These Tragic Souls and a Sword Reborn
in an Intergalactic Space Opera
Story Intro: "Welcome! I'm an evil god, though not that evil of a god!" is what they woke up to. Join our heroes and heroines, having just met their demise, displaced by an extradimensional event."
Story Starts
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Book 1 - The Empty Twin
Ch 1.9 Gaining Trust in the Thirteen
(Ryuu Lion-Astraea)
[Part 9 of 9]
Grakkan Empire
System: Leafil | Planet: Unnamed Pair of Theta
Date:
Grakkan Standard (GknS)| System | Local | Galactic Standard (GS)
'Revolution' / 'Prime Satellite' / 'Rotation' / 'Time'
GknS 34k6.rev-70% / 10.rev-43% / 256.rot-25% / 07:38:06
Local: 42k6.12.rev-58% / 8.rev-51% / 293.rot-21% / 04:00:00
GS 13k9.rev-47% / 8.rev-49% / 256.rot-17% / 07:01:23
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Lefiya Viridis stood in the morning-night, watching as three figures lifted into the sky and vanished among the unfamiliar stars. Rose Potter, Ryuu Lion, and Shirou Emiya—flanked by a small contingent of house-elves on their own miniature brooms, whilst rough-looking creatures called goblins rode four to a group on flying carpets—were off to circumnavigate an alien planet on what amounted to flying cleaning implements.
Just minutes earlier, she, Haruhime, and Syr had stepped outside after breakfast to witness the impromptu flight lesson. A broom. That was what they were using to search for the celestial dungeon entrance.
The absurdity of it wasn't lost on Lefiya, though she supposed they'd all committed to stranger things by now.
Lefiya couldn't help the small, undignified snort that escaped her as she observed Ryuu's deeply sceptical expression. The elf's face was a study in controlled doubt as she hovered her hand at chest height, right above where the broom lay motionless on the ground, calling out "Up" with the kind of measured patience one might use when reasoning with a particularly stubborn child.
The broom responded by jumping—just slightly—with every vocalisation of the command, as if it were mocking her attempts. Ryuu's eye twitched almost imperceptibly, and Lefiya had to press her lips together to suppress a smile.
Meanwhile, Shirou stood awkwardly beside Ryuu, his tall frame hunched in a way that suggested profound discomfort. He kept shifting his weight from foot to foot, clearly trying to find some position that didn't make him look like he was about to topple over. His shoulders remained tense as he waited for more instructions.
After another two minutes of gentle cajoling from Rose, Shirou ventured a suggestion—that perhaps Ryuu should try holding the broom first, attempting to connect with it magically rather than simply commanding it. He'd managed the technique himself just moments earlier, his initial stiffness giving way to grudging competence once he was actually airborne. Lefiya watched Ryuu consider the advice, her expression shifting from scepticism to thoughtful consideration. Both Rose and Shirou had already demonstrated that the brooms actually worked—her doubt, however instinctive, had been thoroughly debunked.
But after just a few more minutes of careful instruction and experimental adjustments, the pair were already airborne—zipping about the compound's perimeter as if they'd been riding these devices for years rather than mere moments. Lefiya blinked, startled by how quickly they'd adapted. Then again, she supposed that was the entire point of the 'Riding Aptitude' they'd all purchased, wasn't it?
Lefiya frowned at that particular recollection, her thoughts circling back to one of last night's more heated debate topics—whether or not some of the choices they'd made during the transfer had been predetermined or subtly guided by some higher being orchestrating their fates.
The question had left her unsettled then, and it still did now. There had been a concerning number of convergent purchases across their group: 'Conceptual Crossover' had been universal, for instance. But then again, a significant number of them had also bought into the hints system, and given the context—that they'd be transported to a universe where space travel was commonplace—purchasing 'Riding Aptitude' wouldn't exactly require divine intervention to justify.
'Then why does it feel like something else?' she wondered, unease prickling at the back of her mind.
She could still recall both Rin's and Rose's faces tightening at the thought during last night's discussion. Rose's expression had darkened in that particular way that suggested the topic was far from settled, while Rin had been more contemplative—chin resting on her hand, elbow braced against her folded arm, her turquoise eyes calculating. Lefiya exhaled slowly, pushing aside the disquiet. Some questions, it seemed, had no comfortable answers—only more questions waiting beneath.
Later that night, she'd been assigned to room with Rose—an arrangement Rin and Hermione had devised. The logic was straightforward: pair members of each group with someone from a different faction to foster camaraderie. Or "mutual resentment," as Rin had sarcastically added, grinning despite the fact that this had been her idea.
They'd acknowledged there might be friction at the start. Cultural differences were inevitable, and everyone was encouraged to remain open-minded, communicate when uncomfortable, and avoid taking offence too quickly.
