At dusk, Lucia bid a quiet farewell to Lansseax at the grand eastern plaza and boarded a common covered hackney carriage bound for Valeria Hall. As the wooden wheels rolled out from the eastern districts, leaving the temple's shadow behind to approach the outer gates of the Golden Temple, a sudden, violent rain began to lash the capital.
Unlike the gentle, drizzling chill typical of an Altus autumn, this downpour erupted with a savage, predatory force. Heavy drops struck the wooden roof like a hail of silver arrows piercing the heavens, filling the interior of the carriage with a deafening, muffled pitter-patter.
Lucia stared through the blurred glass window, his gaze entirely out of focus. The passing stone tenents and grand arches dissolved into a hazy, chaotic sar of gray.
Everything he had witnessed throughout the day was swirling in his mind like a deep-sea vortex. The theological debates with his sister regarding the Initial Ring, the specialized logistics of the foundries, the blood-soaked sand of the Serante pits, and the grim, silent horror of the corpse wells clashed together in violent confusion. He tried to compartntalize the data, but his soul was too heavy.
He saw the faces of the Misbegottens and Demi-humans—artists and master blacksmiths working as respected colleagues under Lansseax's roof—and watch those identical features transform into butchered cattle, slaughtered for the entertainnt of a howling crowd. Finally, his mind drifted down into the foul, echoing dark of the Shunning-Grounds, where mountains of broken carcasses rotted in the slush while the exiled On twins bled alongside giant, radioactive crustaceans, tearing at each other for a desperate scrap of at.
According to his ta-knowledge of the future tiline, Radagon would eventually pass a sovereign decree to abolish the public Colosseums. But looking at the current state of the lower city, that purge was years away.
Furthermore, that future reform was never designed to preserve the lives of the non-human races. The cold incarnation of Golden Order Fundantalism simply viewed such primal, blood-soaked spectacles as a theological blemish contrary to the absolute, geotric perfection demanded by the Law. Once the pits were sealed, the displaced survivors would rely be funneled back into the industrial gears of the state, serving as naless slaves across the provinces.
In the grand tally of the world, nothing would actually change.
"Why must the architecture of this world be so broken?" Lucia murmured into the rain-streaked dark, his voice a flat whisper.
Even though he held the status of an Empyrean—sheltered from the at grinder by a divine bloodline—the modern education of his past life left him with a conscience that could see the structural rot of the empire.
If this stagnant, cruel reality was the absolute pinnacle of civilization during the Erdtree's golden age, what manner of unfathomable depravity and pitch-black horror would The Shattering War unleash when the Ring finally broke in a few decades? Just tracing the macro-logistics of that coming collapse was enough to turn his blood as cold as the abyss.
He couldn't decipher the definitive source of the malice. Was it the tyrannical ignorance of the mortal masses? The rigid, unyielding paraters of the faith? The failure of the rulers, the flaws in the Elden Ring itself, or the high-and-mighty Outer Gods watching from beyond the stars?
For a foreseeable eternity, the outcasts—the Ons, the Misbegottens, the Demi-humans, and the trolls—would continue to endure endless humiliation, torture, and state-sanctioned slaughter. Innocent children would be born into chains by the hour, and royal twins would be cast into subterranean irons like sins against the light. The cycle would grind onward until a civil war consud the continent, reducing all living things to re livestock in a wasteland of ash, ending eventually in the dead silence of a broken world before the next cosmic reset began the tragedy anew.
In such a fated, never-ending wheel of sorrow... what could his single blade achieve?
He wrestled with the philosophy until the carriage pulled into the private courtyard of Valeria Hall. Without the absolute, crushing military power required to rewrite the laws of reality, any conceptualization of "how the world should be" was rely a pathetic, aningless fantasy. In this grand design that engulfed the cosmos, even the demigods and sovereign queens were nothing more than decorated marionettes dancing to the strings of the Greater Will. If they weren't, they wouldn't have all walked blindly toward their inevitable slaughter at the hands of the Tarnished.
"I have no leverage," he whispered to the glass.
Just as the Gloam-Eyed Queen had warned him within the depths of his mory during that fateful night: in the future of this world, re survival would be a luxury. With his current tier of strength, how could he hope to alter the horizon?
"Your Highness! What are you doing?"
The carriage door flew open, and Guilel rushed forward through the deluge, hoisting a massive silk umbrella over his head. To her frantic eyes, Lucia had stepped down from the fra before the horses had even brought the wheels to a full halt, standing in the freezing rain like a ghost. Even though she had sprinted from the arcade the mont the lanterns cleared the gate, he was already soaked to the bone.
"Ah... Guilel," Lucia said, his consciousness snapping back into his physical fra. He looked at the frantic dragon girl, a faint, reassuring smile touching his lips. "I'm fine. Do not fret."
