A Journey Unwanted

[Realm: Uhorus]

[Location: Galadriel]

[Western Outskirts]

"Well, minus a few tears," Victoria murmured, her voice quieter than usual as she carefully navigated the thoroughly ruined plains. Her steps were slow—sabatons shifting around broken stone and sunken earth where the ground had given way under overwhelming force. Chunks of rock lay scattered, remnants of the plains. She tilted her chin upward, blue eyes narrowing slightly as she studied the sky, as if confirming the absence as much as acknowledging it.

Lucinda had already dismissed her blade. The weapon dissolved cleanly, the red light fading as though it had never been there to begin with. Her hair, once blazing with that white glow, had settled back into its usual state, the fire gone, leaving only residual disturbances in the air around her. The brightness in her eyes dimmed as well. She turned as Victoria approached, her posture easing but not fully relaxed.

"Are you alright?" Lucinda asked, her tone steady as she glanced briefly at the devastation around them before returning her gaze to Victoria. "I held back in the output of that attack in order to increase the potency, but even then, I’m aware it was still far more destructive than intended." She paused, as if weighing her words. "I didn’t want the aftermath to spiral beyond control."

Victoria waved a hand dismissively. "I’m quite fine, dear. More than fine, actually." She exhaled softly, her lips curving into a small, almost satisfied smile. "If anything, I’d say I’m feeling a rare sense of relief." Her gaze drifted upward again. "For the first time in a while, the skies look a tad clearer. Not by much, mind you," she added, tilting her head slightly, "but enough that it feels noticeable. Even if it’s still dull."

Lucinda followed her gaze, her expression softening just a fraction as she looked up.

The sky remained fractured—torn open by those unnatural wounds—but there was undeniably a gap now. A visible absence where tears had once bled into the world. What remained beyond them was still that same oppressive blackness, that suffocating void that refused to resemble any natural sky. But the the break in that pattern mattered.

It had to.

Lucinda nodded slowly, a small smile forming, though it didn’t quite reach her eyes. "It’s something," she said quietly. "Even if it’s small, it’s still something at least."

Victoria hummed in agreement, though her expression shifted as her thoughts began to move again. "Now there’s only the matter of how to apply this consistently," she murmured, almost to herself at first. Her fingers rose to adjust her bangs, smoothing them back into place as her gaze sharpened. "Which, unfortunately, is where things become significantly more complicated." She glanced sideways at Lucinda. "More insight is required. A lot more, if we’re being honest." Her lips pressed into a thin line before she continued, "I imagine you’ve already questioned why that worked as well as it did, haven’t you?"

Lucinda didn’t answer immediately. She remained silent for a moment, her eyes tracing the remaining tears in the sky as if replaying the sequence in her mind. "The defensive measures aren’t simple," she finally said, her voice low. "They’re reactive, but not in a predictable way. It doesn’t seem like it’s just about power."

"Exactly," Victoria replied, her tone sharpening with approval as she folded her arms lightly. "Outputting immense power is only one factor, and frankly, not even the most important one." She shifted her weight slightly, her sabatons crunching against loose debris. "Reports from Mirabella, for instance, often detail her tendency toward excessive destruction. Which, to be fair, aligns perfectly with her temperament." A small smirk touched her lips. "Yet despite that, the defense mechanisms never activated on this scale. At most, the tears simply increased the number of standard Abyssal Creatures produced. More bodies but nothing like what we just witnessed."

Lucinda’s brow furrowed, her thoughts aligning with the same conclusion. "So if raw output was enough, someone would have triggered this before."

"Precisely," Victoria said, her voice firm. "We would have seen it in reports, heard whispers of it at the very least. But there’s been nothing. Not a single indication of this kind of large-scale defensive strain." She paused, tapping a finger lightly against her arm. "Which means the trigger condition isn’t just destructive capability. It’s something more specific."

Lucinda exhaled quietly, her gaze lowering slightly as she processed that. "Intent," she said after a moment. "Or at least perceived intent."

Victoria’s eyes lit up slightly at that, a pleased expression forming. "Now you’re thinking along the right lines." She tilted her head slightly. "It’s not just that you were powerful. It’s that the system—whatever governs these tears—recognized you as a direct threat to their existence. Not just something causing damage, but something capable of interfering with the mechanism itself."

Lucinda’s fingers curled slightly at her side. "So Mirabella’s attacks, they were destructive, but not really directed at the source."

"Exactly," Victoria replied, snapping her fingers lightly as if punctuating the point. "She destroys what’s in front of her. You, however..." She glanced at Lucinda, her gaze more intense. "You were preparing to act on the tears themselves. Whether consciously or not, your mana carried that focus."