They'd planned to rotate the arrangement periodically—every half-month or so—though when someone asked what a "month" even meant in this timeline, the discussion had briefly stalled. In the end, they'd simply declared roommates would change every twenty sunrises. No calendar conversion required.
They'd already surmised they were in the Leafil System—a deduction built on several converging pieces of evidence.
First, the twin planet. Theta, according to 'General Knowledge,' dominated the sky at certain hours—massive enough that its features were visible to the naked eye from its sibling world. The Sacred Tree of Theta, in particular, was unmistakable: a colossal organism whose canopy was visible even from planetary distances, its silhouette breaking the limb of the planet like a dark crown. They'd spotted it within hours of awakening.
Second, the prophetic hint itself. Register your team at Tarmein Prime. Tarmein Prime was a well-known administrative hub within the Grakkan Empire—'General Knowledge' had supplied that much readily. If they were meant to register there, it stood to reason they'd been deposited somewhere within Imperial territory.
Third, the moon. An enormous satellite orbiting not one planet but both—a circumbinary moon, stable in its path around the twin worlds' shared barycenter. Such configurations were rare. According to 'General Knowledge,' the Leafil System was the only system in the Grakkan Empire with a stable twin planet arrangement and a circumbinary moon.
The evidence was circumstantial, perhaps, but the convergence was difficult to dismiss. They were almost certainly on the Unnamed Pair of Theta, the empty-twin—a frontier world on the edge of Imperial space.
What they hadn't yet determined was why they'd been sent here specifically. The dungeon, presumably. But why this dungeon? Why this planet? Why thirteen souls flung across realities to land on an unnamed rock orbiting a twin world in a galaxy none of them had ever heard of?
She could blame it on randomness—Syr herding her group toward Shirou's cluster of four souls, the collision that followed as they backed into Rose's group, Marin and Haruka slamming in from either side. A chaotic confluence of trajectories, nothing more. Just souls bouncing off each other in the void until they happened to stick together.
And yet... plenty of them had quoted the hint. Thirteen. Was it prophetic, or predetermined? Had the number shaped their choices, or had their choices shaped the number?
'Trust in the thirteen and develop the frontier planet,' the hint had said. 'Your adventure will begin at the bottom of the dungeon.' Plenty of the hint said that; the others finished with 'Register your team at Tarmein Prime.'
But as Lefiya recalled Rin's expression from last night—that calculating, troubled look, the way her turquoise eyes had gone distant with thoughts she hadn't shared—she suspected none of them would like the answer.
Not really.
"Lefiya?" Haruhime's gentle voice pulled her from her musings.
She turned, realising she'd drifted back inside the tent without quite noticing. The others had already departed—Rose, Ryuu, and Shirou vanishing into the pre-dawn sky alongside their escorts. Before leaving, Shirou had used his unique magic to conjure weapons for everyone, preparing for the organised teams that would eventually clear each floor of the dungeon. Strip mining, Hermione had called Rose's proposal. The term lingered in Lefiya's mind with an odd mix of practicality and absurdity.
To be fair, a lot of regular people called adventurers 'miners' jokingly, so the idea wasn't too far-fetched. After all, adventurers went underground to gather materials—they just replaced pickaxes with swords, staves, and magic, and stone with various monsters. And what did they get in return? Precious materials.
She blinked, realising Haruhime was still waiting for her attention.
The renard—a fox-person, or kitsune in Galactic Basic—stood by the dining table, a tray laden with food balanced carefully in her arms. The dishes they'd prepared this morning for lunch, Lefiya noted. Haruhime's golden ears twitched slightly, betraying a hint of concern beneath her serene expression.
"Could you help us carry these down to the beach? Hermione said she didn't know how long the meeting might run."
Lefiya nodded, already moving toward the table to gather another tray. The familiar rhythm of routine tasks was grounding—a small anchor amidst the whirlwind of the past day.
Then, without warning, everything around them floated. A sharp snapping sound echoed through the tent, and the trays lifted from the table of their own accord.
"Let us be doing this, mistress," said a high, earnest voice.
Lefiya turned to find a cluster of the same creatures that had accompanied Rose, Shirou, and Ryuu earlier. House-elves, she reminded herself, recalling the descriptions from last night's meeting. They stood barely hip-high on her, with large, lamp-like eyes and ears that flopped like wilted leaves. Small and unassuming, yet they possessed a peculiar kind of magic that still felt utterly foreign to her senses—nothing like the Falna-granted abilities she knew, nor congenital magic.
Lefiya watched, fascinated and slightly concerned, as the floating containers wobbled precariously in mid-air. The house-elves scrunched their faces in visible concentration, their large eyes narrowing with effort. She could see the strain in their small frames, the way their magic fluctuated unevenly.
