Chapter 85

Chapter 85: Chapter 85

Hilde continued, “Among the myriad of stars, only a few more special people can be born on the stars of the nine gods. Helena says receiving God’s blessing is different from being born on God’s star. Although I was blessed by Goddess Anthea, I was not born on her star.”

She continued speaking with a cheerful voice. Her voice seemed cheerful for some time, but the more she talked, the more divine she became.

“So, I always wondered. Who was born on the star of Goddess Anthea? How friendly is the person? Since I was born to support the goddess in her blessing, can I become friends with that person if I met them? Then…”

“So?”

“The goddess’s star, which had not been seen for some time, suddenly appeared!”

“Oh my goodness!”

“It was right next to the star of god Airius!”

Marianne naturally got carried away with Hilde’s explanation. Although Hilde was talking absurd old myths, she was captivated and curious as if she was listening to fairy tales with Cordelli in her childhood.

“Is it amazing?”

“Cool. Don’t you think it was because the god and the goddess loved each other?”

“I think so too. So I called them twin stars.”

“How cute!”

Covering her mouth, Marianne couldn’t help but laugh. Hilde stared at her and blinked her big eyes.

“Lady Marianne?”

“Yes, Priest Hilde.”

“You love the emperor, don’t you?”

It was an expected question. But it was a straightforward and simple question that any child could ask if he or she knew about the purpose of the emperor was to come here to hold an engagement with Lady Marianne.

But Marianne unconsciously frowned at the moment. Her heart pounded. Her heart trembled like a child caught doing something wrong.

“I know everything.”

Tik, tik.

The embers of the stove scattered here and there in a messy way. Her golden eyes turned reddish.

“The emperor was born on the star of Airius. I heard that twin stars are destined to be lovers or siblings. As you and the emperor are not brothers or sisters, both of you are supposed to be lovers, right?” Hilde blushed and laughed.

But Marianne could not even crack a smile. She felt nauseated as if there was an earthquake in her heart.

“Did you say I was born on the star of Goddess Anthea?”

“Yeah! I told you earlier. Your star and the emperor’s star were holding their hands together side by side and twinkling. Yesterday, the grand duke was worried about you, so I told him that the two stars were over the mountain, and that although they dimmed a bit, they would be fine if he sent the search team.”

Although Hilde babbled for a long time, Marianne could not focus on her words. In the blink of an eye, she got confused.

God’s constellation?

Was it that God had already prepared the end of her first life where drowned miserably in the lake, as well as her second life that she earned like a miracle? Did God even arrange for her to be the emperor’s ally to fight against Ober? Did God also have her foolishly expect more of the emperor than her role as a political partner?

“But what’s more strange is …”

Regardless of what Marianne was thinking about at the moment, Hilde mentioned another foresight in a whisper.

“You have two stars.”

Two? What the heck?

While Marianne made a perplexed expression, Hilde pointed to her left shoulder with her other hand that did not hold her hand.

“Right here, Goddess Anthea is still shining.”

She drew a line horizontally in the air with her tiny fingers.

“And here, the star of Goddess Kader is asleep.”

Mariane glanced behind Hilde’s right shoulder that she pointed at. Of course, she couldn’t see it. Only the long and colorful corridor filled her vision.

“As I didn’t see you when you were a baby, I don’t know exactly. But Goddess Anthea’s star suddenly appeared a month ago, right? So, I think Goddess Kader’s star must have been protecting her until then.”

At that moment, Marianne was shocked as if she had her head hit. She had goosebumps from head to toe, which she couldn’t understand.

What she said was an infinite metaphor, but she could instinctively combine her past with Hilde’s words.

“One month ago? Did you say a month ago? ”

“Yeah. It was last month that I first saw the star of Goddess Antea.”

“When was it last month?”

Marianne pressed Hilde with an urgent voice. Hilde was a bit embarrassed by her sudden, rough attitude.

“Uh, um…As the fresh milk was served at breakfast the day after I saw the star…Around April 19?”