Lucinda frowned slightly, looking back at the sky. "So when I gathered that much power it was more so what the power was going to be used for."

"Yes," Victoria said simply. "And that," she added, her voice lowering slightly, "is what forced the system to respond differently. Instead of increasing numbers, it redirected energy and concentrated it. Created something designed to counter you specifically." She gestured vaguely toward the destroyed plains behind them. "That creature was tailored."

Lucinda’s expression shifted at that. "Then if we repeat this..."

"We risk escalation," Victoria finished for her, her tone calm but firm. "A stronger response and a more refined countermeasure. Perhaps something even you would find inconvenient." She let that hang for a moment before sighing softly. "Which is why we can’t just brute-force this solution on a global scale."

Lucinda nodded slowly, her earlier smile gone now, replaced by a more serious look. "So we need to replicate the condition without triggering a stronger response."

"Precisely," Victoria said again, her lips curving into a confident smirk. "A delicate balance. Enough to strain the system, but not enough to provoke it into evolving further." She straightened slightly, her posture regaining its usual composure. "And that, dear Lucinda is where things get interesting."

Lucinda glanced at her, a hint of curiosity breaking through the tension. "You already have something in mind, don’t you?"

Victoria’s smirk widened just a fraction. "Of course I do. I wouldn’t be much of a spawn of a God of knowledge if I didn’t spend my time thinking ahead." She turned her gaze back to the fractured sky, eyes sharp. "The question isn’t whether we can do this again."

She paused, her voice dropping slightly.

"But first, back to our little princess. Mirabella has expended much more destructive magic than you have on every outing," Victoria began, her tone calm as she turned her gaze fully toward Lucinda. "And I don’t mean that lightly. We had to redraw entire maps because she destroyed a mountain that one time," she added, her lips pressing together as if recalling the sheer scale of it. "An entire landmass reduced to something unrecognizable, and yet even then, the tears did not respond to this degree. Not even close."

Lucinda’s eyes lowered slightly, her thoughts turning inward as she replayed the earlier moment. "Yet when I merely made my mana more apparent..." she murmured, her voice contemplative, "they strained themselves, not just to respond, but to counter me specifically. Because something sensed my intent behind it."

Victoria inclined her head slightly, watching her closely. "Exactly," she said, her voice softening but not losing its clarity. "It tells us something important—something we can’t afford to ignore." She shifted her stance, folding her arms tighter as her gaze drifted briefly back to the fractured sky before returning to Lucinda. "There is a method behind how these tears determine what constitutes a threat worth prioritizing. Their defensive nature isn’t passive, not in the way we initially assumed. It doesn’t simply react to whatever happens to be dangerous in the moment."

Lucinda lifted her gaze again, her expression sharpening as the pieces began to settle into place. "Which confirms the ’source’ theory," she said. "If the response isn’t automatic, then something is deciding." She paused, her eyes narrowing slightly. "Meaning whatever the source is, it’s intelligent."

Victoria’s lips curved into another approving smile. "Exactly," she repeated. "And that intelligence—whatever it may be—chose to act now. Not before, not when Mirabella leveled a mountain, not during countless other instances of overwhelming force." She turned her gaze upward again, studying the remaining tears as if expecting them to respond even now. "It acted because of the specific conditions present here."

Lucinda followed her gaze briefly before speaking again. "Because it was me," she said quietly. "And not just me but what I was doing." Her brow furrowed slightly as she continued, "We didn’t come here to destroy whatever was in front of us. We came here with the intention to study the tears themselves and to understand them, and eventually to interfere with them." She exhaled.

Victoria nodded once, a small definitive motion. "Yes. You were a problem to be solved with more force."

Lucinda looked down at the ruined ground beneath her feet, her gaze lingering on the broken earth where her power had carved through the landscape. For a moment, she said nothing. Then, quietly, she said, "So the source would know about me being a spawn of Octavia." The words came slower than before, as if she were testing how she spoke them aloud. "Or at least it would recognize what I represent."

There was no immediate comfort in that realization.

Victoria didn’t rush to respond. She let the silence sit for a brief moment before answering, her voice steady. "Indeed," she said simply. "It may not know you in the way we understand knowing, but it understands enough. Enough to classify you and enough to react accordingly." She glanced at Lucinda again, her expression softening just a fraction. "And that’s not necessarily a disadvantage."

Lucinda lifted her gaze slightly, though her expression remained conflicted. "It doesn’t feel like an advantage either," she admitted. "Knowing that something like this is watching." Her lips pressed together.

Victoria said nothing to that; she understood.