"Aaron, are you really okay? Ever since the end of your match…"
Akari's voice faded off, one look at the blond-haired boy's beaming smile making her hold her tongue.
"What are you even talking about? I'm fine! Never been better, actually, with this face mask you bought me."
Running his hand over his skin, he felt the piece of skin-like material that was wrapped tightly around the burned areas of his face.
Without a high amount of mana intake, the Ghostship's healing wouldn't take effect, leaving him with the gruesome scars for as long as it took the healers to repair.
The pink-haired girl glanced over at him with a frown, her eyes looking through not just the physical mask that the boy put up but also the emotional barrier he constructed around himself.
She took a deep breath as they entered the highest box in the stadium, the sight of only one figure sitting on a lavish throne of white.
"Y-your Holiness…"
Akari immediately bowed deeply, a gesture which Aaron did not copy, even after his past with the woman.
She was the voice of the non-contracted gods, the same ones who watched silently from their heavenly perch, not even daring to touch humanity as if they were insects.
Maria Elaris, whose golden blonde hair drooped back along her beautiful white dress, tilted her head sideways, glancing at the two challengers.
Observing her closer, Aaron's eyes focused on her fair skin that matched wonderfully against her liquid gold eyes that flickered with wonder and curiosity.
Around her neck, a white band was attached to a golden chain that hung down into her chest, a holy star representing the five sacred churches she represented.
Then, of course, the stony pitch-black chains that bound her wrists together, thin white bandages wrapping around her forearms where the shackles ripped at her magnificent flesh.
Even the fifteen-year-old boy who had refused to bow could not refute her beauty, the feathery white wings behind her back tucked inward to keep her figure to that of a normal woman.
Catching Aaron's probing glance, she stood up quietly, the only sound being that of the chains across her wrists.
Akari attempted to bow deeper, a fact that her back, which was very much still injured from her fight with Alaric, begged her not to do.
The woman's steps were slow yet long, the distance between the pair of teenagers and the pontiff closing in only a few seconds.
She stared across at Aaron, the two at an equal height, allowing them to focus their gazes directly into one another.
"Your Holiness."
Finally, after she had stood and faced them directly, he showed respect to the woman, bowing his head and hearing her shake the chains.
From his experience on Gharr, he knew what such a signal meant; however, beside him, Akari kept lowering her head even lower, a fact that the woman felt was her own fault.
Voicelessly communicating with the boy, she successfully stopped the young girl's spinal workout and faced them both directly.
Nodding her head, she stepped towards Akari first, placing her hand on the trembling girl's shoulders.
There was a flash of light, and then a dove appeared on the blue-eyed girl's shoulders, a look of surprise following it.
"Eep!"
Jumping back in shock and then covering her mouth in fear of disrespecting the woman, she watched as Maria Elaris shook slightly, an action that Akari perceived as displeasure.
Silently cursing herself at what she had thought was something that had angered the woman, there was a moment of pause before the pontiff stepped towards Aaron.
He knew that the Angel wasn't displeased with the girl in the slightest; in fact, he recognized the sound as a stifled laugh, one prevented through the binds that sealed her.
Yet as the woman reached out her hand to touch his chest as she had done in Gharr, he took a step backwards, the reminder of what Cam had said ringing through his head.
The golden-haired woman tilted her head to the side, a tad bit of confusion coating her face as she tried again.
When she had done it on the Isles, a similar event had happened where the boy flinched backwards, but now, unlike before, he stepped away for a second time.
Not attempting a third, she pointed towards the boy's hip, a glowing red light being emitted from the blade.
Trying to think of how to communicate what to say, she suddenly had a thought, her right most wing stretching out wide and grabbing two objects from her chair.
Obviously unprepared for what she was doing, Aaron shifted his posture nervously, the idea of the woman forcing truth upon him at a time when the truth was all he had to keep him sane, making him wary.
Yet as he looked closer at what she was doing, he realized that she was writing words on a piece of paper.
Coming to the realization that this was always something she could've done, he pouted, thinking about all the hand signals he had spent months trying to decipher.
Couldn't she have written something on a piece of cloth then?
Waiting a moment before she turned the paper around, he occupied himself with staring outside the highest box, the sight of the arena below drawing his attention.
A pool of crimson soaked the center of the arena, a team of medics crowding around what seemed to be a torso without any limbs.
It couldn't be…
The match he and Akari had come all the way to the top box to watch was that of the Swordsman of the South against the Marshal of Fallen Lightning, the first of the second round matches.
However, in the less than five-minute period they had appeared before Maria Elaris, it had finished, and with closer inspection, the lone torso was found to be that of Havok Fenmir.
H-he lost that easily?
Instinctively taking a step towards the glass, he was stopped by a massive white wing that blocked his path, a piece of ripped paper being held up in front of his face.
"Eh?"
Taking a step back to glance at it better, he made out a few sentences that were hastily scribbled in elegant handwriting.
"That sword you have. I've seen it before, and I've met Penelope Strauss's spirit. She recognizes me, no doubt, but you must inform her that I am of no threat to someone of your specific nature. If she requires additional information, I understand that a possible vow might be against her free speech, so if she wishes to seek me out on her own, then that would be acceptable."
Aaron's brow furrowed as deeply as it could possibly bend at the sentences scrawled out on the paper, his mind going blank, and everything he had thought he had known failing.
S-she knows about Penelope? A-and specific nature? That wouldn't mean the Ghostship, wouldn't it? This is bad…
His heart rate instantly spiked, his hand subconsciously moving towards the tilt of his weapon.
The Angel watched this happen, doing nothing to stop it as he unsheathed his blade in all its splendor.
Its flashing red light grew brighter, a scene that Akari watched with an open mouth and wide eyes.
『We will speak later. Leave this place at once, and I will find you at midnight on the eighth. If you are late, then I will assume you have betrayed me, and there will be an issue that must be taken care of.』
Aaron and the woman listened to the threat clearly, the pink-haired girl staring blankly in confusion at why her friend was in a circle of white wings.
There was a flicker of doubt behind the Angel's eyes as she thought for a moment, her lips pursing before a message was drilled into the boy's mind.
『Understood.』
The deity within his skull flared to life, yet it found nothing to fight against; the sudden signal vanished before it could barricade the non-essential pieces of Aaron's mind.
Receding back into the crevices, the blond boy felt the beautiful woman's voice echo within his mind.
T-thats her real voice?
It was like nothing he had ever heard before, a mix between angelic and serene, something that felt like a serenade to the very soul.
Dumbstruck, he stared at the woman until she took a step backwards, holding up a separate piece of paper to Akari while she burned the one she had written for Aaron.
"Y-you want me to stay with Aaron and protect him?"
The blond boy coughed loudly, the utter surprise of what had just left the girl's mouth leaving him gasping for air.
"W-what?"
Trying to interject, he was helpless as the pink-haired girl nodded hard, her hand pressed against her chest tightly.
"I-if it's what you wish, then I must follow it… Thank you for your divine message, Your Holiness."
Staring between both women, he could only rub his forehead while sighing hard, a new problem that he would have to deal with had spawned from nothing.