Your Birthday Present: It's Me
In the end, the one that won was one of the Spectres that weren't considered to be part of Alec's 'inner circle', so to speak, but it made the Spectre beam, nonetheless.
Alec felt very indulgent that day, considering that his Spectres were all acting like this for his birthday. The Spectres were all so happy that he really couldn't bear to kick them out of the mood.
The System was quietly sitting by the side with a piece of cake, eating it as his Spectres were messing around.
He thought about Elysia, who was missing the party, and his mother, who was still gone somewhere he didn't even know where to start finding. Was he going to comb the entire planet to look for the place where it would lead to another realm?
His mother had gone to find his father, apparently, and it filled him with various conflicting thoughts.
His mother was a strong person, and she wasn't the type of person that would allow external factors to get in her way.