Chapter XXV

Onwards to Tomorrow

Alex was waiting for them on the other side of the gateway when Jenna and Kraden passed through, his arms crossed.

"I don't think your brother likes me very much," he said, visibly upset despite himself at having been shoved through.

"Why, Alex," Jenna said, mockingly. "Are you actually upset?"

He didn't answer, his blue eyes lingering on the passage, which from their side now appeared to be nothing more than an ordinary wall.

"He's not coming," Jenna told him.

"Ah," Alex said, a slight smile crossing his lips. "He's gone after Sheba, hasn't he? I can't imagine Saturos and Menardi will be very pleased with that."

"Why do you care?" she demanded.

"Well, everything seems to be falling apart," Alex said, shrugging. "Tensions are running high, and everyone conspires against one another. Our little merry band might soon be breaking apart."

"And what will you do?" Kraden asked. "If that were to happen?"

Alex didn't answer, looking away. Then, he said, "So long as the mission is completed, and the lighthouses are lit, you can do as you want. I care nothing for your petty squabbles."

"In that case," Jenna said, glaring at him. "Why don't you show us the way to Idejima?"

"Very well," he answered, turning perhaps a bit too quickly and starting off. "Let's waste no further time."

They walked in a tense, uncomfortable silence through the brick walls of the lighthouse, the soft flickering of the torches the only sound.

Eventually, Alex asked, "What will you do if Saturos and Menardi are the ones who end up meeting us at Idejima?"

"I thought you didn't care," said Jenna.

"Yes, but... they will surely realise that you pilfered the Jupiter Star from them."

Kraden turned to him, bewildered. "You... know that?"

"I saw it happen," Alex said plainly. "I am not so blinded by rage as our cold-blooded friends. You aren't counting on them surviving to join us, are you?"

"No," Jenna said, coldly. "I hope they don't."

"Isaac's group will certainly take care of that," Alex continued. "But... then Felix will be there when that happens. If you had planned to make a clean break, you should have simply left Sheba to their mercy."

"You know Felix could never do that."

"Of course, my dear. I would expect nothing less from your noble brother."

Jenna glared at him. A part of her was wishing that Alex had gone up the lighthouse with the Proxians after all.

They reached the false entrance of Venus Lighthouse, a set of heavy stone double doors. They pushed them open, blinded for a moment by the sudden sunlight.

A crowd of people were gathered outside. Dozens of people, some armed with swords but most carrying simple spears of even farming tools, were angrily confronting two men in the signature armour of Tolbi, who were backed up against a tree.

"A militia," said Alex under his breath. "No doubt from Lalivero."

Of course, as soon at the lighthouse doors were opened, the crowd had turned their attention to them.

"There they are!" shouted a man at the front of the Laliveran mob. "They're the ones who took Sheba!"

"Uh-oh," said Kraden. "This isn't good."

The crowd started to move towards them.

Alex sighed. "I have a distaste for violence, but... if I must."

He took a step forward, raising a hand, but Jenna moved and shoved his arm down.

"We can't hurt these people!" she insisted. "They've done nothing wrong!"

"It would seem you share your brother's inclinations," Alex said, amused in spite of the situation. "Tell me, my dear, would these people show the same mercy to you?"

"That doesn't make it okay! And stop calling me that!"

The group of Laliverans were drawing closer. The two Tolbi soldiers exchanged a few nervous words, and then turned and ran in the direction of Lalivero.

"Very well," Alex said, sighing like an exasperated mother. "I will not kill them... unless I have no other choice. You two make for Idejima while I deal with this rabble."

Alex's Psynergy surged, and he was filled with an ethereal glow. His body began to hover off the ground, floating slowly up above the marble steps of the lighthouse entrance.

The Laliverans halted their advance, staring in shock.

Alex raised his hand, and the clouds above darkened. Raindrops began to fall.

"Let's go, Jenna," Kraden urged. "We can slip away while they are distracted by Alex."

Jenna nodded.

They all but jumped down the stairs, making their way to the immediate right of the crowd. No one paid them any mind, their attention captured by the sight of Alex, who was now turning pools of water into spikes of ice.

