A white-haired man in very blue clothing stepped off the ship.
Anyone closely watching the waterline of the ship itself would have noticed a sudden and drastic increase in its buoyancy at that moment, but no one noticed. They were all far too focused on the man himself, the Chief Justice of Fontaine, a head of state arriving to Inazuma at the behest of the Archon Raiden Shogun. He was without retinue, lacking his own fanfare, and for most of the humans gathered for this event: rather unimpressive.
Those in the Archon's inner-circle, gathered and clustered about the Raiden Shogun's divine presence at the near end of the wooden dock, were all fully aware of the true identity of the single man now striding down the wood planks towards them. This was the de-facto Hydro Archon, god and ruler of Fontaine, and a rare equal in power to their own god who had summoned them here to provide a respectable state greeting in this moment. More than that, they knew little: only that the Raiden Shogun had sent an invitation to the Hydro Archon, and he had agreed to come.
And now here he was, calmly walking towards them, alone and seemingly unassuming- except for the profusion of lace about his fashion. Lace was for tea cozies in Inazuma, not for clothing.
"Chief Justice Neuvillette," said Ei as her visitor stopped at a respectful distance before her. "I welcome you to Inazauma."
The world was silent save her divine voice and the gentle sounds of anchored ships in harbor. All of the mortal world was intensely focused on this meeting.
"You honor me with your invitation, Raiden Shogun," said Neuvillette with a formal bow, his voice deep and precise- if a bit quiet for the straining ears of the hundreds of eavesdroppers.
"And you honor me with your acceptance," returned Ei. "I have prepared quarters for you in the castle. And if you desire anything else, you have but to request it."
Ei turned, her arm moving in the imperious and wordless order to all the Inazuman's gathered: we are leaving to take our guest to the keep. Everyone began to move.
"I do have a request, Raiden Shogun," said Neuvillette into the general murmur of motion.
Ei, her retinue, her soldiers, and hundreds of other people suddenly ground to a halt- already half-starting the expectant departure from the portside.
There was a murmur of confusion.
Ei turned back to her guest, slightly off balance. "Yes? What is it?"
"I would very much enjoy a walk on this fine beach. With you. Alone."
"A walk," said Ei, slightly taken aback. "On the beach. With me?"
"Yes. I would be honored if you were to join me, Archon," said Neuvillette, his hand outstretched towards the nearby expanse of sand and shoreline- as if he needed to be more specific about the beach he was referring to.
A soft murmur of vague indignation came up out of the gathered crowd of humans. Ei could sense the hackles rising in Kujou Sara's shoulders, the loyal woman always near at hand, always bristling at the vaguest hint of disrespect. But nothing was said directly in Neuvillette's presence, his stature known to be akin to that of an Archon.
Or perhaps even more than a mere Archon. Much more. A greater sum of two combined parts.
Amongst those of the state gathering of Inazumans present, perhaps only Yae Miko could also see Neuvillette as Ei could: a looming, deep chasm of power upon which the physical form of the man known as Neuvillette, standing on the dockside in his fancy blue coat, was but the deceptively still surface of an unfathomably vast river.
"The honor would be mine," said Ei. She made a negative gesture to her people. "You shall all stay here."
A very small smile from Neuvillette who, of all things, immediately took off his boots. Another murmur from the crowd, that a man would take off his shoes before the Raiden Shogun! Ei was too surprised to even contemplate if she should be offended or not. Before she could contemplate it, Neuvillette stepped quickly down the old, wooden stairs to the sandy surface of the beach itself.
He turned towards Ei, the setting sunlight giving his draconic eyes a gleaming appearance as they looked at her. He extended a hand upwards towards her and bowed gracefully, every appearance the courteous gentleman. Ei blinked down at him, again off balance.
Well, everything she did was political. It would not serve her purposes to have her people believe Neuvillette was intentionally trying to offend her with his bare feet. She gracefully stepped out of her own sandals, though her long stocking prevented herself from also being barefoot. She stepped forward towards the wooden stairs, her footwear immediately being gathered up by Sara behind her.
A murmur of humanity, but Ei paid it no heed as she reached for Neuvillette's hand. Their skin met. A thrum of power and energy surged through them both at the contact, unperceived by any but they. For Neuvillette, it reminded him of Focalors- confirming to him that this was indeed the true Electro Archon- there could be no mistake.
For Ei, it was her first connection with another being similar to herself in centuries. Long lost memories lost to the ravages of time and eternity sizzled through her consciousness. She saw sunlight through blossoms, the smells of comfort and love, and a budding warmth in her heart that set her physical form sizzling with excitement.
