Lance's Role

by Thrudgelmir2333

A 'shonen' fic that sequels Next Dimension and Lost Canvas. In 1960, the Pope of Athena receives three prophecies from an old enemy that irremediably set the course of his reign over Sanctuary's tragic history and almost two decades later a Saint of Pegasus finds himself put through the unfolding of a new age of violence caused by the Pope's actions. Please enjoy and review.

67. SS2: The Curse of Hatred - Part 1 of 6

Notable OCs: Pegasus Lance's Saint Generation, Civil War Saint Generation, World War Saint Generation, Daemon Lucifer's Specters, Maiden Elisa, Priam's Black Saints; Cyrulian Refugees

Notable Original Concepts: Mount Olympus Training Ground, Sanctuary Court, Teos Cloth, Athenian Empire mythology, Isle of Gardens, Stardust Prison, Hades' Dark Princes; Desert Beyond, Sanctuary Town Layout & Buildings; Kido Mount

Recurring/Cameo OCs of Jenny DeVic: Mrs. Schafurwatt, Cyrus

Recurring/Cameo Concepts of Jenny DeVic: Great Bodyguard Legend, Golden Line Heritage, Sanctuary Orphanages, Andromeda Island's Geography & Tests, Sanctuary Nobility, 88 Knights Festival

Author Notes:

-Originally this chapter was going to cover the entire first part of V2's version of the Death Queen Island Side Story. Unfortunately, this small period of the characters' lives ended up having more to explore (and improve upon) than I initially thought. The good news is that I got it all done anyway, but the bad news is that it ended up a 28k word monstrosity that was better off split between two halves.

-1.45M words reached, beginning last stretch to 1.5M. I swear I'm not doing it on purpose.

-This chapter has been betaread by Jenny DeVic, writer of Love You Kill Me and More Than Gold. If you like my story, check hers out.

-Also, this chapter's publishing celebrates the fic's 11th birthday!;

{======================|SSII|======================}

December, 1969

{======================|SSII|======================}

It was getting dark and chilly. The old, light blue Bedford pickup truck scaled up the hill road, raising dust trails into the air, and it turned on its headlights to see the road better. Its driver was a villager of Rodario who owned his own vehicle and therefore did courier runs in and out of Sanctuary's world, usually helping Saints go into cities without grabbing too much attention to the paths they took out of Sanctuary. This time, it was making the journey back to Sanctuary's periphery territory, carrying two passengers on its cargo bed it met within Athens.

The travel from Athens to Rodario had to be slow and meandering, staying off the main roads and going as law-abiding as possible to avoid any unnecessary stop by the police. It was Sanctuary's policy that anyone doing these driving runs entered and left its secretive borders without anything on them of suspicion other than the metal Cloth boxes, but this was no reason to risk being followed by prying eyes into Rodario.

Usually, Saints would just do their best to speed their way in and out of Sanctuary, counting on supersonic movement to make themselves impossible to follow. Still, Saint Noah of Triangle wanted to give the red-eyed boy alongside them a chance to not only see the path to his new home with his own eyes.

Having never really stepped outside of Attica, or Athens itself for that matter, the small ten year old boy of crimson irises, charcoal hair, Mediterranean skin, black winter jacket, and dark blue jeans spent most of the journey either asking Noah questions or staring out the cargo bed. Back home, there were some forest parks up north, some impressive hills surrounding Athens, plus the island of Salamis just offshore, and these had always stimulated his imagination when looking out his old orphanage window. However, this was the first time he was actually leaving his environment and was transfixed by the decreasing number of lights, streets, and homes.

As far as Red understood it, Noah took him to somewhere among the regions of Boeotia and Phocis, at the Corinth Gulf. Somewhere in the hills that some of his fellow orphans had always called the 'the central boondocks', as opposed to every other boondocks people in the city considered anything outside of Athens to be, there would be some kind of road that would take to the land of the people who could punch rocks into smithereens and kick ocean waves into the sky, like Hercules. Or at least like Noah.

The boy looked out the road they were following. While the path was obscure, going through forest roads and hill slopes, there was nothing magical about it. "How come no one ever finds Sanctuary, Noah? These roads don't look like anything special."

"They're not. In fact, Rodario has a 'nosy tourist' problem." the Silver Saint explained. "But Sanctuary isn't at Rodario now, is it?" He noticed Red tucked into his corner of the cargo bed shivering. Noah saw this, took a palm, and made it glow, forming a warm sphere of light above the skin that reflected the wonderful image of a galaxy in its core, like an elliptic fireball.

Handing it to the boy's hands, the Silver Saint smiled when he saw the shivering stop. "Do you feel better?"

The teenager cleaned his nose and nodded, his face illuminated by the torch. "Y-yeah. Thank you, Noah. C-Can you teach me how to do this? I hate asking for help on these things."

The Triangle Silver Saint shook his head. "It's hard to explain without you rediscovering the Cosmos. It's like breathing out a dream of yours into your hands. You just shape that burning chaos of energy inside of you into something useful, like a ball of light."

Red wasn't sure if he understood all the weird lore yet that the Saint mentioned now and then, but whenever he tried to remember the previous years of his life, all he felt was a wall in his head. Red nodded resignedly, focusing on the warm ball of energy.

Someday he'd get to do the same without help, just like Noah. "I can't remember at all how to do this. You must have done a good job blocking that all out of my head."

The Saint's green eyes widened curiously, and they padded the armor's pocket as if to search for something to write on. "Oh? You're complimenting me? Go on, please."

Red smiled shyly. "I can sleep now. But that's a good thing, right?"

Noah chuckled brightly. "Yes it is. By the way, Red, before we get to Sanctuary, I want you to start getting used to addressing Saints and Amazons correctly, alright? Some of the people in Sanctuary don't like you being so personal. It could get you in trouble."

Red nodded, wanting to cooperate as much as possible with this strange new world he was being brought into. "Okay,…I can do that. How so?"

The Triangle Silver Saint smiled and raised a finger. "Usually, you'll address Saints by their title, followed by the name, especially if they're wearing their armor when you meet them. It's the same for Maidens and especially his Holiness, the Pope. Mister and Miss are acceptable, too, for when you're not sure if they're in the military."

"That sounds easy enough, I can do that. It's just that…" But Red then scratched his head and stared at Noah. "What if they're… you know…."

The Triangle Saint blinked. "Yeah? Spit it out."

The boy pouted, looking down. "What if they're assholes and hide behind that?! People are unfair like that all the time! If I have to treat them with respect all the time, how am I gonna stand up for myself?"

Noah covered his mouth to conceal a snicker. "Red, trust me, you should still make an effort to do so… even if they're unfair and cowardly. You want to be on the right side when they call someone in to settle the problem. This isn't going to be like Athens, anymore."

Though clearly hesitant about it, the pre-teen eventually nodded at the Saint. Still, the boy's crimson eyes darted to the side as if concerned about a lingering doubt. "Okay, one more thing, though, how do I treat them if they're like you? Not as a Saint, but, you know...um…. Are they a mister or a miss?"

Noah blinked hesitantly for a second, as if unsure of what the child was referring to, but then they widened their green eyes.

This alarmed Red's face, who scurried to appease. "I'd rather just keep calling you Noah, but what if people ask me about you in Sanctuary? They're probably gonna do it at some point. What do I say?"

The Silver Saint nodded understandingly. It was a perfectly reasonable doubt, especially for a small boy learning about the new world he would enter. Noah has been asked far worse for far worse motives. This was because he didn't seem to fully fit the mold of either male or female, even in Sanctuary's land of long-haired Metal band warriors. Even though he was not being made to wear a mask, he still had a soft jawline, a genuine smile that lacked the stoicism imposed on the males of Sanctuary, a curly pale-blond hair that dressed down to neck height, and a medium body frame that looked slightly too small for the white and blue plates of armor that the Triangle Cloth dressed him with. More importantly, the smooth Adam's apple in his throat was contrasted with the soft, yet denouncing twin elevations in his upper chest, covered by trainer fabric and Cloth metal. Even his voice seemed more or less a neutral pitch that was neither a feminine high nor a masculine low.

Eventually, a solution came to the Saint. "How about you call me Saint Noah or Saint Triangle? But honestly, it's better off, though, if you avoid talking about me."

Red blinked in disbelief. Why would he not talk about the Saint who saved him? "What? That's dumb! Why wouldn't I?"

Noah looked away sadly at the shifting, forested landscape. "Well, generally speaking, people in Sanctuary frown at you if you name-drop Saints too much. You'll sound entitled. Also, just because I'm a Silver Saint, Red, it doesn't mean my name carries that much weight… or that I'm well-liked. Some students are treated more poorly based on who people associate them with. It's… one of the unfortunate sides of people that even Sanctuary can't get rid of."

