"For anything worth having, one must pay the price."

-John Burroughs

━━━━━━━━┓ ? ┏━━━━━━━━

She refused to give up the task just yet and continued to manipulate dark emotions to a bare minimum as instructed. Every day she would get out from her self-created space and, would just like that, obliterate ill and bleak emotions from anyone she could see. The process repeated itself for a few decades making her see the evolution and innovations that man had catalyzed as years came and go. She even got promoted to the second-to-the-last Hierarchy and seeing the slow, but apparent progress, she decided that she could live like this for as long as it takes, until she reaches her new desired rank, to be considered as a "Relic Warden"- the threshold on the Hierarchy where she then would be allowed to live on the Divine realms in exchange of guarding a sacred relic.

Yet, fate again took another hundred and eighty-degree turn. A table-turner that would make her climb up the ranks without having to wait for another eon in such an ugly workplace, but with a relatively large price that she has to pay, and a fallen deity caused it all.

"Viscount End"-The Prince of the Ruined, in his heinous shenanigans, to increase his power by making men sin by any feasible means, begins to plan another major incursion and there's nothing more perfect than his callous scheme to inflict "The Great Depression"... And so it happened, without any prior warnings.

The incursion happened fast, whilst Lacrimosa is still in its havoc's midst, left alone in the eye of a great catastrophe that men had never seen before.

The plan took hold of mankind in the eeriest ways, an event that was least expected and is currently underestimated by history. That time, it was the Dark Ages but thrice the agony, thrice the deaths, thrice the despair, thrice the poverty and a hundred times the horror's disambiguation. It was truly an occurrence that made earth similar to Gehenna, a place uglier than that of the abyss.

And yet, caught up with the task she was to bring to fruition, Lacrimosa then utilized every bit of her power to subdue the subsistent melancholy, only to see and realize... that her power had an unmarked limitation.

Adversely, as she attempted to spell the end of the eerie timeline in a single usage of her peculiar prowess beginning by obscurely extracting the unfathomable negativities, she began to feel the darkness first-hand that she would usually just cast out from her. The call for food. The feeling of being killed. The feeling of utter hopelessness. The feeling of being in an endless loop of agony and sadness. She experienced it all.

And what's more is that just by being cognizant of the fact that Earth is in a crisis unlike any other before, her authority level rose up unprecedentedly breaking the charts of the magistrates that made her equal to them herself. But, the magistrates, fearing that she would eventually surpass and reach the ranks of the two Primordials began to take measures.

They stopped Lacrimosa, retrieved her from the realm, dully increased her rank to a much-desired level and let her lived in the Divine realms just as how she wanted, but she... was never the same.

She hated her prowess as much as she hated her experience on Earth. It was a rare ability able to deform negative forces to become her own arsenal of power. Let her see sadness and she can kill you by that. Show her despair and she can turn the negativity to a sharp two-edged sword and plunge it to someone else's heart. Cower in fear in her presence and her power would rise up via visible scales.

Moreover, in all of its peculiar glory, she hated it. Not because having such potent ability made her life dull, but because it made her go through all of that putrid event as if she wore the soles of the constantly tormented mankind. The feeling alone is nauseating and the memory is very grim to be reminisced.

Now, here she is. In the Divine realms known for her ability and her infamy of climbing the hierarchy quicker than almost everyone else. Feared. Isolated. Considered as an outcast by none other than herself. After all, she is very different from the other deities. Unlike them, she empirically experienced what it really is like to suffer and mourn.

(.....)

After the conference that she intentionally abolished, she lived another ten years of leisurely not caring about anything else. All she did was stay in her minimalistic self-made realm, enjoy the leisure and relaxing atmosphere it has to offer, play the piano that she could summon anytime if she feels like playing, and would just go out if called by someone with a higher rank than her. It was a dull life, a very sad one, and yet matched her title perfectly of being the "Goddess of Disambiguation".

And then came the unprecedented news...

"ATTENTION TO ALL DEITIES. THE 'HIGHEST MAJESTY' PETITIONED FOR A MEETING IN ACCORDANCE TO THE CONTROVERSY OF MANKIND. PRESENCE IS IMPERATIVE. PLEASE BE THERE AT THE CONGREGATION..."

And so, another gathering is to take place, but this time, it would be deprived of arguments and insignificant drivels and if not because of the 'HIGHEST MAJESTY' address, Lacrimosa would have had deemed it another waste of her time, but now, it might as well be something that is worthy of her heed.

The denizens of the Divine Realms, including the 333 deities and as well as the Magistrates found themselves facing each other, yet again on the same lavish rectangular table in a seemingly ordered manner. Well, they are to receive the words from the highest, so they should be. Furthermore, this time, the only one who will speak is the highest himself in the form of a conscious flame as he does not permit anyone to see him personally, not even the Magistrates themselves.

