Hearing Anastasia's sincere words coming from the bottom of her heart, Ishia only gave a weak nod and hoped Anastasia was truly serious about what she said.
The four of them then moved from the floor to the two long wooden chairs facing each other. Anastasia sat with Philekos and Ishia sat with Lynda.
The atmosphere that had been full of laughter slowly grew more serious. Anastasia sat across from Ishia with both hands on her knees, hidden beneath her cloak. She still smiled so genuinely and softly, but her posture was more solemn.
After remaining silent for about a minute, Anastasia began the conversation slowly.
"On the day your older sister was kidnapped, did you see the kidnappers act clearly enough?" Anastasia asked Ishia, who sat with her head bowed.
"Y-yes... That day, that night... I saw everything so clearly," Ishia answered in a weak voice, head still bowed. "I saw my sister being kidnapped by a group of men who had a horse drawn carriage and a strange wooden wagon where they dragged her inside, then they disappeared into the dark of night," she continued.
Anastasia listened to Ishia's explanation intently. She seemed to be thinking while processing that information before asking again. "Besides that, did you see anything on their bodies? Like a mark or a symbol?"
"Uh... That night..." Ishia paused for a moment, trying to remember and replay the scene of her sister's kidnapping in her mind. She stayed quiet for more than a minute, letting the memories flood her thoughts before she remembered something. "I-it seems, I remember... At the time, the men who kidnapped my sister seemed to have a strange symbol on their wrists. Some symbols were covered and some were not. A few of them even seemed to have the same symbol on their face or shoulder."
"Very good, keep going Ishia. I want to know what that symbol looked like when you saw it. That information is very useful for me to identify the kidnappers," Anastasia said, nodding in approval, praising Ishia without saying it out loud.
Hearing Anastasia's encouraging response, Ishia tried again to picture the strange symbol on the kidnappers' bodies. Meanwhile Lynda, who had been silent until then, slowly pushed herself up and walked out toward the adventurers' guild kitchen to make hot chocolate.
When Ishia finally remembered the symbol's shape, she began to speak while lifting her head slightly. "The-the symbol, it looked like a crescent moon with a skull beneath it that was pierced by a sword from above."
"A crescent moon, a skull and a sword, huh? Hmm..." Anastasia nodded slowly, then closed her eyes for a moment to try to recall something.
On the other hand, Philekos, who felt somewhat familiar with Ishia's description of the symbol, began to remember someone who had been dead thousands of years ago during the great war. That person had been an important figure in one of the seven Orthodox Churches, which operated on the continent full of magical energy and knowledge called Efiria.
That figure was closely connected to the Orthodox Church that worshipped the Goddess of the Realm of Endless Dreams, Ilo'ukhan. That Church had an emblem of a veiled woman with two swords pointing downward and a crescent moon entwined with a rose above her head.
That symbol represented the sanctity of the goddess Ilo'ukhan, and had been the identity of that Orthodox Church for thousands of years. The symbol Ishia described, however, resembled a dark or antithetical version of that sacred emblem that appeared after the death of the important figure from the Orthodox Church.
But the antithetical versions that appeared were very varied and what Ishia described was only one of them.
"Anastasia... Isn't that..." Philekos looked at Anastasia and saw her expression turn serious.
"Yes... No doubt, they are fanatic worshippers of the Maiden of the Eternal Night," Anastasia said, slowly opening her eyes and assuming a grave expression.
"If that's really them, then the reason behind those kidnappings is to—"
"Bring about the Resurrection of that Maiden, through her weapon," Anastasia finished, clenching her hands tightly and bowing her head for a moment.
She felt her heart pounding harder. Her hands were sweating, her breathing grew heavy and tight, and her mind flooded with memories from the past. At one point in her mind she stood in a field of withered flowers filled with the stench of rot from a woman who lay dead with dozens of spears driven into her body.
The woman stood with a shattered face, dried blood and decaying flesh. She wore a long black dress with steel armor on her shoulders and damaged arms. Her eyeballs looked utterly destroyed yet remained monstrously intact in their sockets.
She stood among the withered flowers, like Anastasia, but with a red moonlight illuminating her ruined body. Anastasia herself stood among the withered flowers as well, but without any moonlight shining on her.
The woman then raised her index finger and pointed at Anastasia with pure hatred. "This is all your fault, Anastasia. You are the cause of my death and the loss of hope for my people. You cursed me with your false vow on the day we first met. You swore you would come help me, protect me and watch over me... But what you did was the opposite. You came without sin just to watch me die at 'his' hands with no resistance. You didn't even lift your weapon to stop him... it hurts! it hurts! it hurts! it hurts! it hurts! THIS HURTS SO MUCH ANASTASIAAAAA! YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED THEN, NOT ME!!!" the woman said, slowly approaching Anastasia while tearing at her own face.
She then grabbed Anastasia's hand and tried to push her down. "YOU SHOULD HAVE DIED, ANASTASIA! YOU DON'T DESERVE TO LIVE, YOU DON'T DESERVE TO BREATHE OR EVEN FORGIVENESS! YOUR LIFE IS A MISTAKE AND YOU ARE A SIN BORNE BY THIS WORLD BECAUSE OF YOUR SELFISHNESS THAT DAY!"
Seeing that the woman truly hated her, Anastasia's body began to tremble. She stared at the woman with a fearful expression, tears welling at the corners of her eyes and her lips trembling fiercely as she wanted to say something. "F-fo-forgive me! I-I-I didn't mean to leave you and not help you! I-I-I only—"
Her words were immediately cut off by the woman, who slammed Anastasia's head into the ground and gripped it tightly. "ONLY WHAT, ANASTASIA! SAY IT! SAY IT! SAY IT! SAY IT! ONLY WHAAAT, YOU SINNER!"
The earth that had been hard slowly turned into wet mud that swallowed her head bit by bit. The woman continued to grab Anastasia's head so hard and pushed it deeper into the mud.
When Anastasia was truly terrified and desperate, snowflakes began to fall from who knew where. Those flakes made the woman lose some of her anger, while other flakes formed the body of a wolf that called to Anastasia.
"Get up, Anastasia! Don't let your fear take over you! Fight, like you always do... ANASTASIA!"