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You stride out of the keep, filled with rolling emotions of what you swore. When was the last time you were ever seen as a hero? No, that’s not the right question; you remember the smiling faces of those you’ve helped over the past months, from Clarice to Marie to Ivern’s closest clan. No, the question should be, when have you ever been a hero before the Inquisition? You were always an intimidating sort, a rival, a challenge, a leader, but a hero? It is not as though your color scheme, the royal colors, is one that is closely associated with the tales of radiant heroes who could slay hundreds of demons with a slash of their swords. Perhaps you are not the woman of those stories, but you refuse to play the heel in this tournament. That is simply not who you are.
Though you say that now, your actions in the coming month will speak much louder than your thoughts.
At the very least, your father has no problem with you smacking down the foreign prince who dared to challenge your honor. You content yourself with that much as you march to the cold halls of the Cathedral, which are as welcoming as ever. A mass is being held today, forcing you to enter through a side door lest you become trapped in the moving mass of peasants, nobles, and clergywomen. For while in the mortal world there is clear difference between the qualities of a smelly peasant and righteous noble all are equal under the superior eyes of the Goddess. She accepts all, whether that be the burliest of oxfolk, the smelliest of wolffolk, the stubbornest of dwarves, or the averageness of humanity. All are equally distant from a God. Though you doubt that it is the same for foreign invaders who trespass on her land, at least the ones who refuse to conform to the rules of her domain, unlike Asher or Marie.
Speaking of, as you walk through secret doors and hidden corridors, you eventually find your way into the room where the woman is currently reading one of her ‘manga’. From the alien cover, you can make out two girls in green attire standing in winter ruins. She looks up for a second, sees you enter the room you two once shared, closes her book, and slowly stretches on her bed. “Oh, hey, Lorina. What are you doing here?” She asks.
“I was thinking about getting extra instruction before the tournament. Is anyone around!”
She yawns then nods, “I think everyone is. There's a lot of preparing they need to do for the tournament, so it’s all hands on deck.”
You raise an eyebrow, “Except you, that is?”
She shrugs, “I’m still only a lowly Stranger fresh and new to this world. Think I make people uncomfortable, so I make myself scarce when I’m not told to do anything.” She says as she shoves thin slices of yellow food into her mouth from a strange, similarly-tinted bag that is all too loud.
“Understandable. Then do you know who might be most helpful?”
