✧ Chapter 26 ✧

As they traveled into Polar Plaza, many fluffles were walking wherever they pleased. It was surely a sight to see. There were blue, red, and green-lit lamp posts decorated throughout the plaza; celebrating the holiday season.

"Wait. So if Luminaria Day ends after the light show happens, how are we going to gain the trust of The Elder Fluffle before then? Do we have to find something that they need?" asked Styra.

Omnikra faced Flight's direction which began to make him feel uncomfortable. Something about this told him that the reason that was true could be because he had a certain valuable item…

"No. No. No, listen okay. If you're going to tell me that it's the Shard Of Surreality, we can't do that. The shard is our backup plan. Without it, we may not make it out alive. If that guardian controls reality, we are taking a chance on our survival. You and Styra may be powerful but as she said before, unlimited power can't solve everything-"

Omnikra interrupted him before he could say more.

"Unlimited power cannot solve everything? Not to be rude but, what is that phrase supposed to indicate? A being with control over all aspects of existence can indeed solve every problem known to be. I think you are referring to who possesses that power as the bigger factor in that scenario. Tell you what. See that statue up there?"

The gazes of Styra, Snowflake, and Flight caught the center of attention within the plaza itself. A large stone fountain had an ice statue in the middle. It consisted of a large humanoid figure wearing a flowing intricate dress, wavy hair with dreadlock braids intertwined, and a specially designed tiara dedicated to the ruler of Frostice. Omnikra proceeded to further explain the history behind it to prove a point.

"Diamondion, The Guardian Of Reality, is a highly devoted queen who has connections with many worlds. As you can expect, she has fought in many wars and is probably one of the most successful of the Heptarion Force. I have spied on them for a long time. If you haven't noticed, these fluffles surrounding us could turn against us at any second. They are just one of many."

Flight still wasn't too convinced about giving it all up like this. Plus, why would The Elder Fluffle really want this shard? Omnikra wasn't specific enough regarding the details behind this. He had to get the proper answers.

"Okay, I get that. What I believe we really should do is… Where did Styra go?"

Looking around the busy marketplace, Snowflake was also absent from their view. Fortunately, Omnikra was able to direct his perspective toward where she actually was. As it turned out, there was a clamoring of fluffles taking precedence at random shops where this beaming flash of light ran to each one. It was Styra.

"What is she doing?" asked Flight.

When Omnikra looked into her subconscious, it learned that she was trying to form relations with each of the townsfolk. She flew to each of the stands in a blur, as each fluffle shared their customs. With the Eternal Light Of Life, she was able to freely speak and understand their language without the hassle of going into the archives of time just to have it figured out. She was becoming stronger in her abilities to use all of the Eternal Lights with ease. To her, this was a way to test each of them to their full advantage. However, she was causing a big scene without realizing it.

"Wait!" shouted Omnikra with a demanding voice.

Styra came to a screeching stop. She ended up next to a fluffle that was showing her that it had a pouch where it kept a few special items. Snowflake was peeking from inside when it heard the audibly unnerving sound.

"Styra, you didn't tell us what you were about to do. I understand you want to form bonds but, you are creating an unnecessarily large performance that would be enough for The Elder Fluffle or Diamondion to catch us in the wrong act when we have not fully initiated the next step in our plan yet. Can you not do all this? Keep it under control," said Omnikra.

Being in the limelight, Styra was about to defend her reasoning until a huge band of fluffle soldiers came down from the castle's pathway into the square. They began to play this strange gentle fanfare with their spherical horns high in the air as the instrument could play multiple different kinds of sounds into one. It was an endearing orchestrated song until the moment it ended. Two grown shirokeis that were about five feet tall walked down to the entrance of the market pulling this ice carriage while being whipped like horses. This made Snowflake jump out of the pouch and whine because it was scared to see its kind in captivity. The fluffle that had Snowflake in its pouch looked at it with a certain sadness. Omnikra, realizing they were about to start the event, hid far away behind a house before everything got settled.

Out of the carriage doors came The Elder Fluffle. Its small black top hat, lengthy gray cane, and white fancy mustache were well noticeable upon arrival. Styra and Flight could tell something bad was ready to happen. As The Elder Fluffle approached, he looked larger in comparison to most of the others. His hulking pudgy feet shook part of the land step by step. A duke fluffle placed a pedestal before him as he started his annual announcement speech. When he spoke, Flight realized he would have to ask Styra again to translate the words that The Elder Fluffle said. This is because the fluffles' language, Uku, was foreign to him.

Upon inquiring about what he said, Styra's face dropped from what she had heard.

"Flight, I'm sorry. He wants one of two things. A valuable item or an ode by someone to become his servant at the castle for life... You know where this is going..."

Omnikra lost all hope as it was trying to avoid having any of them fake their servitude to Diamondion. The risks played themselves. Flight couldn't stand her selflessness to break apart the plan. Sticking together was the stronger priority against that, although there was no real way to control her actions at this rate.

