Chapter 324: The Goddess Of Truth
When she had first been given this mission by her sister, she had been told not to dig too deeply into this matter.
Just do her duties normally, without thinking too much into it.
She had agreed easily, thinking it would make her life simpler.
But now, after everything she had learned about him, she wanted to know more!
So, despite her sister’s warning, she decided to check it out.
With a wave of her hand, the abyss around her completely transformed.
The oppressive darkness melted away, replaced by something grand and awe-inspiring.
She now stood in an absolutely enormous library, so vast that its boundaries stretched beyond the limits of sight.
Bookshelves reached so high that their tops were lost in a celestial glow, disappearing into infinity.
Some shelves contained tiny, delicate books that could fit in the palm of a hand. Others held tomes so massive they looked like buildings, their spines decorated with intricate celestial patterns.
It was the Celestial Library to Arcana, a repository of all knowledge in the universe.
Every life, every fate, every story that had ever existed or would ever exist.
Lumiel quickly made her way through the endless aisles, her fingers tracing the spines of countless books.
She whispered under her breath. "Luca, Luca, Luca." like she was searching for a specific volume in a massive collection.
Finally, she found it.
A book that contained Luca’s life and every detail included in it.
She felt quite proud of herself. Even though Luca hadn’t told her anything, she could easily find it out herself using this.
She was practically bouncing with excitement, like a child about to read a storybook they had been waiting for all day.
But when she finally turned the pages, her expression shifted from happiness to confusion to outright disbelief.
This was because there really wasn’t much information about Luca!
Usually, when she went through a mortal’s record, she could find everything about that mortal and their entire life story.
It was like reading an autobiography—detailed, intimate, complete.
She could see their first breath, their last words, every triumph and failure in between.
But this book was different.
The most details she could find about Luca were what he had been doing for the past four hundred years or so.
It was there in clear writing: his travels, his battles, his interactions with the various peoples of the world. It was thorough and well-documented.
But beyond that...
She turned further back in time, and the information became sparse.
Here and there, she found fragments: mentions of events, vague references to things she could not quite understand.
The details became more discreet, more guarded, as if someone was trying to hide something from prying eyes.
And by the time she reached a record of a thousand years of his past, the pages were completely blackened out.
She stared at them in disbelief. The ink was so dark, so absolute, that she could see nothing at all.
It was as if someone had taken a brush dipped in absolute darkness and painted over every word, every letter, every trace of information that had once existed there.
She turned the page. More blackness.
She turned another. Still nothing.
She scratched at the pages with her fingernails, trying to see if the ink would flake away.
But she did not scratch the ink; she scratched the page itself, damaging the record.
And yet still, beneath the damage, there was nothing but more blackness.
Someone had made sure that his past remained a secret, buried beneath layers of absolute, impenetrable darkness.
Lumiel closed the book slowly, her mind racing. Even though she could not see the details of what was inside, she could figure out who had redacted it all.
She put the book back on the shelf with trembling hands and made her way deeper into the library.
The moving staircases carried her through levels of knowledge, past shelves that contained the histories of entire galaxies, past archives that held the secrets of Gods who had existed before her.
She reached a central panel, a projection of light and energy that hovered in the middle of a circular chamber.
It looked like a computer, but it was not made of metal and glass.
It was made of pure celestial energy, responding to the will of those who knew how to use it.
Lumiel waved her hands, swiping her fingers through the projection like she was navigating through the most advanced interface imaginable.
She went through folders and lists, searching for the one piece of information she needed.
And finally, finally, she found it.
The access log showed a single name—the one who had redacted Luca’s records, the one who had sealed his past behind a wall of absolute darkness.
She could not help but utter under her breath in surprise,
"Big sis, it was you?"
It was her own sister, the Goddess of Equivalent Exchange, who had redacted all of Luca’s files.
But this discovery did not make her anticipation simmer down.
If anything, it made her even more excited!
Her sister was normally very aloof, and every action she took had reasons behind it.
If she had done something she had never done before in all of their endless existence, there was definitely something massive going on.
And Lumiel wanted to find out what it was!
—
Lumiel flew out of the library, her robes streaming behind her like liquid starlight.
She made her way through the heavens, passing celestial palaces and golden waterfalls that cascaded from massive plumes of clouds.
Everything was breathtakingly beautiful, a wonderland beyond mortal comprehension.
She headed toward a crystalline palace that sparkled with a thousand colors, its walls made of pure diamond and crystal.
The architecture was impossibly delicate yet somehow imposing, a testament to the divine being who dwelled within.
She made her way through the corridors, each one more beautiful than the last, until finally she reached an office-like room.
Books were scattered here and there, some open, some closed.
A massive table dominated the center of the room, covered in stacks of documents and records.
Behind the table sat another Goddess, a figure of breathtaking beauty with long blonde hair that cascaded down her back like liquid gold.
Her blue eyes were sharp and penetrating, capable of seeing through any deception, any falsehood.
She radiated an aura of absolute truth, the kind that made it impossible to lie in her presence.
This was Vera, the Goddess of Truth.
She could perceive the truth of the universe and reject all falsity and chaos.
She was on the same level as Lumiel, a junior Goddess in the heavenly hierarchy, and because of that relation, they were quite close friends.
And right now she looked...rough.
Her usually impeccable blonde hair had escaped its braid in wisps. Dark circles smudged beneath her golden glasses. She was scribbling furiously on a parchment, her movements frantic.
