Guarding the Naaru's Sacred Blessing [Mass Release Countdown 2/2]

"Click."

The jeweled cabin door of the naaru starship Genedar slid upward. Under the watchful eyes of a group of fully armed guards and priests, the five young heroes rushed out carrying a stretcher.

"Wait!"

High Priestess Ishana, standing at the front, raised her holy staff and called them to a halt.

Only after releasing a burst of Holy Light over the group and confirming that no Nathrezim were concealed among them did she step forward to inspect the injured person on the stretcher. One look at those bizarre wounds made Lady Ishana suck in a sharp breath.

"Who is this?"

She looked doubtfully at Captain Neri beside her. The latter sighed and said:

"It's Commodore Diakum. We arrived a little too late."

"You're saying that lump... is Diakum?"

Ishana was startled once more.

As a legendary priest nearly two thousand years old, she had seen plenty in her lifetime.

When she was young, she had followed her priest parents through Argus, taking part in all manner of dangerous emergency rescues. She had seen countless strange and unusual patients, but this was truly the first time she had encountered a case like this.

It was no wonder Priestess Ishana described the patient lying on the stretcher as "a lump." Dick's current condition was simply too strange.

"Get him to the infirmary!"

The priestess inspected the mass of irregular crystals that seemed to have melted together under intense heat, mixed with flesh and part of a torso.

Once she confirmed that Commodore Diakum was still breathing faintly, her determination to heal him immediately took precedence. After the five young heroes hurried away with the stretcher, Ishana looked around, then grabbed the hand of the worried-looking Neri.

She asked in a low voice:

"Where is Commodore Malderan? Didn't he go down there with you? Why hasn't he returned?"

"He..."

Neri clenched her fists. A trace of sorrow showed on her smoke-stained face as she said:

"The Commodore sacrificed himself. He used a secret Holy Light technique none of us had ever seen and saved Commodore Dick when all hope was lost. But the price was that he himself was melted away in the fel storm.

I think he foresaw all of this. He chose to meet his fate."

"Alas."

Priestess Ishana traced a triangular Holy Crest over her chest and sighed.

"The Eredar have lost another protector. May the Holy Light bless his sacred soul... His wife and children are still waiting for him to return. Holy Light above, how am I supposed to tell them such heartbreaking news?"

"Save the living first."

Neri said softly:

"I'll speak to Commodore Malderan's widow."

"Mm."

Ishana nodded. After taking a few steps, she turned back and looked at Neri anxiously. She glanced around before lowering her voice and asking:

"Did you see Commander Kil'jaeden and the other warriors on the battlefield? They..."

"They fell."

Neri closed her eyes and said hoarsely:

"I saw it with my own eyes. They embraced fel energy, became Man'ari, and joined the demons. But... our escape pod wasn't attacked by any demonic firepower as we departed. Not even the fel bats or doom guards harassed us.

That isn't normal!

The demons would never kindly watch us leave, so I suspect that Commander Kil'jaeden and the demons' master made some sort of deal.

They sacrificed themselves in exchange for our safe escape today, along with the other Eredar."

"This news must be kept secret!"

Ishana's expression shifted several times before she instructed:

"Grand Executor Velen is receiving treatment as well. Until he has recovered enough to handle affairs, this information must not spread. The people are already filled with grief. We cannot let such terrible news further poison their hearts.

Go report to Governor Hutton, Captain Neri.

In the current situation, this ship urgently needs an excellent commander like you to help the Governor restore order."

"Mm, I will."

Neri nodded and said:

"Though I know a naaru priestess like you will certainly do everything possible to save Commodore Dick, I still hope you will try even harder. The people need Good News. If Dick survives, it can undoubtedly be seen as a most auspicious sign..."

"At a time like this, you can speak your heart, Neri."

Ishana sighed.

"It is difficult to completely hide your feelings for someone. Perhaps some subtle affection has already begun to grow between you and him. Keep faith. I believe the Holy Light will not abandon Its devout apostle, and I hope your feelings will eventually find their home as well, child."