Throughout the crowd, none raised their hand or were able to offer anything special except for Styra. Flight tried to change her mind but the damage was already done. She walked to the front, knowing that if she were to do this, they'd be better off. The shard was too important to be given away like that. If Omnikra wondered why she sacrificed herself, it was due to being born billions of years ago. It made her feel this way for a long period of time without any signs of change during the asteroid wipe. In her head, she wasn't doing this out of selfish reasoning. If they had to talk to Diamondion by doing this, that was the only course of action she needed to hear.

When Styra reached the pedestal, The Elder Fluffle congratulated her, as well as most of the audience. A loud celebration took place where the night skies began to light with what looked to be rainbow clouds tattered across like a blanket. The second Luminaria showed itself, a mist of sparkles and snowflakes traveled through the air from one of the castle's main balconies, appearing behind the pedestal. Erupting out of it was the one and only, Diamondion.

"My fellow Fluffles, I welcome you to tonight's spectacle! Let this be a time of love and memories worth cherishing. For we are going to have a large banquet take place at the front entrance of the kingdom for our 100th anniversary of this town's settlement!" she said.

Diamondion saw the fluffles cheer; screaming excessively to the top of their lungs. Out of the majority, however, Snowflake and Flight looked like outcasts amongst the praise. This started to raise suspicions about her new servant. By glancing over at the newcomer who volunteered, the supposedly new servant was becoming so stiff to everyone and everything around her. Diamondion walked over and placed her hand where Styra's heart was. This made the audience gradually quiet down. Flight could tell they were going to need some sort of backup right now, but it was not just the shard that he thought about.

Back in the STS-0, Hisa was asleep in the cockpit while Chelbie slept across the cargo seats as if it was a bed. When the alarm activated inside the ship, Chelbie woke up in an instant to flashing red siren sounds and signals. She opened the cockpit door to see what it looked like outside. The air was little to less impactful on her skin as expected since they were shielded from the outside. Upon closer observation, she saw a shirokei sniffing next to the shield until it noticed her bizarrely standing there with confidence. It seemed appalled with how rowdy her expression was.

Chelbie shrugged at the creature's judgmental look at her.

"Ey, what did ya expect? Blazin' is my style!" she shouted, as she ran inside the ship and closed back the cargo doors to wake Hisa up.

Hisa felt tired, but still intact. They rang Styra's earpiece so she could let down the Time Shield. However, there was a problem. Diamondion was already looking at the star on her suit as if she was trying to feel for what was inside of it. If Styra used the Eternal Light Of Time now, everyone would notice the white light switch to purple which would equally cause them to be on bad terms about where Amethion was. Fortunately, Flight had the shard so he could save her. The only thing to consider was the longevity of using it against a much more experienced guardian.

Omnikra was holding too much back to not start something. If Styra took care of the fluffles' commitment to their queen, then that wasn't going to be the actual issue with them. Rather, it was really Diamondion herself they had to worry about. The weapon looked at Flight, whose eyes looked back at it. This time, he put the shard into a zipper pocket on the inside of his cloak to keep it from being visible. Then what happened next was total madness. The queen decided to provoke Styra to see what would happen. She was not afraid to confront those who seemed like invaders. Diamondion punched Styra down with no remorse.

"What made you think I am susceptible to being lied to? My presence is beyond your understanding," she said.

At that point, Styra could tell the fight had begun. Omnikra flew out from behind the house, hitting against Diamondion as a distraction so Styra could let down the Time Shield surrounding the STS-0. Hisa, who was waiting patiently, finally let the ship take off when she saw the Time Shield disappear. Hovering over the frozen landscape, she analyzed the location of the earpieces with DIVA's fascinating adjustment to drawing out terrain within seconds to find Styra and Flight's geographical positions.

"Hang on tight Chelbie. We have a girl, my friend, and talking blades to save," she said, as the ship flew over to the village.

"On the second one, you meant fiance, right?!" Chelbie shouted.

At Polar Plaza, Diamondion flew over to where Flight and Snowflake were, while most of the fluffles ran away into their houses. Styra, being abandoned onstage, used the Eternal Light Of Time to teleport all of her allies onto the pedestal where she was. With hope sinking down the drain, The Elder Fluffle was frightened by the frantic crowds, running back to his ice carriage with the duke fluffle and the two shirokeis taking him back to the Frostice Realm. The soldier fluffles on the other end of the spectrum began to attack Styra who fended them off with her powerful abilities. With so much chaos happening at once, Diamondion was about to go straight for Omnikra again.

Flight used the Surreality Shard to create sufficient damage to the queen’s armor with Omnikra guiding him with death defying tactics. Styra and Flight were able to double team her with many hits from both the front and back. This however escalated the queen’s fury. Diamondion started to evade their attacks, eventually shooting Flight into another reality as he disappeared out of the blue. The shard itself could not be affected by the shot, causing it to drop into her hands. She squeezed it so the shard would stay inside her castle; no longer to be seen.

Styra tried to do a hook kick at Diamondion when she was not looking. Being aware this time, the queen caught her foot, flinging her around until she was able to throw the girl far over onto the middle of the Frostice Realm's bridge. Omnikra, trying to save its wielder, didn't notice that Diamondion was prepared to bring out her weapon of choice; The Staff Of Reality. As she attempted to deliver another deadly blow towards the two of them, the STS-0 started to shoot the incendiary bullets at her which were indefinitely ineffective since Hisa didn't know how strong the guardian actually was.

