"My only joy, my precious little garden, blooming with such wondrous pigments despite being planted in the ashy concrete, was my sole relief in those days. Yet it was ripped away from me. Those colors, that beauty… I could not see it anymore. Those flowers were my only love, but the world deigned to leave me bereft of even that. And so I wilted. Years passed, the nation transformed into the age of Nox, yet I was still broken.”

  —Satanael

  ———

  The Knight

  The two silently leer at the other, feet stomping onto the moist dirt as they carefully stalk around the field, waiting for the other to make the first move. This foe is different. Satanael is unlike Annalay who rampages with her heart laid bare. Instead, he scrutinizes the Knight’s every move. He lingers with footsteps aflutter, gauging its every twitch of muscle and keeping a firm distance away. Those are not the maneuvers of the Polus; rather, they are of an assassin’s—a killer who lurks out of sight for a single moment of vulnerability—and yet here is, his form fully revealed in this garden without shadow.

  There must be a secret to his confidence, a scheme lying in wait. But the Knight will yield nothing of worth so long as they continue this revolving dance. The door has disappeared; there is no escape in this endless meadow.

  It does not intend to fall for his tricks so simply. If the only path is forward, then so be it.

  Close your eyes, Aegis.

  The Knight raises its leg, and then it slams the ground below. A plume of dust erupts skyward in a long trail, and Satanael’s stance wavers for a brief second as he attempts to scurry away. It is too late, and the Knight emerges from the cloud. It bolts behind him, raises its blades, before severing his head in one fluid motion.

  Just like that, his body crumbles without a word.

  … Is that all?

  It lifts up his head and crushes it between its fist. Bone and brain matter splatter, yet Satanael still does not react. Is he truly dead after that entire speech? No, there are still some methods by which he can revive.

  The Knight stomps the corpse’s heart. It tears away the arms, rips out the legs, and splits the torso in two. Yet Satanael, or rather what remains of him, still remains quite dead.

  Hm. This can’t be right. This separate dimension should have begun collapsing upon his death. That it still remains implies the man is still alive. Well, if physical mutilation has failed, then perhaps a more thorough method is in order.

  It gathers every mangled piece of sinew around it and throws the bloody pile all together into one clump; then it raises the blade of the sun and prepares to reduce the man’s remnants into ashen cinders.

  “Solgas, let loose your flame.”

  But it receives no response.

  “Solgas?”

  The blade is entirely dulled, as if slumbering. The Knight takes a look at the Lunas as well and discovers a similar state: The twins are not responding to its call. No, more accurately, they are unable to respond. Something about this space is disrupting Creation’s flow, turning the celestial weapons into mere scraps of stardust.

  Aegis, it speaks to the child in its mind. Are you able to stir Creation around you? Attempt to beckon it forward.

  Aegis does as he commands, but he soon lets out a confused gurgle. The energy in the garden feels strange and foreign, and any attempts at manipulating it only result in the child’s senses to be assaulted by pain.

  But if so, then why does his invisibility invocation still persist? Before it can ponder over the bizarre phenomenon any longer, an ominous laughter from the beyond confirms its suspicions. Satanael’s gloating voice rings clear in its mind; however, the pile of flesh that used to be his body is still there. Unmoving. The Knight attempts to find the source of his snickering, but all it can see is the same verdant field.

  “My, my, quite the impatient one you are,” he says from every direction. “A pity. I had much more planned for the first act—oh, it would have had such wonders and twists—but I suppose I should have expected one such as you to surpass my expectations. Never the matter, let us delve straight into the second act, shall we?”

  A surge of bloodlust bids its instinct to move, and the Knight quickly slashes at its side toward what appears to be mere air. Its blade makes contact with something, something unseen. And it does not take long before a rush of invisible attacks to hurl forth.

  They are not particularly powerful in comparison to the Polus knights, but what makes Satanael’s assault difficult to deflect is the complexity. The rhythm. At times it contains a clear pattern while others are more disjointed and chaotic in nature. He is not a warrior, his attacks lack that ingrained depth that comes from repeated training, and his urge to kill is almost whimsical in a way. It is almost as if Satanael is leading the Knight on a waltz, purposely conducting its every movement through a song of sparks and strikes.

  But his true form is not there. He has no physical presence, and slashing the space behind the transient attacks yields nothing: not even so much as a scratch. This is puzzling. If he was simply invisible, then my vision would have revealed him long ago. Not even Aegis’s sorcery can fool me.

  “Oh, my dear lady! It appears you are in quite the conundrum,” his voice whispers into its ear. “Your efforts are admirable, but surely this cannot last forever. You will falter, eventually. Bit by bit, I will prune you. I will be the one to bring out your inner beauty, and from your blood shall rise a flower like never seen before. I wonder just what appearance shall it bloom into? Goodness, my body shivers at the thought.”