'Probably the same problem Rose's group encountered,' Lefiya thought, remembering Hermione's earlier explanation about spatial coordinate difficulties. Whatever had changed them during the transfer had disrupted even the house-elves' innate abilities.
As they followed the struggling creatures outside, however, everything gradually stabilised. The containers steadied, floating in a more controlled formation, and Lefiya allowed herself a small breath of relief. Something about being outdoors seemed to help—perhaps the lack of walls interfering with whatever spatial calculations their magic required, or perhaps there was simply more space, more room for errors to be corrected before they became disasters. She watched as one of the trays tipped precariously, only to right itself a moment later with a subtle adjustment.
Originally, they'd planned to hold the meeting outdoors by the beach. But with the sky still dark and no clear sense of how far off sunrise might be, they'd decided to erect a second tent beside the one Rose had set up last night—a shelter for the land-dwellers, positioned near the water's edge where the aquatic races could participate comfortably.
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The beach had transformed utterly in the hour since they'd begun setting up their impromptu assembly.
A second tent now stood beside the water's edge, connected to another that seemed half-submerged, its entrance facing the gentle waves, where the aquatic races could participate comfortably without the discomfort of prolonged exposure to air. The darkness that had blanketed them during the initial setup had gradually, almost reluctantly, softened. The sky shifted in stages—from the deep, star-pricked black of true night to a bruised purple.
Lefiya found herself seated at one of the conjured tables, her notebook open before her, pen poised above the blank page. The familiar weight of it in her hand steadied her slightly—a small anchor of routine in this increasingly surreal existence. Around her, the other members of their group had arranged themselves in a loose semicircle facing the water, each settling into a position that seemed to suit their temperament.
Rin sat with that particular brand of stillness that suggested intense focus rather than relaxation. Beside her, Hermione shuffled through sheaves of parchment covered in dense, cramped handwriting—notes painstakingly prepared for this very occasion, Lefiya suspected. 'Did she even sleep?'
The other woman's lips moved slightly as she reviewed her material, a habit Lefiya recognised from her own study sessions.
Illya had claimed a seat near the front, crimson eyes bright with curiosity despite the early hour and the late night they'd all endured. There was an eagerness in her posture that suggested she was genuinely interested in what was to come, rather than simply present out of obligation.
Gabrielle sat tall and composed nearby, while Sakura had positioned herself quietly near the back, violet eyes watchful and expression serene. Marin, surprisingly subdued for once, had her own sketchbook out—though Lefiya caught sight of the frantic, almost manic doodling as her pen moved erratically across the page. Nervous energy finding an outlet, perhaps.
Syr sat somewhat apart from the others, while Haruka had taken up position near a large board someone had set up, as she'd be doing the general note-taking for everyone. Her posture was relaxed but attentive, ears slightly perked with interest.
"Good morning, everyone," Hermione began, her voice carrying across the beach with surprising authority—the kind of natural projection that came from years of answering questions in classrooms and boardrooms alike. "These are the representatives of each race currently not in stasis. Thank you all for gathering at such an early hour."
The house-elves stood in a small, tight-knit cluster to one side—barely hip-high on Lefiya herself, with large lamp-like eyes that seemed to catch and reflect every scrap of available light. Their ears flopped like wilted leaves, and their clothing ranged from clean pillowcases to what appeared to be actual tailored garments.
One of them, who had been helping with breakfast preparation earlier—Lefiya had noted her efficient movements around the cooking fire—now joined the group of representatives with a sharp crack of displaced air. Winky's face scrunched in visible frustration, large eyes blinking rapidly, and Lefiya noticed with an academic's eye for detail that she'd materialised just slightly too high—perhaps a hand's breadth above the floor—before dropping with a soft, undignified thump that sent up a small puff of dust.
The wobble was telling, actually. Winky's face scrunched in visible frustration, large eyes blinking rapidly, and Lefiya noticed with an academic's eye for detail that she'd materialised just slightly too high—perhaps a hand's breadth above the floor—before dropping with a soft, undignified thump that sent up a small puff of dust. The same spatial coordination problems that plagued the witches' magic and had caused Hermione such visible distress during yesterday's demonstrations, it seemed, affected even these creatures' innate abilities. Their magic was struggling to adapt to this reality's underlying rules, just as everyone else's was.
'Something to bring up later,' Lefiya noted mentally, already composing the question in her head. Last night's meeting had already extended far longer than intended—well past midnight—due to tangential discussions and philosophical debates that, whilst interesting, had done little to advance their practical planning. Better to stay focused now and save detailed inquiries for a more appropriate moment.
The goblins stood in their own distinct group—short, rough-featured humanoids with intelligent, calculating eyes and practical clothing. Their leader, a grey-skinned individual who stood perhaps a head taller than his fellows, carried himself with unmistakable authority. His expression was neutral, professional, but Lefiya caught the keen assessment in his gaze as it swept over their group.