Red hesitated but nodded eventually. He imagined Sanctuary had prejudices too, somehow. "Okay, I don't like it, but I can do that, too…."

"Great. So, are you excited?" Noah looked out the cargo bed and recognized the slope they were following. "It must be about twenty more kilometers to Rodario. We'll be in Athena's land soon."

The small boy shrugged hesitantly. "I guess."

Noah blinked. "What's wrong? I thought you were happy to leave Athens."

"I was." The boy then seemed to pause to work up the courage to explain it, biting lip. "But then, that will be it, right? You're going off somewhere to work as a Saint."

"Yeah. I'm sorry I won't get to be with you, Red. I know you really wanted to. But you wanted to be a Saint, too, right? It's not like I can have you around otherwise."

Red blinked over and over, fighting sadness. He looked out the vehicle and focused on reasons to be happy about where he was being taken to.

Noah could practically see the frog stuck in his throat and encouraged him to blurt it out. "It's okay. You can say anything to me, Red."

"I want to be with you, Noah. You saved my life, not Sanctuary." Red finally blurted it out. He looked away abruptly, as if ashamed of his honesty. Life had clearly taught him not to show vulnerability. "Before you came along, I thought I was gonna die in that orphanage… or worse. I had nothing to look forward to. It's not the Saints I want to become like. It's like you."

Touching as it was, Noah wasn't sure if it was wise to encourage this kind of adoration, given the path Red had ahead of him. "That's… What about your dreams?"

Red gave the Silver Saint a weird look and then sighed in resignation. "...What dreams, Noah? I don't remember what happened anymore, but I remember I wanted to be dead. I don't wanna think about my stupid old life anymore." he confessed. "I just want to become… like you."

The Triangle Saint stared observantly. After accepting to join Sanctuary, Red had also asked him if he could make him forget about all the terrible abuse he endured to that point. Provided the person was receptive, this was a trivial task to Noah. Only a few days had passed, but it seemed that the seal was working for the most part, blocking the actual events from Red's mind so that they could not come back to haunt him while he was lying at night and had nothing to distract him from his despair. It was not uncommon to do so in Sanctuary, as it helped the trainees focus on their growth and forget about any loyalties still left to their old lives.

A convenient kindness, some in Sanctuary might call it.

The boy continued, glancing ever so slightly at the Saint's leg, which laid at his flank in the cramped cargo bed. "You protected me, not Sanctuary. Until I have the bravery to do the same for someone else, I won't be happy…."

The Silver Saint's eyes sank sadly, and he tightened his armor plate around the prosthetic, replacing his right leg, hiding it from sight better. "This wasn't your fault, Red."

But the boy sank his face into his hands, riddled with guilt. "Y-yes, it was!"

The Saint reached over and pulled the boy into their chest, resting chin on his head and patting it comfortingly. Noah would say they'd do it again, but he had encouraged Red's idolization more than enough. "You're wrong."

The pickup truck suddenly rocked and braked, startling the two of them. Slowing down, the driver turned the wheel to move around something in the road.

Noah's head rose to see in the dark. "Is something going on, sir?"

The driver, a rural man of Rodario in a winter coat, turned on the high beams. "Yeah… that over there."

Red got up in the cargo bed and gasped in horror before covering his mouth with the smell. Off the roadside of the hill path, between the pine trees, was a horrifying spectacle of blood and broken car parts. A truck much like the one they were one was laying on its side, the bottom of its wheels facing them, and a disturbing stench of death emanated from its blood-soaked side door. Streams of red dripped from beneath the vehicle, undoubtedly from a body or two inside.

"Goddess, they must have slipped off the road. Damn tourists." the driver deduced, picking his short-wave radio. "It's like they can't read the warning posts. Someday some billionaire will do the same, and then goodbye Sanctuary. I'll call someone from Rodario to come to take care of this, Saint Noah."

Seeing the Silver Saint trying to get up to investigate, Red lowered the cargo bed fence and helped Noah land his prosthetic foot on the ground correctly. "Noah, what happened here? A car crash?"

The Silver Saint stared at the wreck. "Sometimes… normal people get curious about the strange off-path roads that take us to Athena's home. They get dizzy with the loops meant to take them back, and tragedy happens." He saw the boy approaching it. "Red, don't get too close."

"Sorry, I just want to take a closer look. I think my parents died the same," he explained. However, as the boy followed the trail of destruction highlighted by their ride's high beams, his red eyes noticed black scorch marks near the road pavement. "Look, the ground is all burned up… but the truck didn't explode."

The Triangle Saint was impressed. "Good eye, Red! You're right. It wouldn't blow up so close to the path it slipped from either." As such, Noah then activated his sense of cosmos and immediately saw the scorch marks highlighted with a flare of green and white, like radioactive glow. "This wasn't an accident… someone with Cosmos attacked these people."

Both the driver and Red turned to him. The boy, in particular, gawked in outrage. "An attack? Who?!"

"Black Saints, that's who!" the driver immediately spat from his safe seat. "Bastards must have ambushed the normies here and thought our maze paths would get blamed for it!"

Red's eyes followed Noah curiously as the Silver Saint limped closer to the vehicle, knowing that his idol was about to use Cosmos again.

Having never heard anything but good things about Sanctuary, Red felt compelled to ask "Noah, what are Black Saints? What's going on?!"

Noah took a quick look, using their white cosmos to carefully turn the vehicle on its normal side, exposing the three dead passengers in winter clothing with their bloodied arms and faces slanted on their seats. The top of the vehicle was blasted open, probably by the inciting attack, and there were no luggage or valuables to speak of. A father and two children are in the back seat. A tourist map was abandoned on their seat floor, and the pale ring marks on their fingers indicated that their jewelry had been stolen.

Burning a bit of cosmos in the fingertip to make extra light, Noah frowned, spotting a second hole ripped through the passenger seat's roof. The corresponding seat belt was ripped off, judging from the broken buckle, and an adult feminine shoe was left behind.

The sight of the cadavers made Red nauseous, covering his mouth and looking away, and the driver blessed himself with Athena's mark with his fingers. The Saint, on the other hand, reached inside and drew a triangular shape with his thumb on their foreheads, Noah's Cloth-taught way to bless the dead.

The Silver Saint turned to see Red puke and took a cloth to clean his mouth and sighed. "Red, I told you to stay back. You've never seen this much blood before."

"Noah, w-who would do this?" Red asked, horrified. "T-Thieves? Murderers?"

"Worse." the Silver Saint thought, but Noah kept the details they found in the dark and then took Red out of there into the cargo bed. "Not everyone uses the Cosmos to help others, Red. In the end, it can be a weapon, just like every other source of strength. Come on, let's go. Someone smarter than us can figure this out later, and Rodario will close its gates once it gets too dark."

Gently pulled into the vehicle, the boy's red orbs stayed locked on the crash site's sight until the pickup truck turned the corner.

{======================|SSII|======================}

The truck driver took the drachmas off Noah's hand, nodded, and drove off, leaving the two of them off on the modest building complex of red tiles and yellow-painted bricks at the edge of Rodario. Its wooden windows were closed and blocked by metal bars, giving it a foreboding look, and its metal archway covered in carefully pruned vines had emblems of the church of Athena and a title engraved on it.

'Heart of Sasha'

Limping towards the gateway, Noah joined Red. "This is it, your new home. Here you can stay until you prove yourself to Sanctuary and a Master picks you to be a trainee."

Red's eyes surveyed the place. "Well, it looks better than my old orphanage."

Noah chuckled. "The bars would scare most kids."

"I'm ten, not four, Noah." Red then shrugged. "At least those are around real windows, not holes in the walls that let the cold in all night long." He stared at the title on the archway, clearly honoring someone important. "Noah, who is Sasha, anyway? A Saint?"

The inherent cuteness of the question made Noah smile bemusedly. "That's Athena, Red. Sasha was one of her many names in old wars. You'll learn plenty about that later."

The idea that the Greek Goddess was real and God was not was still something that the catholic-raised child was getting used to. Somehow seeing the name right in front of him in a real place, rather than Noah's stories illustrated with the cosmos, made it all seem much more real.

Red folded arms and grumbled to himself, kicking a pebble. "Greek gods, old wars..."

"It's a lot of weird things at once, right?" Noah asked, smiling nostalgically at days the Silver Saint had felt just like this. "Especially after coming out of a Christian house."