"If I remember the local area, Idejima is this way!" Kraden shouted to her.

One of the Laliverans charged to the front of the crowd and, after shouting something about Sheba, threw a spear towards Alex. The Mercury Adept warped to the left, the spear passing through only empty air.

The Laliverans cursed at him, shouting about demons. In return, Alex smirked, a god among men.

Jenna and Kraden did not see the rest of it, passing into the trees around the path back to the Suhalla Desert.

Kraden's sense of direction was not perfect, but it was enough to get them to the meeting spot without incident.

Idejima was a small peninsula, bordered by a few small hills from the rocky path between the desert and the forest around the lighthouse. A few miles long, it was defined by a large gulf of water that made up most of the middle, and left the bulk of the peninsula in view.

As they emerged from the hills, they found the peninsula eerily still and quiet. Across the water, Venus Lighthouse was just barely visible.

"Here we are," said Kraden, taking in the view.

"Yeah," answered Jenna. "So what do we do now?"

"We just wait."

Jenna frowned, looking back to the still-unlit lighthouse.

If it was taking this long...

She prayed that Felix would be alright.

"Felix said there would be a ship here, right?" Kraden asked.

Jenna turned and looked again. Idejima was empty. "He told me that Saturos and Menardi had plans of some kind. I don't know what, though."

"Perhaps he will know," Kraden said, pointing behind them.

Alex emerged from the mouth of the narrow cavern passage they had just gone through. Either he hadn't needed a long distraction, or he caught up with them very quickly.

"Excellent," Alex said, upon noticing them. "You found your way here safely."

"Did the locals give you any trouble?" Kraden asked, frowning.

"Hardly," Alex answered. "After a few got their heads wet, they mostly turned and fled. It was a nice clean fight, no blood shed; easier than I expected, even."

Jenna gave Alex a dirty look. "Are you mocking us?"

"Not at all. I can understand, after our companions'... shall we say 'incident'... that you would wish to avoid undue violence. And as I said before, I have no love for it myself."

"Don't act like you were opposed to that... incident." Jenna glowered. "You were the one who froze Felix in place."

"Would you rather I hadn't?" Alex asked, raising a blue eyebrow. "My intervention kept him from rushing in and getting himself hurt... or worse. Difficult as it might be to believe, I am on your side."

The wind blowing from the sea was salty, and it chilled the bones. Jenna crossed her arms against the cold, turning away from Alex.

"The beacon has not been lit yet," Kraden observed, looking to Venus Lighthouse. "Have Isaac and his companions reached them after all?"

"I believe so," Alex said. "As I passed into the cave, I caught sight of a very large Psynergetic dragon in flight at the top of the lighthouse. I doubt they needed such desperate measures if it were a simple dispute with Felix or some very bold Laliverans."

Jenna shivered, only partly from the cold. Though she would die before she let Alex see it, she was worried for Felix, as well as Isaac and Garet. She hated the idea that they would all end up fighting, and she could only hope that Felix had been smart enough to take Sheba and run in the confusion.

"What will we do then, if Isaac and his group win?" Kraden asked Alex.

"We will have to run," Alex answered, not sounding particularly pleased with the idea. "The plan was to take to the seas once we met up here, but it seems increasingly likely that that won't be able to happen."

"And how were we to do that?" Kraden asked. "We figured there would be a ship waiting here from the way Saturos and Menardi spoke, but this place is empty."

Alex frowned. "They were waiting for a ride. Two other Proxians were to arrive with the ship. The lighting of the beacon was to be a signal to them. But as there is no ship waiting, nor a lit beacon..."

And then, as if waiting to spite his words, there was a golden flash in the distance, as the Venus beacon fired to life.

"That's it!" Kraden exclaimed "They did it!"

"So it would seem," Alex said in a quiet voice.

Jenna glanced at him. He did not sound very relieved. Something was bothering him.

"The ship must be approaching then," Kraden said, turning and making for a hill at the centre of the peninsula. "Come on, let's go-"

The sage was interrupted by a thunderous noise; an ear-splitting crack that tore through the air.

The ground around them began to shake, only slighty at first, but after only moments it was so violent that they were thrown off balance.