With that, the High Priestess leaned on her holy staff and hurried toward the infirmary.

Neri remained where she was, somewhat at a loss. Perhaps because of Priestess Ishana's frank counsel, or perhaps because she was about to bear the duty of delivering such dreadful news, the capable commander of the Assassin Court felt frightened by what lay ahead.

She suddenly felt exhausted.

She even wanted to fall asleep right there, so her numb mind could recover a little.

But soon, she sensed someone approaching. Opening her eyes, she saw the Twins standing not far away, supporting each other as they softly asked:

"Captain, what should we do next?"

"You should rest."

Neri said hoarsely:

"Once you've recovered your strength, go report to the Governor. Arcane Mages as outstanding as you will surely be of great use during the journey ahead. Go rest."

"But we think it would be better to accompany you through the work ahead."

Saloras said quietly:

"Your complexion is frightening. You look like you could suddenly collapse and die at any moment. Forgive me for speaking so directly, but the truth is that you seem to need rest more than we do."

"We are your subordinates, Captain."

Oreses said softly:

"You don't need to hide your feelings from us. We've been through life and death together, after all."

"You little girls, what do you know about pain?"

Neri curled her lip and said:

"Come here!"

The Twins stepped forward, only to be surprised when the always-strict Neri draped an arm around each of their shoulders. The three women leaned against one another as Neri whispered in a voice only they could hear:

"Our home is gone... We've become wanderers, girls. I'm a little... afraid... I'm so tired... Am I useless?"

"Now that you mention it, I think I'm feeling a little..."

"We were fighting before and had no time to think about it. Now that things have suddenly quieted down, it's normal for these feelings to surge up. Wait... whose tears are dripping onto my hand?"

"It's blood! Sister, quickly! Get the Captain to the infirmary! No wonder her face looks so awful—she's injured."

Meanwhile, in the starship's infirmary, Priestess Ishana had changed into a healer's robe and was performing emergency treatment on Dick with the other priests from the Temple of Lura.

Dick had directly faced the fel storm unleashed by Sarkir before his death, and part of his torso had been incinerated. Yet that was not his most serious injury. His body was covered in strange crystal fragments.

After being melted by extreme heat, those broken fragments had nearly fused completely with his body. At first glance, he looked like a half-sealed piece of "amber."

The irregular melted crystals happened to encase Dick's shattered torso, leaving only his head and most of his neck exposed.

The priests first tried to remove the melted crystals. Otherwise, they could not cast any healing spells on Commodore Diakum, nor could they clean and stitch his terrible wounds. Yet when they used magic, they were astonished to discover that every healing miracle and detection spell cast upon Dick vanished without a trace, like mud sinking into the sea.

"These crystals are absorbing magic!"

One priest cried out:

"I've never encountered anything like this before. Is it some kind of demonic curse? Are they using it to torture Commodore Diakum?"

"What if we cut them open with tools?"

Another priest said:

"We just don't know what material these crystals are made of or how hard they are. And they're fused together too tightly. If we make a mistake, Commodore Diakum could suffer further injury. The only Good News is that there is no fel contamination in his body. It seems some force purified him.

Priestess Ishana? Why aren't you saying anything?

Have you discovered something?"

The other priests looked toward their leader, while Ishana had indeed fallen into an odd silence.

Faced with their questions, she said nothing for a long while. Only after more than ten seconds did she reach out and touch the irregular melted crystals around Dick's body, speaking with a trace of sorrow:

"What do you think these crystals really are?"

"Perhaps some kind of protective magical effect?"

"But they were clearly formed from many crystal fragments fused together under intense heat. Look, there are obvious cracks on the crystals. Those are the result of fragments fusing together. Before I became a priest, I was a jeweler. I would stake over a thousand years of craftsmanship on this—this absolutely isn't a single crystal that has merely changed shape!

Perhaps similar crystal shards happened to be near Commodore Diakum when he was injured, resulting in this strange form.

