"Are…..are you…..normal?" Elizabeth asked as the Owl tilted its head in the opposite direction.

"Normal?" The Owl asked confused, "You are speaking to a talking Owl who is the embodiment of Souls and Greed, how could I be normal?"

….Okay, fair.

"But….you seem normal?" Elizabeth said, "You aren't combusting in an explosion while speaking a weird combination of caps, numbers, and symbols….Nor are you speaking in a valley girl accent….or are brooding in a shadowy corner while pledging your eternal allegiance to me as your Shadow Goddess."

Elizabeth quickly enumerated the multiple issues that her other Minions had.

"To be fair Mistress, you are quite literally the reason the Shadow Dragons are even able to be somewhat stable. They would be really crazy to see you as anything but that." Aura chimed from the side, "Besides, for most summons and minions, their creators are akin to all-knowing rulers and masters. So giving them that kind of fealty and faith is normal."

"...Fair, but then what about the Fire Salamanders and the Thunderbirds?" Elizabeth fought back the allegation.

"...They got born out of Rena and yourself, you have no one else to blame for that." Aura said with a shrug, "In the meantime…this….this is quite interesting."

The Owl said nothing and merely eyed the two girls as they spoke, "As to answer your question…" Elizabeth said, clearing her throat, "Can you elaborate?"

"Do you wish to restart civilization on this planet?" The Owl asked once more, "Do you wish to restart the circle of transmigration, to once again give a chance to civilization's rise and destruction, to bring life to this planet devoid of it besides the pseudo creatures roaming it."

Pseudo creatures?

"The Fire salamanders and thunderbirds are alive," Elizabeth said, confused, "What pseudo creatures?"

"They may be alive, but while it may be so. They don't have the Light of Civilization guiding them." The Owl stated, "They merely Live. They don't thrive, they don't compete, they merely…are."

….Elizabeth was sure her Shadow dragons didn't do that, they….they had a thriving city!

"Not as bad as those Shadow entities within the dead city at the center," The Owl said, turning its head in the direction of the Shadow Haven, "At least they aren't merely pretending to live."

….Dang it!

"So?" The Owl asked again, "Do you wish to restart Civilization?"

"....Imma say a tentative yes," Elizabeth said, feeling something strain against her Core, "But! But! Hang on to that for a second."

And as she spoke, the feeling receded once more; Elizabeth tried to trace the feeling down and found the little Owl in the middle of the weird feeling; she was aware that she had mixed Greed and Soul into the creation of this one.

But…she hadn't expected for it to go for the throat from day one.

"What is that you do?" Elizabeth asked, eyeing the Entity with caution, "You got formed from Greed and Souls, but what does that mean exactly for you? The Fire salamanders manage fire, and the Thunderbirds manage lightning; what are you in charge of?"

"That is quite obvious," The Owl said preening under Elizabeth's gaze, "I rule over Souls, those that fall under your purview, my work is to ensure they return to life and to guide them, to ensure they move forward and that civilization can thrive."

"So….you protect the dwellers of Terra Nexus? And return them to life?" Elizabeth asked, that wouldn't be so bad, a secondary layer of protection would be welcomed.

"No," The Owl said shaking its head, "I ensure the progress, but that does not mean that I will protect the inhabitants, my work is for Civilization, not for the Civilizations within Terra Nexus."

Hah? Wasn't that…counterintuitive?

"Oh…..you are one of those…" Aura said, sighing, "Mistress…this….you may not like this one."

What?

"What's the issue Aura?" Elizabeth asked, "We did need someone to lighten the load from Alice and Chloe, and by what this owl is saying, she will guide those that die back into life; why wouldn't we want someone to heal those that are in danger?"

"I will not heal," The Owl stated, "That is not my purview, Life is not under my domain."

….

"But you said that you would…" Elizabeth asked confused.