"This is all so freaked up. And those people in that car crash…." Red paced around worriedly and looked up at the Silver Saint. "I don't know about this place…."

Noah chuckled. The Saint already understood enough of the kid's type to know a new kind of vocabulary would blossom in Red soon. "Don't worry, you'll get used to all sorts of weird new things. Before you know it, you'll feel smarter than everyone else on the planet for knowing about Sanctuary and Athena."

The boy stared off anxiously. "Yeah, I guess. But she isn't around right now, right?"

Noah nodded patiently and answered in a non-committing way, knowing these questions were a form of stalling. "Yes, that's right."

Red turned to him. "...Noah, I'm worried. What if I'm not good enough? What if..."

The Silver Saint felt the instinct to kneel to his level, but the prosthetic made him hesitate. It was less than a month old, and he had little practice minding his right leg being gone.

So he limited himself to holding the boy's shoulder. "Hey, what are you saying? Remember what you've done already. You saved my life as much as I did yours. You've already touched the cosmos once, brief as it was. You have to be with people who can help you do it again."

"But… what if I don't believe in any of this, in Athena or anything else?" the pre-teen asked, ashamed. "What if I just believe in you?"

Noah shook his head. Red was still thinking in terms of his Christian upbringing. "Believing in her doesn't matter to me, Red. Not anymore. And it's not going to matter to your Cosmos."

Anxious to know more about Noah in any kind of way, Red insisted. "What do you mean? How can it not matter?"

The Triangle Saint turned his eyes to the starry sky as if to search for an answer he had written down for himself in the constellations. Red tried to follow his gaze, but he understood nothing about astrology other than that the stars were big burning balls of farts that people imagined shapes on. He just stood quietly and waited for the Saint he admired to express themselves.

However, the answer that came was just as bemusing as the silence, if not more. "Do you mind if I ask you something back, Red? What do you see when you look at the stars? A bunch of pointy lights, or the home of the gods? Or something else?"

Red followed his gaze to the constellations. He always felt the night sky somewhat intimidating. He imagined Noah expected something better than to say he saw a lot of darkness and blinking lights.

Yet, the Silver Saint encouraged him with a patient, expectant look. "Just say what comes to your mind."

The boy gulped and eventually tried to voice his immature thoughts. "I see… nothing. When I look at the stars, I can't make out any constellations on them. It makes me feel kinda dumb since you and everyone else seem able to name them just fine, but I... feel instead like we're inside some big monster's mouth… like that emptiness could come crashing down on me at any second. I look at the blackness between the stars, and I feel my head's upside down and that I might fall off the ground into it. Does that make sense?"

The Silver Saint shook his head. The question made to Red, about as superficial and valid as a Rorschach test, had an interesting response in the sense that Red's mind was focused first on the dark background than the lights that usually caught everyone's eyes first, specifically as a potential threat. This could have a million different interpretations, ranging from Red having trust issues to being one of the hundred and eight Specters, none of which Noah would take more seriously than knowing what Red saw in a bunch of blots on a paper.

"There's no wrong answer, Red. I see a bunch of darkness, too. A lot of Saints take comfort in Athena and her Cloths being there to guide us through it."

While young, Red was smart enough to get the metaphorical meaning. "So, the starlight?"

The Saint's green eyes turned back to the sky with a curious wonder. "Still, I think that if every star out there would suddenly die out, the dark wouldn't be so bad, don't you think? Even if the universe went completely blind, there are so many wonderful things that Cosmos can do. Giving birth to light and warmth again would be… unimaginative, even."

The boy just stared, transfixed; his thoughts returned to the torch Noah offered him at the truck.

The Triangle Saint turned down to him. "To reshape what 'light' is, to make yourself see just fine in the dark, to restart the universe with a whole new Big Bang so that up will be down, fire burns through water, the small crush the big! When the cosmos is that marvelous, Red, why should humans lose hope in the mere absence of Athena's light?"

A warm, inspired, yet terrifying feeling filled up the boy's throat, one that made his eyes go wide in amazement. Suddenly, stepping inside the building ceased to be such a scary thing, and instead, Red turned to the building like its door hid a whole new world.

The boy paced around a bit, taking this in. "So, if I can have the Cosmos, I can make the world a better place. I can have hope. And it doesn't matter if she's around or not." he asked, staring at the Saint, keeping his next thoughts silent. "I can become like you."

The Silver Saint smiled. "If you put your mind to it, Red, this power will let you do so much more than just that. To a real citizen of the Cosmos, atomizing something, splitting the sky, or shattering the earth is trivial. The ability to stop a tidal wave or even destroy a galaxy is nothing compared to the magnificent, blossoming flowers of wonder that can be explored when you sail on the endless currents of the universe. An ocean of stars, never-ending, carrying hope and change in every single blinking light."

The boy nodded slowly, feeling inspiration fill his heart. "Noah, will I get to see you again?"

The green-eyed Silver Saint paused melancholic. In more naive days, the Saint would likely oversee Red's growth himself, but Red, or Lance as Sanctuary would call him, was better off with a real Master picked for his zodiac. With the memory seal in the child, Noah didn't have to worry about any unpleasant memories returning to Red and preventing him from starting his life over in Sanctuary.

All he needed was a little luck, then, and to forget about his old life.

"Promise me that you'll live, Red, that you won't lose hope and that you'll grow as much as you can as a Saint -" As such, the Silver Saint smiled softly, hugged him, and gave him the most honest answer possible. "- and if the stars will make it, yes, of course, we will."

Red hugged back, knowing this would be the last he would see of his hero for a long time, and as if to punctuate their embrace, a set of seven stars in the southern night sky, a group of seven stars shone brightly, irradiating his fate.

{======================|SSII|======================}

Chapter 67

Side Story 2

The Curse of Hatred – Part 1

Auspicious Starts

{======================|SSII|======================}

One Month Later,

January 1970,

Sanctuary, Golden Zodiac

{======================|SSII|======================}

In an otherwise cold first month of the year, Sanctuary was a place that felt itself warm with excitement, bustling with people in the wet streets. The people of Rodario and Sanctuary Town smiled in content, packed in their winter clothing outside, shared happy greetings, hugged old friends, and talked of the upcoming Coliseum games. Children played at the mountain pass parks, where snow fell, and even the bored patrolling hoplites found new energy in their vigilance. It was as if Athena herself blessed them with excitement and hope.

There were so many reasons to celebrate, after all. They were marking four years of peace. The strife, paranoia, and conflict came crashing down with the subjugation of the last Cyrulian holdout and the recovery of the Sagittarius Cloth at the 'Battle of the Spire,' a clash so fierce that a spiked tower of rock was forged in the middle of the Atlantic.

It was a month of happiness, where the hatred and distrust between brothers was put to an end, and Athena's land was finally left with only her faithful. Pope Arles would have made it a permanent holiday if the Zodiac was not ashamed of the involvement of Pisces Aeneas on the enemy side and therefore wished not to honor the Zodiac of a traitor.

Carried in his guarded carriage towards the Coliseum, the masked Pope looked out the window at the cheering bystanders with melancholy. "We'd be preparing Aeneas' birthday around this time."

The sharp, green-eyed Capricorn Saint of long black hair sitting across him sighed shortly, clasping fingers on his lap. "Your sympathy is admirable, but he picked his side, your Holiness."

"I know, Kirin, but happier memories refuse to leave me," Shion assured. Long ago, the Holy Father learned to expect little consideration from the Catalan warrior for the Black Saints, as it was customary of Capricorns. Still, this particular war embittered the tenth Gold Saint, leaving Kirin with little mercy for the memory of even his former friends. "The timing of your recovery of the Pisces Armor almost feels ordained by the Goddess, as if to remind us of the man who wore it."

"The Goddess is all-loving, your Holiness. It is in her perfect nature to guide our hand to honor even those who have betrayed her. However, I believe that the Baron of Bluegrad's greed, his mines in particular, had more to do with finding the Pisces Cloth than divine providence."

Lord Arles' head recoiled. "Kirin… what an un-Capricorn thing to say. Will you not say, instead, that her light inspired the Baron?"

Folding arms, the Gold Saint looked away, knowing the Pope didn't believe his own words. "The important thing is that we can finally work towards restoring the twelfth Temple's honor, your Holiness. We've gone four years without the armor in which, at any moment, we could have been attacked. We must never again let Pisces fall into the wrong hands."

The Pope nodded sadly, resigned to the untreated wounds his warriors had on the inside about the betrayal. "I even saw some of the villagers leaving rose bouquets fashioned in Aeneas' style at his grave today, instead of... uglier things."