Could they be fragments from some shattered Auchenai Crystal Towers on the battlefield at the Seat of the Triumvirate?"

"No! They aren't!"

The priests discussed it all at once, but Ishana cut them off.

The High Priestess seemed to have confirmed some "terrifying" suspicion.

Trembling slightly, she drew out an unusual pendant from within her robes. It was a traditionally handcrafted Eredar ornament, with a golden crystal carefully carved in a sun pattern at its end.

The fact that she wore it so close to her body showed that the pendant was precious to the High Priestess.

Ishana took a deep breath. Under the gazes of the other priests, she removed the sun-patterned crystal pendant and placed it atop the melted crystals surrounding Diakum.

A moment later, to everyone's astonishment, the pendant seemed to "melt" into the crystals around the Commodore.

The fusion was so natural, as though they had always been part of the same thing.

"The material of that pendant was a reward granted to me by Lord Lura centuries ago for my contributions to spreading the Holy Light Doctrine. It was a part of Its sacred body."

Ishana sighed. With a mournful tone, she reached out and touched the melted crystals surrounding Commodore Diakum's body, whispering:

"There is no need to guess, brothers and sisters. Lord Lura's remains protected the Commodore at the critical moment. These crystals are what a naaru's body becomes after melting. They are mythical beings born from the Holy Light, and even after death, they possess all manner of miraculous effects.

Absorbing magic is merely one of them.

Our naaru protected our hero. That alone is a miracle."

The death of the guardian naaru Lura had already been confirmed. It was a fact verified by the three naaru aboard the starship.

They could no longer hear Lura's song.

That meant their kin had died in Argus's final battle. To a naaru, that was the glory of guardianship, but the naaru had feelings of their own. Thus, all three naaru were deeply saddened.

"This is beyond anything we can heal."

Priestess Ishana withdrew her hand, wiped away her tears, and said:

"Send Commodore Diakum to Lord K'ure. Perhaps It has a way to heal our hero."

The priests were all sorrowful.

They were members of the Naaru Temple and could all be considered Lura's disciples, studying the doctrines of the Holy Light under the guardian naaru.

After a thousand years together, they had come to regard Lord Lura as a friend and family. Now, seeing that Lord Lura had used Its final strength to shelter an Eredar hero even after suffering misfortune Itself, this story alone was enough to be written into Eredar history.

They quickly found some materials and made a temporary "coffin." Although it was somewhat inauspicious to put Dick into a coffin while he was still alive, his current state made him difficult to transport without such an enclosed container. Besides, this was not the time to care about propriety.

Many wounded were still waiting for treatment outside the infirmary. They had no time to rest, and even the time they had to express their grief was painfully scarce.

More than ten minutes later, under Priestess Ishana's personal escort, Dick's coffin was carried by several guards to the navigation platform where the guardian naaru K'ure resided.

Upon seeing Dick's condition, the naaru gave a mournful, ringing cry. The emotions contained in that ethereal sound required no interpretation. It mourned its companion Lura's fate, but it also rejoiced that Dick had survived because of it.

However, when K'ure shone Its Holy Light upon Dick in an attempt to heal him, another light burst forth from within Dick's body.

Compared to K'ure's gentle Holy Light, the erupting radiance was fiercely aggressive. It even ignited the coffin holding him in an instant. The milky-white holy flame burned so hot that even Ishana could not approach.

She had almost never seen such an aggressive sacred fire. It seemed stripped of every healing and protective aspect of the Holy Light, concentrating all its power solely on punishing evil.

The holy flames were scorching and magnificent. The light and heat radiating from them were like facing the blazing afternoon sun.

This sudden development caught K'ure off guard as well. The naaru let out a puzzled ethereal tone and swept Dick's body with Its Holy Light in an even gentler manner. Soon, It found the cause of the holy flame's eruption.

As Its body rotated in an extremely steady rhythm, It conveyed the answer to Ishana.

She was startled.