"She will ensure the Souls are reincarnated, she said it herself 'To guide the souls back to life', she will not heal or protect. She will make sure those that are scheduled for death die. Take the souls scrub them clean and stick them in a new body." Aura said sighing, "It is an important part of reincarnation, not many people have the mental endurance to live several lives…I assume that is why Lady Beatrice didn't accept her past life, why Lord Sebastian picked death over life….and I always thought that was why you picked to have your memories scrubbed clean when you came to Zaanam."

Oh…

"So….you will not…" Elizabeth said turning to the Owl, the image changing from an owl coming last second to save her minions….to a reaper that arrived when people die.

"I will make sure the souls are protected, nurtured, healed and then ship them to their new life free of their mortal worries." The Owl stated, its eyes suddenly looking more ominous, from a beautiful pair of eyes who seemed almost infinite in their starry form, to ominous back voids, "I will ensure that any civilization that is a danger to the planet is destroyed, any civilization that can help the world will thrive….and any danger to Terra Nexus will be dispatched. I am The Guardian of Souls."

….Yeah….

"I see…." Elizabeth could see why Aura seemed to speak about this Owl like that, "Do you have a name?"

"You may call me Omen, for now at least, till a better name is decided" The Owl stated as its form started shifting, a second it was the same Owl standing in the tree branch, and a second later what stood in front of Elizabeth was a girl, one that looked to be the same age as her, she had brown hair that went way below her waist almost reaching her knees, wearing a normal green dress.

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The girl had a tree branch in her hand with a single flower bud on it, her eyes were green and for some reason Elizabeth….knew she had never seen this girl before, and yet, she seemed familiar.

"Omen…okay, that's…not ominous at all," Elizabeth joked…getting nothing out of either Omen or Aura

"It seems that you are not ready for civilization to restart, why have you called me here then?" The girl, Omen, asked.

"Well….you are right in that my Soul can't start a cycle of reincarnation quite yet…we don't even have a functioning planet…Aura? How much of Terra Nexus is habitable?" Elizabeth said, turning to the purple-haired maid who always had answers, no matter what.

"Around 20%? The planet is big…like….very big, but most of it is wasteland; with this new…addition, we are finally seeing some help in the atmosphere and ozone layer being stable once more." Aura answered.

"Wait a second, we didn't have atmosphere? How….how are we even alive?" Elizabeth asked taking a deep breath, she didn't notice anything…odd.

"....Mistress….Here is mostly souls and minions, we….we don't really need much to live?" Aura said confused, "And the only actual humans that have come here…aren't normal, or do you think yourself to be normal?"

"That is correct, any life that is brought would die within seconds, eventually some kind of lifeform would start blooming helping the planet move into a more stable form," Omen said nodding at Aura's statement, "But the planet seems unstable yet…"

"Right, after dying for two hundred years perhaps." Aura said in a mocking tone, "No, better to finish making the gems first….But for now, perhaps first find out what your new friend can do?"

That was…fair, Elizabeth also didn't want her minions to die meaningless for two hundred years…

She also didn't want to waste two hundred years on this, she wasn't even sure if she could live that long, she knew she would live more of course, what with her high tier and her parents living as long as they did, she was aware she had a longer lifespan…more so after she took in her inheritance.

"So….first, what can you do besides being a death reaper?" Elizabeth said, turning to Omen, "And where do you want to live? The thunderbirds will get some mountain valley, the fire salamanders will get a series of volcanos, and the Shadow Dragons… well, they got the shadow haven already."

"We do not require dwelling," Omen answered.

We?

"We?" Elizabeth asked confused, she of course knew that there would come more of Omen. It had been the same with the fire salamanders and the thunder birbs.

But…this soon?

"Ah crap…" Aura said facepalming, "They are already here aren't they."

And after saying that, Aura's eyes shone in purple light as Elizabeth felt a pulse spread around them, the pulse went as far as Elizabeth could track it, after some point it seemed to rebound in something and spread in all directions, but Elizabeth got dizzy and stopped tracking it midway.

"Fricking knew it, you already are all over the place…god I hate your kind…" Aura said groaning, "Mistress, don't worry about accomodating them."

