It was when Legi reached the Ganesha familia, her final stop before she'd make her return to Hathor familia, that she was stopped by Ganesha's hand.
"Child of Hathor, is this true…" He knew it was, every single sense of his godly intuition knew it to be so, even so he, especially him, did not like this news. "I need to hear you say it as well."
"Lord Ganesha, I won't run so please take your hand from my shoulder." Legi started, struggling not to glare daggers at the god, only relaxing slightly when the hand was removed. "Yes, I was the one who found the trigger and brought it to Lady Hathor."
"Lord Ganesha what is it?" Shakti asked, taking the letter, her eyes moved along the page… Once done her expression was one that said what she was thinking, but her mouth moved to affirm those same words. "I wish I hadn't read that… Lord Ganesha, is this-"
"It's true!" Ganesha's jaw clenched with a godly fury, and for the first time his familia felt what the enraged elephant felt like. He was careful not to release too much arcanum, but it was enough to really drive home the point that he was already livid. Then he remembered… I need to calm down, doing this will only make Shurry's task down there that much harder. He calmed down, looked at Ardee… "I'm sorry Ardee. I lost my cool. I'll apologize to him for it later too."
"Huh? What do you mean?"
"Your man is fighting monsters born of the dungeon, ones specifically created in revulsion to the gods using our arcanum. So in short, my outburst made his task a little more daunting."
"In that case you should be sorry, there's no way a little blip like that would cause him much trouble."
"He is strong, but there are gods who've been using their arcanum almost constantly for the last 8 years." …
Ardee's expression grew more determined than ever before, yet she still kept her kind and joyful smile. "I'm sure he can handle it even more now. It's not like you doubled that much in such a short time. He's strong!"
"You're right!" Ganesha smiled, and looked back at Legi. "I am GANESHA! I thank you, kind child of Hathor, for bringing this information to our attention. Be safe out there, and remember, hold strong, and protect the people, let him have a home to come back to."
"Every warrior needs their rest." Legi smirked, then bowed slightly and left into the shadowy night.
"Shakti!"
"Yes!"
"Begin preparing counter measures at once. I'm giving permission to use our tamed dragons for aerial combat, and rescue if needed."
"I was going to ask if we could use them-"
"I know, now isn't the time to worry about holding back our full strength. We must use everything we have. This will not be a skirmish, it will be a full scale war within the city limits. A war against evil."
"I will make sure everyone is prepared for the possibility-"
"Please, not now, Shakti, warn them but don't tell me about it right now. I love all of my children, the thought…" Ganesha clammed up and started crying, Ardee patted his back and took him to rest for a moment.
Shakti was standing there, her vice captain Ilta- who remained silent before- standing with her…
"Ilta, don't go getting yourself killed."
"I should be saying the same for you too. We're both in a precarious situation."
"Ardee will be staying behind with Ganesha, and some others to guard him. Her spell can boost others by nearly a full level so that will help to limit other annoying issues later on. And if it comes to it she's a level 5, it would take a lot to get to her."
"That's how it should be, protecting her and the other one she eats for is of great importance."
"It may be even more important than some of our member's lives…" Shakti shook her head. "No, I need to be a captain now too."
"Hey now, just do both. No one would blame you for having a little sister complex going. Might make fun of you for it, but who wouldn't want to save their family."
"I can't imagine what Shurry's going through right now. Do you think him being gone this time is all part of the plan?"
"If anyone said no to that, I'd worry for their sanity. Even a drunken moron could see this."
"Do you think he could have stayed?"
"If Lord Ganesha let him go, then I guess it's safe to assume that whatever it is he is doing, is more important than what's going on up here."
"Let's go, we need to prepare counter measures, and inform everyone of the very real grave danger they'll be in out there. It'd be nice if there were more level 4s and 5s…"
"Hahaha! That's not gonna happen right now, sister-"
"I know, it was merely a thought."
…
Legi returned home to the Hathor familia, and simply passed out on her bed. She'd earned this rest, and no one was going to tell her no after such a long journey running full speed through the whole of the city.
Hathor smiled, and pulled the covers over Legi, and gave her a kiss on the forehead. "You did a good job today, thank you for all your hard work." She walked out and closed the door behind her. "I have a really bad feeling about all of this. Almost like we'll have a lot of familiar faces parting from this world."
Bokhoir was walking up to the upper balcony on his way to get some rest himself. "Lady Hathor, are you still worried about earlier?"
"I am, I worry my children will leave home, never to return."
"I see, it's not much, but remember, Shurry can heal just about any injury, and ailment. So as long as we come home even in a mangled mess, once he returns, he'll heal us all up good as new."
"I know, even so you're going to experience so much suffering… Should I have demanded the rights to go after Evilus before all of this?"
"How should I know? We're all just gonna hafta live with it. Besides, we're a lot stronger now than we ever were. And that's largely thanks to the time we had to actually get this strong. Had we been chasing ghosts, who's to say we'd be the same?"
Nernatti approached as well, wanting to get to her shared bed with Legi. "Besides, while we have our differences with them, they do possess at least a notable modicum of strength. And we certainly wouldn't have them around without the way things played out." She said, then smiled. "Now, I need some beauty sleep with my darling little sister."
…