Kirin turned to the golden Cloth box with them in the carriage and narrowed his eyes with disdain, sunk in memories. He killed Aeneas at Bluegrad. Unfortunately, it allowed Priam and his retainers to flee, a futile gesture as Gemini Akassius showed by confronting the fleeing enemy not long after at the Romanche Gap.

The fighting resulted in the near-total destruction of the Siberian town by tremor, conflict, and fire. The wooden streets meant for frigid tundra weather learned a harsh lesson akin to that of the fires of Novgorod, and both Aeneas' corpse and the Pisces Gold Cloth were thought lost in the closing fissures of the battlefield. While they scavenged for the armor, they had hoped that the burial of Aeneas' memory would have been enough to bring closure.

"If you wish, I can erase the name off his tombstone." Kirin offered. "It would take less than a second, a drawing of a sword at the letters. Let time forget he ever existed. It's not like there's a body on the coffin."

A tempting thought for Shion, who wanted this chapter of his realm closed for good. Pretending Aeneas, Priam, and their consorts never existed was surely the way. "I wonder, though, if I have the right to do such a thing."

Kirin changed the subject. "Holy Father, if you'd honor my curiosity, do you have a candidate in mind?"

"Yes, an excellent one in fact. Aeneas did not train alone for the armor, you see. A maiden on the Isle of Gardens named Elisa is next in line." He then looked up appealingly. "She was actually slated first by her Master, but he wisely saw the talents Aeneas had over Elisa. (*)"

(*) Chapter 21

Kirin gasped and shuffled in his carriage seat as if fighting the urge to stand up in protest. "Surely you will not pick her?!"

The Pope blinked. "Why not?

"Your Holiness, with all due respect, I recommend you have this person vetted extensively or outright crossed out from your shortlist. This Elisa and Aeneas trained together as you said. Trusting a long acquaintance of him is an unacceptable risk. Imagine what disgusting thoughts about you she might share with that…. traitor!"

Once more, Shion gawked behind his mask. "What an exaggeration, Kirin! Elisa has been a Maiden faithful to Athena and her Master for as long as you have, and the people of Crysanthos adore her! When the war broke out, the first thing she did was a pilgrimage to my Palace to beg me to pardon her sanctum! She has never uttered as much of a word against the Zodiac in all her life! You're letting the hatred for Priam cloud your head!"

The Capricorn, true to form, was utterly inflexible, though, and seemed even displeased at the word used to describe his suspicion, based on the stiff stare on his face. Still, he mechanically reasoned, doing his best not to adopt an emotional tone that might offend the Pope.

"It is not hatred; it's wisdom, your Holiness. Your command is supreme, but I will not be the only Gold Saint who will disapprove of having this person within a rose shot of your palace. The optics of such a choice will matter immensely. Remember that your remaining Gold Saints fought and bled for three years in the name of your safety and that of all of Sanctuary. Please do not render the sacrifices we have made pointless."

Shion bit tongue behind his mask reminded of Daniel, Malta, Akassius, and even Paris, the last of which had retired into obscurity but could still be around to protest the decision as well. He tightened his old hand on the candidate files, thinking of how to measure his words.

Within less than a decade, from the Cancer Saint's murders to Priam's defeat, Shion had gone from having nine promising, active Gold Saints to five broken souls, and two of these retired shortly after their triumph. This left three lonesome, but fire-bonded veterans who weren't hesitant to stand up for their surviving friends' interests, even against the Pope. Shion had wondered for years if they secretly blamed him for Priam's treason but were just too loyal to voice it.

This made it difficult for the Pope to be as assertive with these particular Gold Saints as he should and usually was. He had already made them do many vexing things under little pretense, and now beginning the process to replace them with the Saints he needed to save Sanctuary without revealing the flimsy foundation of his fears was a prophecy. He had pondered if he should initiate subtler ways to make the Gold Saints more participant in the Pope's objectives, like having a hand in picking their replacements or voting on new proposals. Still, Shion wasn't ready to relinquish even more authority than he was already supposed to at a time when people already feared the heavy hand the aristocrats had in Athena's land.

"I promise I will give it some thought, Kirin." he compromised.

The warrior across the seats seemed to close eyes briefly in place of a sigh. "Thank you, your Holiness. Moreover, if you don't mind, I'd be honored to accompany you to the Isle of Gardens to deliver the armor, as well. I feel personally compelled to ensure its return, having brought it so far already."

At this, the Holy Father trembled. Was the offer a feeling of personal responsibility that Kirin felt over the Cloth, having been the one to slay Aeneas? Or another attempt to control who Shion picked? Somehow, Akassius' face sprung to Shion's mind.

Kirin then seemed to remember something from the look of his raising eyes. "Speaking of training islands, your Holiness; the Mission Center says more letters have been arriving from the Master of Death Queen Island."

Another uncomfortable topic that made Shion's fingers fold together tensely. "And?"

"Saint Nam of Sagitta has forwarded these... requests to me. I am too sickened to repeat the details in your presence." Capricorn Kirin's nose frowned.

Considering this was the Gold Saint that personally exterminated the Knights of the Zodiac; it made Shion's imagination go wild with what kind of human right abuses the 'Master' wanted the Pope's permission for this time.

Kirin continued. "Your Holiness, if you ask me, I'd rather cut that place in half and let it sink to the bottom of the ocean than accept these. We've thrown more than enough meat at this particular lion. Keeping the peace on Death Queen Island can't possibly be worth this much human misery!"

An uncomfortable silence followed as Shion pondered his options. Despite his attachment to the island as the last surviving surface land of the old Continent of Mu, he wholeheartedly agreed with Kirin that the place was better off gone from everyone's lives.

What halted his step was that not only the volcanic forges of Death Queen Island were one of the few places that a Gold Cloth could be reliably restored, but it also housed the critically important Phoenix Bronze Cloth that both Phoenix Haisaku and Phoenix Ikki had worn in the past.

"Send orders to the orphanages to deny the Master's request for now. "

"Very well. What if someone compatible with Phoenix emerges, your Holiness?"

This was a more challenging fight for the Pope, but not hopeless. "It's true we cannot deny him those, but they are quite rare. So rare in fact, that merciful Athena has made it so that people born under the Phoenix' stars emerge even more sparsely than Godslayers. Statistically speaking, we'd sooner have the Golden Zodiac restaffed to full strength than another Phoenix talent."

Kirin clicked tongue discreetly but nodded in obedience. "I'll send the couriers to Virgo's seers. The children of Athena will thank you for this, Holy Father."

Touching as the words were, Shion could tell Kirin didn't think this was the natural solution as much as it was stalling, but destroying the island was off the table. Until then, they'd have to be patient and hope that a Virgo Saint capable of containing Death Queen Island's evil would emerge from humanity's ranks soon.

Who knew, maybe one was already in one of their many orphanages, learning about the light of Athena's message as they spoke.

{======================|SSII|======================}

Rodario,

Heart of Sasha Orphanage

{======================|SSII|======================}

The cold classroom in the complex of red-bricked walls was austere, possessing small wooden tables and not enough places for everyone to sit, forcing some of the children of varying ages to let the younger kids take the few chairs available, with the older ones forced to stand. As non-citizens of Rodario, they weren't allowed to attend the town celebrations. Still, they also didn't want to attract the ire of the strict and tensed nuns of Athena who passed as teachers in that place and who always kept their trusty, red-drenched canes within reach of hand.

Every single child keeping quiet there had one reason or another to detest the institution. Despite being the most funded of the three orphanage branches serving Sanctuary, 'Heart of Sasha' provided only just enough materials to seem like an actual religious school to any outsider while also trying to screen as many candidates as possible per year. There was a limited number of people who understood cosmos and Sanctuary well enough to explain it to the kids.

No one was being abandoned in the woods to fend for themselves like in Leonidas' ancient land, but no one was offered any comfort or kindness either. There was no time for it.

In this school reserved for candidates from Europe, the child left at the Maidens cared by Triangle Noah now went by a new name. No longer was he the orphan, Red, but the candidate to trainee, Lance.

Lance. A sure Greek name, if he's ever heard one.

Suppose it was better than Heracles number forty-two.

Being one of the oldest kids put Lance in a tough position for learning the cosmos, but it also meant he was picked last by the Maiden to get one of the few seats the room had, as younger students got priority and taller students like him could just watch the class above their heads. However, having spent most of the day outside class training, it meant that classes were just as physically exhausting, forcing him to stand on his feet for hours after even more hours of running and punching boards.