"...We all are around yes," Omen said nodding, "And I am around. I am we, for-"

"Yes yes we got it the first time," Aura said nodding, "The Guardian of Souls, we got it."

"Aura?" Elizabeth asked, confused. Wasn't…wasn't this how the overly powerful and annoying people spoke? Was this that big of a deal?

"You either stumbled or made a very annoying kind of entity," Aura said turning to Elizabeth, "What you made is a concept, or a principle? It's hard to explain for those that aren't unmoored like we are."

Elizabeth knew Aura was unhinged, but unmoored?

"Think of it like this, Mistress," Aura said, summoning a sphere of mana atop her palm, "This is your perception of the world, where you are, and those around you. Your problems, your victories, everything."

The sphere of mana floated, and dozen of mini dots started appearing atop the sphere.

"Then there are people like me, like your grandmother, your parents, gods, administrators, etc.," Then, surrounding that sphere, a new sphere formed, "We exist in the sphere and outside the sphere, we interact with both, in and out. We are what exists to regulate stuff within the worlds we are. I had thought this stupid Owl was like me."

…And care to elaborate on what you are, Aura? Because Elizabeth wasn't dumb enough to not notice how casually this purple-haired maid had put herself amid Gods while she had put Elizabeth amidst the mortals.

"Then we have….Concepts," Aura said, making something akin to a table and placing the double-layered sphere atop it, "Things that exist outside either sphere but that can interact with everything in the spheres, they are…dangerous things. Because they can twist with everything."

"And yet are more limited than anything else," Omen spoke as a small owl materialized within the projection of Aura, "We are bound by what we do; I can see and reap the soul of anyone whose time has ended….but this only applies to the world I am bound to."

"Wait…so what about reincarnators? What about people like Akira? From what you say, then someone like Omen should have killed him when I was fighting him…" Elizabeth said, remembering how Akira just didn't seem to…want to die.

"Not under my purview." Omen said, shrugging, "If I had to guess, he had a way to survive or the blessing of a God or Administrator."

"Reincarnators, Transmigrators, Regresors, Returnees…" Aura said, naming a few of the titles that Mother had spoken with disgust, "Those are people that are usually not bound…they aren't quite outside of the sphere but are closer to the table."

"They are those that are blessed by people worse than those your Maiden of Space spoke of," Omen said, nodding, "We may want to reap them, but we aren't capable because they are blessed."

"What can be worse than entities that can literally walk out of the confines of what we are capable of perceiving it…hell, I don't think any of my skills could perceive half of what Aura speaks here!" Elizabeth said somewhat….worried, she really didn't want to go against these types of entities.

"Storytellers," Omen said with gravitas that betrayed what she was speaking of.

"...I beg your pardon?" Elizabeth asked, confused. Weren't they speaking about the end-of-the-world scenarios?

"Storysmiths, wordsmiths, authors, artists, singers….Bards….Directors…." Omen started describing the most common and mundane of works to ever be, "People that you find in any corner, when a kid starts speaking about a dream they saw, people who weave words and make a narrative."

"....any normal people?" Elizabeth asked, confused, "Are you telling me that my worst type of enemy is that? The drunk in a bar who starts speaking about how he was abducted by aliens and probed?"

"No Mistress," Aura said shaking her head, "Omen is speaking in the wrong order, think of it like this…Imagine you one day decide to start writing a story, the tale of a version of yourself that was born in a more fun world, a world where you had power and might."

Elizabeth could get behind that, she would probably do it one day, write about a version of herself that had managed to laze around and rot in a corner of her room while being pampered by Rossie and Rena…

But how was she supposed to convince people that Rossie and Rena met her if she never left the room? Ah, who cares, it was her story to write.

"Yes I can imagine the appeal," Elizabeth said nodding.

"Well, now imagine you start posting it online, send it to a publisher, or get a friend artist to turn it into a comic," Aura continued with the weird line of thought, "Picture it earned some degree of popularity, just enough to get one or two comments here and there."