"You look terrible." Lumiel announced, floating down beside her.
Vera didn’t look up, but she still complained like a black company worker.
"Isn’t it obvious? Just look at this!"
She gestured wildly at the piles surrounding her before going on to rant,
"The upper pantheon has gone mad I tell! Completely mad!"
"’Oh, Vera’s the new Truth-Goddess, freshly promoted! Let’s dump every unresolved inquiry from the last millennium on her desk!’"
She stabbed her pen into the parchment hard enough to tear it.
"I’ve been working for seventy-two celestial hours straight? My essence is fraying and I think I’m developing wrinkles. Do Goddesses get wrinkles?"
"Because I feel like I’m getting wrinkles!"
Lumiel patted her back comfortingly.
"It’s alright now." She said soothingly. "I know you’re working hard, and I’m pretty sure all of this hard work will return to you in your favor in the future."
"You’ll get promoted to a higher position once again."
But the moment she said this, Vera’s hand froze mid-motion. She slowly looked up, her eyes narrowing with suspicion.
Her gaze was piercing, like she was peeling back the layers of Lumiel’s soul.
Lumiel immediately looked away, a guilty expression crossing her face. She tried to appear casual, but her sudden discomfort was obvious.
Vera’s voice was flat, unimpressed as she asked,
"What do you want, Lumi?"
Lumiel forced a smile, her voice overly bright.
"W-What are you talking about, Vera?" She asked innocently. "Can’t I just come over and visit my friend?"
"Why are you acting as if I came here just to ask a favor of you?"
Vera rolled her eyes, clearly not buying it.
"That’s because whenever I complain about my work, you start complaining even more than me."
She said, crossing her arms.
"You talk about how your work is so much harder, and how your sister is giving you so many responsibilities that you don’t want to have."
She narrowed her gaze.
"So right now, the fact that you’re comforting me in such a caring manner is very, very suspicious."
Lumiel’s face crumbled. She tried to look away, tried to avoid Vera’s knowing gaze.
But she knew when she had been caught.
"Fine, fine." She admitted, her voice small. "Vera, I actually do have a favor I have to ask of you."
"Absolutely not!" Vera returned to her scribe. "I’m drowning here. Drowning! Ask your sister instead."
"The mighty Goddess of Equivalent Exchange can surely spare a moment for her beloved sibling."
"I can’t ask her." Lumiel said quickly. "It’s...complicated."
"Then ask someone else. I’m not your personal oracle."
"Half." Lumiel blurted.
Vera’s pen paused. "What?"
"I’ll take half your workload. Right now. Today. I’ll process scrolls, answer inquiries, whatever you need. Just help me with this one thing."
Vera turned fully now, her expression shifting from annoyed to genuinely perplexed.
"You hate administrative work, Lumi. You call it ’cosmic bureaucracy’ and say you’d rather watch stars decay than file a report."
"Now you’re offering to do mine? What in the celestial realms could you possibly want that badly?"
"Eighty percent." Lumiel bargained, seeing Vera’s hesitation. "I’ll take eighty percent of your current caseload, and twenty percent of your new arrivals for the next century."
Vera’s eyes trembled. The temptation was naked on her face. The piles of papers seemed to loom larger, threatening to bury her completely.
"...How illegal is this favor?" She asked quietly.
"Illegal is such a strong word." Lumiel hedged. "It’s more...frowned upon. Gently discouraged. My sister specifically told me not to investigate this particular matter."
"And you’re investigating it anyway." Vera pinched the bridge of her nose. "Lumi, your sister outranks both of us combined. If she’s warning you away—"
"Ninety percent." Lumiel said desperately. "Ninety percent of your work. I’ll be your personal assistant. Just please, Vera. I need to know."
The silence stretched. Vera looked from Lumi’s pleading face to the mountain of scrolls.
From the desperation in her friend’s eyes to the exhaustion in her own bones.
She sighed, the sound carrying the weight of resignation. "...Fine. What do you need?"
Lumi’s face lit up like a newborn sun. She threw her arms around Vera.
"You’re the best! I love you, I could kiss you—"
"Don’t." Vera pushed her off, but a small smile touched her lips. "Just tell me what we’re doing so we can get it over with. And remember—you’re doing my paperwork for the next term."
"Of course, of course!" Lumiel bobbed her head eagerly. "It’s simple, really. I just need you to look into a mortal’s past. Divine his history, his connections, everything."
"Should be easy for the Goddess of Truth!"
Vera relaxed visibly. "Oh, is that all? You had me worried it was something serious. Mortal histories are simple enough—their lives are short, their truths close to the surface."
She waved a hand, already summoning her divining tools.
"What’s his name?"
Lumiel’s eyes sparkled with excitement.
"His name is Luca." She said before hesitantly adding, "But his life and fate are not the same as any normal mortal. It’s much more complicated and deep, surrounded by barriers and mysteries."
Vera scoffed. "Barriers? Against me? Please. I perceive truth itself. Mortal obstructions are like delicate tissue paper to my sight."
Her eyes began to glow with blue light, the light of discernment and revelation as she she said,
"No matter how complex his life, he’s still just a mortal at the end of the the day."
Lumiel watched her friend with barely contained excitement.
She was finally going to see it, the story she had been waiting to uncover. She leaned forward, her eyes fixed on Vera’s face, barely daring to breathe.
But then—
BOOM!
