Raileigh smiled.
"If you ask me, I think being a ruler means creating a life where people can simply live. Eat. Laugh. Work. Love. Where nobles don't have to look down on commoners. Where commoners don't have to fear nobles. A country where people don't need some grand reason to exist. Where we all come together and find that reason, together."
Jamie put her hands behind her head.
"Hmmm. I kinda agree except with the whole 'Creating a life' part. People should be allowed to try to live. Obviously they will mess up but then they can try again. And even if nothing comes out from it, at least they tried. There's no point in creating a life when the future is so uncertain. So we should all just do our own thing and worry about the problems when they come."
Raileigh folded his arms and rubbed his chin.
"This an interesting view you have but what's so bad about trying to find meaning together?"
"That's just wishful thinking when things can go so wrong so fast so. Right Ellie?" she turned to Elias. Her friend stood watching the waves crash and recede on the shore with a strange expression on his face.
"Ellie?"
"You're both fools." he said letting out a dry, humorless scoff.
Raileigh tilted his head while Jamie just frowned.
"Hey! Who're you calling a fool?"
"The two of you, though I thing Raileigh is the bigger fool between the two of you, At least Jamie has some measure of understanding." He replied.
"Oh...Hey wait, that still doesn't make things better!" Jamie yelled punching him in the shoulder. Elias yelped and rubbed his shoulder.
"What was that for?"
"For calling me a fool."
"I called Raileigh a fool too and he's not offended."
Raileigh gave a faint smile.
"Well I am a bit surprised because that came out of nowhere. But I am also intrigued. What made you say that?' He asked stepping closer.
Elias paused and returned his gaze back to the shore. The three of them had different philosophies. The core was the same but they branched out and manifested differently For a moment he was silent. Then he spoke.
"What's the point?"
Raileigh blinked. "What?"
"Any of it. What's the point?"
He reached out toward the shore.
"People have been born, lived, struggled, and died believing they could change the world."
Elias's fingers curled.
"How many actually did?"
Jamie frowned while Raileigh remained silent.
"All of it is simply inevitable. Empires will rise and collapse. People will experience and forget. Names will be given and disappear into obscurity. At the end of the day everything returns to zero. That is the unfairness of the world."
His nails dug into his flesh and his voice grew quieter.
"So what's the point?"
For a moment...
He almost spoke of another world.
Another life.
Another group who had once been family.
Another group he thought had failed him
Another reason why the world was unfair.
But he held his tongue. Jamie stepped closer.
"You have a point when you said maybe there isn't a point. But so what?"
She smiled at him.
" You have one thing wrong. It's worth trying precisely because the world is so unfair. Wouldn't it be more fun to prove whoever made the rules wrong? Today was the first time I'm hearing that deities or whoever are playing a game and using you and Raileigh as pawns. Wouldn't you love to see the looks on their faces when you beat the game and punch them in the face?"
She laughed.
"It'd be so awesome!"
Raileigh nodded.
"And I don't need certainty that I'll succeed."
He looked at Elias.
"I only need to believe the attempt matters."
Elias stared at them.
Jamie smiled.
Raileigh extended his fist.
"We'll figure it out together."
Jamie raised hers.
"Together."
They looked at Elias.
'Are these kids for real? Effort and belief aren't good enough when there'll never be results. They're this close to seeing it and yet this far off from seeing it.'
He sighed.
'But then again, a counter argument can be made against me that since I think all is meaningless I have nothing to lose.'
He groaned inwardly.
'What a pain.'
Slowly he raised his fist and with a resigned huff, bumped his fist into theirs. Raileigh smiled and Jamie grinned as the prince pulled them close wrapping an arm around each them and declared into the wind,
"Mark my words! We're going to be the change. We'll be the three blazing suns that shine light straight through this miserable world!"
Elias shook his head.
'Idiots.'
And yet...
At that moment the rest of the procession had finally reached the shore, thousands of voices rising in a final, triumphant hymn as the faithful spilled onto the sand.
The singing slowly faded into a reverent hush, broken only by the rhythmic crash of waves against the shore and the soft rustle of robes as the West Cardinal Ljudevit Mlinar ascended a small, hastily constructed wooden platform at the water's edge.
He then turned and faced the people, his ornate bronze thurible swinging in a wide, rhythmic arc that cast thick, fragrant plumes of frankincense and myrrh into the salty night air, purifying the damp sea breeze with the ancient scent of cathedral stone and sacred ritual. As the vast congregation filtered out across the expansive stretch of the shore, they arranged themselves in serried, reverent rows beneath the glittering canopy of the stars, the thousands of handheld wax candles transforming the pitch-black beach into a shimmering expanse of flickering illumination.
