"In my pilgrimage from the twilight forests to my pyramid I contemplated upon the thousand steps; the 13 moons chasing each other in the eternal skies with the same reason why the Alditians celebrates the dawn, the Zhoutanians oil their machines, the Mezenians meditates with crops, the Navenxii moves jungles, the Latamese migrates with the stars, the Akans authorize diplomacy, the Schynths fruits the swamps, and the Sovenians fight the Ocmenians- all these are meant to be in Lord Vartholo's perfect architecture."

-The Celestial Vaults by Scholar-King Ethweltexco of Navenxii-

©

"Miriam?" Hildred whispered, behind her followed the thick light of the afternoon washing out the insides of the apothecary.

"Hildred?"

Lady Blackmercy sprang back to life when she saw a familiar smile by the door bringing all the warmth from a distant country. She came sprinting towards the bald queen to envelope her with arms of longing, and Hildred caught her body like a dead flower of spring.

"Let the tears nourish your gloom, pain is forever built in us women- so bear with it with a woman's strength..."

"Memory is a pleasure I wish I never had..." Her voice cracked like a lonely pillar holding a forgotten temple.

"Hush now Miriam, don't say such things or Ane'deralya might hear! Vallin was just forced. It is not your fault."

"Ane'deralya is a cruel bitch!" All souls present was stupefied with such profanity to the goddess of dreams and memories.

"Unmah lih, osa adut Modiaja Gona leo Im dof fromosko daemdo. Efa'am osa skob hentu osa M'bongosh. Gariso"

(Young one, the Nightshade Heroine and I need some time alone. Leave the room with the Sailor. This is urgent.)

Laguna turned to the sailor sitting on a torn-out couch of fur and leather, aged out of its glory.

"The fuck you want?" The sailor welcomed.

"Your friend's hand for marriage. " Laguna answered, almost amassing a laugh from his grandmother if not from Miriam's dreary state. Of course, it was just said in his mind.

"We need to leave." Laguna voiced out politely.

"Oh I don't need to leave my 'friend', you on the other hand, does not belong here, the snow melts from your footsteps." Ian replied in calm spite.

"You'll find out soon that your desire won't be easy 'friend'." the diplomat smirked on the sailor.

The Sailor stood, blazing his blue eyes on the Ocmenian, his chin pointing at Laguna's neck like a weapon ready to slip a crimson smile. The height of their bodies towering each other as if one would siege the other soon enough.

Ian bumped his shoulder on the Ocmenian on his way to leave the room and Laguna followed his potential murderer afterwards.

"Ampo Caro." Miriam faintly warned in Ocmenian tongue.

(Good luck.)

"So, what are your plans here really, mate?" The sailor grabbed the diplomat's vest as soon as they were out in the snow-buried gardens.

"Diplomatic matters are exclusive only for the Sovenian Queen's ears." Laguna grinned down from his raised chin.

"Don't fuck with me Mud-skin, or you'll find all seas from here to your home rather unfriendly." the exotic vest ripped from Ian's bloodless grip.

"Orazhime ocmen, mathaq go'hais..."

(Mirage of the sands, trick the eyes...)

"Huh?" the sailor tightened.

"I said, as clear as Ice." Laguna replied in a calm demeanor.

Ian'drah retreats his grip leaving a rip on the diplomat's vest.

"Oh rest assured that I won't fuck with you..." Laguna grinned.

"Your friend is reserved for that occasi-"

A spear of ice was sent spiraling towards Laguna's face but his wings had shielded him fast enough, feathers as strong as steel that had shattered the ice into hundreds of pieces.

"Ian'drah, I came here as an envoy of peace, and I'd like to keep it that way." Laguna raised the full extent of his wings to darken the enclosed garden.

"I know your kind, peace is but a facade for your agendas." Ian had conjured a trident of ice, crystalizing a pair of transparent wings from his back in full detail, emerging like a glass-feathered god of forgotten myths- stretching the same span as Laguna's brown ones. Cyromancy is a must since modern-day Sovenian ships are made of ice.

"Violence won't solve your endeavors, better keep that in mind." Laguna smiled, his wings began to engulf in golden flames to welcome the provocation.

