Chapter 57: Her claim
Liliana lay pinned to the ground by the remnants of a temple, close to the Oracle who had been dragged there by the devastation.
Her body was badly damaged. Much of her surface area was covered in dark energy. It appeared to be in the form of chains or cables.
Golden light was leaking from these cracks in fading pulses. Her breathing was very shallow. Too shallow. Her left eye was almost completely closed.
"Master..."
The Oracle stopped.
For a moment, the Oracle just stared at her. Then he whispered her name.
"Liliana."
Her eye slowly opened. The moment she saw him, something inside of her broke.
"Brother..."
As he knelt beside her, blood ran from the corner of the Oracle’s mouth. Every breath of air seemed to pull apart his chest, yet he appeared to be smiling.
"You survived."
Liliana gave a weak, bitter laugh.
"Unfortunately....Apparently I’m meant to be alive," she said to him.
Liliana stared at him.
"Indeed you are...like I invisioned."
"What?"
She didn’t even have time to complete the question, as the Oracle pulled out two objects from within his coat. He had carried these for years, never once explaining why he had brought them. Finally, he would reveal their purpose.
One of them was a deep, bloody red, and glowed with a faint light, as if it were a dying star. The other was completely black, not dark, but actually black. It seemed to be carved out of the absence of existence itself.
Liliana’s eye widened.
"Those..."
The Oracle pressed the two pieces together.
Click.
The world went silent.
Then...
BOOOOOOM!
The explosion of ancient power from the two fragments sent the surrounding darkness of Liliana into instant retreat. It wasn’t destroyed; it simply was recalling something it had long ago been made to forget.
Liliana’s vision twisted.
As the two pieces of the artifact locked together, the world around her began to disintegrate. The screams of the dying soldiers were the first to go, followed closely by the sound of Amon’s battle with the First Refusal.
The crumbling walls of the long-abandoned temple soon followed. In the end, only silence was left.
And then...
She saw another future.
The Second World.
But it was whole.
For a fleeting instant, the Second World had been complete and unspoiled, full of blue skies and untainted land and solid, untouched cities, without any of the mountains rent asunder or oceans boiled to gelatinous ruin, without any of the countless divine corpses strewn about like so much dirty laundry.
And standing beneath that peaceful sky was Amon.
There were three of them standing below the blue, idyllic sky. Amon, surrounded by a brilliant golden aura, stood between the two women. Liliana stood to his left, and the Second Incarnation, still covered in darkness, stood to his right.
But something was different.
The darkness still covered the Incarnation’s arms, but there was no sign of the endless hunger for destruction that usually seemed to be consuming her.
Her eyes were no longer full of madness, and there was no constant whisper of demands for ever more destruction. Instead, she just stood there, calm and full of peace, beside Amon and beside Liliana.
***
Then the sky split open.
The First Refusal descended.
Even within the scope of her own vision, it would be too much for Liliana to grasp the true form and nature of the First Refusal. It was not an entity. Rather, it was a denial of existence.
No.
Amon stepped forward. Next to him was Liliana. She didn’t say anything. There was no need for her to. She moved just like Amon, in complete sync with him.
Amon’s golden light and the dark chains pouring from Liliana’s arms grasped at the creature’s several weak points.
The cracks in its form parted even further as her shadowy links, momentarily freed from her grip, shot out to link themselves with her others already curled tightly round the zones where it was weakest.
"NOW!"
Amon’s voice thundered.
Liliana answered.
"NOW!"
Their powers collided. Light and darkness. Creation and destruction. Two forces that should never have existed together. Yet together...
They were enough.
The First Refusal let out a loud scream. In a flash of an instant, its body collapsed as the heavens around it began to shatter.
And just before it disappeared...
Amon reached for Liliana.
She saw his wounds. She saw the last of his Divinity slipping away. She saw his smile at her. It wasn’t hatred. It wasn’t fear. It was love for her.
His remaining divinity flowed into her. His divinity poured into the wounds that would have killed her if he hadn’t done that.
Liliana fell into his arms. Crying.
And finally, she understood.
