Epilogue: Alicia Piquet

“Ow ow ow…”

No matter how many times I’d cast this spell before, every single attempt would end up with me winding up on the wrong side of the meteor.

“How hard is it to just keep me on top, you dumb rock?! Now my ass is sore!”

I didn’t know why exactly I was screaming at the thing. The other Saints always made fun of me for doing that sort of thing—talking to my spells as if they were sentient. But the joke was on them, wasn’t it? That was exactly why I was the strongest whilst they were struggling to even master their own assigned elements. The only reason most of them were Saints was because I tried to be inclusive, let’s be real—aside from Erica and Anne-Marie, they were practically figureheads, especially that Air Saint guy. He was fricking clueless. If I were in a room with him and Ashmodai and had only two Lumens of Quanta, I’d Holy Smite him twice.

Hehe. “Fricking”. Loved that word—Lower Realm cussing had such a crude veneer to it. It made it sound so more impactful… much more biting than calling someone an imbecile or a retard.

Nursing my butt with one hand, I used the other to survey my surroundings. Thankfully, I’d landed in the middle of nowhere… well, not exactly middle of nowhere, but secluded enough that the only casualties from my sudden entry and subsequent crater were just bugs and plants. Praise Quanta that Marie wasn’t here to give me a lecture. I said a little prayer I learned from the old lady who took care of me at that magic shop they called a “LAN café” and surveyed my surroundings as I did so.

May Jesus have mercy on their souls.

It was awfully green and full of life for a world five centuries deep into the Calamity. I wonder if that PrimotGodXXX guy actually wound up being able to save the Higher Continent?

It was strange; his body had split into three, and he was definitely dead when I’d gone to inspect the wreckage. But as soon as I’d uttered something about me having made a mistake in declaring him the one, his head shattered into grey fragments, as if he was spiting me by undergoing spontaneous magical decomposition. But the other things I killed and transmogrified in the Lower Realm for sustenance when I was first starting out and hadn’t found the LAN shop yet… like rats and the things the forum called cats—those creatures didn’t decompose the same way when I tried storing them in my knapsack. Oh well. Maybe this was Human specific.

I mean, the whole debacle was strange, wasn’t it? What even was that massive vehicle that came and killed him? It seemed so sudden and out of place, almost as if somebody was trying to assassinate him on purpose.

Nevermind that, I thought to myself, and shook my head to accompany that thought. It was probably more likely that I hadn’t spent as much time as Erica said it would when I made that journey down below. She was full of it all the time, I guess, so it made sense that would be wrong—all that complicated stuff about “time dilation” and “the perspective of the observer” didn’t even sit right to me, anyway. It was just an excuse for her to sit there and be pretty, even though she could just use Aether to blink in, nab the guy we needed and port back out.

“Bitch! Lazy bitch!”

The bottom line was this—defeating Ashmodai without me? What kind of unrealistic story was that?

It was looking more and more obvious that this was just my trip not taking as long as expected.

Hmm.

But then… if that was the case, this meadow was oddly devoid of Ashmodai’s undead minions.

“Owow.”

Now it wasn’t just my butt—my head was hurting too. I’d never been too good at thinking, and too much of it always gave me migraines.

In times like these, the best thing to do was head to the nearest settlement and ask for help. I levitated myself into the air, spotted a Human-enough looking city near the base of a mountain, then decided to pay it a visit.

***

“Hello, guardsmen!”

I regarded my fellow Humans with a wave, but they just seemed gobsmacked by my appearance. Maybe my hair had gotten all frizzled up during my interplanetary journey? (That was another phrase I had picked up on the forums. They called me things like an “alien” or a “bot” and taught me various things like, Go [Fleet Footwork] off a balcony, or [Lobotomise] yourself. It was very enlightening to hear all their theories on the universe.)

I smoothened out the kinks in my appearance, but the guards just stood there, unmoving, like Crimean Gargoyles.

I stared at the emblems on their shields. A Calicean Lion.

“Oh, you guys are Calicean! Well, why didn’t you just say so, fellow Caliceans?”

“G… goddess…”

“Wha?”

One of the men quite literally foamed at the mouth and collapsed to the floor. The other guy panicked and stumbled around, back and forth, unsure of what to do.

Um, okay.

Well, not my problem. They were Calicean, I was Calicean, and the gate was open—so I decided to just walk into the city, as was my right as a fellow subject of the Empress of the Holy Lands. Not like I could heal people anyway.

***

The city was bustling in a way I’d seen no other city bustle before.

The architecture was magnificent—far more expensive and glamorous than anything I’d seen, comparable to even the most holy districts of Sienne. A massive clock tower oversaw the entire barony, and even shophouses by the side of the road were sculpted with artisan craftsmanship. Speaking of the side of the road, walkways were paved in marble and granite, a massive waste of crowns in my opinion, and even the tiny houses, oh my goodness—but they had glass.

I was stunned. It was hard to believe that this was part of Calice—a Kingdom that’d been ruined and ripped apart by Ashmodai’s minions, so much so that I had to go to the Lower Realms to find someone capable of defeating the Demon King. Were we so devoid of jobs now we had to make up grass cutting as a profession?! What happened in the two months I was gone?

One other problem—everywhere I walked, people would point and gawk at me. They would usually be kids, most of the time, and their parents would forcefully avert their gazes once they noticed them staring. But that couldn’t be the case, right…? Men in the Lower Realms at the magic shop would constantly conduct courtship rituals in front of me, like, Hey, you play Valorant? Want me to boost you? I was never interested, but that gave me the impression that I was able to maintain my appearance whenever I jumped from realm to realm. Or maybe the stress of two journeys took their toll on my skin?

