"No! Leave me alone, you bastard!"
"Please stop insulting me! I'm trying to help you get off Kyle's back as safely as I can!"
"Let go of me!"
Trying to get a hold of Valentine, the knight's face burned with frustration; his heavy armour did not help calm down the boy in the slightest.
The other knights stole glances at him, while their Wyverns stayed silent, no longer letting out their intimidating wails.
As he reached for Valentine's arm, the boy slapped it away, climbing higher onto Kyle's back, which had smoother and softer scales.
"Sir Valentine, you need to get off Kyle immediately! If you do not comply, then both of us will be punished!"
"I can't, I just can't do it!" Clinging to the scales, Valentine looked around at the rows of Wyverns around him.
What the hell is this place... I can't do this anymore, just take me back!
No normal person would simply accept the existence of these hideous beasts, especially not someone who had yet to reach adulthood. He could accept seeing one wyvern, or maybe even two if he forced himself to. But when the numbers reached dozens, almost passing a hundred, he felt his stomach turn at the sight.
Despite his protests, the knight, using a little bit of his strength, easily overpowered Valentine and took hold of his neck, holding him firmly in place in case he wanted to run away.
As he got off his Wyvern's back, with the pitiful boy below clawing at his stainless armour, a pair of knights who were dressed similarly to him - A short woman with blonde hair tied in a bun and a taller guy with a buzzcut - came over and looked at the two with pity.
"I see you had it pretty rough as well, Noah."
"Heya, Noah!"
Without paying attention to Valentine, he looked up at his colleagues with a forced smile.
"It's nice to see you guys. I hope I'm not causing any ruckus here with my guest."
"Don't ya worry about it." The woman pointed at the countless other knights who were struggling to calm their passengers. "Even Miss Captain couldn't handle her catch's attitude; she smacked him on the head so hard that I heard it all the way over here!"
"Oh Victoria... Then what about yours?"
"Well, I had an idea to put mine to sleep while this guy over here could not stop his one from passing out."
With a playful look on her face, she leaned down and met Valentine's gaze. Her soft eyes and rosy lips made his heart skip a beat, forgetting where he was in the first place.
"Your catch is better than I expected. It's not as bad as it sounded when I heard you were going to the Black Forest." Her finger brushed against the boy's skin, making him flush red.
With an awkward look, Noah let go of Valentine, dropping him face-first on the artificial grass with a muffled thud.
He glanced down at him before turning back to his colleagues.
"Yeah, he has quite the potential, though I'm not sure what happened for him to end up in such a state."
"Whatdya mean?"
"I'm unsure of it myself, but when I found him, he already knew about prayers and was familiar with her flames."
"Ah who cares! It just means he can learn faster!"
"I guess if you look at it that way, it does sound better..."
However, while they were talking to each other, a buzzing sound echoed across the landing site, forcing all knights, wyverns, and even some embers to look up at the giant sun that manifested above the field, throwing tongues of golden flames in all directions.
From it, a voice that sounded like pulling strings on a tiny harp resounded throughout everyone.
"Welcome, young embers!"
Valentine looked up in a daze, covering his eyes from the bright light it emitted everywhere. It looked as if the world around them was engulfed in gold brilliance, not letting go of a single shadow within it.
So bright...
Listening closely to its words, he stood up next to Noah, who spared him a glance while watching the sun with his arms crossed.
"Have you finally regained your senses, Sir Valentine?"
"Shut up, just explain to me what that thing is."
With a sigh, Noah went along with the boy's arrogant attitude. It seemed that even after this much, there was no change in his rude behaviour.
"We have arrived at the Cradle, and now, to accept every lost believer such as you, we will have to sort believers by their blessings and what they have lost in exchange for accepting them. You yourself have gained something, but because your memories were taken as a price, it will be harder to master them."
"I didn't lose any memories, though," Valentine mumbled under his nose, remembering similar words coming from Sunday.