He rubbed his hands together with the cold and felt the small scars on his bruised knuckles from punching boulders still hurt. He wished he could get wrappings of some kind to make it better, but apparently, the pain was part of the process of breaking him down and rebuilding him as a warrior. Despite the child's best efforts, though, it seemed smashing his hands against rocks wasn't getting him any closer to reconnecting with the mystical energy that was the Cosmos. Red, or rather Lance, had no choice but to be patient and steadfast to his promise to Noah, but this wasn't easy given the adversities unexpectedly thrown at him the second he walked inside the building.

You're too old.

You're bad luck, too.

And you're in the line behind sixty other kids.

No one told him this, even Noah, but apparently, one was supposed to start trying to get in touch with the Cosmos as early as being six years old. The reason was that younger candidates had yet to grow skeptical and could picture metaphysical ideas more easily. By Sanctuary's standards, once one reached eight, one was considered on the border of being not salvageable.

Lance was ten.

Not the only one with ten around, but certainly the only one just starting out. The other ten-year-olds were tempered by three to four years of punching boulders and exercising the Cosmos. They might as well have told Lance to start a marathon 3 hours after everyone else. With a limp.

He was yet to understand the 'bad luck' comments, though. Why, just cause his eyes looked different? So what? This had to be the stupidest superstition he's ever heard of!

His red eyes followed the screechy writing of chalk on the board, wondering what kind of disfigured sentence was going to be asked of them to read. This was about his only true advantage as, being raised in a separate school, he could handle these exercises.

The Maiden, named Helen, suddenly stopped scribbling the seemingly endless words and set down the chalk to then snap one hundred and eighty degrees at them. Her eyes landed on one of the boys to the front left, and the tip of the cane underscored the sentence indicatively. "Candidate… Memnon?"

The black-haired Greek boy of six years old gulped in panic, and his bulged eyes tried to read it to himself.

I athasiá tis Aishés an éshei atháshia, as éshei

"Outloud, please." the Maiden stressed.

He gasped, unsure. On the board was a typical Greek tongue twister, followed by three equally tough others. They were expected to recite them flawlessly to prove they were practicing their pronunciation hard, but between the poor materials, the exhaustion of the afternoon physical ed, and the fact the kids saw each other as enemies rather than study mates, it got very difficult to take time and energy aside to do this. There was a kid right next to him wearing a fabric over his bent arm from the previous day's training that was still to get a good look at.

Lance wasn't Memnon's friend but watched him anxiously nonetheless; being a raised Greek himself, he understood the sentences fine, but he felt bad for all the younger kids and even boys in the room from other corners of Europe who might as well have been asked to translate from Arabic.

Still, Memnon did his best. "The, umm,…. The atheist of Aisa-" he then felt the wooden lash on his hand and recoiled with a scream, his best clearly not enough.

Lance gulped, looking away to avoid having to watch the kid weep in silence. The Maidens scowled at them, looking at the walls instead of paying attention, so he had nowhere to look, but the other corners where the students were.

He then noticed they were exchanging things under the tables that looked like comic books, gum and plastic tobacco packs, stuff that they'd quickly pack underneath their trainers. "Counterfeit stuff? I see; they must trade it off in the middle of class cause I guess the paidotribe watches us even closer at the gymnasium, and we all get checked before sleeping."

One in the group of older boys, a huge kid with a misshapen face named Jaki, spotted him staring. "What are you looking at?!"

The harsh tone alone made Lance feel like ratting them out. "Nothing!"

"Then red lights front, retard." Jaki barked, laughing.

Maiden Helen turned in their direction. "You lot in the back-row, unless you wish to answer next, be quiet!"

Lance lowered his head shyly, grumbling. What was that Jaki guy even doing around here anyway? Lance heard he was no orphan. Did this place keep that bad a tab on everyone that some bully looking to score Drachmas could sneak into the crowd?

The Maiden then immediately shifted to the Italian boy after Memnon. "Candidate Sulla? How about you?"

The brown-haired boy from Ferrara of eight years old had already been punished once that day for failing recitation and focused as hard as he could. "The atheist of Aeses... anthrax can have." And he sighed in relief when the Maiden nodded approvingly without smiling.

Her cane pointed to the next sentence. "Keep going. And don't stutter."

Áspri pétra xéxaspri ke ap ton ílio xexaspróteri

Sulla sweated visibly. "A white stone, so white, um." He began shaking, noticing the Maiden's eyes narrowing menacingly. "I-I I don't kn-"

Before his whimper even finished, her cane struck him across the cheek. Lance winced from his seat at the sight of it, but some of the older kids just snickered.

"No crying in the classroom. Do you think Masters in Sanctuary will carry tissues around for you?" she asked.

Sulla merely held his wound and held his teary eyes down. Seeing everyone else either snicker or avert their eyes, she held hands in the waist with a shaking head. "I-I-I I don't know!"

"Go hold the books. NOW!" she ordered, making the boy rush out of the classroom. There was a set of old book stacks in the corridor that he'd have to spend lunch hour holding up with stretched arms. She turned to the class. "Can any of you actually read these correctly? All of them?"

The ten-year-old Lance cringed his fingers around his pencil. He felt deeply tempted to stand up and answer it all perfectly, just to shut her up, but something felt off about it like it would somehow just get him in more trouble. Maybe it was the way he noticed how her eyes moved left to right, not in search of a good student, but rather someone whose reaction she could discipline out of them.

"How do you expect to speak respectfully to your Masters and captains if you can't even read a simple sentence out loud? You're not taking your studies seriously at all! Do you think Masters pick undisciplined students?! We keep the candles on after dusk so you'll study together, not roughhouse in your bunk beds!"

But another hand rose from a red-eyed student standing to the other side by the older kids. "Maiden, may I?"

The Maiden hesitated. "… Go ahead, candidate Guifi."

Lance studied the boy, having had a few encounters with him already and finding his presence the most odd in the entire building. Guifi was clearly neither Greek nor Italian, resembling more a southeast Asian descendant with his combination of brown-tanned skin and Asian facial features. His hair was a strangely pale shade of black; his body was both made slender and hardened by the orphanage's mix of training and nutrition, and, most noticeably, his obedient, expectant eyes were marked by a distinct crimson red much like Lance's own.

The student stood up politely and read all three sentences as best as he could. "The atheist of Aeses his anthrax can have. A white stone, so white, whiter than the sun is. Good morning, camel herder, camel herder, good morning. On a Thursday, the pine tree falls down."

Lance stared at him, stunned. A cocky smirk almost formed on his lips at the prospect of the Maiden having to say something nice for once with this. That was flawless.

Yet, the entire class stared disdainfully at the orphan, especially the Maiden, like he had lepers all over his skin.

An expectant stare set in class while the Maiden judged the boy's performance in silence. "Good, and the ones from yesterday?"

Guifi's expectant stare morphed into a panicked gasp. "Oh?! W-Well, I…"

Her fingers fidgeted on her cane handle. "You studied yesterday's exercises too, right? You're not supposed to get today's stuff correct."

A nine-year-old sitting by Guifi snickered. "Yeah, weirdo, did you?"

Lance practically banged a hand on the wall. "Hey, he said it all as you wanted! You never asked anyone else for yesterday's question-"

The cane struck the air and his face snaped aside with a lashing pain clear across the room, somehow. The Greek teen held his bleeding cheek, his eyes shaking. Apparently distance was no problem after all for the Maiden's caning.

Her stern blue eyes locked on him so harshly that Lance felt frozen to the soul. "Sit!"

Gulping, Lance sweated with everyone's eyes suddenly focused on him, including Guifi. After what he said, the southeast Asian child seemed to wait for some kind of follow-up defense from him, but Lance felt like an eagle with sharp claws was staring at him instead of Maiden Helen. His legs, therefore, quickly lost strength, and he sat back down, quiet.

Helen observed him. "Anything else to say, candidate Lance?"

The boy just looked away, disgusted and unsure of himself, but understanding why she was able to hit him despite being all the way in the back. That was nothing like what Noah would do with the Cosmos. "No."

Before confirming the answer, the Maiden asserted her authority with the first student. "Lance, next time you answer an adult, you will have a choice to make; either lose the tone or your tongue. This is a school of Sanctuary, not the Christian charity house the Saints took you from. Understood? If you thought washing your mouth with soap was bad, imagine what it will feel like with wax."

Everyone gulped or winced. Lance paled and held his mouth uncomfortably, as if picturing the cold metal arms inside it, squeezing.

But the Maiden wasn't done. "Also, you'll do it in time to be the first to see the seer today. Otherwise, you'll stay tonight doing the rest!"

The boy gawked in horror. "Again?!" This was the third time that month. "But she hurts me!"

