Full Crown

Long after a great plague devastated the whole world, the era of healing came. The Elven race suddenly came out from their isolation and shared some fruits that came from the ‘Tree of Life’. These fruits were distributed around the world and were planted on barren lands, giving them new life and restoring the vibrant scenery of the earth. But in the middle of restoring back the world’s lost health, an incident happened. A monster, said to have adapted and evolved during the great plague, awakened and started to eat the nutrients of the land. Or that’s how it should be, but what that thing was really after are the lost souls of the barren lands. The fruits of the ‘Tree of Life’ are actually using the lost souls as nourishments to bring back life to the land through collecting the lost souls by the mana roots of the world. The collected souls were then purified by cleansing the negative emotions and using those emotions as mana to restore the earth.

The restoration of the barren lands were taken to a halt because of the said monster, and news about it were reported out quickly. Since it is a monster that has the characteristics of the plague, it would be a tough opponent for an ordinary soldier or adventurer to fight, that’s why all the nations and races sent their strongest piece and one of them was the first Saintess.

Bearer of the Divine Scepter, the first Saintess, together with the other strongest made their way to defeat the said monster. They fought strong and hard, releasing every techniques, skills, and magic they owned but in the end they cannot defeat it. As a last resort, the Saintess released the power inside the Scepter, then a giant pillar of light that can be seen from all over the world, shot up into the sky calling out a giant bolt of lightning striking down directly into the monster causing the terrain a big change. After the blinding light died out, all that was left is a scorched flesh in the middle of the place where the lightning struck. After the long and hard battle they’ve finally killed it, or so they thought. After examining and removing the burnt flesh, they saw a deep hole was dug underneath it. Believing the monster used it to escape and go into hiding.

“So what we need is the Divine Scepter’s magic that almost killed that monster?” (Rufus)

“Yes, but that would be impossible since, the magic inside the Scepter is now a different one.” (Saintess)

“What do you mean by different?” (Dolph)

“Every generation the Divine Scepter choose its wielder among the blessed young girls of the church. From there, it will grant powers to the chosen Saintess, and a powerful magic that can only be used once. But the magic that the Scepter grants were different from one Saintess to the other.” (Saintess)

“Can it be done by the magic that you, the current Saintess, have?” (Scorpius)

“Sadly it can’t since the magic that I received is not for attacking an opponent.” (Saintess)

“Then how are we going to defeat that monster? Is there a way to replicate the magic that the first Saintess had?” (Crystallis)

“There is a way but I will be needing the help of my entourage and most likely, you Miss Clare.” (Saintess)

“Wait! Me?!” (Clare)

“Yes, since you also possessed holy magic and moreover you have that sword.” (Saintess)

“No, that… Is there any other way?” (Clare)

“There is but, the other option will make us go back outside and prepared for at least a month before coming back here.” (Saintess)

“...” (Clare)

“Clare, if you can’t do just say it, I will back you up for whatever decision you make.” (Rufus)

“Yeah, me too. If it’s hard for you, then we just have to take the other option. You think so too right, Callan?” (Flora)

“Yeah.” (Callan)

“You guys…” (Clare)

“Woah there, don’t just decide on your own. There are people here who needs the payment of this expedition as soon as possible.” (Cassius)

“Yeah, don’t just left us out like that. We also have some say in this right?” (Cyan)

“Just do it, we can’t lose our reward here. And we are already at the ninth stage, you don’t expect us to just walk away right now with nothing on us.” (Cassius)

“Hey you guys! Clare has her own circumstances, don’t just dump things to make her feel guilt!” (Flora)

“But you want to dump this expedition out just to say she can’t do it?! We also have our own circumstances here!” (Cyan)

The meeting started fine when the Saintess is taking the lead. She told the story of the first Saintess and the possible clue that can defeat the black monster. The only problem now is actually the suggestion she gave. With the circumstances that Clare has about her weapon and the circumstances that the other adventurers has about the quest, the two side clash their opinions and now started a quarrel in the middle of the meeting. When both sides are heating up, Frederick suddenly got in between the rising tension.

“Stop your quarrelling!” (Frederick)

Both groups quieted down from the outburst of wave from Frederick’s voice. The moment silence took over the meeting room he gave his own take in the problem.

“I understand that both sides has their own reasons, but we won’t be able to move forward if you just keep shouting at each other. Sir Cassius, stand down, if you don’t know the problem of the other side, they will just keep resisting your reason to continue. And Miss Clare, we don’t know your circumstances, but if we let that monster eat more specters and phantoms, even the countermeasure that the Saintess has might not be enough if we wait anymore. We won’t push this huge responsibility to you, so if you don’t want to continue, you can just use the teleportation stone and abandon this quest together with your party.” (Frederick)

“…Please give me some time to think.” (Clare)

“Don’t worry, you can take your time Miss Clare.” (Saintess)

“Thank you.” (Clare)

With that, Clare and her party got out of the meeting room and the meeting was adjourned at the same time. It was decided that the meeting will continue tomorrow, so we went to our respective positions and took the rest of the time to do our own things.