Diane was suddenly picked up roughly by her scruff. She tried to break free of the hold, but the hand holding her was extremely strong and firm.
"Ya know little kitty, as much as I do love cats, I don't like my son being taken advantage of"
Flora said, glaring into Diane's eyes as she held her by her scruff on her face level. Flora was looking firmly at Diane, as if expecting the cat to say something.
"Meow"
Diane answered trying to play it innocent. Flora's face twisted into an annoyed glare as she frowned.
"I might be old but not stupid, kitty. I know you're one of Grey Beards; no native descent cat would try to leave Purrt Royal or be smart enough to manage it. So, you better speak cat before I throw you into the sea."
Diane stared back at the old lady's eyes and sighed.
"Alright, alright… I can talk. But whose Grey Beard?"
"You don't know Grey Beards is dear?"
"Should I?"
"Naturally, Grey Beard is believed to the be the creator of all cats. He used other races as example and ingredients to make cats. He's basically the cat god."
"Really? So… cats aren't natural in this world? meow"
"No dear, what the gods say is natural. If the gods created cats, they're natural."
Huh… Seems like Diane had been missing out on quite the core information on her own species all this time. Who knew cats were actually created by some weird god. But were other races also created by other gods? and if so… what are the gods? These answers were far beyond what Diane herself could contemplate, and she believed it was far-fetched to think the old grandma holding her by her scruff would be able to answer. Diane opened her mouth
"Can you let me down? meow"
And surprisingly, Diane felt herself being lowered. Her paws touching the hard wooden deck below her as she felt the hold on her scruff ease.
"So… you asked for my motives on sneaking onto the ship?"
Diane said fidgeting with her paw as she glanced at Flora and the back down
"Well… I- I got into a bit of trouble on Purrt Royal and I was expecting so I just wanted to get out of there"
Diane said looking down now.
"So, umm… can you let me stay, Nya please?"
She continued looking up at Flora with the classical cute eyes everyone depicted when cute animals wanted something. Flora however just chuckled.
"Amusing how you think your little kitty eyes can waver me, but sure, you can stay, I don't think you were lying despite trying to manipulate me into helping you with your cuteness."
Flora said shaking her head before rubbing Diane's hair.
"So sweet little kitty, are you going to tell me your name, or do I rename y-"
"Diane!"
Diane answered hurriedly, she was quite fond of her name, and didn't what this weird grandma naming her, god if she named her something like Madampawselle.
"Well Diane, it's very nice to meet you"
Flora said returning to her usual old sweet grandma smile. It was really unnerving how fast the grandma had went from threatening to grow her overboard to smiling at her sweetly again.
"You too Flora"
- - -
Valo's head pounded, and he was losing his mind. It felt like his whole being was remade into a new shape. He was still stuck in that endless darkness, unable to move in any direction as he wasn't even sure if there was direction.
Valo had tried touching his face with his face with his paws and hadn't managed to. In fact, did he even have paws anymore? He had no concept of time for the same as he didn't have any concept of space. He was truly stranded in this empty darkness. Was he going to stay here forever? That he didn't know. Since if this was after-life, he'd be quite disappointed. He'd heard all about serene garden filled with eternal sunbeams beyond The Rainbow Bridge. Heck even the eternal torture of being denied access to catnip in Purrgatory would be better than floating in this emptiness.
Well, it wasn't really emptiness after all Valo could still see the river of rivers as he had come to call it. The thing was, unlike at the start, practically nothing on it was happening. At best some island became brighter by one thousand of a single lumen and one other dimmed that amount every now and then.
But that was it.
WAS. BORING!
Valo would rather watch fishes swimming in a circle without being allowed to actually catch any of them.
And worst of all! His head was still pounding like somebody was hitting it every second with a stick. At least that served to distract him from his boredom somewhat, he would probably be fully crazy by now if he was allowed to just sit there and stare at the emptiness without any pain.
Then suddenly something happened. Infront of Valo a… box appeared? Not the kind of he had lived in but a flat and blue one, slightly see through with some character he couldn't recognize. But as he looked at the letter as if by his very nature, he was able to understand them.
[Congratulation user [Valo] for filling the perquisite for system activation]
[Your legacy truly knows no bounds: You have successfully managed to influence the Fate of the world significantly in 8 of your lives]
Achievement Unlocked: [Fate bender]
Reward: -Error-
System notification: Reward for the Achievement [Fate bender] can't currently be claimed due to the insufficient existence of the body of the User.
[Attempting system recalibration]
[….Failed…Fail-]
[Changing reward type]
Reward: [Authority of the Unwritten]
[Authority of the Unwritten: A single use authority ticket for the user to embedded one unwritten law onto their self.
Note: Only usable while User is in pre-incarnation from]
Pre-incarnation form estimated time: 23 hours 59 minutes…