Jenna cried out for Kraden, concerned for the old man's safety, but her vision was filled with the chaos that had so suddenly engulfed the tiny peninsula. The ocean waves, which had before been striking leisurely against the rocky cliffs around them, were rising, growing ever more aggressive from the trembling earth.

The tiny peninsula could not sustain the assault; cracks were forming in the ground, starting around the cliffs they had passed through to get there.

Jenna, unable to stay standing, found herself on the ground. Looking up, she was faced with a rapidly-growing fissure, swiftly moving towards her.

Moments before the ground beneath her gave out, Jenna felt a surge of Psynergy, and for a split second, everything went dark. She blinked, and she was in Alex's arms, on safe ground.

Taken aback, she looked to the Mercury Adept. He wore an expression she had never seen on him before: worry.

"Um, thank you," she managed.

"Think nothing of it," he replied.

Jenna realised the shaking had stopped, replaced with a strange feeling of nausea. She climbed to her feet in spite of the unsteady ground, turning back to Venus Lighthouse.

The beacon was lit at last, despite the violent shaking and the high ocean waves that struck at the ground around it.

And then, she realised the lighthouse was shrinking; slowly growing farther away.

"What... what happened!?"

Jenna turned again, taking in her surroundings. The land around Venus Lighthouse, which was growing farther away by the moment, had been torn at the very cliffs that bordered Idejima. Pieces of what had once been the peninsula were floating at sea, drifting away in different directions.

Alex had saved her from falling into the sea to drown, warping her onto one of the larger chunks of land.

Kraden was nearby, breathing heavily as he leaned against a tree for support. "I did not anticipate the lighthouse would react this way; Mercury's beacon did not. There was some shaking, but nothing like this..."

"How could we have?" Alex said.

Jenna could only watch helplessly as their small land raft drifted away from the mainland, into the empty blue of the sea.

Upon Isaac and his companion's return to Lalivero, there had been little to say. It was evident enough that they had failed in both their mission to stop the Proxians from lighting the lighthouse, and to bring Sheba back safely. Iodem and Faran had been waiting for them at the town's border, and after covering the immediate basics of what had happened, they returned to town.

The two men did not say a word to each other the entire time, and the tension was so thick it put them all on edge. They waited tensely for Faran to explode in anger at Iodem, but he never did.

When they returned to town, Iodem gave them a fistful of coins to pay for lodging, and then muttered something about needed to send a letter at once. He vanished, leaving the four exhausted Adepts to make their own way to Lalivero's humble inn.

They retired immediately, buying two rooms and following their usual arrangements. Isaac went to the room he would share with Mia, but she did not immediately follow, leaving him alone.

The sun had not set, so he drew the curtains, removed his armour and even his golden scarf, and lay down, staring at the ceiling.

Isaac's mind raced with thoughts. He found himself struggling to process everything that had happened. So much of it felt unreal, like a story he had heard rather than his own memories.

He could not erase the image of the last moments of both Saturos and Menardi from his mind.

At some point his physical exhaustion won, and sleep found him.

In his dreams, he saw Vale. The people were gathered there: Garet's family, the elders, the shopkeepers, and his mother Dora. All people who he had known and loved his entire life.

Lights filled the sky, from four directions, and they passed at a great speed, gathering at the peak of Mt. Aleph. The villagers watched in awe. as the golden sun shone brilliantly like another sun.

And then, powerful energy burst from the peak, and everything in Vale, including all of its people, were reduced to ashes.

Atop the mountain, a stone with a single eye hovered, and the eye turned to him, as if knowing he was watching.

Isaac woke suddenly, his heart pounding.

He sat up, wiping a cold sweat from his forehead.

It was just a dream. Just a dream.

He was not alone; he could hear a soft voice in the room with him. Looking at the other bed, he saw Mia knelt on the floor, her elbows resting on the mattress and her hands clasped together. She prayed, though he could not understand the words.

She must have heard his breathing change, because she suddenly stopped, and turned around to him.

"I'm sorry," she said. "I tried to be quiet. I didn't want to wake you."

"It wasn't you," he said.

"Ah," Mia said, nodding. She understood without him needing to explain.