"You mean there is a foreign object near Commodore Diakum's heart? Aside from Lord Lura's remains protecting him, there is another sacred object within his shattered torso?

This...

It's unimaginable!

What kind of complicated situation was this Commodore in when he encountered danger? So there's nothing we can do about it now?"

In response to Ishana's questions, K'ure gave a concise answer.

They could not interfere with Dick externally in any way.

The sacred object hidden within Dick's body was clearly in a state of "stress." Even a naaru's Holy Light would provoke a retaliatory burst of holy flame from it. Any other healing method would undoubtedly cause the same terrible result.

However, K'ure also gave Ishana a reassuring conclusion.

Though Commodore Diakum's injuries were severe, he was currently in a wondrous state. The Holy Light protected him from slipping into death, while the naaru fragments formed the strongest external defense, preventing him from falling into an even worse situation due to unexpected events.

It could not determine how long this state would last.

But before Diakum's condition changed, he would remain in this state "between life and death" for a long time without facing any further danger to his life.

That conclusion allowed Priestess Ishana to relax slightly.

She glanced at Commodore Diakum, protected by milky-white holy flames. After several sighs, she requested that Diakum temporarily remain in K'ure's area. In his current state, he was truly unfit to be touched by others, lest some dangerous accident occur.

The naaru agreed to the request.

Ishana was very busy. She had to return to the infirmary to treat the wounded, and Grand Executor Velen's condition was no less concerning.

On this starship that had already left the Argus region, most people had yet to recover from the grief of fleeing their homeland. But regardless, they had to learn to accept reality as quickly as possible.

Several hours later, Captain Neri, walking with the Twins supporting her, found the area where Commodore Malderan's wife and children were staying.

They had been temporarily assigned a cabin on the starship's third deck. Since Malderan's wife had long worked as a volunteer at an orphanage in Oronaar City, Governor Hutton had entrusted her with caring for children who had lost their families in the war.

When Neri found her, Malderan's wife was holding a toddler who had just learned to walk and feeding her water.

She gently rocked the child while humming an old Eredar tune. Her children were very sensible, helping several women care for the crying little ones nearby.

The sight filled not only Neri but even the Twins with guilt and pain. They could not imagine how devastated Commodore Malderan's wife would be upon learning of her husband's death.

Holy Light, why must someone so kind endure such a terrible fate? Was this some damned Faith Trial?

Yet to the three women's surprise, this noble lady did not collapse in despair upon hearing of her husband's sacrifice. Wiping away her tears and struggling to maintain her composure, she asked through choked sobs:

"So, my beloved traded his life for Commodore Diakum's life, correct?"

"Yes! Without Commodore Malderan's sacrifice, we would not have been able to bring our hero back to this ship."

Neri, who could barely walk after emergency treatment, said hoarsely:

"Everything was too chaotic then. I didn't hear Commodore Malderan's last words clearly, but I seemed to hear him reciting a prayer to the Holy Light... He fulfilled his duty. He was a hero truly worthy of the Eredar!"

"He embraced his destiny, children."

The woman smiled sadly and said:

"The day I parted with my beloved, he told me that he kept having the same dream. In that dream, he saw that our little Maraad and little Lelan would encounter a terrible fate in another world.

He told me that fate had already been changed.

He saw Diakum appear in his dream with his own eyes. He saw our son and daughter grow up healthy, clad in glory, and ultimately lead countless of our people back to their homeland.

He believed it was a revelation from the Holy Light!

Commodore Diakum was the messenger of fate sent by the Holy Light to save the Eredar, and his mission was to ensure that this messenger of fate could join us in embarking upon this trial of the Holy Light. I had actually prepared myself for this long ago. I am proud of my husband...

I..."

She could not go on. Even the strongest person could not hold back their tears. Neri's emotions burst forth at that moment as well, and she rushed forward to embrace the woman. The two Eredar wept bitterly.

Maraad and his younger sister Lelan still did not know what had happened.

