12 |The Forbidden Third Option|

Destiny holds within it something mortals cannot comprehend thus we could never set our own. We live to die and that is all life amounts to for those who are fallible. There are only rare deviations where someone can defy death, this however only occurs within some with a great fate. This fate would essentially destroy any mundane destiny and crush the cycle of life and death.

The role fate plays is as far as mortals have achieved in understanding the greater powers of foreknowledge. However, the gods are different from mortals, they instead can see beyond the unknown. The sea of death and garden of life is open for their manipulation, but, they rarely do it. It is rumored changing life and death would have adverse effects on the four gods. It was agreed upon that the life cycle was to never be touched without a very significant reason.

Jian Han, in this case, is a very unfortunate person, the sea god had decided to exact his defiance through him, the rules would soon be broken.

"Ren are we ready?"

Liliana returned to the room with a line of six guards behind her. Each pair of guards stood with a large barrel between them and a cyan light seemed to be bursting from every slit and crack. She signaled them to line up on the edges of the empty pond.

"Yes, you guys can begin."

Ren gave her consent as she looked over at the guards now at each edge. In the time it took them to come back from retrieving the holy water, she had entered the pool and reduced Jian's clothing to ashes, before inscribing a rune on his chest. The symbol was not similar to the those on the edges, but, if anyone present was familiar with the ancient encryption language, they would know that the rune allowed for absorption.

She turned and stood next to Liliana who had now moved from in front of the doorway to before the pond to get a better view.

"Begin!", they said in unison. Each pair of guards grabbed their barrel and one of the two popped the tops off. The second tilted their containers toward the empty pond and as if they timed it, the material in each poured out all at once. Small stones flowing into the pool and a harsh yet consistent sound of them colliding filled the room and did not stop for a very lengthy amount of time.

The stones were bright blue in color and held a black undertone to them. The pond bed was soon completely filled with the small luminous stones and Jian's body could no longer be seen anywhere.

"Well, what are you girls waiting for? You can bring the barrels back and report back to your stations. Cardinal Ren and I have it from here."

With this command, the troop of guards exited the room in an orderly fashion before shutting the door behind them.

Ren started a low chant and the stones seemed to respond to her voice. On the surfaces of each, a symbol similar to overlapping tridents appeared. The light blue glow from each stone intensified until they were a pronounced cyan color.

Space and time above the pond began to ripple and capture the light, then condensed it into an unknown substance that poured back onto the stack of solid stones. The new liquid was as black as ink and absorbed all other light that touched it. The borders of the pool were soon lined and a few seconds later the substance gushed forth from the ripples.

Hours later the stones were no longer present. Instead, a tranquil surface of black liquid remained. Jian's body remained at the bottom and did not float up.

"This still unnerves the shit out of me every time I see it you know. "

" Yes, for once I will agree with you Liliana, but, this is a task from her holiness just like all the others."

Ren nodded in agreement. Her eyes never left the pond from the moment the stones started to convert until they were done. She rarely got to use her encryption knowledge because it was commonly used for only rituals on the continent. Having only seen battle, there was no need to be too familiar with it. However, her holiness gave them the task of doing rituals like this recently so she had to learn.

Fully well knowing, Lily couldn't be asked to learn anything beyond smashing, burning, and gossip.