"That prayer," Isaac asked, "I didn't understand the words."

"Oh, I wouldn't expect you to," Mia said, smiling slightly. "It was a very old tradition, passed down through my clan. My father made me say the words every night. But... it was different then."

"If you don't mind me asking... were you asking the gods to forgive you? For what happened at the lighthouse?"

Mia looked down at the floor. "No. I made those prayers back at Mercury Lighthouse, and the gods do not need to hear them again. I was actually asking them... to forgive and welcome the souls of Saturos and Menardi."

Isaac didn't know what to say to that at first, but after a moment of thought, he asked her, "Do you think you could teach it to me?"

"Of course," Mia answered, smiling.

When the Adepts woke the next morning, and made their way down to the common room of the inn, they found Faran waiting for them.

"Good morning," he said, giving a polite nod. "I had hoped to have a word with you before Iodem sees you off. Please, have a seat."

He beckoned to a set of four chairs gathered around a table. Isaac and the others made their way over and sat down.

"If you are hungry I can have food brought," he offered.

"We'll be okay," Isaac answered, ignoring the look Garet gave him. "We don't want to hold you up."

"Faran, what did you mean about Iodem seeing us off?" Ivan asked.

"Iodem is... anxious," Faran answered. "He wishes to conclude his business with you at once so he can leave for Tolbi. After what happened, I can't say I blame him for not wanting to stay in Lalivero a minute longer than he needs to."

The Adepts exchanged uncertain looks.

"About Sheba..." Isaac said.

"If you are worried, I do not blame you," Faran said, with a wave of his hand. "I know you did the best you could to help her; certainly more than any of us could have. The blame lies not with you, but with Babi for putting her in the situation to begin with."

"Still," Isaac insisted. "I'm sorry. I know she was like a daughter to you."

Faran nodded slowly. "Thank you for that. My wife and I... we will manage. The next few months will not be easy."

"Because of Sheba?" Ivan asked. "Or the situation with Tolbi?"

Faran ran his thumb over his moustache as he considered. "I know that you are, in some capacity, a representative of Babi's. So I am not sure what I should say. But you can probably image that the already-tenuous relationship between our countries will not be getting any better. Already the workers on Babi's tower have again laid down their tools and refused to work, and I cannot bring myself to order them otherwise."

"I don't blame you," Garet said.

"I suppose I should get to the point then," said Faran. "A group of Laliverans went to the lighthouse entrance yesterday, despite my orders to keep away. They encountered two soldiers from Tolbi who were cleaning up the destruction outside. I think they were angry, and out for blood, and they were about to have those men strung up."

"Oh no..." Ivan muttered.

"Indeed," Faran said grimly. "Luckily, they were interrupted. The lighthouse doors opened, and three figured emerged from inside. Two men, one of them elderly, and a young woman."

"Alex," said Mia.

"And Jenna and Kraden," Garet added.

Faran nodded. "The soldiers followed their orders and retreated. However, the Laliverans tried to attack the new arrivals. Apparently the man started floating in the air and attacking them with water and ice, while the other two fled. Only a few survived to make it back here."

"Alex killed them all?" Mia asked, shocked.

"Not quite." Faran's expression turned dark. "It would seem this man toyed with them for a bit, wounding a few, but mainly stalling for time. When he left, my people regrouped and tried to follow. But after the lighthouse's beacon was lit, earthquakes followed, and the seas began to rage. The area around the lighthouse was flooded by the tide; I'm sure most of these men drowned."

"Gods," Isaac said heavily. "I'm sorry."

"It is a shame," said Faran, bowing his head. "I ordered them away for a reason. And yet, there is a silver lining. If Sheba did fall from the lighthouse as you say, then perhaps the rising waves were the gods reaching out to save her."

"It's possible," Garet said. "Our friend Felix went in after her. I think he was trying to save her."

"Sheba is a blessed child," Faran said. "She came to us from the sky; I do not believe a fall from the lighthouse would kill her either. She will make it."

Mia smiled. "I think so too."

"Iodem does not know this yet," Faran continued. "The Tolbi soldiers reported to me, and I gave them coin for their silence. And I hope that you will not tell him either."