They ran over hand in hand, only to be stopped by the Twins.

Saloras crouched down. Recalling the tone Commodore Diakum had used to comfort that little girl at the Arcane Academy, she placed her hands on Maraad and Lelan's foreheads and softly said:

"Your father chose to remain on Argus. Like a hero, he fulfilled his oath to defend our homeland. He will keep fighting there until the day we find a way to save the world and return...

Eredar can live for a very long time, children.

You will definitely see your father again."

"You're lying!"

Little Lelan screamed:

"Father would never abandon me, Brother, and Mother! Move aside! I want to find my father."

"Commodore Malderan entrusted you to Commodore Diakum's care."

Oreses's tone became even gentler as she softly said:

"You know Commodore Dick, right? He and your father were true brothers-in-arms. Their bond surpassed even the ties of blood. Don't you trust him?"

"Oh, if it's Uncle Diakum..."

Maraad touched the radiant shortsword at his waist, the one he had been given, then took his sister's hand and said:

"Then we believe you. But why are Mother and that big sister crying?"

"Ah, perhaps they're practicing in advance for all the setbacks they'll encounter on the long and arduous journey ahead. Like someone once told me, the tears shed at a wedding are meant to prepare you for all the hardships of marriage to come...

Ah, tears.

If tears could stop blades, how gentle would this sea of stars be?"

"Big Sister! How can you say something like that in front of children?"

"It's fine. They won't stay children forever. They'll grow up too. Come to think of it, we're only just adults by Eredar standards ourselves. Look at the time we've had lately...

What a miserable mess!"

That night, Governor Hutton, who had spent the entire day handling government affairs and had only barely established the internal management system of the starship, dragged his exhausted body to the navigation deck.

He looked at the newly crafted gemstone sarcophagus before him, then stepped forward to gaze at Diakum lying within.

The child's horrifying injuries filled the old shaman with sorrow.

His left arm was gone, one of his legs had been partially severed, and half a kidney had been blown away. Bones were even visible through the wounds on his arm. Just from the injuries visible through that layer of crystal, one could imagine the terrible battle the child had endured.

He had watched this boy grow up!

Though they were not as close as he was with his adopted son Jaide, Dick was still a child of Krokuun and Krokuun's pride.

"We old men are useless..."

Governor Hutton reached out and stroked Dick's face. Tears streamed down the old governor's cheeks as he sighed.

"That's why you had to suffer such torment. I'm sorry, child."

"Father? What are you doing here?"

Jaide, commander of the Krokuun Hunt Cavalry Legion, spoke from behind him. Hutton turned around and saw Jaide making his way over with a cane.

His injuries were not as dreadful as Dick's.

But he had still walked through hell several times. Recovering quickly would not be easy.

"Come here, child. Look at your brother."

Hutton called to him and had Jaide step forward. When he saw Dick's terrible state, the fierce plains cavalryman nearly shed tears.

He clenched his fists and said guiltily:

"If I had been by his side then... Holy Light, he looks like a Talbuk that has been chopped to pieces. Why did the Holy Light make him suffer such torment?"

"Don't cry! It's bad luck."

Hutton said sternly:

"For Dick's great deeds and sacrifice, we must honor him for a long time and regard him as the embodiment of our ideals and righteousness, using him to inspire ourselves to bravely face all the troubles ahead. He is Krokuun's pride, and so are you!

Dick needs to rest now, so you must take up the burden he left behind! Like him, do everything in your power to protect our people!"

"I won't let Dick laugh at me when he wakes up. Don't worry, Father. I won't bring shame upon my brother!

Krokuun has become part of our memories, but the Krokuun Hunt Cavalry Legion will always stand before our people. Anyone who wishes to harm us must first endure the devastation of our blades.

We have already lost Argus. I will not allow us to lose anything more!

I swear it!

I swear in the names of Krokuun and Dick that one day, we will return! We will reclaim our sacred inheritance! Krokuun is waiting for us... Homeland, we will never let you down!"