Diamondion quickly flew upside the ship and used the staff to puncture it, sending the two of them inside into another universe as well. Now that that was out of the way, she was ready to pursue and destroy her longtime rival. At the Frostice Realm's bridge, Styra woke up in a daze. The height from which she could see below was way too far for her to imagine. As for the starry sky, it made everything ten times worse. As Omnikra tried to help her up, their reality was unexpectedly changed as they ended up in the middle of San Francisco's Golden Gate Bridge on Earth. It was at this moment that she knew things were going to get insane. As cars were stuck in this terrible traffic jam, Diamondion's presence alongside them made it enigmatic.

Styra and Omnikra raced past the cars as fast as they could towards Diamondion who used the staff to switch reality again at her whim. This time, they ended up in a long dark alleyway with neon-lit objects parading their perspective. They jumped over dumpsters, slid on old pipes, and flew through the wet concrete. With every distance trekked, everything they once thought was something pushed their senses through harder tests. Birthday balloons would suffocate their vision. Popping through a large pink one sent them into a seemingly endless labyrinth with yellow textured office walls where no windows could be seen. Pushing through a random door, caused her to fall down an exaggerated cartoonish cylindrical tower where trees and trails encompassed the sides all around her. The drop boosted her speed onto a strange curved pathway that would've helped her ease onto the ground. That became a subverted expectation when it turned into this roller coaster track above a mysterious red fog spreading everywhere until an ominous empty blue eye stared at them from the end where they seemed to be headed for. In front of the eye, Diamondion was waiting there.

"Reality is not what it seems. See, you can't change anything if you don't really know what it is. This child cannot keep you from your flaws," she said with sarcastic exasperation.

As they stopped running to the eye, Omnikra tried to call out her wrongdoings.

"Do you not see it? The Omniverse is corrupted and you believe that it is peaceful. My goal is to end what your master did when he denied it with arrogance. That is why we need to fulfill The New Guardian's story. So that it may be whole as it once was."

Styra couldn't believe what it had just said. She had told the weapon before that being the New Guardian wasn't what she wanted, yet that persistence was what drove it all the way to this point. Onto the last draw, Styra almost blocked a hard jab from Diamondion coming in from behind her. The jab then proceeded to severely and nearly shred the skin on her face. Each hit made it worse, confusing Styra's mental state to focus on the enemy when the environment was also fighting her as well. Omnikra kept trying to land strike after strike using its four blades but was instead met with whacking from the spinning staff every chance it got. In a reluctant twist, when Diamondion used the Reality Staff to shoot Styra into a reality involving outer space, she transformed into the previously powerful form that touched the orb.

Instead of sending her away, she was able to combat being sent there. This surprised Diamondion for a while as she flew back and pointed her staff at this phenomenon.

"Styra, you meddle with contrivances that are beyond your understanding. Unsurprisingly, I thought Omnikra to be using you for its delusions. But now, I see. You only play good, to hide how evil you are."

Those last words. Styra felt she was right to some degree. That painstaking thought did not ensure that she wanted to be evil. She had a feeling that Diamondion had judged her too quickly. Almost like Sapphirion. The Kra energy blasted from her hand like a disturbed volcano shooting lava into the air. Like a force unimaginative to the naked eye, Styra fought with all of the power she had along with Omnikra's assistive techniques. She teleported and created time projections to trick her. Unlike the other guardians, Diamondion wasn't fooled in the slightest. When that didn't work, firing firestorms and lightning only made it worse. As for sound waves, all they did was damage the eye that was trying to help Styra. In feudal desperation to put an end to what was certainly more of a distraction, Diamondion sent them to a few more universes so far that it almost literally hit the boundaries of this multiverse. From a school playing an orchestrated musical number at an elite auditorium to their final destination being an underground dark blue cave with sentient glowing coral life that could breathe oxygen.

Diamondion disappeared out of her view, but her voice was without a doubt present.

"You truly lack a control of self, Styra. When that delusion is made real, the truth behind it becomes this shared perception: you fear the very things your innermost being fights to deny. You fear it because you could not choose another way. That choice is what you have also accepted now. These minds cannot see themselves for what they really are. You know why that is?"

Omnikra crashed into the cave before noticing Styra's unfocused gaze around the entire place. Since she was standing on this coral bridge, the last resort could only be to summon itself using a Kra Forcefield to prevent the possibility of a terrible attack from happening. In an anticlimactic setting, Omnikra covered her while also getting its forcefield penetrated by the Reality Staff. Diamondion finished it off with a shattering cosmic explosion to instead use as a means to send her to outer space one more time. Rather than do that though, the overwhelming experience reverted Styra to her base form which knocked her subconscious out. Omnikra, who was connected to her mind, tapped out in what felt like its protruded end all along. The coral bridge collapsed into the deep abyssal ruins. Diamondion talked to herself, answering the question that she asked Styra while watching them fall.

"They will only be distracted by that curse of knowledge. Your desire to know cannot truly save you from that which is unknown."