Ian'drah charged with one strong flap of his icy wings, his trident piercing both wind and sound intently aimed at Laguna's neck. A flaming Scimitar impeded the trident which delivered a sharp noise upon the clash of the weapons. Ian leapt a long distance away from Laguna, he didn't expect the Ocmenian to conjure a weapon too.

"My turn..." Laguna snickered as the flames in his Scimitar turned so hot that it melted the blade down the snow like dripping steel from a forge, leaving a long fiery trail of melted steel burning down the ground.

He slowly walked towards Ian, and then, lashed out his new weapon that cracked the cold Sovenian air in traumatizing echoes- a steel whip engulfed in glorious flames.

"We Ocmenians are made out of Sand and Beastial Blood... " He flexed his wrist skillfully and another crack broke through the winds. "Not Mud!"

"I knew you had the savagery within, you fucking dung-of-a-race!" Ian crystalized a spike of ice underneath Laguna in an attempt to impale him but the diplomat flew off quickly enough.

"Divine Oserio have pity on you..." Laguna tried to conjure up a fireball as large as a boulder but the Sovenian climate weakened his magic, it came out as a firebolt instead that Ian had fended off easily with his wings.

"Oserio this, Oserio that, I'll make you meet your Ocmenian god if you really revere him that much." Ian'drah threw the trident at the diplomat in the sky, foreign blood spilled on the snow gardens as the trident managed to graze through Laguna's shoulder, causing a small rip. Before Laguna could react from the pain, another trident was sent flying to his chest- but it was shattered by a lash of his whip.

"Time to end this immature association..." His steel whip raged in larger flames, lashing it thrice at Ian'drah in a single heartbeat. The sailor was quick enough to shield himself with his wings but this time, it was a frail attempt, the whip sliced through ice easily like knife on butter.

"Be mindful of your manners, Sovenian. You should at least pay me respect for saving your life earlier in the sea."

"All souls in Viridia knows that respect is a waste for the likes of you!" Ian conjured two ice tridents once more, ready to be thrown at Laguna.

"Truly? Unlike you, your friend had repaid me rather willingly by letting me enjoy his private company in my chambers."

Tridents fell hard down the snow, Laguna was astnoished from seeing the sailor's face; eyes widened, lips parted and shoulders slouched in despondence.

With a flick of his wrist, Laguna completely rendered the static sailor wingless, but Ian'drah did not move a muscle, he just remained there staring into nothingness- a place where his sanity was once were.

"Lost the will to fight?" Laguna landed like a feather, waving his hands with foreign incantations to trap his unmoving prey in a circle of golden flames.

"Now that you've realized that I've won since the beginning of the battle, you should learn that the same would apply with our contest for affection to a certain individual." Laguna licked the blood from his arm in a satisfied grin, walking slow towards the Sailor only to stop behind his wall of flame, caution had always been a diplomat's trait.

"Oh don't be hopeless by the cause and effect. Hildred told me that you've tasted almost all the finest faces Dirge has to offer and yet you never made a move on the one that could turn them all faceless." Laguna gripped a fistful of Ian's hair to face him up to the sky.

"Foolish enough that you are even willing to bring down potential peace to mask your insecure cowardice."

There were no response.

"Rethink this through Sovenian, you've spent and wasted enough time with The Blackmercys so I guess it is rightfully so if I'll take him fo-"

In a pocket of time, Laguna's body was propelled far through across the garden by something gargantuan and unseen- of aquatic mythology spilling into inferno fire. His back was about to break the garden walls but a freezing grasp had caught on his neck mid-air, he found no strength scream nor breathe, his feet floating a few inches above the snow, and the magic coursing through his veins was blocked by this sudden strong grip on his neck.

Each of the diplomat's teeth begged to explode from the squeezing pressure.

"I don't care what you are or what you did for this world." Ian'drah whispered voice traveled like a thousand howls in dead winter, and his eyes, turning white and ghastly as the pale ghosts who haunt the Glacial Maze, glimmering as a different entity.

"But if you ever try to dictate the time which I could spend with my love..."

"Then I'll dictate the time which you can spend with your life." with one hand, Ian'drah raised Laguna's heavy entirety to the sky, as if offering a timely sacrifice to the forgotten gods who were forgotten for the greater good.

