A Real Goddess Would Let Nobody Die

As there were no longer any operable enchanted cars in this age to transport people along the roads between cities, due to a lack of blue mages to charge them, the only efficient way to travel was for Me to fly Myself. That meant traveling alone, once again.

As I flew toward the site of the Sacrifice, I considered what My exact plan was.

First, of course, I needed to find Izena. I had three obvious places to check: the site of Her death, Our home in Ezenta, and the site of Her mother's death in Solenn. I would check here, the site of Her death, first, since it was closest and also rather likely, Ezenta second since it was next closest and next most likely, and Solenn last.

I really hoped that She wasn't in Solenn. I did not want to approach that place until We were fully prepared. I had too little information about the exact nature of the threat.

But what exactly would I do once I found Her, or rather Her mana?

I would revive Her mind, of course, but the whole problem was that the mind echo stored in Her mana would be damaged because Her mana is insufficient to hold a fully faithful copy. It would be compressed, reduced to Her foundational will. My mana would need to find the pattern, interpolate, and fill in the gaps, to restore the original. But into what? I would need a receptacle that can hold a full mind.

I could look for a mindless human, purify the taint as I had done many times to obtain a vegetative body, and place Izena into it, but that option horrified Me. I am no body snatcher. I will not make use of My enemy's vile magic. Izena would hate Me for putting Her in that position. Unforgivable.

No, the solution was obvious. I would place Her into My Own body. Our body. I had inferred that this must be possible.

"It's exactly how the monster's mind domination worked on Oscanion and the storm flies, wasn't it?" I said to Myself. "It places a red mana-based link to its own mind into the mind of its victim, or a copy of its mind, and subjugates them. It leaves an enslaved fragment of the original mind, unlike in the non-magical victims, so that it can still access the victims' mana, which is irreversibly bound to their minds."

I bet if I had ever had a chance to examine Oscanion, I would have found the mind of a black mage imprisoned within a cloud of the red-brown taint, just like with the storm fly and its green mana. That special domination must be something that can only be done by the monster itself, in Solenn, not indirectly by one of its slaves, and must require too much effort to do generically.

Convinced, I made a resolution.

"I will do the same, place Izena's mind into My Own, but there will be no subjugation. We will share. We are Sisters."

Then, as I concluded what My strategy would be, I had an epiphany, shivering in glee and anticipation.

"We will be able to use both types of mana, and both benefit from My enlarged pool!" I whispered excitedly.

Oscanion had not been particularly powerful before suffering the taint, weaker than Azenum. Afterwards, his spells--definitely black magic spells, still--had the monster's tainted mana mixed inside, and he was much more powerful, comparable to Izena and me at the time, if not slightly stronger.

"He was more powerful because the mind of the monster controlling him was able to supplement his attacks with mana from its own pool!" I almost shouted. "Izena would be able to cast black magic powered up with white mana from My pool! It's like how blue mana in enchanted items mimics the effects of other mana types, when the cast is set up properly!"

Incorporating white mana into an attack spell was, uh, not ideal, but the innate healing properties would not make a difference to an instantly vaporized target. It would be comparable to dunking one's enemy in boiling burn salve: based on what I had seen with the monster's red mana incorporated into Oscanion's black magic, the foundational black magic spell would make the mana boil, regardless.

We would be a truly perfect Goddess. What could a black mage with My level of power achieve? It would be spectacular. It would befit a Goddess.

I giggled maniacally.

I loved Izena's explosions before. I was a big boom aficionado. I graded how much I approved of lightning bolts based on how much mana it cost to heal My blindness after watching them.

I couldn't wait.

"Boooooooom pfllllaaaaaaaah. Kzzzzaaaaap kchoooooowwwwwww." I mimed, before collapsing into snorting chuckles.

I imagined the horror of Our enemies fighting two Goddesses in one body, a complete pair, equal parts unstoppable attacker and impenetrable defender (I would only need to cast one shield!). I remembered the storm fly's words.

"It fears you and your sister," or something like that.

Oh, it had no idea, absolutely not the faintest inkling how badly it had utterly doomed itself, and even still it was afraid. It was afraid of what Izena was like 943 years ago.

"Judging by how much it increased Oscanion's strength, it had comparable strength to Izena and I 943 years ago. That made it terrifyingly powerful and difficult to contain then, when working through Oscanion, much stronger than any other human just like We were. But what can it possibly hope to do against My strength now, with Izena able to wield it too?"

I grinned ferally. It would burn. Oh, it would burn, and it would know before the end Who had come to kill it, and why.

The only problem We would need to deal with was resisting its mind domination, which had brought a storm fly much more powerful than itself in raw mana terms under its near-total control. Two of them, in fact. I hoped My purification would be up to the job. It needed to be, or the world was doomed as soon as the Solenn Guard's amulets failed, unless We could find a powerful red mage who wanted to help, or a blue mage who could charge the amulets. But, significant mages no longer existed anywhere in the world. Good luck with those alternatives.

All that remained was to find Izena, or rather Her mana and the mind remnant within. The dome placed near the location of Her death had just come into view.

As I approached to land, I could see that I had been spotted--My glow was never subtle--and there was a man wearing the black and white robes waiting for Me.

"Welcome, White Goddess," he said excitedly after I landed. "We were told to expect Your visit, and are most glad to see You. Please, let us know if we can be of service to You."

"Thank you for welcoming Me," I replied. "I am glad to see that My family's Sacrifice has been memorialized with care, both here and in Rokesha proper."

"Of course!" he said, beaming with pride. "It is our honor to be the city that was saved, the last to receive Your Salvation before Your Departure, and we are proud to be the first to receive Your Salvation once more upon Your Return."

Others wearing the black and white robes had joined him now. I spoke to the group.

"I have come here seeking lingering traces of the battle," I said. "They would not be visible to any non-mage. I am wondering if there are records of the past, observations made by mages, suggesting the presence of a peculiar cloud or smudge of black?"

I stared at the black smudge on the ground that had been Izena--

Yes Sister, I'm coming. Hold on just a little while longer. I will find You.

The listeners were concerned with what I had said, and perhaps with the brief narrowing of My eyes at the involuntary return of My most painful memory.

"Would this be the taint of the enemy, lingering even now?" the man asked worriedly, with a deep frown.

"No," I replied. "Not Oscanion's putrid taint. This would be pure immaterial black mana, like that of My Sister."

Literally that of My Sister, but no need to share those details.

"Ah!" he said, and all present were very obviously relieved. They conferred amongst themselves. "We know of no such thing offhand, but we can check the records. We do not have all the accounts memorized, of course."

Imperfect memories must be nice, I thought.

"Thank you. I will search the area Myself while you search the records, then."

While I wandered the field, as empty today as it had been during the battle aside from the small Temple, I tried to figure out exactly where Izena's body had been destroyed, exactly where Her smudge had been. I could perfectly remember the scene from that day; My memory had never faded. The problem was that the land had changed. Individually the changes were subtle, shrubs in different places, treelines changed in shape, hills had eroded a little, the cliff had receded a bit farther from the sea, plants now covered areas that had been blackened, and so on, but collectively these changes were enough to make it difficult for Me to find the exact location.

Predictably, scenes of the battle replayed in My head constantly.