I checked my reflection in my gauntlet just in case. Nope—I still looked like me. Okay, perhaps beauty standards differed depending on how far out from the capital you went.

I reached the bottom of the clock tower, which also situated a massive plaza that had performers in it. Jesters juggled, some bards were singing, and merchants yelled from atop boxes as they tried to move their merchandise. Here, I started getting less and less stares—perhaps it was because the various performers around me were much more eyecatching in their getup, or maybe just the general density of people around the plaza making me less noticeable. Either way, this was much more preferable to the host of troubled looks and hushed whispers that I got in all the smaller districts—and eventually I found a troubadour yelling out the news.

“Crown Princess sentenced to death! A heretic on the run! Read about it all in the Silvercross Gazette!”

I gestured out to him. “Excuse me, sir!”

“What is it, milady? Oh—nice costume, if I do say so myself! Rather daring!”

“Thanks! My armour has pockets!” I had to yell to project my voice above all the hubbub. “Hey, I was wondering—what city is this?”

“This is Silvercross, madame!”

Silvercross? I’d never heard of something like this before. And such a pretentious name…

Mm, mm, I nodded to myself. There’s no doubt about it. Erica must have named this place, disgusting slut whore…

But that opened an entirely new can of worms. A bustling city that I’d never heard of, named by one of my peers somewhere far out in the countryside, with a population density that’d be unheard of even in the most inner cities… there was no doubt about it.

This was… the future?

“What happened to Ashmodai?”

“What?”

“Ashmodai! The Demon King!”

“Do you mean Asmodeus?!”

“No, Ashmodai! The devil who summoned all those skeletons and ghouls and stuff!”

“There is no such person,” the troubadour said, annoyed for some reason. “Look, nice costume and all, but if you’re going to derail me from my job… Just get on your way! Buy a copy or get the fuck outta here!”

What the heck even was a copy? How did he know fuck? Wasn’t that Lower Realm vernacular? Was this some sort of technological advancement… language drift sort of… huh?

I was confused, but I quickly realised what the man was referring to—there was a large stack of parchments by his side with pictures and words on them, similar to what they called light novels in the LAN shop. Except those had weirdly proportioned fictional female adjacent things on the cover with ginormous breasts, but these seemed… more serious in nature?

I picked up a “copy”.

MAIDEN OF REVOLUTION REVEALED TO BE BASTARD AND HARBINGER OF DEMONS

“Hey, pay for that shit, you dumb wh—”

“Zip it, serf,” I snapped back.

I channeled one Lumen of Quanta to seal the guy’s mouth shut. Telekinesis always came in handy to dispatch people without killing them. His muffled screams of protest were still audible in the background, but this was the best I could do right now.

Scanning the “copy”, I saw a black and white photo.

A girl that looks just like a younger version of me, next to a Knight.

“What the heck?”

And then, some text below that.

Maelle Piquet, 14, heir to House Piquet and the Holy Kingdom of Calice, as well as an Empress candidate, found to be guilty of crimes against religion: heresy, thaumaturgy, and bastardry.

I genuinely didn’t understand what any of these terms were, except bastardry and Calice and Empress… okay, that was basically understanding the whole thing. Let me rephrase.

I didn’t understand how thaumaturgy could be a crime against religion. And what even counted as heresy nowadays, even? Why did this girl have the same name as my peasant name? It was disgusting—bless my mother’s soul, but being called Maelle was the entire reason I made up the “confirmation name” rule about becoming a Templar.

I supposed I would read more to find out. But as I decided to do that, I realised that more and more people were starting to gather around like I was some kind of exhibit. Perhaps they didn’t take too kindly to me shutting the troubadour up? Now that I thought a bit more about it, maybe I should have just sent him into outer space instead—his muffling was indeed rather loud.

Often claimed to be a reincarnation of the Revered Goddess, Legendary Gravity Saint Alicia Piquet—Third Princess Maelle had often been touted as a true ‘heir of heirs’ within the context of the Piquet line. However, in a shocking turn of events…

I… what?

Reincarnation? “Revered Goddess”? “Legendary”?

All around me, the voices grew louder and louder.

“Is that…”

“No, it can’t be…”

“Goddess?”

I didn’t know what to do. I was as confused as them.

Did I… Cross over into the wrong timeline? Do I need to find Anne-Marie?

“Excuse me,” a voice said. “Pardon me.”

A man in light armour cut through the ever-growing crowd, then put a hand on my shoulder. I had half a mind to implode his body and fold it into a pretzel… but eh, he was kind of handsome, so whatever. Much better looking than that PrimotGodXXX chap—and all of the Lower Realm magic shop denizens, for that matter. The only thing strange about him was the “7” tattooed below his eyelid.

“Hello. Gravity Saint Alicia, I’m assuming?”

“Um… yes?”

“Pleased to make your acquaintance,” he said, bowing politely. “I’m Elder Denzel Meyer, Templar Justicar of Sienne sect.”

“...”

“Sorry—force of habit. I know most of those words mean gibberish to you right now. But if you wouldn’t mind, could you follow me for a quick history lesson? The King wants to get you up to speed.”

King? We’re being ruled by a man now?

Before I could respond, he grabbed my wrist and pulled me out of the crowd. Typical male behaviour.