It's strange; they keep telling me that I lost them, but I remember every moment of my life as if it happened yesterday.
There was nothing wrong with his mind except for the strange occurrences where he could not refuse certain actions, but that was all he had discovered.
Furrowing his brow, Noah gave him a look of sympathy.
"Even if you think you haven't lost anything, there's always a chance you did. Perhaps it has something else to do with your mind. I heard there were cases of people losing their emotions or humanity."
"...What do you mean by humanity?"
"As in, they do not possess any humane aspects. Though after seeing your actions, I suspect you lost more than that."
Bastard.
Grinding his teeth, he turned back at the brilliant sun that did not hurt to look at despite being dozens of times brighter than the sun he was used to seeing.
This world just keeps getting stranger and stranger, though I can see some patterns.
As he put his hands in his pockets, the sun spoke again, its voice beaming brighter and warmer than the sphere of flames itself.
"Young embers who have fallen from her sacred path, do not be scared! For my name is Aurora, the Knight Marshal of Sky Rose Knights!"
Valentine turned to Noah, eyeing him.
"Knights?" He asked. "Seriously?"
Noah raised his brow, smiling. "Why? Do you have some issues with us?"
"If they all act like you, then I guess so."
The young knight chuckled, his heavy armour glistening under the makeshift sun.
"Do not worry, I am an exception."
Sure buddy.
With a grunt, Valentine looked back at the bright sun with half-closed eyes.
"You all may have been lost and scared when a knight riding a glorious wyvern appeared out of nowhere and brought you here, into this Cradle."
Glorious? Those things look worse than lizards.
"For those who have not yet been informed, at some point in time, you may have received an invitation from a member of the church. It could have been a wandering Priest, a retired baptist, or, in some cases, a mountain hermit who chose to live in seclusion."
That sounds about right.
Valentine nodded, finding it to be true after receiving his invitation out of nowhere from Sunday, who lived in a forest.
"Those invitations are not mere letters, as you probably figured out after meeting your knights; they are, in fact, a mark that was placed upon you to one day be taken here."
"You lot, who were blessed by our Goddess Victoria, have been chosen to follow her will and return to the path of shedding her tears."
A cold chill ran down his spine as the sun started to change.
"In this cradle, we will teach you how to have faith. Nothing will be forced, and you will always be free to leave as long as we find your reasoning to be logical. We are not monsters, but devout believers who only move according to her will!"
"Our faith is to be shared with others, not kept to ourselves."
"So, to celebrate this blessing, we chose to give you a chance to prove yourself worthy of it."
Its tone shifted suddenly, having gained a clearer form of a woman in her forties, standing right under the sun that hung above the ground.
She, dressed in light plated armour that reflected sunlight, looked like a semi-goddess herself. With lustrous hair that was tied neatly in a long ponytail and a gentle smile that reached everyone present.
Her hand rose weakly before her, followed by the sun that moved according to her will, dropping on the pale grass and swallowing it whole.
"Do not fret, little ones. For your goddess will be with you."
Countless screams echoed from within the golden glow; dozens of children were tearing off their burning skin, crying at the crazed flames that were slowly forcibly stuffed inside their bodies, melting their souls from within.
The knights, untouched by the heat, took hold of those children, carrying them in their hands across the burned grass with somber looks on their faces.
A choir of pained moans and broken will was engulfed in pallid flames, escaping just barely to ask the world for help.
But no one came rushing to help.
It was normal.
And no one could refuse something that had been established centuries ago, moreover a tradition that could bring disaster for new generations.
With a fanatical smile on her face, Aurora closed her eyes, taking in the smell of charred flesh with her whole being, even going as far as taking off her already light armor and turning it into charcoal before also fading into grains of ash.
Dressed in light clothes, she basked in it with a satisfied expression.
"Do not blame me, poor children."
She spoke quietly to herself.
"Blame yourself... for not accepting her sacred light."