"You should have thought of that before acting so disrespectful." She then finally turned to the East Asian boy. "As for you, Guifi, sit."

The brown-skinned Asian boy sat back on the floor by the other older students. The mention of his Chamorro surname only attracted more tense looks from everyone. Someone had clearly chosen not to adapt to the local culture just yet.

As Lance sat humiliated, anguishing about the seer meeting, a ball of paper crumbled with rubbers was suddenly tossed right at his head by one of the older boys.

They snickered with mocking whispers. "Uh-oh, the red-tard's in trouble!"

Meanwhile, Guifi sat quiet, relieved that they weren't talking about him this time. Yet, despite the way he often felt stared at by the class, when he looked around, it was Lance's most hateful look, like he personally blamed him for the mess he got into.

{======================|SSII|======================}

There was no permanent on-site seer, and these had to be asked in from the Golden Zodiac, making them special guests that had to be honored. As a result, the room reserved for candidate star reading was tidier than the classrooms. There were undoubtedly no blood splatter marks on the walls, and the chairs were mildly more comfortable than the cold, hard wooden seats given to students during lessons, but only just enough that the child would be relaxed while they were prodded for information about their life and personality.

His belly rumbled. Ten-year-old Lance wished he could have taken some food on the way to this room, but Maiden Helen escorted him the whole way, ruining his hopes of getting some nutrition before returning to training. Having been with the seer more than once, Lance watched her perform the most unpleasant part; the reading of his hand lines.

"Stay still." the seer in front of him demanded, stuttering every word and pressing her burning thumb harder on his right palm. "I need to make sure."

Lance felt his red eyes get wet and panickedly pressed himself against his chair, squirming and wincing as her thumb burned cosmos in his palm like a scalding stamp. Her ornamented black robe from the Virgo House, pale irises, wrinkly face, and vacant expression, like someone who had peered into the depths of the stars, made her look like a witch. The lack of hesitation in harming him combined with the trailing way she spoke made him wonder if she was actually a real one sent to hurt him.

After an excruciating minute of Lance holding his mouth to contain screams and weeping, she let go, seemingly leaving no burn mark on his hand. "We are done. Your name, again?"

"W-which one?!" the teary boy shouted, holding his wrist and desperate to leave. She didn't even care about what he had to say about why he felt so angry.

"The one that matters."

He scowled at her resentfully. How was it that he could swear his flesh was burned through, and yet his hand was intact? He gulped and focused on the name he got as a Saint. "It's L-Lance. Can I go?!"

She stood up. "Not yet." and walked out the only door, closing it behind her.

The boy gave a second of distraught stare before he tossed his chair to the floor in anger, screaming.

Outside, Helen awaited her, still in her white robe, bronze armlets, and aegis pendant. "Well, sister?"

At Heart of Sasha, like other Sanctuary orphanages, it was policy to find something final for the children getting too old to learn the cosmos, as six-year-old kids of flexible minds had a much easier time finding Masters whose time they could waste before being put in hoplite armor. Because it wasn't guaranteed that someone would have a Bronze constellation protecting them from birth, unlike with the Gold ones, discovering that a child had a Bronze Cloth compatibility growing in them was extra incentive to send them right away to whatever Athena meant for them, rather than the foot soldier programs. Doing otherwise was seen as betraying Athena's destiny for them.

As such, the vacant-eyed seer's conclusion was as final as it was terrible. "It's the same as last time. And the time before. The boy was born at the height of the July Phoenicids. This makes him a Cancer as well as a perfect Phoenix. The mark of the Queen is clear across his hand lines. It's very likely the cause of his inflated sense of justice... and his cursed red eyes."

The black-haired Maiden rubbed her lobes, knowing the terrible meaning of such a winning combination.

Helen fidgeted with her Aegis pendant. There was just one problem. "I can't send that boy to Death Queen Island! Athena, forgive me; he's as uncooperative as they get, but having a bad attitude with class doesn't make me hate him bad enough to send him there."

"Why did you start sending for me, then?" the seer asked. They were only facing this dilemma because they bothered to check his compatibility. It was blissful ignorance until then. "You could have waited. Ignored him like the rest."

Her hand covered her mouth shamefully. "We took him in at a Silver Saint's recommendation. You know… the Triangle one."

The seer's eyes squinted for the first time, unfamiliar with the person. "Who exactly?"

"Don't make me say it... the one stuck-halfway!" Maiden Helen confirmed. "Triangle wouldn't listen to us about Lance's age and insisted he already had contact with the cosmos once, so we decided to start forwarding the candidate to a Master right away. The first step was to find out if the boy had any natural compatibility already..."

The seer exhaled in enlightenment. People like Saint Noah were considered protected in her House, thanks to many Hindu influences. However, this was the exception in Sanctuary, not the rule. In Athena's land, Saint Noah was not allowed to teach students, which likely forced the Saint's hand in leaving the candidate in the Maidens' hands.

Maiden Helen's hands clasped anxiously. "The Goddess has chosen us to steer her children into the right path! We cannot deny the strays." she defended herself. "Before you told us he was for the Phoenix, the other sisters and I wanted to… process the boy as soon as possible, find him a master, anyone. But we were having trouble. On top of his age..."

The unspoken rest brought to the seer's mind the following important point. "Red eye curses are common and can come from multiple forms. It is said at the Virgo House that the Lost Canvas Godslayer was cursed by his father to control his fate. Did you hope for such a mundane cause?"

"Yes. We thought he might be a Dragon or even Pegasus!…. Not this."

Her vacant stare seemed frozen. "We cannot change his fate. It doesn't matter how many times you call me to do new readings. His latent cosmos will always spell the Queen's flame. That boy belongs to the island." She then added a further warning before the Maiden even considered the possibility of concealing this. "In light of this happy period in Sanctuary, His Holiness, the Pope decided to deny…. new prison convicts to the Master. The gates of Stardust Tower will remain locked to that monster. Denying him a student, though… will offend the Master greatly."

"Not if we don't make it known right away!" the Maiden snapped, increasingly sick of the seer's passive stuttering. They looked and acted like Athena herself came to them in visions at the Virgo House. "Or if we find this boy an alternative teacher!"

"You wish to lie… to Athena's Masters?" she confronted. This alone made the angered Maiden take pause. "You act like you cannot live with yourself for sending a boy to Death Queen Island, but tricking the good faith of the Saints is just as awful. Think carefully, Maiden, before you offend the Goddess' chosen."

The Maiden stared tensely at the boy through the one-way glass, seeing him wipe his tears and looking around to find a way out. Usually, they could pretend that whatever hellhole they sent the bad ones to weren't death sentences so long as the kids turned their rotten attitudes around. Even Andromeda Island, famed for its vast desert graveyard, had a kind teacher that occasionally passed minor armors.

With Death Queen Island, though...No one they ever sent to that place was ever heard from again. "Tell Sanctuary to give me some time, and we'll make a decision."

The seer bowed to her religious peer respectfully. "I will, sister. And a happy peace festivity to you."

{======================|SSII|======================}

The dusty field enclosed by the orphanage grounds for training purposes lacked natural boulders for actual rock punching, but it did have stiff wooden boards nailed to cement walls to punch on. The point wasn't really to unlock the cosmos then and there; no one thought more than a small percentage of the students would pull off something supernatural before spending a year or two under a Master's guidance in a real training ground. No, the point was to accustom the children to having to punch painful targets for hours at an end so that the Masters didn't have to put up with resisting, weeping children squeamish about pain or blood.

They had been used in succession for efficiency's sake with little care for the students' well being. As a result, many of the orphans currently sparring and punching targets in the field had bruised, scarred, and even deformed knuckles and toes from smashing their flesh against these challenging targets. Many would carry these marks to the grave.

Still, a small white porcelain statuette of the Goddess rested over the top of the patio's entry doorway to inspire the students with the knowledge that Athena watched over their trials, even if things seemed bleak.

Paidotribe Philoctetes judgmentally paced behind the candidates, back and forth with a baton and coiled lash in the belt. His brown eyes surveying for excuses to put his equipment to use. Clad in leather armor padding, sporting an aggressive black Mohawk, and hiding his injured eye behind a metal square strapped around his head, paidotribe Phil was easily one of the most universally hated figures at the orphanage, the reason why being as clear as the sound of his lashes.

"Come on, you girls, are you afraid of seeing your bones pop out?! PUNCH HARDER! FASTER! STRONGER!" he yelled. He smiled when he started hearing the thumbs on the boards getting more consistent. "That's better! Music to my ears! Don't let me hear you lose pace, or I'll kick your useless fucking asses to the curb!"

