Chapter 222

Chapter 222: Wavering

As always, Vanna calmed herself and silently recited the sacred passages from Storm Canon. Then she took from the drawer a half-burned Inscribed Candle, set it by her side, and lit it on the candlestick.

A small, bright flame danced at the tip of the candle. A soothing scent spread slowly as the oil evaporated. Vanna drew in a gentle breath, then, without hesitation, dragged the dagger across her arm.

Blood seeped into the fine patterns on the dagger, as if the blade absorbed it. A brief pain came from her arm, but it did not even last a few seconds before it turned into the faint itch of a closing wound.

Vanna could even hear the soft sound of cells regenerating and blood congealing. She watched as the wound on her arm healed quickly, while the faint sound of waves seemed to echo by her ears.

She looked again at the ritual dagger in her hand. After a slight pause, she held the bloodstained blade over the burning candle and let the flame lick the tip.

“Please hear this Listening Rite, Master of the Storm, Gospel of The Deep Sea, Maiden of the Still Sea. Please hear this Listening Rite. Your follower needs guidance…”

The flame crackled. The blood on the dagger ignited in an instant and turned into a hazy glow that floated along the blade.

This was the sign that the channel had been opened.

A Saint could, using blood as a guide, a special Prayer, and a special ritual, build between herself and the God a channel far more stable and direct than what an ordinary priest achieved in Prayer. This special power and “favor” was exactly what set a Saint apart from the rest of the Clergy.

And as for how stable and how direct this special “channel” truly was…

In a sense, it was almost the same as speaking directly with a god.

The soft sound of waves rose again, growing clearer as if it echoed right inside her mind. Vanna felt the air around her grow damp. Even her nose seemed to catch a faint salty tang. Then her thoughts suddenly blurred, and the scene before her changed.

Her familiar bedroom vanished. Around her stretched endless, gently surging dark-blue seawater. Faint blue lights rose and fell in the depths, as if hundreds of mysterious light sources glowed within The Deep Sea. Vanna felt as if she stood at the center of some vast, shadowy Deep Sea domain. In the rippling light before her, a blurred figure slowly emerged.

It seemed to be a Lady in a long dress. Behind her, vast hazy Shadows spread in all directions. The Lady’s face was hidden behind a veil. The Shadows behind her coiled and wove together like countless chains, or like the outline of some much larger “body” that lay beyond Mortal reason. The figure in the dress was only a small part of that immense body—the one small part Mortals could still bear to perceive.

Vanna drew in a slow breath and tried to steady her heartbeat.

As a Saint, seeing the storm Goddess Gamona’s phantom or avatar form during a special ritual was nothing unusual. But when she thought of how shaken she had been today, and of the almost heretical doubts in her heart, she still could not help feeling nervous.

The mysterious blurred figure seemed to draw a little closer. “She” did not speak, but Vanna felt a “thought” appear directly in her mind.

The Goddess’s phantom was telling her to speak.

“I…” Vanna hesitated for a moment. At last she seemed to make up her mind and spoke directly: “I survived because of Subspace. Why did you still choose me as a Saint and grant me your divine blessing?”

The blurred figure did not move at all. Vanna did not dare to push. She knew that, even though she saw only a projection, that projection pointed straight to Gamona herself. The question she had just asked was a huge risk—

It already went beyond what was proper for a Believer. But she truly wanted to know the answer.

She waited in anxious silence. She did not know how long had passed before a thought suddenly dropped into her mind as if planted there—

“…There is no difference…”

“No difference?” Vanna froze. This answer, cut off at both ends, was even harder to understand than a broken, obscure prophecy or revelation. She instinctively felt that this reply should have other “context” around it, information she had failed to grasp and so could not hear. That thought made her ask again before she could stop herself: “No difference in what? I don’t understand. Do you mean that, even knowing I was once blessed by Subspace, you still chose…”

But Vanna did not finish. The Deep Sea vision around her suddenly lurched and roiled. The gentle, bright lights in the depths went dark one after another. The Goddess’s phantom was on the verge of collapse in the blink of an eye. Vanna felt herself being “pushed” out of the channel. Before the connection was completely cut, she barely sensed a few faint words:

“…Time is short… about to… reach the threshold…”

The connection broke completely.