After the purification he bowed and the crowed bowed in answer before one of the Alter servers stepped forward and took the the thurible from him. The Cardinal raised his hand, and silence fell over the crowd like a blanket. His voice, when he spoke, was not thunderous but gentle—a quiet, resonant hum that somehow carried across the entire beach without effort.
"Brothers and sisters of Aerthos," he began, his eyes sweeping over the sea of upturned faces.
"We gather tonight on the eve of the Hydrangea Festival's third day, as our ancestors have gathered for centuries, to remember a simple truth: that light endures. That even in our darkest hour, even when the storms rage and the earth trembles beneath our feet, the flame of hope cannot be extinguished."
He paused, letting the words settle over the crowd.
"We have seen darkness this week. We have seen violence. We have seen the faces of our neighbors twisted by fear and rage. We have wept for the fallen, and we have trembled for the future. But we are still here. We are still standing. And that, beloved, is a miracle."
"You hear that?" Jamie muttered to Elias but he nudged her with his elbow to shush her up. The Cardinal looked toward the sky and continued.
"In the sacred texts, we are taught that the first Hydrangea bloomed from the tears of the Primordial, a flower born of sorrow and hope in equal measure. It reminds us that beauty can emerge from pain. That life can flourish in the ashes of destruction. That even the smallest light can pierce the deepest darkness."
He lowered the burner and reached out, his hand open, his voice rising with quiet intensity.
"Tonight, we light our lanterns not as an act of defiance, but as an act of faith. Faith in the light that dwells within each of us. Faith in the bonds that connect us—brother to sister, neighbor to stranger, noble to commoner. Faith in the dawn that will surely follow even the longest night."
He bowed his head, and the crowd followed suit.
"Let us pray." he said as they all knelt down.
The words of the homily washed over the beach like a wave, thousands of voices murmuring in unison as the Cardinal led them through the ancient prayers of the Church. He prayed for mercy, for redemption, for them all to be filled with the sacred duty to care for the weak and the lost. He sprayed for the Primordial's light, which had shattered to give them the twenty faces to lead them, and of the promise that one day, all shadows would be banished forever. This part intrigued Elias.
'I just realized that I don't really know a lot about the church.' he thought he and Raileigh smacking Jamie in unison as she was fiddling with a passing crab.
'I'll need to research more about them, maybe they know something...'
When the prayers ended, the Cardinal raised his head and smiled—a warm, genuine expression that seemed to reach every corner of the shore.
"Now, my brothers and sisters," he said, "let us release our lanterns. Let us send our hopes into the sky, where they may join with the stars and remind the heavens that Aerthos still stands."
The crowd erupted into movement. Families and friends gathered around their lanterns—delicate paper constructs painted with hydrangeas and prayers, each one a unique expression of hope. Hands reached for candles, flames flickered, and one by one, the lanterns began to glow from within.
Elias and Jamie looked around then at each other, each believing the other would bring some. Sensing the oversight with a faint, knowing smirk, Raileigh casually reached into the spatial depths of his 4.0 dimension , his hand slipping out a moment later holding three pristine, collapsible rice-paper lanterns stamped with the traditional seals of Aethelberg. He handed one to Elias and another to Jamie, his golden eyes catching the amber glow of the surrounding candles as he offered a quiet, encouraging nod.
Without a word of complaint, Elias pulled out the thin wire frame of his lantern, his fingers moving with practiced, if reluctant, dexterity to lock it into its cubic shape. Jamie provided the flame and kneeling together in the damp sand slightly removed from the crushing press of the crowd, the three of them carefully tilted their paper vessels, guiding the rising heat into the hollow centers until the delicate paper walls glowed from within like captured pieces of the dawn.
Imitating the precise, ritualistic choreography observed by the thousands around them, they each held the base of their illuminated lanterns steady against the wind, closed their eyes for a brief, silent second, and then blew out the flame Jamie had conjured similar to how the people around them did to the handheld candles they had used to prime the internal air, and casting the spent tapers in a swift, practiced arc behind them where they plunged hissing into the dark water.
The trio didn't have any candles so they instead each took an object of their person, Raileigh a piece of jewelry, Elias a random artifact and Jamie a half eaten sandwich artifact and threw it into the churning foam of the ocean.
With a synchronized heave, they released their holds, sending their individual lanterns drifting upward into the heavy night air. The three paper spheres caught the thermal updrafts rising from the massed congregation, tumbling gently before stabilizing and joining the massive, breathtaking river of thousands of other glowing lights ascending toward the firmament. Elias stood shoulder to shoulder with Jamie and Raileigh, his neck craned back as he watched their small contribution mingle with the celestial expanse, the tiny specks of warm orange fire rising higher and higher until they dissolved into the vast, indifferent darkness, twinkling bravely among the other celestial bodies like a stubborn promise of tomorrow.
Like they too were stars in the sky.