Chapter 179: Good Afternoon, Mother

Vuvi and Penelo walk Pip out of the room, the three Saint Sisters trailing after them, still stark naked, strutting along completely unbothered, smiling warmly the entire way.

Penelo grins back at them, leaning in to mutter to Pip. "What exactly did you do to them?"

Pip glances over his shoulder, takes in the sight of all three sisters, and tilts his head with obvious appreciation, letting out a slow, happy beep. The sisters all chuckle amongst themselves, murmuring about how sweet, how cute he is.

Vuvi grabs his chin and turns his head firmly back around, fingers pinching hard enough that his neck servos whir in protest. "Focus. We have an entire kingdom to help, not just three greedy Saint Sisters." She shoots a sneer back over her shoulder. "I get it, honestly, if I had a body like yours, I’d be showing it off constantly too. But is the full nudity really necessary? Could you at least put your see-through gowns back on and pretend at some decency?"

The sisters laugh at that. "Apologies," Nela says. "We’re not exactly used to mortal standards of dress."

Each of them snaps her fingers, and a shimmering gown settles over her body a heartbeat later, barely more than a whisper of fabric, the thinnest possible layer of decency.

"Better," Vuvi says, then rounds back on them. "What was that sword he had, when I walked in?"

"A blessing," Hela says. "He earned it after showing us his heart."

"He showed us a lot more than that," Nela mutters, and Bela snorts beside her.

Vuvi turns to Pip. "Is that true?"

He nods, opens his palm, and activates Holy Manipulation, a slow, glowing sword rising out of it.

Vuvi slaps it back down without ceremony. "Fine, fine, you can show me properly later." She throws a grudging thanks over her shoulder as they walk. "Maybe kidnapping my construct wasn’t the worst thing that’s ever happened."

"We only wish to see him succeed," Hela assures her.

Vuvi stops walking. Turns. "Do you actually believe the Great Mother’s blessed him? I have no idea how he really came to be what he is. And I’m worried that Pip’s—"

Hela cuts her off gently. "There is no doubt whatsoever that the Great Mother’s hand has touched his soul. It is no coincidence that you, specifically, built the vessel that houses it. All of this, every step, is part of her design."

Vuvi’s whole face brightens. She slaps Pip’s shoulder, grinning. "See? We were right all along. It’s not a coincidence we found each other. The Great Mother herself set us on this path to save the world."

The three sisters go very quiet at that. Nela winces. Bela rubs both hands together, guilty.

"Yes," Hela finally says, voice carefully even. "The Great Mother has great plans for him. He will change the world. Without question."

As they reach the church’s front entrance, they hear a commotion outside, and the doors swing open onto an unexpected scene: Princess Kathoril at the base of the steps, mid-argument with someone, the rest of the team lined up behind her alongside Vexena and her generals, and beyond all of them, hundreds of commoners packed into the town square.

Veena spots Vuvi and Pip first and waves, mouthing a sorry.

Kathoril turns, relief washing over her face. "There you are! Please, allow me to introduce my brother, King Kandor. Apologies for the lack of ceremony, and the... audience," Kathoril apologizes, face folding into embarrassment, "but the King insisted on meeting you."

The King comes bounding up the steps two at a time, skidding to a stop directly in front of Vuvi and Pip, eyes wide and wild, gaze bouncing rapidly between the two of them. He seizes Vuvi’s hand and pumps it enthusiastically.

"An honor. A genuine honor, meeting the one and only Vuvela Blackthorn! I’ve followed your work for years, and when word reached me about the Prince..." He turns to Pip, grinning ear to ear. "The construction is even more remarkable than I imagined. I’ve spent an entire month trying to reverse-engineer him just from rumor alone, and believe me, I’ve heard plenty. I’d love to learn all about him, if you’d indulge me."

Vuvi beams, clearly flattered. "I’d love to discuss it with you properly, Your Highness. Very soon. But we’ve got a great deal to sort out first, and we’re already running badly behind schedule."

"I am entirely at your disposal," Kandor says, bowing deep. "I ask only to learn."

"He’s very sincere about this," Kathoril adds, sighing. "Terrifyingly sincere. It’s been the only topic of conversation in this palace for weeks."

"I have a whole binder," Kandor says, brightening, practically bouncing on his heels. "Several binders, actually, organized by Chapter and cross-referenced with diagrams. Would you like to see them? I could have them brought immediately, this very minute, no trouble at all."

"Maybe after we’ve saved your kingdom," Vuvi says.

"Understandable. I’ll have them organized by then."

Vuvi shakes his hand once more, satisfied, then turns back toward the Saint Sisters. "This," she announces, "is how you’re supposed to treat me and my construct."

Her triumphant smile falters the instant she sees their faces, all three staring straight up into the sky, the entire royal procession ignored completely, expressions carved into abject, bone-deep horror.

Vuvi follows their gaze upward, her own face slowly twisting with fear as she sees what they see.

A gigantic portal has torn open above the square, far larger and far brighter than anything the kitsune twins or even Vexena herself had ever managed to conjure, holy light swirling and sparking around its rim in slow, hypnotic spirals. Beyond it, reality itself seems to fold and twist over its own edges, layers of existence peeling back on top of each other like pages in a book nobody was ever meant to read, the very seams of creation laid bare for all to see.

A low hum builds beneath the square, rattling shutters and toppling a fruit cart at the edge of the crowd, apples rolling unnoticed across the cobblestones as every last head tips back to stare. Every eye in the square turns upward, frozen in overwhelming awe as minds slowly succumb to the illogical maelstrom twisting above them, brains boiling in their skulls, trying and failing, catastrophically, to make sense of what they see.

A column of blinding light slams down onto the church steps with rib-rattling BOOM~, ripping apart the stone directly in front of the Saint Sisters and sending a shockwave of pulverized rock rolling outward across the square.

The light fades, and a figure remains standing in its place: an impossibly tall, feminine silhouette made entirely of pure, radiant light. The three sisters drop to their knees instantly, heads bowed low, as the Great Mother’s presence settles fully onto the mortal plane for the first time in living memory.

And every single person in the square drops dead where they stand, all at once, in perfect, silent unison.

Kandor mid-sentence. Kathoril mid-breath. Hundreds of commoners still frozen in the exact postures of awe they’d worn a heartbeat earlier, hands still raised to shield eyes that will never blink again.

Vexena. Eris. Veena. Maribelle. Sera. Ka’Lula. Raikya and even Zora, all of them folding to the stones in the same silent instant, weapons and satchels clattering down beside them.

Vuvi herself, still mid-turn toward the light, collapses without so much as a sound, Penelo crumpling beside her a half-second later as blood pours from eyes, noses, and ears in dark, sudden streams, thousands of minds liquefied in an instant beneath the sheer, unfiltered weight of the Great Mother’s presence, bodies crumpling to the cobblestones in a wave that ripples outward from the church steps to the farthest edges of the square, until nothing remains standing anywhere in sight except a single golden construct, and three trembling women kneeling at his feet.

Hela swallows hard, not daring to lift her eyes from the ground.

"Good afternoon, Mother," she whimpers.