Phil spotted Lance entering the gymnasium field. "Aw, ya got your palm burned yet, rose-eyed? The targets are all taken for now, so go fetch some slop while you still can. I want a productive afternoon today! Everyone's getting three hundred punches in!"

Philoctetes would have cracked his whip too, just for emphasis, if he hadn't gotten experienced at flirting with the line he could cross with the kids in the gymnasium. A man of light muscle frame dressed like he was ready for the post-apocalypse, this guy was, in Lance's opinion, one of the worst assholes in the Heart of Sasha, having clearly dropped out of basic foot soldier training to live his days being the orphanage's drillmaster as some kind of screwed-up power trip.

Lance squinted at him, surprised they even left anything for him. "You just want to pretend to the wardens that you made sure we ate."

"Quit giving me the stink eye and go get your serving before I make you eat toilet soup instead!"

Irking in disgust, Lance rushed towards the mess hall door, where some kids were still leaving to train, finishing their meals late. Inside, after rolling his eyes at the sight of the emptied food servings, he saw Guifi sitting at a corner table, eating his broth as quickly as he could while every other person at least a bottle of water, a piece of fruit, and an actual bowl of stew rather than something that looked meant for stray cats.

It was a revolting sight since Lance could picture perfectly why he only got half-ration. He headed to the canteen chef. "Do you have anything I can eat?"

The chef, a mustached man from Rodario, looked at the clock. "Why are you so late?"

"Seer," Lance answered reflexively.

"Uh uh." He then got to the real problem. "I don't have any full portions left and we're saving that for another group. Get outta here."

Lance then watched him take the rest of the food away. At that moment, if there wasn't a plexiglass wall between the two to protect the chef from all the roided-up kids demanding food, he was sure this guy would have lost even more teeth to his fists than he already had.

Lance grumbled as hard as his stomach, resigned. "Of course. God forbid you don't let that slop spoil," he walked away, taking a bitten-into apple off left at one of the tables. He saw the chef head out the back door for a second, though, and this caught his attention, watching the man's fat fingers searched inside a drawer to pull out a set of keys. "Uh, so that's how he gets in. There must be some backdoor."

On his way out, he looked once more for Guifi, for some reason. Perhaps to make himself feel better about not being the only one being denied his fair share of food.

He crossed the East Asian kid on the way out the door. "So, what made you late?"

Guifi paused nervously, shifted his eyes, and gave him a quick answer dripped with resentment. "I wasn't. The others shoved me out of the line to the end, and then the food guy said to deal with it. I got here before anyone else."

This stunned Lance, who didn't even get another word in until Guifi paced out of there to do his punching rounds.

{======================|SSII|======================}

The sun climbed high in the sky, making their blood and sweat glisten as it ran down the wooden surface of the targets and dropped on the dirt. They could all feel the paidotribe going back and forth around them, judging their movements, and the back of their legs always cringed instinctively, expecting a sudden kick or lash at the slightest let-up.

"You useless pieces of shit! You'll land in Athena's streets at this pace, dirtying up her town, like a bunch of dog feces! Pick up the pace and make yourselves real fucking men of the hoplon! GET TO IT!"

Keeping his sore fingers as closed as he still could, Lance practically tossed his hands more than he punched them at this point, exhausted and famished. He was running on half-gas from the day before and with skin not even half as hard as that of some of the other kids. When Phil was distracted, he looked at his hands to see a heart-wrenching series of bruises marks, red and black, that smelled like copper, while his arm bones were getting numb to the shoulder.

The wood was rickety and cracked, already worn by someone before him.

Not far from where he was, he heard some six-year-old collapse and was immediately beaten by Phil with his baton. "YOU'RE OUT, YOU MISERABLE BABY! You're lucky these aren't Spartan times! We'd feed you to the fucking wolves! QUIT CRYING!"

With something boiling inside his temples, Lance shouted and struck the target with his foot instead, causing it to shatter in half.

Phil turned to him. "HEY, DON'T BREAK THE TARGETS, you punk! They're expensive!"

Lance gritted teeth. "Expensive?! They're plywood with paint and attached to rocks!"

The baton whipped across his face immediately. Lance stumbled with a numbed shock on his face and an explosion of pain in his right teeth while Phil pointed to the benches. "Go fix up another one if they're so fucking worthless to you! You're only one hundred and fifty-six punches in!"

Struggling not to fall, Lance made his way out of the main field and headed to the supply shed. He leaned on the wall for a bit, massaging his face. For a second, he could swear a tooth was knocked loose.

He was walking further when he suddenly overheard a couple of the kids talking like they were practicing.

"The canteen fatso takes the extras out the backdoor after our practice hours. We just have to get our numbers in a bit sooner." some ten-year-old with spiky pink hair whispered.

The second one with blue hair pretended to be still punching. "You don't see the risk, Agot?! What if we're caught?! I'm not hungry enough to risk spending the weekend without eating in the cage boxes!"

But the pink-haired one scoffed. "Shut up, Kastor! What the fuck do they give us to eat in the first place? Practically nothing! We're going to be Saints of Gold one day, and we have to starve? Bullshit! We ought to nuke this place with cosmos when we're older. Besides,... we don't have much to trade with Jaki other than the desserts and the goyos. I want my goddamn comics."

Trying to be discreet and with a rumbling stomach, Lance approached them. "Hey, are you gonna steal food?"

They both eyed him, and one lowered a hand to a pocket knife. "Yeah, so?! Get lost! If you tell any-"

Lance shook his head. "Wait, I don't wanna rat you out; I want in! I know where he keeps his keys!" he assured. He saw them snickering. "What's so funny?! You don't believe me?!"

The pink-haired one, Agot, pointed at him. "Aren't you the new red-tard? Fuck off! We don't want your help."

Lance's eyes narrowed. "What's your problem?! I can help you get food for everyone!"

The pink-haired one shook his head and showed his middle finger. "Number one, we want the leftovers for ourselves! There are some nice chicken pie bits left, and they're not for sharing; they're for trading." Then he gave Lance the other bird. "And number two, you could say you have a bag of gold and I still do not want someone cursed on the team! You'll fuck things up! Now fuck off!"

"Cursed?!" With bulging eyes of bewilderment, Lance stormed off. "Fine! Nice life to you two!"

The blue-haired one, Kastor, saw the angry look on Lance's face and whispered to his friend. "Hey man, are you nuts?! He's definitely going to tell on us now!"

The pink-haired squirmed. "Shit, you're right! Um…"

Close by, Guifi pushed himself to punch the target one more time, making it shake with the force of his fist. He breathed deeply as sweat went down his brown temples, and he punched it again, making his hand bleed. His red eyes took occasional looks at the other lined up students, and he tried to sync his striking with theirs. Some of the orphans, especially the older ones, were already really good, like they've done it tens of thousands of times.

Punching the target once more, Guifi did his best to focus. He braced himself, focused his strength, and lunged forward. It was getting so hard to throw himself again.

Especially with how much his head…

...wobbled…

The world suddenly seemed to spin aside, and his foot tripped. Guifi gasped loudly and collapsed in exhaustion, getting Lance's attention. The ground underneath him was pooled with caked blood, and the boy's tanned skin was drenched in sweat.

Agot clicked tongue and folded arms. "See? That's exactly why I don't want any red-tards on the heist."

Lance rushed past them. "The hell is wrong with you two?! Shut up about your stupid operation and come help him!" He turned Guifi around and saw him breathing heavily, filthy with the blood and sand he fell on. "Hey, are you okay?!"

Guifi panted, barely registering Lance's presence. In fact, the boy gritted teeth in anger, tensing his eyes at the ground like he'd punch the first person he'd lay eyes on with sheer frustration with his failure.

Paidotribe Phil saw what happened and came to ruin their day even further. "Hey, what's going on here?! Who told you to chit chat?!"

Agot saw this and realized how he could get rid of the problem. "Paidotribe, they were talking about stealing food!"

Guifi widened his eyes. "What?!"

The paidotribe rested a hand on his coiled whip. "Is that true?!"

Lance looked back and forth in panic. "NO! If anyone was gonna steal food, it was them!"

Poking Kastor with his elbow for him to go along with it, Agot pointed fingers straight at them. "We caught them talking about how they saw the chef storing his keys! They were at the canteen at the end of the hour and thought they'd take food!"

Kastor looked around confused but nodded anyway. "Y-yeah, I heard it too! He wanted us to help him!"

Phil rubbed their chin, remembering sending Lance there.

