Blue light flickered across the analyzer in the starship cabin late at night. Estelle held a strand of Luna's hair – left on a wooden desk that morning as she helped tidy teaching materials. The DNA sequence on the screen showed nothing distinguishing her from any other Wangshu native. No trace of an Aeon's shard. No Stellaron corruption.
*"Just an ordinary girl."*
He murmured the words, yet carefully sealed the strand inside a metal case.
The cabin door screeched open. Dark golden stardust seeped through the gap, coalescing into the spectral form of Idrilla.
"My knight,"*the phantom's voice sighed, gentle as moonlight. Her ethereal fingers traced the crack in his Polaris Mirror Shield. "Why guard this false peace? Release the Stellaron. Use it to reshape Beauty. You could become greater than I."
Estelle lifted his head slightly, his gaze sharp enough to pierce the illusion.
"You are not her. The true Idrilla never defined Beauty with 'greatness'."
"Are the Knight's tenets heavier than the bones of an Aeon?" The Stellaron phantom sighed. Golden dust formed fingers that brushed Estelle's cheek. The touch was cold and viscous, like a dead slug.
A vision flooded Estelle's mind: The village ablaze. Crystalline spikes erupting from Luna's abdomen. Villagers wailing in pools of blood.
Estelle frowned faintly but did not rise. Silver fire ignited in the depths of his pupils, fueled by the power of Beauty.
"Polaris, Purify!"
Instantly, the cabin expanded into a boundless sanctuary. Countless shield reflections spun like stellar rings, their mirrored surfaces flashing with the glory of civilizations the Knights had guarded through the ages. The Stellaron phantom dissolved in the torrent of Beauty.
The Mirror Shield suddenly levitated. From its crack shot countless threads of light, lashing outward like vines. A muffled tremor came from the direction of the altar. The Stellaron's pulse was forcibly suppressed. The crimson thread coiled on the shield's surface recoiled into a tight, quivering ball.
"Tricks like these are unworthy of shaking the Knight's oath." As Estelle recalled the Polaris Mirror Shield, its crack seemed… fainter.
He pulled up the starship log. Under 'Pending Investigation', he added a new line: *Stellaron exhibits psychic influence. Beware mental contamination.
He immediately reinforced the Stellaron's seals to shield the villagers. Yet, the phantom's words echoed: "Release the Stellaron. Use it to reshape Beauty." He couldn't help but dwell on them for a moment longer.
*Clang— Clang—*
The school bell was a Stellaron Lily stalk striking a copper basin.
Each dawn, Estelle stood at the classroom door, watching children arrive with dew on their boots. Pigtailed Lena was always first, clutching Doctor Kava's freshly bound textbooks.
Quiet Toby hid in the back row, yet his eyes would lift when Estelle spoke of constellations. Karun, Anvil's boisterous son, swung his wooden sword with gusto, but would silently lay down straw when Lena stumbled on a pebble.
"Arithmetic isn't just for sums. It's to understand the rhythm of the stellar rails," Estelle drew the intersecting paths of Wangshu's twin moons on the blackboard. "Like our calendar. Every fifteen years, the moons converge. Not an end, but the start of a new cycle."
He deliberately avoided war, teaching the children to block thrown pebbles with their wooden swords, not to strike first.
When little Karun asked, "What if the bad guys are too strong?"
Estelle didn't answer. Instead, he lifted the Polaris Mirror Shield. Sunlight streamed through its crack, casting the shadow of a Stellaron Lily onto the ground.
Afternoons on the playground often carried Luna's song.
She sat beneath the old locust tree, a simple lyre made from Stellaron Lily stalks resting on her knees, its strings salvaged from hunters' discarded bowstrings.
As tree shadows slid over slate desks, Luna's melody drifted through the window.
Children paused their play. A breeze stirred the Knight's insignia on Estelle's shoulder. From its crack flowed dust-like motes of light, dancing in resonance with the music like swirling stardust.
"Stellaron Lilies fade / Petals fall into the fire / Not an end, no / But a letter to the stars // Twin moons set / Tides wash over the shore / Not goodbye, no / But fish bearing moonlight / Swimming to a new bay…"
Lena hummed along. Toby arranged pebbles into star patterns. Karun tapped the rhythm on his desk.
Leaning by the window, the gentle melody pulled Estelle back to the days before Idrilla vanished, when he was just a raw recruit trailing the old Grandmaster.
Luna's voice, like honey steeped in moonlight, slipped through Estelle's ears into deep memory. The firelit nights of his youth sharpened suddenly – pine resin popping in flames, throwing the Knights' shadows, huge and flickering, onto tent walls.
Moryas always perched on the thickest log, strumming an old guitar whose strings were frayed at the edges. His calloused fingertips brushed the neck, raising a soft metallic hum.
He sang tunes gathered on their travels – dockworkers' shanties, starship engineers' repair chants. At playful parts, he'd hit a wrong chord on purpose, making the young Knights around the fire roar with laughter.
The old Grandmaster tipped a wineskin down his throat, droplets glistening on his silver beard. Thumping his chest, he'd boast of single-handedly destroying an entire Antimatter Legion unit – though Kay always muttered, "It was three of us, actually." No one minded, not even the strictest recruit, who'd listen wide-eyed, their gaze reflecting the fire like polished insignia.
Argenti stood always where the fire blazed brightest, his armor gleaming. He clutched a worn, dog-eared book of poetry.
He recited verses praising Idrilla like they were battle cries, his voice rising dramatically.
Passing merchants he'd stop to hear him often mistook him for a fanatic – until they saw him secretly slipping them his own rations, then muttering, red-faced, "Beauty must be shared."
Estelle would chuckle then, slowly turning a stick of spun sugar over the flames. The sugar melted to amber, its caramel scent mingling with pine smoke. Just as a crisp shell formed, Moryas's hand would dart out and snatch it.
"Hot! Hot!" Moryas hissed, juggling the stick. The Grandmaster would already be there, hooking another stick away with his scabbard. Estelle would shake his head, smiling ruefully, pull another puff of sugar, and wrap it around a fresh stick. He'd spin it lazily between his fingers.
Flames licked the sugar, casting dancing light spots on his hand.
He wasn't sure if he even liked spun sugar that much. But watching Moryas and the Grandmaster squabble, seeing the hopeful eyes of the young Knights waiting for a share, a thrumming warmth would spread from his palm up the stick – more comforting than any sweetness.
Only when the last stick was "requisitioned" by Argenti for some passing starfarer would Estelle brush the sugar dust from his hands.
As the fire dwindled, he'd toss on a pine log. Watching sparks spiral upward with the smoke into the star field, he'd think that perhaps this was Beauty – not doctrine from a book, but the crisp shell of burnt sugar, the laughter over stolen treats, Argenti's fiercely earnest profile as he read, everyone crowded around the same fire, their very breath smelling of the same sweet, shared warmth.