The Flow of Will
The Flow of Will. The same phenomenon was unfolding across every star. The instant Arie heard those words, the only thought that flashed through her mind was impossible.
Just as the sky held countless stars, the gods who watched over this world were equally innumerable. What could be seen was never the whole picture; when the stars concealed within the night were added to the count, the number swelled beyond measure. For the exact same phenomenon to be occurring simultaneously among that vast multitude of stars…? Such a thing would be impossible unless the gods had united as one and begun to move in perfect harmony.
“That makes no sense. Are the gods preparing for war?”
Arie pressed the Pope for a more detailed explanation. No matter how close she stood to the gods as the Saintess, she was still nothing more than a Mortal who had never reached Transcendence. Having not yet stepped into that higher realm, she could not read the currents of the world. No matter how intently she gazed at the stars, the Pope’s meaning remained hidden from her.
The Pope said nothing. He simply swept his hand gently through the empty air. In response, thin lines resembling delicate tails appeared on every star that filled the room. Arie instinctively understood what those lines represented.
“…The flow.”
“You see clearly. Not everyone perceives it this way, but this should be sufficient to help you understand.”
What was the flow? It was the history of movement and change present in all things. That current was not confined to the physical alone. Emotions, time, thoughts, will—everything that existed, and even things that did not, possessed its own unique flow.
“A Transcendent cannot read every current, but the scope of what they can see grows according to the powers they wield and the disciplines they have mastered. What you see now is a visualization of only the ‘Flow of Will’ that appears to me.”
“Then in Your Holiness’s eyes, is the entire world covered in these threads?”
“Hmm… that is…”
The Pope paused, considering her question, then shook his head.
“One day, when you too reach Transcendence, you will understand naturally.”
Under normal circumstances she would have let out a playful laugh and teased, How pitiful it must be to live as a mere Mortal, but this time Arie swallowed the words, keeping them locked inside. She studied the stars the Pope had revealed and the countless threads stretching between them.
“It’s true… the Flow of Will is moving.”
“Indeed. The will of the gods flows in one direction or another. Yet the stars themselves show no movement whatsoever. Now look closer.”
At the Pope’s urging, Arie examined the slender threads wriggling like snakes. This time a single oddity caught her attention.
“These… are they being pushed aside?”
What she had first taken for random, ruleless writhing now looked as though the threads were being forcibly displaced by something unseen. Faced with a phenomenon she could not comprehend, Arie turned to the Pope with disbelief written across her face.
“Did you not say these threads were the Flow of Will?”
“I did.”
“Then does that truly mean… the will of the gods is being pushed away like these threads…?”
“……”
The Pope answered with silence. Arie understood that silence as confirmation. He would never have spoken of such a thing without certainty. Yet that very certainty only deepened her confusion.
“If this is real… why aren’t the gods taking action? They must sense the disturbance.”
“That I do not know. The gods do not share their inner thoughts with me.”
There was no way the gods themselves could have failed to notice what the Pope had perceived. The fact that they had taken no measures at all was undeniably strange. Upon discovering the anomaly, the Pope would have attempted to commune with them at once. When no reply came despite his waiting, he had turned instead to the Saintess.
“I believed you would be able to receive their answer… It appears I was mistaken.”
“…It seems so. There is no response at all. They used to let their emotions show so clearly…”
Yet the outcome was identical. If anything, the connection felt even more tightly sealed than before; not even their emotions could be sensed. As Arie continued to pray, unable to hide her disappointment, the Pope spoke in a quiet voice.
“That is enough. It seems the gods have no intention of answering.”
“But if our communion with them is completely severed like this…”
“Do not worry. Divine power remains completely unaffected, which suggests the gods have no desire to cut off contact forever.”
As the Pope said, nothing within the Church or the Holy Kingdom had changed. The only difference was that the Saintess could no longer speak with the gods. The rest of the clergy, who had never directly felt the divine presence, continued their worship in blissful ignorance.
If the Pope—who had read the flow of the stars—and the Saintess—who had heard the news directly from him—simply kept silent, the matter would never spread. Another secret that had to be guarded to prevent chaos had been born, and Arie’s shoulders felt heavier than ever.
At that moment the Pope called out to her, noticing the weight of her thoughts.
“There is still more I must tell you.”
“Have you already discovered something?”
“Yes. Before you arrived, I reflected deeply on the flow. I was able to reach one conclusion.”
“……”
When he had first noticed the phenomenon, the erratic writhing of the currents had led him to believe there were no rules at all. But after careful analysis revealed that every flow was being pushed regardless of direction, a single hypothesis formed in his mind.
“It seemed too strange that all the gods would experience the same phenomenon at once. Their wills could not have united when not every god holds friendly relations with the others. Only after realizing the flows were being pushed did one possibility finally occur to me.”
“A possibility…?”
“That some unknown force is forcibly displacing the Flow of Will.”
“Pardon…?”
If an unidentified something was pushing against the collective will of every god, the simultaneous nature of the phenomenon made sense. Yet each god was an existence that had long since surpassed the realm of Transcendents. To push against the will of all of them should have been impossible.
The Pope had thought the same and tried to dismiss his own absurd hypothesis—until he noticed something dark and suspicious slowly approaching from a distance far greater than the stars themselves. So distant that it was impossible to tell whether it was a single entity or many, this unknown presence…
Having revealed everything, the Pope spoke to Arie with solemn gravity.
“Remember this well, Arie. It seems events of great import are about to unfold.”
“……”
“Should the unexpected occur, stay close to those you can trust. That way, even if the Holy Kingdom itself should fall, you will still be able to find your own path.”
“…Yes, Your Holiness.”
Arie nodded, her expression hardened with resolve.
Complete darkness swallowed every direction. There was no way to tell whether the black mist that had consumed us still lingered or had already vanished.
“……”
“……”
“……”
Hestia and I remained pressed close together, silently drawing strength from each other. Our forms were barely visible, yet the warmth of contact was still vividly clear.
For a while… or perhaps for a very long time, we stayed like that, listening only to each other’s breathing within a silence so absolute it felt as though the world itself had stopped.
“……”
“Ahem…”
The seemingly endless quiet was finally broken by Hestia’s awkward little cough. Noticing the faint blush on her face, I slowly eased back a step.
For some reason her gaze had begun drifting in a rather dangerous direction… It looked strangely familiar, though I couldn’t quite place where I had seen it before.
“Um…”
“Y-yes?”
A fleeting ominous thought crossed my mind, but Hestia’s voice snapped me back to the present and I quickly discarded the pointless speculation. She was pointing toward something in the distance.
“It appears there is something over there.”
“Oh, you’re right.”
In the direction she indicated stood a door. Unlike the massive gate that had led to the treasure vault, this one was ordinary in size—about the width of a dormitory entrance. In this realm of pure darkness, it was the only thing emitting a faint, gentle light.
“…This feels way too suspicious.”
“I agree.”
“What should we do? I don’t see any other paths.”
“Hmm…”
Hestia pondered for a moment before speaking in a tone that suggested she saw no alternative.
“We cannot remain here indefinitely. In darkness like this, there is no telling when or where something might emerge.”
“I suppose you’re right. I’ll follow your lead, Lady Hestia.”
Together we began walking slowly toward the only visible door within the gloom.