He's lying again, Guilel thought bitterly, her red eyes scanning his face. His lips were curved, but there wasn't a fraction of joy in his expression—only a deep, ancient sorrow that felt too heavy for his young shoulders.
"Let us retreat indoors," he said softly, shearing water from his sleeve. "The night is late."
The subsequent month conford to his rigid, chanical routine. To Guilel's relief, His Highness's brief mont of existential collapse seed to vanish with the autumn storm, dissolving the mont the sun cleared the plaza walls.
Day after day, Lucia committed his body to relentless cultivation. Miquella and Malenia maintained their frequent visits across the garden wall. The private sparring sessions between the young Empyreans continued, though by the third week, a subtle shift occurred—Lucia's refined physical control and draconic vitality began to consistently claim the upper hand.
Concurrently, he routinely slipped into the lower quarters to enter the brackets of the Caelid Colosseum under the handle "Lucifer." Logged across consecutive victories, his points surged through the brackets, rapidly securing his promotion to the Purple Steel tier. Backed by Lansseax's forged docuntation, Old Hart's auditors found no discrepancies in his registry, eventually delivering an official scroll of invitation to the year-end Championship Battle Festival.
Contestants below the Purple Steel rank could no longer provide the structural resistance required to test his skills. After a brief tactical calculation, Lucia accepted the slip, eager to witness the absolute apex of the capital's arena economy.
According to Old Hart's vague, greedy hints, the Grand Festival was far more than a standard tournant. Beyond the baseline rune purses, high-tier gladiators possessed an avenue to seize "unprecedented wealth" during the solstice gas. But whenever Lucia pressed for the technical specifics of that opportunity, the old clerk's mouth locked shut, refusing to share the logistics.
On a damp morning in early October, Lucia exited the Serante tunnel network, his face concealed behind his common steel helm. As he navigated a narrow thoroughfare, he caught sight of three arena enforcers casually tossing a Misbegotten worker with a shattered femur into a muddy drainage alley.
He had witnessed similar cruelties multiple tis over the month. However, just as he prepared to suppress his aura to offer the artisan a pouch of silver under his "Lucifer" persona, a graceful silhouette flickered across the mouth of the alley.
A young girl clad in utilitarian scholar's robes hurried to the side of the unconscious Misbegotten. She thodically checked his vitals, pulled a roll of fresh linen gauze from her vest, and began tightly binding the splintered bone to stem the arterial bleed. She grabbed the giant blacksmith's arm, attempting to hoist his massive bulk onto her shoulders, but her human fra lacked the physical strength required for the weight.
Before she could slip, the heavy, rhythmic clank of iron plate echoed from the main avenue. A young knight encased in polished golden armor sprinted into the alley, his hands reaching down to effortlessly take the Misbegotten's bulk into his arms.
"You run too fast," the knight panted, his breath misting in the cool air, his voice carrying a distinctly youthful register. "I'm entirely unfamiliar with these lanes; I nearly lost your trail three blocks back."
The cadence felt familiar to Lucia's ears, but the helm muffled the pitch, leaving him unable to instantly identify the speaker.
"We have no ledger for delay—seconds dictate survival!" the girl giggled, resting her hands behind her back as she skipped alongside him. "Besides, I moderated my pace significantly. If an elite vanguard cannot keep step with a scholar, your training at the Ancient Dragon Temple was a complete waste of tithing coin."
"That is a logical fallacy. I am rely geographically disadvantaged."
"Hehe. Keep telling yourself that, Sir Knight."
The pair moved deeper into the slums, carrying the broken Misbegotten between them. Lucia's eyes locked onto the longsword sheathed at the boy's hip.
The forgework was unmistakable: it was the exact azure-tinted, scale-alloyed blade he had examined within Master Shugo's foundries. Though the mud obscured the breastplate, preventing him from verifying the presence of the Dragon Claw Emblem, the steel was an absolute fingerprint.
An apprentice of the Ancient Dragon Temple... a Knight of the Faith, Lucia's mind calculated the variables with lightning speed. Wait. Gray hair... red eyes... red-gold prayers... Is that Kristoff? And who is the girl trailing his boots?
After a fraction of a hesitation, Lucia tilted his helm, his boots falling into a silent, predatory rhythm as he tracked their silhouettes deeper into the labyrinthine alleys of the Lower District.
Author's Note:
Kristoff: Known in Elden Ring lore as Ancient Dragon Knight Kristoff, a legendary hero who would earn a hero's burial in the Royal Capital for his valor during the First Defense of Leyndell.Double-Update Schedule: A note from the author regarding the release pace for the upcoming chapters.
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