The Adepts exchanged uncomfortable looks.

"We can," Isaac said. "But why? What difference does it make?"

Faran frowned, growing silent for a moment, before quietly saying, "Our people will not survive under Babi's thumb. Sheba is my daughter. And I love her. But as an idol of the people of Lalivero, she was something that Babi could take and use against us. Yet, as a martyr... she will inspire them, and Babi will not be able to use threats against her to force their compliance."

"You don't want her to come back...?" Ivan whispered.

"I do," he said. "As a father. But as the leader of the Laliverans, I think it is best for us that she does not... at least for a while. Her return would cool tensions that I think it best we let burn. Even if she were to return, Babi would just take her hostage again. At least this way, she will be free."

"Why tell us this, then?" Isaac asked. "You asked us not to tell Iodem, but why take the risk at all?"

"Because while I don't know the full extent of your circumstances, I know you are pursuing these people. They have the same powers you have, and that Sheba has. You had the right to know. And I imagine you will continue to pursue them?"

"Of course," Garet said. "As long as Jenna's still out there, we'll keep looking."

"So if you find these people, you will probably find Sheba with them," Faran said. "And if that does happen, I would like you to tell her... that we love her and we miss her, and that she is welcome to return when it is safe again and... when she is ready. Will you do that for me?"

"Of course," Isaac told him.

"You are honourable people," Faran said, rising. "Good luck, wherever your travels take you next."

They rose, and shook Faran's hand, and with a flick of his cloak he vanished through the inn's front door.

"Well," Ivan said. "Iodem is waiting for us, right? Let's go see him now."

They found Iodem at the docks at the edge of Lalivero, where the city met the river. He stood outside a large warehouse that was built on the docks, pacing back and forth. At the sight of their approach, he rushed to meet them.

"There you are," Iodem said. "I have some bad news, I'm afraid. After what has happened here, I will not be able to join you for the next part of your travels as we had originally planned."

"Why is that?" Isaac asked, feigning ignorance.

"I must return to Tolbi as soon as I can," he said. "With Sheba dead, the situation in Lalivero has become incredibly volatile. I must get back to Lord Babi, to tell him what has happened, and to assist with planning out the next steps, if we are to prevent conflict between our nations."

"I see," Isaac said. "So will we be taking the ship, then?"

Iodem nodded. "There is one more thing I must tell you. A few soldiers were scouting the area around the lighthouse immediately after the earthquake. The peninsula of Idejima was apparently destroyed, with chunks of land drifting out on the tide. My soldiers reported seeing some people swimming out to these, but they were too far out from the shore to help them."

Isaac nodded.

"If you have the chance to assist any of them as you set sail, please do so," Iodem said. He reached into his cloak, and withdrew a sealed envelope, followed by fist-sized crystal orb that was perfectly round and solid black within.

"Lord Babi gave me this to give you once the business with the lighthouse was complete," Iodem said, handing Isaac the orb. "He told me it is what powers the Lemurian ship. Within the envelope are instructions, which he has faith that you will understand."

Isaac took the envelope. "We'll do our best."

Iodem placed a hand on Isaac's shoulder, and leaned in to whisper in his ear, "Please take care of any business you need the ship for as quickly as you can. He needs more Lemurian draught, especially after this. Even a single day could make the difference."

Without waiting for a response, Iodem stepped back and nodded to all four Adepts. "The warehouse is unlocked for you, and the ship is ready to go. Good luck and godspeed."

And without any further pretense, Iodem rushed past them into the streets of Lalivero.

"Wow," Garet said. "He really is in a hurry."

"That place he said was destroyed, Idejima," said Ivan. "Felix mentioned that place, right? He said that was where Jenna was waiting."

"That's right," Isaac said, frowning. "And if she was on one of those pieces of land drifing out to sea, we can't afford to wait. Let's go power up this ship and get going."

Babi's Lemurian ship was a beautiful vessel, crafted from wood and steel that was so well entwined that it looked less like a vessel of the sea and more like a work of art. It put to shame the oar-driven ship they had crossed the Karagol in.

