At Freya familia's home, Freya sat on her throne with her familia presented before her. There was a mix of emotions, but among all of those emotions was the regret of failure… It was clearly the strongest one. There were many who held a great amount of anger towards Ottar for his failure, blaming him silently in their heads because he was the strongest, he should have won, he had to win… if everyone else broke, he wasn't supposed to… it didn't help that it was his fault they got involved in the war game to begin with.
Freya could see all of this going on, though she felt that her familia was about to be disbanded, she also couldn't help but feel good about the freeing feeling this would give her, to just live as Syr. So, she decided to end this moment of bickering, raising her hand in a smooth, warm gesture which grabbed the attention of everyone.
"Ottar, I watched your fight with the Scarlet Harnel." Freya began, swirling what might have been the last glass of expensive wine she may ever drink in the lower world. "You did your best, I hadn't expected Astraea's girls to have grown so much in such a short period of time. So, I don't blame you for this loss."
"My Lady… I'm the one who wanted to fight them…"
"And I allowed it. It is my responsibility… that and…" Freya had a small tear run the length of her cheek. "I love all of you too much to blame any of you for this loss."
What followed was a course of people professing their love for their goddess. "Lady Freya, I love you!"
"Tomorrow, Ottar, you and Hedin will accompany me to the Denatus chamber to hear the demands of the victors. Come see me later…"
"Yes, Lady Freya."
…
In the Loki familia, there was a rather different sight. All of the members that had been part of the attack that killed Alraj, were currently standing before the rest of the familia, they had just finished explaining what they had done in the past… the weight of this realization was not lost on anyone who'd seen what the Origin Wolf could do.
The newer members were all stunned into silence. Each and every one of them had seen the effects Origin Wolf had on the city. Some of these new members had actually been thinking about joining other familias before they'd been roped into the Loki familia. Others had received fatal injuries during the war against Evilus, they were actively dying due to the massive shortage of elixir, but when the moonlight hit their forms, they were right as rain.
Many of the younger members of the Loki familia only held respect for the Zeus, and Hera familias. That respect immediately extended towards Origin Wolf after the Evilus war. So now… Everyone felt off… One beast person had to speak up, the animal instincts he had were so strong, that respect for Origin Wolf would never go away… even so, he had to ask something else.
"Finn, tell us why you did it!"
Finn looked at the beast person. "Orba, I already told you, we wanted to be the strongest familia, so we attacked them. There was nothing more, and nothing less than that. We just got lucky that the guild at the time needed someone to stand up after the news of Zeus and Hera familias' failure."
Orba's eyes went wide with fury, and confusion. "Then why!? Why did you seek all of us out!? You roped us into your mess."
"I had a feeling Origin Wolf wouldn't bother attacking you. Even now it seems he can be counted on to not harm the innocent."
"You make me sick, Finn. You're a murderer." Orba, snarled, he wasn't fighting, he was warning. Something feels different about me… I feel like I might stand a chance even if I'd need a little help. He turned and started leaving, stopping when some of his fellow familia members looked at him, a look that indicated they knew exactly what they were all thinking.
""Finn, and all of you, you're all just as bad as Evilus.""
Orba, along with basically every member of the Loki familia they'd ever obtained in the last 8 years left the grand hall. The only member remaining was a young Ais currently in a bear hugging snuggle by Loki. Though, she did eventually manage to wrangle free of Loki's hold.
"Don't go Aissiepoo!" Loki cried out as Ais ran away to follow the others. Loki continued to cry on the floor for a moment until she shuffled herself to her room, crying herself to sleep. The executives were awake all night…
"You think we're gonna see the day after tomorrow?"
"I doubt it."
"Even if we did, not like it matters much, right? Our familia has crumbled. Even some of the members that were there that day, have turned on us, the traitors."
"Shut up, they're just trying to save themselves. We've been doing the same thing for years now. It's just our turn to face the music…"
"Finn… you look more upset than usual."
"That's because I am, Riveria, Gareth." Finn said, clicking his tongue. "Do you remember what he said that day, 8 years ago?"
"He called us Evilus. And we spent the last 8 years trying to prove otherwise." Riveria answered.
"Aye, and now we're called that again, this time after what happened to the city from Evilus' attack."
"We only proved that we're no different than them. No, we may be even worse than Evilus was. They had a goal, and openly committed to it regardless of the cost. We… We did nothing of the sort, we instead hid our treachery for 8 years, and when it came time to fight Evilus, it was them who laid the terms of each and every encounter. Hathor familia out performed us in every conceivable way. We were never the strongest, we were never even close."
"Meda's spell?"
"That's one example for sure. But it's not the only one, even Ganesha familia out performed us by a considerable margin. They have more than 6 level 7s now. We have 3 level 6s… We lost our top spot a while ago…"
"All we can do now is hope our punishment won't be too terrible." Noir added, attempting to put some wisdom into the atmosphere.
"We'll find out tomorrow. I would run, but I know that Origin Wolf would catch me before I'd even know what happened." Finn lamented.