He had never hated her. He had never feared her. He had feared what his love could do to her.
The vision shattered.
Liliana returned to reality.
Her eye stared blankly into the darkness. Tears rolled down her face.
"I..."
Her voice trembled.
"I did this."
The Oracle said nothing.
Liliana gazed toward the far-off battle. Another golden explosion lit up the ruin of the world.
Amon.
Still fighting. Still refusing to fall.
Her fingers curled into the ground.
"...I did this to him."
Her voice grew weaker.
"I knew."
She swallowed.
"I knew what he was afraid of."
Another explosion.
"I knew what he was trying to protect."
Another.
"I knew everyone he cared about."
Her voice cracked.
"AND I STILL LET THEM USE ME AGAINST HIM."
She lowered her head.
"I loved him."
Silence.
Then Liliana whispered the words that hurt more than anything else.
"...and I handed his enemies the weapon they needed to destroy him."
Her eye closed.
For the first time since the darkness had entered her body...
The hunger disappeared.
No whisper. No craving. No voice demanding more.
Just silence.
And within that silence, Liliana finally understood.
The greatest weapon against Amon was not stronger armies, nor greater amounts of power. His enemies didn’t need to defeat him. They only needed to find something he loved.
A friend. A disciple. A village. A memory. Someone he could not abandon.
And Liliana...
Liliana had become exactly that weapon.
She opened her eye. The tears stopped.
"Is there still a future..."
Her voice was barely audible.
"...where we stop them?"
The Oracle looked toward the battlefield.
"Yes."
Liliana froze.
"Yes?"
"There is still a future where Amon survives."
Her heart began pounding.
"Where the First Refusal falls?"
"Yes."
"Where the worlds survive?"
The Oracle looked directly into her eye.
"Yes."
Liliana’s breathing stopped.
"Then tell me."
The Oracle’s expression became grim.
"However, that future requires something that you do not have."
Liliana’s gaze sharpened.
"What?"
"The Key of Poseidon."
Her expression changed.
"The Key of Poseidon?"
The Oracle nodded.
"Amon and the First Refusal cannot continue fighting."
A huge explosion shook the ground in the distance, and a new tremor shook the whole of the Second World as mountains split in two and the heavens were bent.
Into the First. Into the Third.
And somewhere far beyond them...
Even Yggdrasil trembled.
"Every time they strike each other," the Oracle continued, "the boundaries between the worlds become weaker."
Liliana stared toward the battlefield.
"If they continue..."
"The second World will collapse."
He paused.
"Then the first."
His gaze lifted toward the distant heavens.
"And eventually, Yggdrasil. The third."
Liliana’s eye widened.
"Then we need to stop them, whatever the cost. No matter what."
"Yes, but not by fighting them."
The Oracle held up the black fragment of stone.
"Poseidon possesses the Key, liliana."
The Oracle’s gaze returned to her.
"One future where the First Refusal is defeated."
"One future where the worlds remain intact."
Liliana wiped the tears from her face.
"And I’m part of that future?"
"You are."
She looked toward the distant golden flashes.
Amon was still fighting. He was still injured. He was still determined to save everyone from himself.
Even after everything she had done.
Liliana stared at him for several seconds.
Then she clenched her fist.
"I made the mistake."
Darkness began gathering around her.
"I gave them the weapon."
The darkness wrapped around her body.
"Then I’ll take it back."
Amon was still buying them time. He was holding the line against all of them with what little strength he had left. And he still held to the belief that, in the end, there would be a way to save them all.
She would not waste that time.
She would not waste the vision she had been shown.
One future. Only one.
A future where the First Refusal fell. Where the worlds survived. Where Amon lived.
And she was part of it.
Liliana could finally see clearly. The way she had been used against Amon had prepared her for the moment when she would become the instrument for his salvation. The feeling of guilt would not cease to exist in her, but it would now be the driving force of her actions.
The Oracle caught up with her. He was breathing unevenly, but his eyes were alert.
"Once we enter Olympus, there will be no turning back."
"I know."
"Good."
Liliana’s voice was calm.
They walked in silence after that.