  “I am afraid you’re going to be disappointed,” it grunts. “What makes you so sure these feeble attacks will wear me down?”

  “Feeble? Your words wound me, Lorelai,” he says with mock indignation. “But I admit, my strength is a bit lacking. I much prefer to tend to my flora than hold a weapon, after all. However, your fate was sealed the moment you stepped foot into my garden. My paradise. I have all the time in the world.”

  When I set foot into the garden? So it all started there. I must think back… what did I see? Nothing—a flash of light. The mock sun blinded me, and when I turned my head, he was standing there with his arms held wide. But was that truly him? Was the man I entered with and the man I saw the same? Perhaps my thoughts were wrong from the very beginning. This garden is not just a separate dimension, but rather…

  The Knight understands now. It understands why Creation is so muddled, and it knows why mutilating his body results not in his death.

  The garden is Satanael. The sky, the soil, the very space itself: all of it is he.

  “You…” the Knight says. “What have you done to yourself? How can such a thing even be possible?”

  Stolen story; please report.

  Creation is endless in its potential, but even the Knight has never witnessed such a baffling transfiguration before. The man cannot be considered human anymore, for all that remains of his mortal self is his spirit. His blood has transformed into rain. His flesh has been ground into soil. He is the land itself, his very own seedbed. This shouldn’t have been possible. At least, not without the help from a being far beyond the nebula.

  “Hm? That look in your face… you’ve realized it, haven’t you?” he chuckles. “Oh, Lorelai. You’re ruining all of my dramatic reveals! Where’s the flair, the art of suspense, when you discover my secrets so quickly?

  “I am not in the mood to listen to your ramblings. Answer me: Who gave you this power? Were you seduced by a Star?”

  He doesn’t answer; instead, the onslaught stops, the expanse becomes silent, and soon Satanael manifests back into reality with his puppet of flesh. It has the same floral mask, the same robe, and the same eerie aura, but there is something else now mixed into his guise—confusion. Genuine confusion.

  “A Star, you say?” he questions. “Now why would I give myself to one of the Mother’s kind when she is here right with me? Do you think of me to be some sort of unfaithful scoundrel? Oh, you insult me. My heart belongs only to her, and so it shall be for the rest of my existence.”

  Hm? Was I wrong? There is no deceit in Satanael’s words. He is sincerely baffled by its question, as if it has just insulted him with the foulest of curses.

  “But a Star you say? That is very interesting,” he says. “You surprised me at the theatre, and you surprise me again with this mysterious knowledge. Polus doctrine proclaims those divinities long absent in search for new lands; and yet you, who is second only to the King, seem to believe otherwise. What other secrets are you hiding? I must know.”

  Satanael raises his crimson sap-covered dagger and hovers it right next to his chest. “Ah, but you won’t answer me, will you? That is perfectly fine. I shall simply have to wretch it out of you by force.”

  Without even a hint of hesitation, Satanael plunges the dagger straight into his body. He laughs, and then he squirms, shaking, trembling, until a squelching wet blob of puss begins to crawl out of the cavity.

  “Now, it is time for the third act.”

  The blob rips its way out of Satanael’s torso with a wail. Bit by bit, its form shifts, undulating and sticky, before faintly resembling the figure of a human being. It breaks free and falls with a splat. Twitching. The thing rises with a deformed leg. It stands up and basks in the sun’s rays. The light showers it, burns away its membrane of mucus, and thus is left a complete replica of Lorelai—body bare and skin gleaming like that of a newborn child. Only, there is one difference: the thing’s face is unmarred. And it is through the copy that the Knight can see how truly stunning Lorelai must have been in the past.

  “This form… it truly is beautiful,” the thing says in Satanael’s voice. He runs his fingers along the arm of his new vessel, groping and inspecting every bit of his naked surface. He delights in the touch, revels in the wind sending waves through his golden braid, yet the Knight does not sense a morsel of lust in his caressing hands.

  It is not sexual perversion, but rather a degenerate pleasure in taking away the identity of another.

  “What is the meaning of this?” the Knight questions. There is no benefit for Satanael to halt his assault, so why display this grotesque ritual of birth? It does not matter what form he takes when the entirety of the garden is his flesh and being. An endless number of false bodies could attack it right now if he so wishes, but instead he stops and performs this farce for only one reason: sadistic glee.

  “Whatever do you mean?” he teases with a giggle. “I desired a change in appearance, that is all. Does it bother you to see your face in another? I do wonder… would even a mighty Throne hesitate to cut down their mirror image? Would you squirm, flinch as your blade slices through what is your own? So many questions for us to discover together.”

  Satanael does not merely wish for its death. No, he wants to dominate it both in body and mind. Unfortunately for him they are merely empty words toward the Knight. The woman he seeks to subdue isn’t here.