Per Babi's instructions, they went below decks to what was called the 'engine room', which turned out to be a dark chamber in the ship's heart full of glowing lines and a crystal in the centre. After placing the black orb in the centre crystal, the ship hummed to life.

The four Adepts excitedly made their way back up to the deck, eager to set sail.

"Okay so how do we make it go?" Garet asked.

"According to this," Ivan said, reading Babi's handwritten note, "we just take the wheel and will it go."

"No oars or sails or anything?" Mia asked. "Incredible."

"I would figure this was built in the Lost Age," said Ivan. "So it's powered by the same stuff as the lighthouses."

"Alchemy," Isaac said grimly. "The thing we're trying to avoid bringing back."

They stopped at the wheel. The others looked to Isaac, waiting for him to take the wheel.

He hesitated.

"Hey," Mia said, placing a hand on his shoulder. "It's okay."

"We've travelled all across Angara and what do we have to show for it?" he said quietly. "Two lighthouses are lit and our friends might be dead. We keep trying so hard, just to fail again and again."

They were quiet for a while. The others had noticed Isaac's mood since leaving Venus Lighthouse, but they had not said anything yet.

Eventually, Ivan asked, "Isaac... did we fail the people of Kolima?"

"Or Feizhi?" Mia added. "Or the passengers on the ship whose lives we saved when that sea monster attacked?"

"How about that town with the living statues that were flooding everything with their spit?" Garet asked. When they all gave him baffled looks, he scratched his head and said, "Actually that one might have just been a dream I had."

"Even if we didn't stop them from lighting those lighthouses, we've still made a difference," Ivan insisted. "And I'm sure there's more out there we can do."

"Do you remember what we talked about when we first left Vale?" Garet asked. "Things might be serious, and the stakes might be high, but this is still an adventure! I've already got so many stories to tell Aaron when we go home. We even fought a dragon... sort of."

"And now we get to explore the seas!" Ivan said, beaming. "All my travels with Master Hammet, and I never got to sail on a ship on the Eastern Sea. And this is an ancient Lemurian ship at that!"

"When Mercury Lighthouse was lit, I could have given into despair," Mia said. "But even if we fail again, and all four beacons end up lit, we can still fight to protect the world as Alchemy returns. It isn't over until there's nothing left in the world worth protecting."

"Okay, okay," Isaac said, unable to hide his smile. "I get it. I'll stop sulking."

"Good," said Garet. "Because I'm excited to finally see the ocean properly for the first time, and I didn't want you dragging down the mood."

Isaac took hold of the ship's wheel. Immediately, he could feel the power surging through from the black orb.

"Jenna's out there somewhere," he said. "Faran believes Sheba survived. So I'm going to do the same."

"Then let's go find them," Garet said, grinning.

Isaac mentally urged the ship forward, and just like that, it began to move. Gliding smoothly over the water, it passed through the length of the warehouse.

As the Adepts emerged into the open, the bright sun shone proudly over a shimmering blue ocean of possibility.

The fragment of land that Jenna, Kraden, and Alex had found themselves on was less than a kilometre across, at least according to Kraden's calculations. They had drifted for hours, but they had no way to measure time and it seemed to stretch on for eternity.

Jenna and Kraden found themselves sitting in the grass beneath a tree, under the meagre shade it provided.

She hadn't said anything about it, but Jenna was worried. Both for her brother, and Isaac's group, who had been at the lighthouse when it had been lit. But also for them.

She's asked Kraden which way they were drifting, but he had no idea. And so Jenna was left with the logical conclusion in mind: if they did not end up in the direct path of a continent or island, and no one on a ship managed to find them by chance, then they would simply continue to drift out to sea.

If they did not die of starvation or exposure, then eventually they would reach Gaia Falls, the end of the world, and go over into the abyss from which no one returned.

In any case, their odds were not good, and Jenna was finding it increasingly hard not to give in to despair and cry.

Undoubtedly, Kraden was aware of this as well, yet he was keeping a strong front for her sake.

With nothing else to do, they simply sat there in silence, and waited.

Eventually, Alex returned from somewhere and approached them.

"There is something you must see."

Jenna sat up, giving him a look. "Is that a joke?"

"Not in the slightest," he said, smiling slightly. "Trust me, you'll like this."