Laguna's lungs began to churn along with his heart as the veins of his eyes starts to bloom out petals of blood on the white corners, bathing his blurry view of this winter world with red.

"WHAT DO YOU THINK YOU'RE DOING?!"

"Snowberry?" Ian had instantly let go of Laguna's neck.

"What in Viridia are you thinking!?" the boy ran towards the diplomat's motionless body, kneeling beside it to assess signs of life. "I feel no pulse from him, Ian!"

The Sailor lost the words in his mouth,

"Laguna, Don't meet your god yet..." Sion pulled a pouch of klaster seeds and dried spring-grass from his satchel. He took a pinch of the seeds and three blades of grass then chewed them in his mouth. He then opened a vial of green and drank the content of it to mix with the chewed ingredients.

He opened Laguna's mouth to transfer the potion from his mouth down to the diplomat's. The sight of the kiss twisting the blade of jealousy in Ian's chest.

"That's enough." Ian finally managed to form a sentence, pulling Sion's body away from Laguna which made the boy land on his back.

Having finished transferring the improvised mixture, Sion stood, and slapped the sailor across the face with the impact of palm to cheek resounding across the sky. The world around them muted afterwards that even the soft landing of snow could be heard.

Then Sion shouted with glassy eyes:
"You just love to suffocate everyone not acting on what you wish huh!?"

A gasp for air broke the silence between them; the miracles of a Blackmercy's alchemical prowess at work.

"Easy, easy, don't rush the life back in..." the boy catered to the dying diplomat.

"Help me... He intends to kill me..." Laguna mumbled from bloodied lips. In Sion's eyes, he is dying, but from Ian's, he is appealing to pity.

"That's the least of your worries around me, don't worry, I'm here." Upon hearing Sion's assurance, the Diplomat closed his eyes.

The boy grabbed Ian by his shoulders, slamming the larger man against the thorny garden wall. The strength Sion exerts is but a blow of wind for Ian and yet his body felt extremely weak upon his touch.

"What's gotten into you lately boy? Huh? Trying to kill a figure of peace?! Are you a fucking terrorist now?!" Ian just looked down on him, unable to speak a word again. He's just enjoying the fact that Sion is back at arm's length again.

"This is madness Ian'drah! Madness beyond Askala's fucking madness!"

Ian had to lean back harder to the thorny wall to know if he really was in reality. Sion is so near him. He was always dazed and speechless whenever he is this close to Sion.

"Mad?"

"No shit!" Sion gave up, knocking on Ian's head as if it's an empty nut.

"You're a grand shipwreck Ian'drah, anyone who built a ship only to wreck would be kind enough to not sail with his loved ones on it." The boy whispered. "And I know that you're not just anyone in my life. You're better than this..."

"Fix your shit together Fish-head, come back to us once you did." Sion had let go of the Sailor, walking away to cater back to the once dying diplomat.

"Steady, don't rush yourself, can you stand?"

"Yes... I think I'm still... able." Laguna's body trembled while standing with Sion's support.

"Here let me help you, let's stride off before more suffocation falls upon us..." He took a last look at Ian only to see him looking back like a chained feral on the wall, he knows that if he let go of Laguna, Ian'drah would skin the diplomat alive with the nearest stone. This same deadliness is why he is well known in the Sovenian seas in the first place, he reinvented danger in the seas.

Once the pair limped back to the apothecary, Ian'drah was left alone in the garden. Taking two steps forward to reveal a fully scarred back of reddened flesh that lines hundreds of open-wounds. He fell on his face, embracing his knees as he wept on the ground. His blood and tears staining the white garden as snow falls to embrace his morbid state like a white blanket of comfort. His hands slowly reached for his throat, holding it tightly.

"Akantanel, Santifar..." he started to murmur.

"Fonclere, Ane'deralya..."

"Vartholo, Eldro, Aldite, Mozdin, San'dio, Viri, Ili, Syrosh..." He called out each of the Sovenian Pantheon.

"You damn silent gods..."

"Give me arms to caress instead of ones that holds him tight." The Sailor wept.

Author's Note: Sorry if its almost 3k words, this Chapter is hot garbage. But I wanted to elaborate the Sailor's nature around Sion. Feel free to ask who those Gods are.