  “Now, come to me. Can you truly cleave your own—”

  The Knight rushes forward midway through his speech and pulverizes his head into a fine red mist. Contrary to before, the body does not crumble. Instead the headless torso freezes in place and crosses its arms as if baffled by what has just occurred.

  “No hesitation?” Satanael’s disembodied voice echoes once more. “That is surprising, even for you. I do not quite how to feel. Every plan of mine, this stage designed to bring your beauty to its highest peak, has been completely dashed away. I am a little bit vexed, if I am to be honest.”

  “Then end this farce already. No more dramatics. No more feeble attempts at manipulation. Either you use your full strength to bring me down, or you will give up and allow me to exit this realm.”

  Satanael sighs. “Such a bore you are. Do you not realize I am trying to help you, to realize your full potential so that you may bloom at your best? Now it’s all ruined. When you perish here and I use your body as fertilizer, your buds may not be as lovely as they could have been. Does that not frighten you?”

  “I am not dying here, Satanael,” it says. “Not to you, nor to the source of this grotesque power. Were you truly not swayed by the lies of a Star?”

  “How many times must I tell you? I was blessed by the Mother. I saw her form on the day of my first sacrament, the day I rediscovered my passion for art in this world, and I will not have the likes of you tarnish my devotion.”

  The man is a zealot to his very core, but perhaps the Knight can take advantage of this. A mind propped up by faith will find its fall to be all the more vicious.

  “And how do you know that was truly Cosmos? Think back to that day and look very clearly. Look at their face. Their hair. Their eyes. Can you remember exactly what their appearance is?”

  “I…”

  The headless body trips on its own steps and falls to the floor. It stumbles there pathetically, rolling on the dirt as its limbs flail about as if each one has a mind of its own, and Satanael’s distressed voice rings clearly in its head: confusion. Rejection.

  “No, you cannot trick me. That form was clearly the Mother’s. No other could have shone with such love, such tender warmth.”

  “What did you see, Satanael?” It pushes his sanity further down. It pries open his heart and plants a seed of doubt. Such exploitation should be familiar to him, and yet he is just as vulnerable to its effects than any other. “Tell me. What did you see?”

  “I saw…” He pauses, and for a moment the Knight believes him to have finally succumbed. But he soon proves it wrong. Instead of facing his insanity, he chooses to delve deeper within. “I saw my face. It reflected off the flower’s dewdrops, and it was in there I saw a light glaring from my lost eye. I understand now. That form of hers was me. I was Cosmos all along—her avatar. Her sacred reincarnation. And when I realized my purpose, my body bloomed. It turned into the seedbed I had always wished for, but this world could not handle the birth of another. It could not handle the birth of a new divinity, and so I hid in the space between reality. I could only exist in the possibility of what lies beyond the doorway.”

  Hm, it appears I have made him worse.

  “My purpose isn’t false. This truly is my calling, my sacred duty. Oh, Lorelai… I am more devoted than ever before, and I have you to thank for this wonderful epiphany. Do not worry: Even without the pruning ritual, I am confident now that I can bloom you into a truly special existence.”

  Words have failed. In the end, the Knight must fall back to its prior strategy of physical resistance, though it does not have much hope for its continued use. Satanael is becoming stronger, the garden’s frenzy is rising, and his madness distorts the space even further. Aegis squeezes his little head in pain. If something is not done soon, then his concentration will falter, and his figure will be fully revealed.

  “My dear lady, have you not accepted your fate?” Satanael chuckles while approaching it with an indifferent stride. “There is nowhere for you to escape, nowhere for you to hide. And while this is a rather dull method, I could simply watch you starve here rather than exert the effort to make your death a stunning one. I do not want that. I want to respect your strength and give you an end befitting that of the Heaven’s Throne. Please, Lorelai, I am a florist. Allow me to make you my masterpiece, and so you shall thrive here in paradise.”

  As loathsome as his goading may be, Satanael’s confidence is not misplaced. The Knight cannot destroy the garden in its current state; it has never faced a foe like this before. The only option left is to tear through the field and bring about as much destruction as it can.

  But that will take some time. This realm stretches far beyond the horizon; I know not if Aegis will be able to endure such force. It is unfortunate I cannot use the Solgas to cause a wildfire, but perhaps I can—

  It stops, looks at the Celestial blades, and then looks up at the still-invisible child atop its head. The Knight can never invoke Creation’s aid, but that does not mean the divinity’s presence is absent. No, it lurks deep within its chest as a plague—one the Polus know very well.

  “Lorelai,” Satanael says, outstretching his blood-soaked palm. “Accept me, and I will gift you an eternity of happiness.”

  It can feel it bubbling inside, that sickening mist. It wishes to escape, to infect everything with its resentment. And so it shall have its wish.

  The Knight takes a step forward, and then it shakes Satanael’s hand. “I am quite tired of eternity.”

  Before the madman can react, the miasma toiling inside the Knight explodes, and it rushes out swallowing everything within its murky tide.