Lance was outraged, seeing the odds against him. "Wait a damn minute; I wasn't goi-"

"Y-YOU LIAR!" Guifi shouted, rushing past Lance and punching Agot to the ground. The two kids rolled and screamed at one another with punches. "TAKE THAT BACK!"

"Hey, leave him alone, FREAK!" Kastor shouted, rushing to kick Guifi off of Astor to the ground. He helped Agot up, and the two closed fists to beat the red-eyed Asian boy to a pulp. "We'll freaking kill you!"

Seeing the two gang up on Guifi, Lance growled and attacked as well, landing a kick right on Astor's stomach and punching Kastor right in the face away from Guifi. "GET OFF HIM, YOU ASSHOLES!"

Chaos was then installed with the four kids punching, rolling, shouting, and kicking among them in the sand, all accusing each other of lying.

Phil laughed and folded arms. "Eh, eh, what a bunch of punks! We oughta put you at the Coliseum to make bets on."

But Maiden Thea, one of the holy women walking by the gymnasium, saw what happened and paced in. "What is Athena's name is going on?! Paidotribe, put some order into the gymnasium!"

The abusive trainer panicked. "Oh, right! SCATTER, YOU ANIMALS!" he roared, shoving his muscled arms between them to drive the four kids off each other. "Agot! Kastor! Get back into practice! NOW!"

The two boys grumbled, holding their bruised faces, and headed off. "We'll get you two later, freaks!" they threatened.

"Go to hell!" a bloody Lance spat at them before helping Guifi up. "Hey, a-are you okay?"

The brown-skinned boy coughed, feeling the pain of bruises over his exhaustion. "Y-Yes…" he lied. "W-what the hell?! Why did they start lying about me?!"

"They didn't want me to help them take food cause they'd have to share, so they tried screwing me over!"

Guifi blinked, confused. "Wait, so this is your fault after all?!"

Lance squinted. irritated. "I told you all, NO!"

"This is their fault, Maiden Thea." Phil denounced, pointing at them with his baton. "Kastor and Agot say they were going to steal food."

The two boys saw the aged Maiden glare at them. Lance's jaw dropped with the sheer unfairness. "Are you kidding me?! I told you it's all those assholes-"

"Language! In the pens! NOW!" Thea ordered, causing Phil to harshly pull both of them by the arm.

{======================|SSII|======================}

Leading the three into a room at the end of the hot enclosure,Thea went to two small cages kept in the corners that were barely big enough to hold a Greyhound, much less a pair of children. Thea opened the cage boxes in the closed off rooms of the orphanage and bobbed her head to them at Phil.

Tightening his muscled arms on both kids' chests while they kicked and screamed in the air, the paidotribe prepared to toss each right into their little holding pen like a pair of angry foxes while the Maiden held the gates open.

Lance's feet pushed against the bars and snarled at Phil. "YOU SON OF A BITCH! YOU KNOW THEY WERE LYING! LET ME GO!" but the Athenian boy was tossed right inside the cage with a foot slammed straight into his ass.

"Why don't you calm down in the oven, brat!" Phil threatened, impatient, while Thea locked his cage. "The sun is gonna beam over these cages all afternoon. I'd save my saliva if I were you for when you get bone dry under the rays!"

"He's right! Those two were in on it! AND I GOT NOTHING TO DO WITH IT!" Guifi screamed from his hold.

"STOP IT, you monsters!" Maiden Thea demanded. "Who taught you to speak in such a filthy manner?! We saw you throwing the first punch! Don't you know denying such a clear fault is a sin?!"

Guifi irked, feeling cornered because of something he didn't do. "They were accusing me of something I didn't do!"

Her arms folded indignantly. "Don't you raise your tone at me, child! Your word isn't so clean! Aren't you the one that attacked candidate Jason when his Master came to get him?! It seems to me you have a history of getting into fights!"

Recovering, Lance widened his eyes in surprise. He hadn't heard of this about Guifi.

Guifi's face tensed in outrage. "He stole my slot! I'M JUST TRYING TO GET MY CLOTH, YOU BLIND BITC-"

Her hand smacked across his face instantly, scalding him with cosmos. Guifi screamed, and she then pointed at the little statue of Athena at the top of the patio's doorway. "This is outrageous! Aren't you ashamed of acting in such a way in front of the Goddess?! Maybe after spending a day inside those hot pens, you'll learn some respect!"

Phil then pushed Guifi into the cage and locked the gate. "If the rats don't get you first, that is!"

The two grown-ups then walked away, exhaling in baffled tones about unruly children who didn't appreciate the patience Athena had for them. The door to the room was closed with a metallic lock as if the cages weren't enough.

Lance's foot bashed his cage door with his foot. "That bastard paidotribe! He gets off on this crap, I swear! I oughta just steal the food anyway if they're just gonna do this to us, regardless!"

Guifi just slid down inside his cramped pen. They were going to be there a while. The worst part was he wasn't even doing anything wrong. In fact, it was their fault he passed out cause he barely got anything to eat.

Knowing this, Lance turned to him appealingly. "Don't you think it's unfair?! It's like they want to trap us or something, but then they punish us for getting mad at it! I bet Agot and Kastor went to raid the kitchen while all the grown-ups were dragging us here!"

The brown-skinned boy's eyes moved away. "... You'll get used to it."

Studying his resigned reaction, Lance measured in his head how long Guifi must have been there before Lance to already just accept it like this.

But clearly it was bullshit. The Maidens were right about one thing; Guifi threw the first punch, which means he wasn't so innocent, and also that they didn't have a leg to stand against what Agot said. It made him mad that he could swear he oughta unlock the Cosmos just from that.

Yet, chances were he wasn't going to. Slumping against his corner, Lance ran fingers through hair, realizing it could be years before he unlocked the cosmos, if ever. He took interest in the sight of Guifi, who seemed just as frustrated if not more, cringing his fingers on the cage-like he couldn't stand how tight and small it was, but unable to do anything but rattle nails on the humiliating prison.

"At least I'm not the only one without the Cosmos at ten," Lance told himself, wondering if it was something about having red eyes. Maybe he could take comfort from that, selfish as it was.

A warm, orange sight silenced his thoughts, though, and made his throat tighten. Probably unaware of it, Guifi's fingers were digging into the metal ever so slightly, emanating an unmistakable radiation to Lance, and a power briefly emerged in the pale-haired boy in the form of a brimming aura. The Athenian boy stared, distraught, as the counterpart silently raged against his pen.

Seemingly realizing what he was doing, Guifi suddenly stopped and turned away shyly, leaving behind the mark of his fingers on the bars. Lance stared in horror at them, suddenly feeling crushingly alone.

{======================|SSII|======================}

Chapter End

{======================|SSII|======================}

Next Chapter: Chapter 68 – Side Story - The Curse of Hatred – Part 2 – Kindred Spirits

Description: Despite his hardships at Heart of Sasha, Lance eventually forms friendship with Guifi. Meanwhile, Maiden Helen decides to search a little harder for a way to save Lance from being sent to the island of the Phoenix…

Deadline: February 27th

Author's Notes: I'm back from my writing vacation and now it's time for the long-awaited Death Queen Island Side Story. I technically missed the deadline by posting this 30 minutes past midnight where I am and for that I'm sorry. Chapter 68 is under beta by my friend Siena and will be published on time two weeks from now.

To old readers of the fic's second version, the themes and progression of the Side Story should be mostly the same, except obsolete storylines and characters have been removed and there's more focus on the parts about Heart of Sasha. My original intention was to keep the HoS confined to one part, but by the end I was left with 30,000 word monstrosity so I decided to divide it down in two, since it was impractical to both getting it done beta-reading by today.

A big challenge in this chapter was in writing versions of the characters that are younger, especially Lance. I'm so used by now to have him in his angry 16 years old that morphing him down to his starry-eyed ten year old version before Mount Olympus was surreal and I had to ask help from not just Jenny, but my friend Mahogany. Another big challenge was depict what an abusive orphanage is like in a world where Tatsumi exists, and we haven't even gotten to Death Queen Island yet.

ANYWAY, please make sure to share the story, review it, like it on Twitter/Tumblr and generally support this project if you enjoy it. I've recently passed 25000 hits, which is nuts for a Saint Seiya OC story and I'm happy, but in the grand scheme of fanfics this isn't all that impressive so please don't stop giving feedback, especially at this stage where the story is escalating and the hard work is only increasing.

Also, make sure to check out the Saint Seiya Reddit Discord server, where I'm currently one of the co-admins. Other writers like Jenny DeVic also can be found in it. You can hang out with the rest of the English-speaking SS community and we host several weekly events, like episode streams, games and now a whole new Horror Movie Night themed after the Underworld.