"I am beautiful, charismatic and powerful, why would I only get two or three comments about a tale of myself?" Elizabeth asked miffed about that.

"It doesn't matter!" Aura said exasperated, "That is not the point, imagine this for the sake of the argument."

"Okay okay!" Elizabeth said raising her hands in defeat, "Jeez…"

"Well, now…one of the commenters wants something to happen in the story, and you are enjoying and happy for people to like what you write…so you compel and add that change to the story," Aura said summoning a new projection, in this the world suddenly glitched for a second and was changed, Aura had added a new color to make the change noticeable, "And then you roll with that change, your world, your story, changed."

".....yes?" Elizabeth said, "What's the issue? It's only a story."

"Not for the people within the story," Aura said turning to stare at something in the space between them, Elizabeth….wasn't comfortable thinking about that space for some reason, "For the people within the story, their world changed forever, and while most didn't notice…there are those like us who can….see those changes."

"Bearers of concepts," Omen said, "Just as the Maiden of Space is aware of the changes to space, those that bear other concepts…Entities, if you will, are aware and can sometimes speak to those on the other side."

"Wait wait wait a second," Elizabeth said raising her right hand in a stop motion, "So…you mean to say that we are what, a tale? A comic? A series? A movie? A…the delusions of another version of myself?"

"Hard to tell, while it is the example I gave you, there is no guarantee of knowing. It could very well be just a bored God playing around with his food." Aura said, shrugging, "There is no way of knowing for sure. What I can guarantee you is that there is at least one Entity that has messed up with Zaanam, and at least one another one on the same level as Omen here."

"...that blonde asshole…" Elizabeth quickly thought of the reason why everything was wrong in her life.

"Actually, the sister," Aura said from the side, "That one probably was or is somewhat in the level of being able to interact with the table."

Alexa was?

But….

"But she was that cute…" Elizabeth couldn't say it in any other way, "How could someone that cute be dangerous?"

"See?" Aura said grinning, "You found a little girl, one that was harmless living in your Soul, as if it was nothing. Merely playing around….and you find no issue?"

"But….she was….wasn't Alexanders the one who brought her along?" Elizabeth asked confused.

"I wouldn't know, I wasn't around." Aura said shaking her head, "I know of her, because I saw the rest of her work, how she opened a space into the original dwelling place of Terra Nexus. And trust me, that one, that one was dangerous."

"....Yeah….but…no…hmm…." Elizabeth couldn't see it, not in Alexa, she knew Alexa was…important, but….something made Elizabeth stop from seeing Alexa as someone dangerous, she couldn't for the life in her think of her as anything but cute…and that….that was worrying.

"It matters not," Omen said clapping and getting her attention, "This was merely an example of the level of powers and what my abilities are, and why I will not be able to provide any help whatsoever in combat."

What?

This….wasn't this girl at the same level as someone capable of allegedly rewriting reality?

"That is how they are," Aura said from the side sighing, "They are broken in power and might, but so constrained… What can you actually do?"

"....I can ferry the souls of those that die within your Domain," Omen said to Elizabeth, "Ensure they reincarnate in a viable vessel and give blessings to accelerate the birth of civilizations."

"Nothing of value then," Aura said sighing, "I mean, they are useful things, but not for what we want to do right now."

"It doesn't matter, Aura," Elizabeth said, shaking her head, "I didn't fuse those two gems to get a solution to our current issues; if that was the case, I would have used The Space Gem instead."

"...True," Aura said nodding.

"The important bit is something else," Elizabeth took a deep breath and focused on her Soul, in terra nexus, in the Domain she had, "Is it sturdier now?"

"Yes….?" Aura answered confused about it, "Of course it is, Terra Nexus and your Domain are more stable now that you have an actual reincarnation cycle set up."

"Sturdier enough to bring Amelia back home?" Elizabeth asked, "Sturdier enough to let us link with Amelia and the dimensional node?"

"Oh…." Aura said as she looked as if someone had said something important, "Right…..That was why you did the whole thing….we kind of went meta here for a second."

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