A Villainess Should Be Strong

Her supposed past lover bore the same name as Aleksei Villarante, a man she met after coming to Alfheim, but she didn't think much of it. It was only a repeated name, and the name Aleksei wasn't exactly rare. It was a great name, and contained a rather favorable meaning: Defender.

"Sister, you might have not noticed anything off because your memories about him are still trapped.. he, too, isn't aware of the things he is meant to do," Heine proclaimed.

"By that, you mean..?" Estelle frowned heavily, getting even more confused with each sentence that came out of Heine's mouth.

"The Aleksei that you have been traveling with recently is a fragment of your past lover, but he is confused. His divine soul was incomplete, because he got it from you. Compared to him, I have a complete divine soul because I am a true deity.. Although that doesn't exempt me from getting repercussions as well. Traveling down here from the upper realms, even as a deity is harsh. It takes a toll on our souls because this place lacks divine power, so our souls don't necessarily bade well here. You have been conditioned by the previous world, and your divinity lies elsewhere, so even if you contain the strongest deity's soul, you are fine. However, he is much different from us. His repercussions came in the form of memory loss, and his thoughts were also wired differently due to the shock his soul received when he came down here," Heine continued his speech on and on, making Estelle dizzy at his endless stream of words.

Estelle stretched her palm in front of her, acting as a gesture for Heine to pause.

"...Stop. Explain to me in an orderly manner, don't just say these statements out of nowhere. Explain from the start, what happened from your point of view. Of course, whether or not I will truly believe in them will have to depend on myself," Estelle warned, halting the man's speech. "I could buy your story, but... Haah, explain first, I'll decide later,"

"Alright, sister," Heine gave a troubled smile as he thought that the girl was finally giving him a chance.

"First of all, stop calling me sister. I am still unwilling to recognize Estraea as the current me," Estelle said, stopping him before his speech even started.

"Then.. Estelle," Heine looked dejected as he said his words. He was forbidden from his right to address Estelle as his older sister even though he fully knew that the Goddess laid within her.

"Wait, no. Before you start, there's one more thing.. did you harm Liviera and Frey?" Estelle looked at the man with piercing eyes, scrutinizing his every gesture.

"No. They were knocked unconscious by my underlings, but I have made sure that they wouldn't be harmed. My purpose was to draw you here, sister- I mean, Estelle. I have no enmity with them as of now," Heine explained.

"Knocked out.. huh," Estelle heaved a sigh of relief. However, Heine's words actually contained a frightening fact. The fact that the enemies they faced were probably from 'Noir', and Heine declaring that he really was Noir's leader.

However, this fact wasn't as important as recalling her incomplete past. Back when she was trapped inside the space, she only had the chance to glimpse into the beginning of everything's creation in a summary form. The ending was also rapidly brushed upon, with her only receiving vague information that didn't shine a bright light into the truth.

Now that she was presented with a willing Heine to tell her the complete story, she was willing to listen.

She knew that Heine had a soft spot for her because she was the vessel for his beloved sister. That way, Estelle knew that she could try to make use of this fact and play it around to her benefits.

"Then, start now," Estelle manifested a chair, sitting down comfortably and crossing both her arms and legs. Her eyes stared at up at Heine, who was left standing awkwardly as he began to tell the stories.

"After you recalled your memory.. what was the last clear memory you retained?" Heine asked, wanting to get a handle of where he should start from.

"The world's creation. And the Surface's creation. After that, everything was glimpsed over, I don't have a clear understanding of it,"

"..Oh. Then, I will start after the Surface's development," Heine nodded. "To tel you the truth, the Surface in question is not the current world we are standing in right now, even if they bear the same name and look extremely similar. This.. is a difficult matter that we have managed to nurture. The real Surface.. the original piece lays in a place you've visited before. Now, it is nothing but a barren wasteland,"

Estelle thought for a moment. Her eyes widened when she finally came across a candidate that suited the conditions. There was another realm that had the exact same geographical position as this realm. She spent years inside that realm, so she would be familiar with it.

It was Arayle's domain, the Underworld.

"Don't tell me.. the Underworld?" Estelle's mouth gaped in shock.

"Yes. The Surface that you remember, it is what the Underworld looked like when it was first created. The current Surface is just an exact replica of that place, they are different realms and dimensions. This is where you have the first misconception, and why you wouldn't be able to finish your journey on your own. Your story.. about the Elven people's Moon Goddess, it actually happened inside the Underworld, tons of years earlier. The stories in this world.. like I said, they are replicated from the original realm, so the current Alfheim's Moon Goddess isn't you, but holds a similarity with you. The implantations were created using your divine fragment, so your traces is left here,"

"You were supposed to travel around this world with the characters we have prepared for you. The players that would aid you. Each country holds different purposes, but ultimately, this entire realm was created for you,"

"That was why, Aleksei was put into an Elven body. Your past lover, he was supposed to be one of the aids to set up for your arrival. But when we first planned to go down to this realm, we didn't notice that it was an incomplete realm. Thus, even if we successfully went through, negative things would happen to us. We wouldn't be the exact same state as we were in the upper realms. As for me, I only lost my awareness up until you arrived to the world. Before that, I was truly Heine, who lived as a Fae King. Only after I was called by the Spirit Tree multiple times and seen some things connect did I catch on to who I am. This is why.. your assumption that I planned everything down to our first meeting is false, Estelle," Heine put up a saddened expression as he continued.

"The current Aleksei Villarante holds no memory of his divinity. However, he too must've realized that he is different. That he holds a connection with Alfheim's signature energy. It is precisely because.. fragments of your divinity will obviously resonate with Alfheim, which is the nation directly connected with you,"

"I didn't understand anything about the upper realm at first. I lived for hundreds of years as Astarte, so when his memories were introduced to me, it happened in dreams. The revelations were made bit by bit, and with every session, I felt like I was losing my mind,"

"Then, I began to see the world from Astarte's point of view. It was a gradual change, so I struggled a lot. Between the two personalities.. no, three lifetimes. I was sent down to aid your life as Kirisaki Reina. I existed as Yuuma,"

Estelle's eyes flickered with astonishment as she took a deep breath in to compose herself. Her breath was shaky as he remembered the man's constant aid from the very start. "Continue," she said.

"We created two realms to launch this project, to rescue you and put you back together. Into your preserved divine body that lays beside the Absolute right now, chained to the Origin Tree. One of them was this world, which you now know as the Surface, and the other was your past world, Kirisaki Reina's world. They were both created to sustain you. To put it into simple terms, Reina was your emergency vessel as your soul was too weak to handle even the slightest bit of magic energy. Through living as Reina, your soul began to stabilize and could finally pass on to Estelle, your second vessel. Right now, your state is meant to recover your true worth, as a Goddess of Creation,"

"But several things went wrong. It went outside of our calculations. As Reina, you were plotted on by Hikari. As Estelle, you encountered trials that weren't supposed to happen," Heine's expression twisted as he spoke.