact: at the end of your Dada’s and my journey on Pristina all those centuries ago... we actually had to fight that specific God."

Vincent groaned loudly, throwing his head back and clutching his temples.

"Ugh, my brain hurts just thinking about all this. This conversation topic is way too deep and complicated for me. And I’ve never been good at academic stuff in school. Why would her breaking my link equate to a whole war where she has to destroy an entire world?!"

"Alright, let me give you the summary, V. Basically... Her Majesty created a bunch of universes. She created first-generation Gods to look after them. The first-generation Gods made second-generation Gods, who made third-generation Gods, so on and so forth."

She pointed a finger in the air to illustrate.

"I’m guessing that whatever shithead generation God currently in charge of the human race on Pristina made a strict ’law’ that the link between a Familiar and its master cannot be broken.

"If Her Majesty breaks it, that God would bitch to their buddy God, who’d bitch their buddy God. And since Her Majesty’s only real rule is to observe without interfering, they’d see her as an oppressor invading their realm.

"They’d complain up the ladder until word reaches the bitter first-generation God – who already hates Her Majesty. It would give him the perfect excuse, no matter how small, to rally an army and attack the Divine Realm just to try and take her down."

"Okay, I get that part," Vincent said, turning to his mother. "But why must she destroy Pristina?"

"Only Her Majesty knows the answer to that," Maribelle replied. "Perhaps to sanitize the realm before the war spreads, or perhaps because a realm without its governing law collapses on its own? I’ve no idea."

Vincent took a moment to process the immense wall of lore while rubbing his chin.

He looked between his mother and Natasha. "So... what generation of Goddesses are you two, then?"

"Despite being created long after the first-generation Gods, Nat and I are technically first-generation, because we were created directly by Her Majesty herself to reside here in the Divine Realm at her beck and call."

"What generation am I then?" Vincent pointed to himself. "I’m half first-generation divine, half mortal."

Natasha pinched his cheek fondly, rolling her eyes. "You are no ’generation’, dummy. You’re simply a Demigod."

Maribelle smiled warmly at them both, leaning forward. "Now then... you said there was good news, Vinny. What is it?"

"That’s right!" He reached into his jacket and pulled out the three shimmering, golden paper slips, holding them out for them to see.

"The good news is that I can go back to Earth! Her Majesty told me the reason I was rejected from going home wasn’t because of my link to Maelle at all! It’s because some God back on Earth is blocking my passage! These are divine permission slips. We can send three people to Earth to find out what that God is doing and fix it!"

Natasha looked at the glowing slips with a skeptical frown.

"What’s so good about that, V? As happy as I am that you can go home... I’d rather you not go to a world where time moves differently..."

"That’s the best part!" Vincent grinned.

"Her Majesty is going to temporarily sync the time streams together while we investigate! So I was thinking... whoever goes to Earth can just find the God of Reality responsible for managing time down there and ask them to permanently sync Earth’s time with the Divine Realm! That way, there’s no more time dilation ever again!"

"WHAT?!"

A hysterical scream of shock echoed from a cluster of pillars a few paces away.

Natasha didn’t even flinch. She simply rolled her eyes and crossed her arms. "It’s about time you stopped hiding."

Vincent turned his head. Stepping out from the shadows with her long blonde hair fluttering in the wind was–

"Deina...?"