Everyone then got to the same position they were in as the last time, including Lacrimosa herself who is situated on the innermost edge, but they, as a thousand-century practice, remained standing up while waiting for the Highest's presence to descend. And then the flaming consciousness came and positioned itself right in the center of the table. Not even one dare to say a word and be underscored as an unholy braggadocio. Only the presence could speak, and that, any questions must be held back and be saved for later.

"A decent day everyone! How unfortunate to say that all of you are now divided. One side favors damnation for the creation, while the opposition chose salvation. And in order to cease the ongoing Paradox, I am now implementing a new decree... 'The Warfare of Fates'. Each of you is required to choose a human for yourselves. The winning deity gets to decide the ultimate extremity while the human will have a wish for himself to be granted by me. Everyone in the basal part of the Hierarchy should make amends, and I also consider the participation from the fallen...I command thee Magistrates to further extrapolate the rules, not yonder."

Then just like that, the presence left, leaving everyone with nothing but strong pounding heartbeats as they think critically as to what the Highest meant whilst hoping that their first translation is wrong. Then, a deity snapped out from his paralysis...

"What? A war between deities? This is absurd!"

"We can't do anything about it. it's the decision from the 'highest' himself!", the magistrates further seconded and not one could object.

Everyone left the congregation, with cold sweats that could heal the wounded running down their lit countenances... Except for Lacrimosa who was a bit disappointed.

And so the magistrates, as instructed, began to make the rules of the warfare. From that point on, at least 10 important assemblies explaining the war took place of which Lacrimosa did not attend all.

The Magistrates have long gone finished the structure of the decree and it is soon to begin without falters. The deities themselves also have had chosen their vessels which they would call as "Herrschers" and have been in constant connection with them...

But Lacrimosa was still not in the mood to choose a human vessel, not until a note three years later came in her realm saying that she must need to choose now or face terrible consequence from the Highest himself and that, this is her last chance. Ten days have been set and if by all means, she would fail to choose a human to be the vessel of her will in that specific time frame, she will face the putrid price.

The Goddess, speculating as to how troublesome it might be if she were to ignore the letter, not to mention that it acknowledged the 'Highest' in between, she decided to venture again in the world that she hates leaving her self-designed realm with as little as "This is very tiring. Let's just get this over with".

She then descended, only to see that the world that made her suffer has changed quite drastically, but still, with the ever-increasing immorality and the rampancy of sins- visages that she was acquainted with for a few decades, that she would never likely forget...

Choosing to ignore the somewhat familiar scenes, she then hovered throughout the landscape scanning for the possible adept Herrscher...

Moreover, while the Goddess is very lazy and would prefer mediocrity over sound outcomes, she is not that frivolous to think alike when choosing integral 'materials' like this. Not to forget that it's a 'human' that she's talking about, the entities that have been the cause of the Divine Realm's ruckus and the reason why she changed... Yet, eight days have passed and still, there was none that fit her criteria;

First. It should be a girl. Second. She should be an abandoned street-child known by no one. Third. She knows how to behave in the noblest ways. Fourth. Her mouth is constantly thrifty in words. Quite the criteria now aren't they?

And then, came the ninth day. A time where she decided to alter the four criteria she spearheaded herself...

It was a night like any other, still with the dull per diem visages of crime, violence and ill intentions, but one thing made it quite unusual...

It was the endearing gargantuan moon that reminded her of her past humble life back in the third realm from whence she was but a lowly spirit. Unfortunately, all of that now is but an array of imaginative scenarios all starting with "What if's" and Lacrimosa knows too well, that she can't continue dwelling too much in the past.

And then...

"BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG! BANG!" she suddenly heard an avid myriad of echoing gunshots intervening her, as she was rather busy of accommodating her endless reveries.

And there, atop a mountain, by a mansion's giant window she saw, a very young girl in a detrimental scenario crying her heart out while hugging two corpses lying cold on the floor, begging for her life. A young man in noble garments pointing a gun with a deranged demeanor coming for the defenseless little girl's life, and dead bodies lying all around outside...

And at the same mansion's bedroom, one storey above, a boy is sleeping, without a clue of the derangement that's currently taking place in the same household.

"BANG!" the little girl died, suffering from a candid gunshot on the chest, while the next thing that the Goddess saw was the merciless perpetrator stretching his back and then taking a seat on a grand piano's bench, smiling deceitfully as he beholds the deceased lying cold in front of him.

"How deranged this realm really is. Perhaps it's actually better for it to sever." She said with an expression of legitimate disgust, amalgamated with pure hatred. Power also came surging into her from the perpetrator's freshly-executed negative intentions, a power that she neither asked for nor needed.

She then cast a cold wind to pass through the sleeping boy's bedroom, waking him up...

"Guess I found him...my Herrscher." The Goddess exclaimed.