She very nearly lost her balance and fell, but Neuvillette gracefully helped her to the sand, the coolness of its soft texture bringing Ei back to this reality. She blinked at him, their height similar, and all the familiarity vanished. It was only the feeling of their connection that was similar- but everything else about this entity that called itself Neuvillette and which made itself look like this- was entirely alien to her.
Ei snatched back her hand, slightly faster than she intended. Neuvillette let it go.
"It has been a very long time since I was in these lands," said Neuvillette, lifting his arm slightly to coordinate their first steps together. "I've been eager for this moment since Narukami crested the horizon."
Ei stepped forward, the sand mushing into the fabric of her stocking. "You have been to Inazuma before? I was not aware of this."
"It was a very long time ago," said Neuvillette said with a small smile. "Before you and yours came to your supremacy, I believe."
"I see," said Ei.
They walked in silence for a time, gradually putting distance between themselves and the hundreds of Shogunate officials and soldiers and sailors who stared after them from the port's docks.
The world had hosted a great many entities before the Archon War. A majority of those were now dead. Ei glanced at Neuvillette as he strode beside her, his human-appearing feet scrunching into the mildly moist sand with each step, stray grains sticking wetly to his flesh. Most were dead, but not all.
"Do you find it much changed, Chief Justice?"
"Neuvillette, if it pleases you, Raiden Shogun" he said with a gracious nod. "And yes. It has changed, it seems. But also, no. There is an… essence to this land that I find very familiar. It has been so very long, but I do believe it is as the same as it ever was."
Ei was not about to let this person use her true name. By no means! But if he wanted her to use his, so be it. That was the hospitable thing to do.
"Is this experience why you decided to come here, Neuvillette?" asked Ei, bringing the conversation to a definitive point. "I wrote to you for advice, and you give me a state visit. Why?"
Neuvillette glanced at her seriously, coming to a stop in the sand. The tide was coming in. The waves were gently approaching, hissing as they ate up more and more of the beach with every passing moment. The sunlight was growing orange with the late day. Some lonely fisherman in a tiny canoe of a boat was a ways off shore, plying a pitiful net for a measly catch.
"Raiden Shogun, you wrote to me and asked me about justice and its application upon humans."
"Yes," said Ei. "And I had hoped you would write me a letter with the answer to my questions. I was surprised to get your response advising of your imminent visit."
"Your questions cannot be answered in a letter, Raiden Shogun," said Neuvillette, his hands going to his hips as he breathed deeply of the sea air before returning his gaze upon her. "There is no strict recipe for justice. No single set of true tenets for a legal system acceptable to humanity. To give you a proper answer in a letter was impossible."
Ei narrowed her eyes. "Then are my advisors who tell me of Fontaine's legal system misinformed? Is the nation of laws… not? What, then, are you Chief Justice of?"
"I am Chief Justice, yes," agreed Neuvillette. "Of a justice system made for Fontainians. Perhaps some elements of that system will work for Inazumans, but I would defer to your knowledge in that. And that is precisely why I am here: to offer you the answer you asked for: 'What is justice?' While deferring to your own knowledge of your own people."
He was talking in riddles as far as Ei was concerned. Perhaps Makoto would have understood him and-
Ei felt old sorrow and anger creeping upon her mind. She closed her eyes and took a long deep breath. If this person wished to play word games, so be it.
"Fine then," said Ei, her voice terse. "What is justice, Neuvillette."
Neuvillette tapped a finger to his chin and looked at her, the vertical slits of his eyes dancing over her form in contemplation. "Pray allow me to answer your question with questions, Raiden Archon…"
"That fisherman, bringing in the net of fish," Neuvillette raised an arm to gesture at the distantly near fisherman, the lace of his jacket's sleeve dangling. "Are his actions just?"
Ei's brows dropped and she stared long and hard at Neuvillette. Perhaps he was toying with her? Insulting her? But his expression remained expectantly natural, so Ei did not seem to find what she suspected in his expression.
"He is catching fish," said Ei, cautiously. "How could that not be just?"
"He is killing the fish."
Ei stared at Neuvillette. Was he mad? "...They are fish. What of it?"
"What if he were killing your citizens?"
"W- what is the point of an absurd question? He is not killing my citizens. He is a fisherman fishing."
"I see," said Neuvillette, his eyes focusing on her, his hand going to his chin in the body language of ponderment: "And… that's different?"
"Of course!" said Ei, beginning to feel exasperated. Had he traveled all this way to play games with her?
"How?"
How?! It was obvious! "Because… fish are just… creatures that swim around in the sea. My people adore eating them."
"Ah, so it is just that the fishman kills the fish because your people enjoy eating them."
"Yes. That's right."