He turned and started off without waiting for them. Jenna looked to Kraden, as if he might know, but he simply shrugged.

They climbed to their feet and followed Alex, who led them to the grass at the edge of their floating island.

Two bodies were lying there, who Jenna recognised immediately.

"Felix!" Jenna shouted. "Sheba!"

They ran over to the two, and knelt beside them. Both were unconscious, soaked to the bone, and looked like they had been through hell... but they were alive and breathing.

Jenna had no idea how they could have possibly gotten there, and she didn't care. The water had swallowed her brother, but this time, it gave him back. Even in such dire circumstances, she was happy that he was okay.

She took Felix's unmoving hand in hers, holding it tight, as tears she didn't realise she was holding back began to flow.

"We're in this together, okay?" she whispered to him. "We're gonna do this. We'll bring Mum and Dad back, and we'll all go home together. I'm with you until the end, okay?"

Wherever this island was drifting to, wherever they would end up, they would go there together.

A/N: And there we have it, the final chapter of the TBS half and the (sort of) first chapter of the TLA half of the story (as this covered the prologue, the next chapter will be the first proper chapter).

I can't believe I've made it this far. Even though this is just the halfway point it still feels like a monumental task to have written so much. There were multiple times where I outright almost gave up on the story, especially during that 3 year hiatus when I had to re-write the same chapter 3 times. And yet, even in the worst moments there was a part of me that just couldn't bring myself to say goodbye to it. This story means a lot to me, as does Golden Sun in general, and especially since I started working on it again this year I've had a renewed love for this fic and its world.

As for this chapter itself, a lot of it followed pretty closely to the original game's events. The scene with Isaac and Mia in the room was an addition I was really happy with. My original idea was to have her praying to her father and ancestors to forgive her for failing again (as Isaac suggested in the chapter itself) before changing it to what it is now. I think it worked out really well and provided a sense of finality to what happened.

The scene with Faran replaces the very long and rather weird cutscene from the game with the party talking to him and Iodem. I never liked how in the game, everything that happened is just kind of glossed over with no consequences. What happens here, with the breakdown of trust between Faran and Iodem, and the political implications, feels more realistic to me, and more fitting for the kind of story I'm trying to tell. Faran wanting Sheba to be a martyr to the people of Lalivero also provides better closure to that part of the story than Sheba simply not wanting to go home, and not caring that her adopted family don't know if she's alive or not.

Iodem being in a hurry helps to avoid having another long sendoff conversation, but I think in this case its justified. Not only does he want to get back to Babi to deal with this mess, but he's probably worried about an angry mob of Laliverans coming after him.

Other than the situation with Jenna and Felix's parents, and skipping over a few dungeons, not too much was drastically changed in the TBS half of the story. I strived to keep a careful balance of changing small things in ways that help make the characterization stronger, and the story more consistent, while keeping the major beats of the story the same. Going forward, in the TLA half, this might change, as there are a few more major things I do plan to have play out differently. A part of this is because, while TLA the game is great and the conclusion of the story is fantastic, I think there are a lot of things that were set up in TBS that didn't pay off well in the sequel. As I'm treating this fic as a single long story, and not novelizations of two games, I think its just a natural consequence of small changes adding up over time that the story will be more different in the second half than the first. That's not to say that it will be unrecognisable as Golden Sun: the Lost Age, I'm just saying to expect a few more surprises than there were in the first half.

And finally, the scene with everyone on the boat talking about the difference they've made on their journey despite failing at both lighthouses. While this is far from the last time we'll see Isaac and his companions, this is the end of their half of the story and I wanted to have a reason for them to go out on an optimistic note despite the somewhat darker ending of this story compared to the game. Tying it all back to that first morning when Isaac and Garet left Vale was a good way to do that, I think.

If you've stuck with me this far, after all these years, thank you so much for your support. Please take a moment to leave a comment below, even if it is only a sentence or two to let me know that you liked it; those notifications I get from readers are the only reward I am getting for this, and writing can be a lot of work sometimes. In any case, thank you so much for reading, and I hope you'll stick around for part 2 of this story!

Next chapter: The beginning of a new adventure!