Warrior Goddess of Sun and Thunder

Golden molten lava churned beneath the Warrior Goddess's feet, and she hid her expression beneath her iron helm, like winter fog veiling the starlight.

The last child of the sky had sunk down, and she too rushed alone toward an entirely opposite horizon.

"Seliose, who are you remembering?" The winged beast, her companion day and night, sensed the faint stirring in her thoughts. The Warrior Goddess was silent for a while; the old days when people prayed to the sky were long past, never to return. "Who am I remembering? I can no longer remember any one person in particular. I once loved the people of this world so fiercely, and I hated the weakness hidden deep in their nature just as much. But now, I cannot remember anyone at all..."

The winged beasts lowered their heads and said nothing; they had seen the Warrior Goddess pursue a steadfast faith, and they had also seen her fall into an illusion of self-deception.

Beneath the iron helm that covered her face, what expression was she wearing? And what was she seeing?

Silverscale Stone screamed inside the furnace. After passing his blessing into the finished gauntlets, the aged highlander presented them to the Warrior Goddess beside him.

"Soft, wounded. Knight, hard. May your bones be as supple as the clouds."

She took the finely crafted gauntlets and gently wiped the silver-scaled ice plating... She began to imagine herself holding a spear tempered from thunder and lightning, and a round shield born of red fire. She would charge toward the battlefield in the sky and save every last person. Strength is only the necessary condition of salvation. The Highlander carefully carved the maxims of truth onto each fingertip, and urged the Warrior Goddess always to remember the soft places of the iron gauntlets.

"Use your palms to warm the pebbles beneath the river. Do not turn the glacier into a sharpened sword."

But afterward, that almost extreme sense of justice and mission of hers only burned away the craftsman's blessing and turned it into a scar that would never heal.

The girl, who had not yet become a knight, was taught a special martial art in the mountain cave where her mentor lived in seclusion.

"Well done. Very soon, I will have nothing left to teach you. What do you want to use this strength for?"

After hearing the oracle, the girl's mind was no longer on her training. Her gentle mentor saw through her troubled thoughts, and so rubbed pine resin onto the short sword she often used. "Teacher, I want to live in reality. Have you ever heard of... the saintess of Janusopolis, and the oracle she passed down?" The girl worried that her mentor would stop her, but she had long since made up her mind.

"But what is the truth?" her gentle mentor asked her in return, "...You will need your whole life to tell it apart, and this is not at all easy."

In the middle of the night, she quietly rose, in a hurry to leave before dawn came, only to find that a folded cloak had long since been placed in her luggage.

At the side of the hero Seliose were two winged beast comrades, Solabis and Lunabis, her mounts and her battle companions.

"We will follow you, Seliose. Let us witness the opening of your journey to slay the gods and seize the flame." They believed in a warrior goddess who was confident and decisive.

The two winged beasts asked the master smith to forge a pair of spurs, part of the ceremony for receiving the medal of the Knight of Sun and Thunder... "Thank you both for your kindness, but I have no use for it," she said, knowing it was a tool that helps a knight control a mount precisely. "Your hearts and mine are one; without borrowing it, we can still work together in perfect harmony."

"Take it, Seliose. You walk the road that pursues the truth, so surely you know well that pain keeps us clear-headed." Lunabis's gaze was as steady as a torch, and Solabis guided her hand to accept the spurs.

The Knight of Sun and Thunder accepted the gift of honor that symbolized friendship... If pain can make a person correct their direction in time, then it is a necessary pain.