"And if he were killing people, it would be unjust because your people wouldn't enjoy being killed? That's the difference? Fish may be killed because your people want to eat them, but your people cannot be killed because they do not wish to die?"
Ei didn't agree that her people were comparable with fish, at all- but the momentum of Neuvillette's questioning pressed her to answer: "Y- yes… I suppose.."
"What if that man is killing not your people, but the people of some rival. An enemy soldier, perhaps. It is a person but your people, or perhaps you, wish them dead. Is that killing just?"
"... Yes..."
"And what if you, Raiden Shogun, did not want that enemy dead, but that man there killed him anyway because he wanted that man dead, because he was an enemy. Would that be just?"
"... I- I suppose not."
"Why? The same man is dead and the same man is doing the killing. Yet it is just in the former and unjust in the latter. Do you see?"
Ei clearly did not see.
Neuvillette held out his arms. "So then, in Inazauma, that which is just is what you wish, Raiden Shogun. The death of fish for your people's pleasure is just, the life of your people who wish to live is just, the death of your enemies you want dead is just, and the life of your enemies you want still living is just."
Ei pressed her lips together and stared daggers at Neuvillette. She saw now where he had led her. Ei felt tricked and that made her feel ashamed.
"You seem unsettled, Archon. Have I offended you?"
"I am uncertain," said Ei, very obviously offended.
"I know. That is why you asked me here, is it not? You are lost, when it comes to humans. Lost as I once was. Lost in the vast ocean of difference between what you and I experience in this world and what the people experience. And you and I, perhaps are not very alike, either; but certainly we are much more akin to one another than either of us are to the human beings who fill our realms."
Neuvillette stepped to a small bit of stone, some tiny portion of a boulder buried under the beach sands.
"The first step to finding your way, Raiden Shogun, is to learn where you currently stand. Find a stable place amongst a world that seems to shift and change with every blink of our eyes. But once we know where we are- we can begin to chart a path to where you wish to be."
He pointed at Ei, still standing on the sand and trying to decide if she was annoyed, enraged, or enthralled.
Perhaps all three.
Neuvillette gestured widely with his arms, like a prophet on a tiny stone of a pedestal. "What is just is what you desire. That is where you stand: You are the Archon of this land, and your will is justice. What you do not will is injustice. Am I not correct?"
The Archon of Lightning glared at Neuvillette for a long moment. He returned the gaze, though no glare of emotion upon his face- simply a direct expectation of answer.
The sun gradually sank towards the horizon, the sea gleaming with its radiance.
Ei stepped towards Neuvillette, closing the distance between their physical forms. When she was upon him, he bowed his head slightly and stepped backward, in deference as the guest to this place, her land, her divine dominion.
And Raiden Shogun stepped onto the rock now vacated. She looked cooly down at Neuvillette, now standing slightly below her, bare feet again on sand.
"You are correct. This is where I am. Exactly."
"And where do you wish to go, Raiden Shogun Archon?" said Neuvillette.
Ei did not immediately answer, her eyes traveling from the distant fisherman, oblivious to the fact he had been the focus of divine contemplation, and she gazed out towards the setting sun. Where, indeed? For centuries, she'd focused on Eternity and tried to hold her realm back from change- but the world had simply gone on changing without her. Creation moved and changed, and it waited not for human, dragon, or gods.
It simply… went on…
Change was eternal. Eternity was change.
So the question becomes the direction, does it not?
"Recently, my people suffered greatly when my justice failed them," said Ei, her lilac eyes on the horizon. "It was old justice, from the time when the world was different than it is now."
She lowered her gaze to Neuvillette, his draconic eyes focused upon her as she stood on her single stone in breach of shifting sand.
"I want an eternally just Inazuma," said Ei. "Where the people live peacefully and free without needing my direct intervention. I believe they need a system of their own justice, and one that will change with them as the world changes around us all. A system that will outlast change by changing with the world- a system to perhaps even outlast myself."
A wave of the rising tide rolled in, washing over Neuvillette's bare feet but not touching Ei's elevated domain on top her stone. The water retreated back towards the sea, leaving no trace of their earlier footsteps- the beach suddenly pristine and virgin.
"But I do not know the path," said Ei. "I am lost. You have the right of it, Neuvillette."
Neuvillette bowed his head. "I do not know the path exactly, either. But I will be honored to help you find it, Archon."
The next wave washed in, drenching Neuvillette's pants and washing up over the side of Ei's rock, wetting her feet. The sun continued to set on them both as they turned and walked back to the port, hundreds of Raiden Shogun's loyal followers watching them silently in the distance. All the world was in expectant wonder at this new and abrupt collaboration between their goddess and this strangely dressed man from across the sea.