Azure Dune, Epilogue - RAINBOW

“And here we are,” I announced, gesturing with my arm at the white marble temple in front of us. Just looking at it sparked countless old memories in me. The place where I’d gone from an interdimensional visitor to a true hero.

“Whoaaaa!” Bianca gasped in awe.

“That’s so cool, gran! Can we also train here to gain cool snow magic like you?!” Harry added.

I chuckled.

“Well, who knows? Maybe you can.” I put on a stern expression. “But it’s not gonna be easy, you know? Do you have what it takes to be true heroes?”

“Yeah!” they chorused without even thinking about it.

I couldn’t help but shake my head with a smile.

“Maybe later, you two. Let’s meet up with the others first,” Jim told them before turning to me. “Are they nearby Az?”

I nodded and gestured into the distance. “They are just on the other side of the hill.”

Corralling the kids took a few minutes, but once the little ducklings were following us again, we made it through the last stretch of our journey over the hill.

I heard four gasps behind me as my eyes drank in the beautiful view from atop the mountain. It hadn’t changed one bit, still every bit as breath-taking as I remembered it.

The mountain here was shaped perfectly for this. As soon as one climbed over this hill, it opened up into a somewhat flat clearing overlooking both the forest and the ocean.

The kids immediately ran forward, shouting in excitement once they recovered from their first stunned impression. Luckily, the edge of the clearing had already been secured by a safety rail to make sure nobody fell off the massive cliff.

“Be careful you two! It’s dangerous!” Jim’s wife shouted at their retreating backs in exasperation before giving a sigh.

I patted her shoulder.

“Ease up, Petra. It’s supposed to be a family vacation.”

“But we’re so high up! What if they fall off?” Petra  asked, clearly worried.

“Then I’ll catch them with my snow. They’ll be fine,” I assured her with a smile.

She relented, although the concern still clearly hadn’t disappeared.

The rest of us made it to the clearing at a leisurely pace and headed straight for the little camp where everyone else already waited for us. There was one table with benches around it, a place for a campfire, and four tents already set up.

“Oh, Azure. You’re here,” Xeron greeted me as she finished braiding her daughter’s avatar’s hair.

Said daughter pinned me with a glare from where she sat on the bench.

“You,” she sneered at me.

I smiled blithely at them.

“Hey, you two. We’re here.”

“Hello. You must be Xeron and Xethra,” Jim’s wife smiled at them and held out her hand. “I’m Petra, Azure’s daughter-in-law.”

Xeron took it and also introduced herself and her daughter. Xethra simply crossed her arms and kept up her glare in my direction, ignoring all of us. Xeron was getting visibly exasperated with her bratty daughter.

“Oh! It’s the evil lady and evil lady junior!” a young boy’s voice caught our attention.

As expected, it was Harry, pointing his finger in Xethra’s direction. Bianca stood by his side, eyeing Xethra.

“Harry! It’s rude to point at people,” Petra reprimanded him.

“Wha– How dare you call mom an evil lady! And I’m not an evil lady junior!” Xethra shouted back at him in indignation.

“You are!” Harry shouted back. “Gran told us you were gonna destroy the world!”

“I– That– Guh… That’s besides the point!” she shouted back, utterly failing to dispel her reputation as evil lady junior.

“No way! Destroying the world is bad! So you’re totally evil!”

“No I’m not!”

“Uh huh. Sure.”

“Get over here you little…!”

Xethra jumped out of her seat and chased after my grandkids as they started screaming about an evil lady junior wanting to eat them.

I briefly eyed Xeron and when our eyes met, she gave me a smile. That was enough to let me know that Xethra wouldn’t actually eat them.

But I still found this whole interaction odd.

“So… how come she acts like a kid? I thought you shared decades worth of memories with her?”

“Ah, well. I didn’t share all of my memories. I didn’t think that would have been wise.”

“Hmm… Still… You never acted like a kid.” I looked over where the three kids tackled each other and rolled around in the snow. I, of course, made sure nobody would get hurt by softening their landing by taking control of the snow around them.

“I think it might have to do with the fact that she has a mother figure now,” Jim theorized. “And since she’s the child, she lets herself act like it.”

I raised an eyebrow in his direction.

He shrugged.

“Or maybe sentient corruption’s minds just work differently from humans.”

“Hmm, I suppose.” I mimicked his shrug.

We went ahead and unloaded our backpacks into the tents and then sat around to chat while the kids played. It didn’t take long until the rest of the party arrived as well. Ellen, Devon, and Trevor flashed into existence with a pull of spacial magic an hour after our arrival. As expected, Xethra eyed them warily as well.

We spent the rest of the day relaxing, chatting, reminiscing, and otherwise finally catching up now that we finally had time for it.

When the night fell, we got ready. My three old companions were fascinated when Jim pulled out the camera and set it up, while Petra made sure the kids were behaving but she didn’t need to worry.

Both Harry and Bianca were snoring away, cuddled beside Xethra who wore a fake annoyed expression, but I could see the hints of a smile underneath it.

An hour of waiting later, and it began. I gently woke the kids up so that they wouldn’t miss it.

“Whoaaaa!” Harry yelled while the rest of us stood completely stunned at the display.

I didn’t know how it looked back on Earth, but I had to say, an Aether-powered Aurora Borealis over here in Alyzean was truly a sight to behold. The lights flowed across the sky, changing in color, and flickering.

I snuck a glance at the kids and couldn’t help but smile at Xethra’s awestruck grin.

I thought back to when we’d first clashed with her and was grateful that we had gone with Xeron’s plan to pacify her instead of attacking.

She may be a brat, but she was our brat. In a way, my adopted daughter, if me and Xeron ever wanted to make it official.

I chuckled to myself.

What would the teenager me think if I were to tell them that they would one day think about marrying the sentient corruption set on destroying the world.

Oh, how some things have changed…

“Heck yeah! This was even more awesome than I thought! Thanks for inviting me, Azure!” Ellen yelled out with a loud laughter.

“It really is… Who would have thought a phenomenon like this was possible…” Devon muttered, his eyes still wide as he took in the sight.

Trevor didn’t say a thing as his calculating eyes scanned the rainbow lights in the sky, mind probably trying to figure out a way to reproduce it with magic.

… and on the other hand, some things have stayed exactly the same.

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And that's it! Thank you all for reading!
We'll be returning to our regularly scheduled Hopping Celestial Fox tomorrow!
Happy holidays everyone! <3