Guardian Moon-Desperate Measures

As the steel weights of feeling unworthy threatened to drown her, Dorothea's eye caught a building in the near distance. "I'll be right back, girls." She hastened to the old historical church where Cichol met his wife and stepped inside.

Dorothea was never a pious woman; most of her life she erroneously blamed Sothis for the unjust crest system that caused her to be thrown on the streets and resented the goddess. Now that it came to light that Those Who Slither in the Dark were the true perpetrators, and that the Church only supported the current system because they couldn't see a better option, Dorothea decided that she should perhaps give religion a second chance.

She quietly scooted into an empty pew and genuflected at the altar. "From one of our talks with Sothis, it seems like you three are always diligently watching us. So I figured I could at least vent to you about my emotions. Is that advisor right about me? Am I unfit to be Ferdie's love interest? I really hope you can shoot an answer down from the Blue Sea Star or wherever you are right now. If you can't, just get back to me soon, okay?"

Dorothea nearly screamed when someone tapped her shoulder. When she realized who it was, she let out a sigh of relief. "Mercedes?"

Mercedes von Martritz smiled. "Hello Dorothea! I'm glad to see you here. Is there anything I can help you with?"

"What are you doing here?"

"Well, I work here. I'm part of the group Lady Rhea sent to restore relations between Adrestia and the Church. I saw Seteth-or Cichol, his real name-a bit ago. He wanted the Rafail Gem back. He said that Sothis wanted to remake it. I was very confused, but people did talk about the Goddess coming down, and sure enough, a short time later, I received a different version of it."

Dorothea tilted her head a bit. "Hold on-you didn't see Sothis descend from the sky down to Garreg Mach? I could see it in Enbarr."

Mercedes shrugged. "I don't remember what I was doing, but I must've been absorbed in it, otherwise I would've heard some shouts and run outside to look. Anyway, are you okay? You look like you need someone to talk to."

Dorothea hid her face in her hands. "Mercedes, what are the qualities of a good empress?"

Mercedes' smile transformed into a grin. "Aha! So the rumors of you and Ferdinand are true! I would say being a good person, open-minded and forgiving. Try to be merciful and compassionate. I think you already have those qualities. And since you grew up on the streets, you have a unique outlook that the upper class don't have. You could really make a difference in the commoners' lives."

"I like the sound of that. Thank you, Mercedes."

"Of course. I'm always here if you need anything else."

After the heart-to-heart talk, Dorothea made her way back to the girls. Bernadetta yanked on her arm. "Are you feeling okay? You were gone a bit."

Dorothea nodded. "Yes. I just saw Mercedes and the time flew by. Ferdie's still in there?"

Constance affirmed, "The Emperor is still performing his vast duties to make up for his absence. I am most touched by his generous offer to accompany us on our holy quest."

Bernadetta murmured, "How're things between you two, now that the secret's out?"

Dorothea quietly replied, "Better. I have a lot more faith in him. But he doesn't know everything . . ."

Bernadetta's jaw dropped. "There's more?"

"It's not like I'm happy about it! Believe me, I hated every minute. I just wanted to get to the opera house as soon as possible so I could escape to Garreg Mach."

Bernadetta decided not to press the subject further. Eventually, Ferdinand finally strode out of the castle once his duties were all taken care of. "Right. Melchior will take care of things while I fight. Is everyone ready to reconvene with everyone at the monastery?"

In the carriage ride back, Dorothea turned to her boyfriend. "Ferdie, do I belong?"

Ferdinand looked at with surprise. "Of course! What do you mean?"

Dorothea felt her bottom lip quiver. "I heard everything the advisor said about me."

He bristled. "I am sorry you had to hear that spectacle. I assure you, I have no intentions of ending our relationship on the matters he brought up."

She thought, "If only you knew, Ferdie. If you knew the whole truth . . ."

Back at the monastery, Dorothea caught Sophie humming in the Officers Academy. She struck up a conversation with her. "Hey there Sophie. Glad to see you in such a good mood."

Sophie waved. "Oh, hey Dorothea. I'm just pumped because I helped out Professor Hanneman and Lysithea with their crest research. I helped catalog artifacts he excavated from Shambhala! He's piecing together what Viskam are so we can make our own to protect ourselves."

Dorothea's mind flashed of the horrible lightning that zapped upon the Leicester Army as they bitterly fought through the dark, eerie halls of the underground society. "Oh? Those Agarthan firing orbs?"

"Yup! His real fascination is with crests, but I think right now he's trying to figure out how these ones work to better understand how Agarthan technology works."

"Makes sense. It'll make it that much easier to figure out how they implanted a second crest on Lysithea."

They continued talking all the way to the Cardinal's Room. Cichol's eyes had bags under them, and he seemed a bit shriveled, perhaps distressed at the Knights of Seiros' report. "There was one promising lead from the search. It appears that in the Kleiman Viscounty, there a group of mercenaries terrorizing the populace, mostly of Duscur ethnicity. These mercenaries are said to do the bidding of strange employers."

Rhea knew where he was headed. "You believe that these sellswords work for our enemies?"

Catherine cheered up. "If that's the case, then we could corner them and get some valuable information! I say we head there right now!"

Nah pointed out, "We need to be careful. It's really dangerous. One misstep and we could all die."