Vanna felt as if she had been thrown back into the Mortal Realm. Her heart pounded. A near-suffocating pressure made her gasp for breath. She lifted her head and looked around. All the visions had vanished. The dagger had fallen onto the table at some point. Only the Inscribed Candle still burned quietly, its flame flickering, unsteady.

She did not know how long she stared at the flame before she finally looked away. She picked up the fallen dagger and slowly put it back into the drawer.

In her mind circled the only fragments she had received during that brief exchange.

“There is no difference,” and, “Time is short, about to reach the threshold.”

She still had no idea what the first meant. The second sounded more concrete, but it only left her more confused.

Was the Goddess telling her that something was about to happen? Was this a warning that the time to prepare for something was running out? What did “threshold” mean? What was about to reach it? Another crisis? Another disaster on the level of a Mortal Realm invasion?

Was it connected to the crisis Pland had just survived?

Vanna’s thoughts spun. This Prayer had not calmed her at all. Instead, she felt even more uneasy than during the day.

But suddenly, a strange color flickered at the edge of her vision, and her chaotic thoughts stopped at once.

The flame dancing on the Inscribed Candle had, at some point, taken on a faint ghostly green.

In the next second, she snapped her head up toward the dressing table and the oval mirror upon it.

Captain Duncan’s figure had appeared within the frame, watching her with a calm gaze.

“Are you all right?”

The dark, imposing figure spoke. The question came very abruptly.

“You?” Vanna jolted and shot to her feet. Then, as if something occurred to her, she added: “Were you the one who disrupted my ritual just now?”

“ritual? I think you misunderstood,” Duncan said in the mirror, shaking his head with an easy tone. “I suddenly sensed your aura in extreme turmoil. I thought there was still some troublesome enemy left in Pland, so I came to check… but it seems I was rash.”

Sense her aura in chaos… so he came to check on her?

Vanna’s mind filled with question marks. She even wondered if she had misheard. Then she recalled the first time she had seen him in the mirror and, by reflex, grew wary again: “Did you drag me into a dream again?”

“You’re still in the Mortal Realm, you don’t need to worry about that,” Duncan said casually. “So I strongly advise you not to leap in here swinging like last time—you really will turn your own room into a mess.”

“…I am not some brute who only knows how to jump in swinging,” Vanna muttered. Talking with this ghost captain was exhausting. His words and actions always went beyond the records, and every time she was caught off guard like this, she found herself relaxing her guard without meaning to. “Besides ‘coming to check on things’, what else do you intend to do? I thought… you had already left for good.”

In the mirror, Duncan frowned, as if the young Inquisitor’s tense hostility gave him a headache. “You really could relax a little. And maybe be a bit more polite. I have indeed left, but distance in time and space doesn’t mean much to me. Also—no matter how you look at it, I just protected your city-state. Don’t you think you at least owe me a word of thanks?”

Vanna stared hard at the ghost captain in the mirror. After a few seconds, she suddenly stepped forward and actually bowed her head. “Thank you very much for your help. At least in this matter, Pland was under your protection.”

This frank gratitude caught Duncan off guard. He had thought this young lady’s head was as hard as her muscles. The surprise actually made him a bit embarrassed. “It… doesn’t have to be that serious. I was just saying.”

“Our positions may be different, but no one can deny that you protected Pland,” Vanna said, lifting her head with a serious face. “Countless people survived the disaster today. Setting aside my duty as an Inquisitor, I should thank you for that.”

She paused there, then quickly straightened her expression. “But that does not mean I will relax my vigilance toward you and the Vanished. We still do not know what your goal is regarding the civilized world… and until that is clear, I will…”

“That’s enough, I understand,” Duncan cut her off. He looked at the young Inquisitor with a half-smile. Her words and attitude were far from polite, but this almost overly straightforward nature made it hard to dislike her. “Then let’s talk about something else… You seem to be in trouble?”

Vanna met Duncan’s gaze. After a few seconds, she drew a quiet breath. “Sorry. It has nothing to do with you.”

“…Nothing to do with me, but I’m curious,” Duncan said calmly. “Whether you admit it or not, you cannot shake off the brand I left on you, Vanna. I can feel how bad your state is right now—maybe I can help.”