The Queen and God's Messenger

Star rode her Ruhe Beast at the head of the army into the God-Descended City. The whole city welcomed her with cheers of jubilation, and the nobles who had once looked down on everyone lay prostrate along both sides of the streets.

It was as though the city had always been hers, waiting only for her to come and review it.

"Great God-Servant Priest, and the Divine Messenger who has come from the God-Given Land."

"Accept, we pray, this offering from the people of Yinsai."

"Welcome, priest of God and Messenger of God, into the God-Descended Land."

More of those kneeling on the ground lifted their heads to Polo in his magnificent golden robe, as though they were looking upon a deity itself. Nothing about his appearance was like a trilobite man's, and in that moment it stood as a symbol of divinity, a symbol of the myth they could never hope to touch.

"Look, quickly!"

"That is the divine countenance the legends speak of!"

"The Mother of Life, servant of God, King of the Ruhe Beasts, Shelly, wears just such a face!"

"Priest Star has the help of the Divine Messenger! She is the one God has chosen!"

Thousands upon thousands of people cried out together.

"The chosen one."

"The chosen one."

God's own believers ran behind the Ruhe Beast and alongside it, some with their arms clasped to their chests, others singing out the Redlichia Covenant at the top of their voices.

Like a crowd gone mad.

They cheered and leapt for joy. They shouted themselves hoarse.

How sacred a thing the power of faith could be, and yet how absurd it could look all the same.

Only days before, Star had been branded a sinner. In an instant she had become one of God's chosen.

She received everyone within the royal palace, and became the new master of the God-Descended City.

And then every one of those people looked in dread at Polo beside her, that mythical life so terrifying it defied description, the messenger of the divine.

"Star, you keep them company. I'm going to go and have a look around the palace!"

"I've seen King Redlichia's palace, but I still haven't seen this one!"

Polo loved excitement, and loved anything new.

But ceremony like this he hated. Tedious protocol and the scheming that came with power felt to him like a shackle locking a person down, leaving the whole body heavy.

The Yinsai Kingdom's nobles curried favor with him, and Polo paid them not the slightest attention. He simply turned and walked away.

The noble families of the God-Descended City exchanged uneasy glances, fear rising in their hearts.

They could not understand where they had offended the Divine Messenger, but none of them dared ask that terrifying mythical life outright.

At once they clustered around Star, Priest of God, the young woman destined to become the new pinnacle of power in the Yinsai Kingdom.

Victory had come far too quickly, so quickly it strained belief.

So much so that Star felt dazed, her head spinning.

Inside the royal palace, flattery and adoration buried her, and it was a scene she was not at all used to.

"The chosen one!"

"This is a gift we offer up to you."

Star looked at the stone tablet two people carried between them. Depicted at its very center was the King of Wisdom in his crown, with figure after figure kneeling before him. All around, people wore looks of yearning and near-madness as they watched the King bestow that divine power upon his own children.

The inheritance of wisdom ability endures forever.

"What is this?"

Excited, the person spread their arms wide, fawning over Star to win her favor.

"The Stone Carving of the Royal Bloodline."

"This is a relic from the God-Given Age. Carved right here upon it is the sacred scene of the Great King Redlichia bestowing his authority upon his sons. The first-generation nobles stood there that day and saw it with their own eyes, and it was their own hands that cut it into the stone."

"Look here."

"This is the founding ancestor of the Xilong family, King Redlichia's fourth son."

Star had heard of this carving before, but this was the first time she had ever seen it.

She reached out and touched it. It was as though she could see the scene from King Redlichia's own era, back when the trilobite men had not yet been driven from the paradise God had promised them.

"The God-Given Age."

What a distant phrase that was, so distant Star felt she could never touch it.

A strange thought suddenly welled up in her heart. To God, how long was a span of time so distant as this?

Was it long enough that he had forgotten what once was?

Or was it that, to him, everything was nothing more than a dream from the night before?

Not long after Star and the Samo family had entered the God-Descended City, the other two Great Royal Bloodline families arrived there as well.

They brought with them King Eli's last remaining son, along with two Ruhe Beasts.

On arrival the two families presented their Ruhe Beasts to Star before anything else, and with them came the shared conviction of every Royal Bloodline family. A new King had to be chosen, and that king could only come from among the Royal Bloodline families themselves.

"Star, you alone have the right to be King of Yinsai."

That was what their mouths said, but from the corners of their eyes, they were watching Polo at Star's side.

That was the real reason they had offered up their Ruhe Beasts, and the real reason Star had to become King.

Nothing in this world could be stronger than the will of God.

Not even an uncertain will of God.

After all, no one dared to guess at the disposition of the divine.

Star was stunned beyond words. "Me?"

"I am the High Priest of the Sky Temple, one who serves the divine."

She looked a little flustered, but Polo showed no fear at all.

"Then be both at once! It's only a crown on top of High Priest, nothing more."

Star looked at Polo. "Is that allowed?"

But to Polo, it seemed like nothing much at all, just the king of some trilobite men.

"Why not?"

Star looked at Polo's grinning face, and all at once the whole thing seemed less hard than she had imagined.

With Polo standing behind her, there was nothing left to fear.

The sky was clear, without a single cloud for ten thousand miles.

Before the royal palace of the God-Descended City, the people of the Yinsai Kingdom had gathered to watch the ceremony, held back at the foot of the steps by a line of soldiers. They gazed up at the palace looming above them. The figure they longed to see had not yet appeared, and already their blood was racing with excitement.

Rumble!

Ruhe Beasts burst suddenly up out of the canals running along both sides of the palace and spouted two jets of water dozens of meters high, which came falling back down as rain.

Crowned, Star came out from within the palace and walked step by step to the front of the stairs, where everyone could see her.

One Royal Bloodline family after another came forward, followed by the nobles of the God-Descended City, and the lords of every city-state and town.

"Great King of Yinsai."

"Star!"

"We shall forever submit before your scepter and your crown, and heed the will God has granted you. May you lead Yinsai toward a farther and brighter future."

Before the eyes of thousands upon thousands, Star took up the scepter passed down from King Redlichia himself, and seated herself upon the throne that belonged to the King.

"A gift to celebrate the birth of a Queen!"

Polo waved his hand, and dreamlike starlight turned into a sky full of blossoms that came drifting down.

Streak after streak of phantom fireworks shot up into the sky behind him and burst apart.

Below the palace steps, row after row of trilobite men knelt down, stretching away into the distance like waves upon the sea.

"The Queen!"

"The chosen one."

"..."

In an instant, that scene froze in place.

The Queen sat high upon her throne, and the Divine Messenger, clad in his golden divine robe, stood at her side, bearing witness to her divinity and her royal power.

The stone tablet preserved that image, and the epic recorded this chapter that would be handed down for all eternity.