Even without actual, active magic, there was something deeply magical about the enthusiastic fervour everyone displayed during the shortest day as the final preparations for the longest night were made. Food was prepared, some of it special, like the hog Murray and Jack had brought back to roast for the night, others were fairly ordinary, like the flatbread to use as a combination of food and eating utensils, some decorations were prepared and a few people even decided to repurpose Christmas Carols and Winter Songs, though any mention of God or Jesus was deliberately stripped from them, or songs mentioning them were avoided entirely. If anything religious was mentioned, it was done by Luna who was leading the preparations to worship Lady Hecate, though it had been decided that the festival wouldn't be purely dedicated to the Lady.

The worship would be a distinct part of it, but more directed towards magic itself and the act of studying it, which was a large part that held the community together. It also helped that the comforts we had all come to enjoy were largely magical, comforts especially nice during the longest, and quite possibly the coldest, night of the year. Sure, the cold didn't bother me anyway, nor did the dark, but I could easily see how the other people gathered around the enchantments providing them warmth and keeping out the bitter cold of winter.

Finally, in the late afternoon, Night started to fall and the world was cast into a dim twilight. As it turned out, we were incredibly lucky and the weather was playing along with us. After a lot of snow, clouds and wind during the previous days and even earlier in the day, the sky had cleared up, giving us an incredible view of the stars above. The only thing to make the view even better would have been a full moon, but that wasn't to be, we would have to make do with the waning crescent we had high above us. Not that it took a lot from the starry view that emerged as the light was fading from the world but it might have been even better with the full moon. Or maybe not, without it, we might be able to see a few stars we'd normally not see, though I doubted anyone would notice.

Not with the sheer amount of stars in the sky and memories of the sky from before the change, when the polluting light of humanity had overshadowed the light of these countless distant stars. Looking up into the sky, I tried to compare the sky I could see here and the sky I remembered from Mundus and soon noticed that there were a few differences, as well as a few similarities. But given that I was working from memory and I hadn't taken all that much care to memorise the stars above Mundus, I couldn't be certain if the patterns I thought to see existed or were imagined, nor could I be confident that the stars I thought were the same actually were, leaving me with little confidence. Alas, if I couldn't tell anything about the two worlds that might be the same, or might be at different points in their cosmic timeline, so I soon decided to leave that part be and focused on the simple things in life, which, in this case, was the utterly amazing view I could enjoy.

A part of me was tempted to head up to the Oculus and use it to see the stars even better but I quickly decided against it, this was a celebration and I shouldn't miss it, even if I usually wasn't a real fan of parties. Luckily, the overall atmosphere was filled with a sense of awe at the natural wonder above us and a quickly growing sense of hunger, fueled by the scents coming from the wide variety of food waiting for us all.

Soon, the feast started and there was no other word to adequately describe it, it was a feast. We might have lacked some of the exotic produce we all had taken for granted just a year before and, back then, the food would have been considered fairly rustic, maybe even simple, but now, in this changed world, the food was wonderful, filling both bellies and making people comfortable.

But, even the best food couldn't last forever, or if it did, people would soon be filled to bursting and continuing to feast would be a waste, something none of us were willing to do. While we had enough food, thanks to our special abilities and magic, all of us were aware that there were numerous people out there who didn't have that advantage and would starve before spring came around, or might already have starved. A part of me regretted that, though I was aware that I couldn't help people beyond my immediate reach, this changed world didn't have the connectivity the world used to have, to say nothing of the absence of large-scale social security. The best we all could do to make sure sapient life could continue on was to make sure that the various pockets of civilisation continued to endure, hoping that a large-scale society would eventually form again.

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Or maybe multiple societies, all in contact with one another but not truly connected, due to the possible emergence of different races. However, who knew how many races would actually emerge from the various legacies? I certainly wouldn't become some sort of broodmare to pop out an entire viable race of Firn Elves and even if I had that inclination, the race would start with half-elves at best, unless I managed to find another Firn Elf, in which case the race would start with a heavy genetic bottleneck, somewhat similar to the Christian story of Adam and Eve, where an entire population would stem from incest on an insane scale. This, incidentally, was the moment at which I decided that this line of thinking would be discontinued until I had either resurrected Sigmir or found some way to decouple the entire birthing process from the biological reality that was reproduction. Maybe if I found some way to utilise that divine domain of 'The Mother' to my advantage but given the circumstances and my personal stance on the matter, I doubted I would invest any time into this particular topic.

It was a good thing that I discarded these useless musings of mine, as the celebration quickly started to reach the point at which I was responsible for the continuation. For that, I had to sink myself into the Astral River, letting the ethereal streams of power surge around, and through, me while feeling them all. On most other days of the year, that would have been fairly painful, even with the various traits and the high attributes that increased my Resilience, I was still vulnerable to Light Astral Power but today, during the Longest Night, that power was as its weakest, allowing me to do what I did.

Namely, I could channel a small part of every flow within the Astral River through myself and project the raw power into reality, something I could only accomplish thanks to my adequate affinity to all types of magic. While I couldn't see the spectacle I was creating, a myriad of different streams of primordial power were surging through the tower, I could hear the people around me sigh in awe and, maybe more importantly, I could hear Luna extoll the importance of Magic, its teachings and the Lady Hecate who could be a teacher of us all. Additionally, I could feel the different people reach out and touch the different streams of power, seeking understanding and, to a lesser degree, divine guidance. I had no idea if Lady Hecate intervened, but there were a few moments when I felt something strange. What, I had no idea but it might be something to investigate in the future if I encountered that sort of sensation again.

Other than these strange flashes of sensation, I focused on Luna's voice as a means to ground me while deep within the Astral. It was an interesting sermon, one that didn't put any stock in what the Lady Hecate could actually do for us but instead focused on the individual and their abilities to learn magic and seek guidance from a teacher, with Lady Hecate being the last teacher one should seek guidance from when all other avenues of inquiry have been sought out and found lacking. It sounded quite good, though I also realised fairly quickly that it could also be seen as some sort of hierarchy, where those with more knowledge and ability were automatically placed upon a pedestal.

Not the worst thing to do, especially compared to a myriad of other ways to determine leadership and importance, but also not the best. I personally was an excellent example of a person with a lot of advanced arcane knowledge but I also knew that I could only be considered a good leader thanks to my access to that knowledge and the resulting advantages. Otherwise, I doubted any of the people around, other than Lia and maybe Luna, would be here and learn magic, they would be back at their different homes and do their best to get over the winter.

Knowing that I had no interest in remaining in this area, I kept my thoughts to myself, letting myself sink deeper into the Astral River while keeping the show going throughout the Longest Night of the Year, enjoying just how endless its embrace felt.

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