The centaurs had arranged themselves in a line behind the seated group, their equine lower bodies too large and unwieldy for conventional seating arrangements. Even folded onto their legs in what looked like an uncomfortable compromise, they towered over everyone else present. Their leader—grey-bearded, with a coat the colour of storm clouds and eyes that seemed to hold the weight of centuries—watched the proceedings with an air of patient, almost philosophical dignity.
And in the shallows, partially submerged in the water that lapped gently at the shore with rhythmic, soothing sounds, the merfolk had gathered. Some lounged on conjured rocks that jutted from the surf, scales glinting in the strengthening light like scattered gems—emerald and sapphire and pearl. Others treaded water with lazy, economical movements of powerful tails, occasionally flicking droplets into the air where they caught the strengthening light. Among them, Lefiya noted the sirens with a mix of academic interest and wary caution—compelling in a way that tugged at her attention almost against her will, like a hook catching on fabric.
She looked away deliberately, forcibly redirecting her focus to her notebook. 'That's quite enough of that.' The last thing she needed was to embarrass herself by staring.
"Let's begin with some good news," Hermione continued, her tone brightening slightly. "Whilst everyone aside from our group of thirteen wasn't present during the... blessing purchasing event hosted by Zelretch—" her expression suggested she had opinions about that particular experience, "—we're happy to report they were still granted certain fundamental abilities."
A visible ripple of interest passed through the assembled creatures—ears perking, heads lifting, attention sharpening.
"Obviously, they have the ability to communicate in this reality's common tongue—Galactic Basic," Hermione elaborated, gesturing as though to encompass the very act of their current conversation. "They were also granted 'General Knowledge,' which provides basic information about this reality's common concepts, and 'Common Sense,' and finally 'Conceptual Crossover'—" She paused mid-sentence, shooting a pointed, almost accusatory look somewhere off to the side, then seemed to remember something as distinct colour bloomed across her cheeks, transforming her expression from authoritative to flustered in an instant.
The pause turned distinctly awkward, stretching long enough that Lefiya saw several people shift uncomfortably.
"—and Inherit Previous Body's Skills," Hermione finished somewhat hurriedly, clearly trying to push past whatever had caused her sudden embarrassment. "Everyone also experienced the same twenty-two per cent increase in height, proportionally adjusted. Well, everyone not currently in stasis. We haven't been able to verify the others yet, obviously."
Lefiya winced internally at the reminder. Yes, that had been quite the revelation last night when they'd discovered that she, Shirou, Rose, and Ryuu had all failed to purchase 'Common Sense' during their blessing selection. The resulting lecture from the others—particularly Rin, whose exasperation had been palpable—still rang in her ears. They'd all grumbled in their defence that it hadn't been recommended for some inexplicable reason, that surely their own native intelligence would suffice, but the counter-argument had been swift and merciless: common sense in one reality didn't necessarily translate to another.
Lefiya caught Illya's slight but visible grimace at the mention of height increases. The Einzbern woman had notably not grown at all, having specified her exact dimensions during the transfer process with what now seemed like unfortunate precision. A decision she appeared to increasingly regret, if the way she'd been eyeing everyone else's new stature was any indication. Being the shortest in a group of giants clearly rankled.
"The main limitation," Hermione continued, regaining her professional composure, "is that they don't have anything specialised for this particular reality. No knowledge of how to pilot spacecraft, no familiarity with the technology prevalent here, no understanding of this galaxy's political structures or trade networks. But that can be remedied eventually through education pods—an expensive solution, admittedly, but workable, especially given our long-term plans and the resources we'll hopefully acquire."
Rin leaned forward slightly, her movement drawing attention like a lodestone. "Which brings us to the matter at hand." Her voice carried that clipped, efficient tone that brooked no argument. "We have a one-year deadline before our lives—apparently—expire, a dungeon to clear for our planetary claim, and an entire world to develop from scratch. Let's discuss what each group can contribute to these efforts. Our lives are on the line, and we need to give it our all to see ourselves through the upcoming hardships.
Before the representatives could respond, though, Rin continued: "But before we begin that discussion proper, Rose has asked that the leaders identify which members of your groups would be interested in joining the dungeoneering aspect of our development, and separately, those who possess knowledge related to astronomy, warding, runes, and arithmancy." She paused, then gestured. "Please follow both Gabrielle and Illya—the two currently raising their hands—if you have astronomical knowledge. And follow Lefiya and Syr—also raising their hands now—if you're participating in strip mining the dungeon."
Lefiya lifted her hand as instructed, feeling suddenly self-conscious as multiple sets of eyes turned her way. She had never truly led a raid team—it was mainly Raul's job—but she steeled herself as Haruka, Haruhime, Syr, and Sakura followed her alongside several of the goblin, house-elf, and centaur representatives.
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END