“Nonsense…” Marianne burst into laughter.

April 19. It was two days before her birthday, when she awoke in the bathtub like a miracle after drowning at the bottom of the lake. It was the day when her father, whose funeral she saw, returned home alive after finishing provincial inspection tours. It was the day she said didn’t matter if it were a dream, and that she vowed to protect this world by doing all things possible.

“It looks like nonsense, right? I also didn’t believe it at first.”

Hilde, meanwhile, understood Marianne’s denial in a completely different way.

“They say when a star falls asleep, a person born with the star will sleep forever. But you’re awake like this, aren’t you?”

“Why…how…”

“Maybe because you have received the last grace of Goddess Kader.”

At that moment, there was heard an unfamiliar voice from behind her back. Hilde and Marianne looked back at the same time.

“Your Eminence!”

Hilde waved her hands toward Helena as if she was happy to see the cardinal. Helena slowly walked along the corridor, dragging her robe long.

“Goddess Kader is the god of destiny. But it was not the only thing that Kader governed.”

Marianne turned to see the giant nine gods’ portraits. Of the nine gods lined side-by-side, the goddess with green hair, standing at the far right, was reflected in her clear eyes.

Goddess Kader governed fate.

She was a hero of mortality and resurrection. She was a god also called the ruler of revenge and courage. Of Anthea’s four daughters, she resembled her mother the most. She was also the only one of the nine gods who suffered the ‘night’ and ‘death.’

Marianne naturally recalled part of an old myth that she had heard.

Tanatos, who ruled the darkness, felt most jealous about Kader among his brothers and sisters because Mother Anthea trusted and loved Kader most.

Tanatos used the weapon of darkness, which everyone feared, as opposed to the light governed by his father, Airius. Humans feared him but distrusted him. Even his brothers and sisters fled far whenever he brought the night. Loneliness and silence brought him up, and the darkness-torn violence in him grew worse day by day.

In the end, Tanatos dug a huge trap of the night and killed Kader. At this time, Tanatos earned death and Kader learned of mortality.

She had been in endless sleep underground, where time did not pass for over 200 years. Kader woke up from a long sleep only when Anthea, who belatedly learned about her murder, brought her back to life through the roots of the world tree on earth. Thus, resurrection became her strength.

Kader went to war with Tanatos on the day she woke up. Her own power as well as her mother’s coexisted within her body. Kader was now Kader herself and part of Anthea.

As he could not overcome the power of the mother god who gave birth to the seven gods, Tanatos eventually hid in the dark underworld with the night. Since then, he quietly carried away death and night only when his father, Airius, did not shed the light.

This was the most famous episode of the myth on Kader.

“Goddess Kader was the only god whose divinity was linked to her mother Anthea.”

Finally, Helena slowly stopped in front of the two.

“From the day she returned from death, goddess Kader made ‘revenge’ and ‘courage’ the weapons to defend her destiny. The cardinals of the previous generation used to interpret the change of Goddess Kader like this.”

Her golden eyes shone brightly.

“It’s one, but it doesn’t become one. It is eternal but at the same time, it is not eternal. The goddess was herself but no longer herself, but at the same time she was still herself. So, her destiny is like this. All uncertain beginnings will aim for mortality, but a thousand resurrections will come again from the predetermined end.”

“…”

“There are two stars protecting you. I think it’s probably because of Goddess Kader’s warm considerations.”

Marianne bit her lip unconsciously. Her unbearable trembling spread to her fingertips and toes.

Hilde anxiously looked up at Marianne. Her hands hurt as Marianne tightened her grip.

“But all this is about the story of the gods.”

Helena stared at the embers bouncing off in the fireplace. Then she said in a somber voice,

“It is too great and painful for a man to bear…”

Mariane looked straight at Helena.

Her golden eyes seemed somewhat deep and compassionate as if Helena understood her messed-up life. It looked as if Helena, who didn’t know her secrets, comforted her by saying how painful and terrible it was for her…