Lum looked at the bird in confusion:
"Gratitude? You mean like… the concept of Gratitude?" she asked.
"Precisely" Gratitude replied. "Normally, I'm constantly in a coma-like state, but after so many eons, I managed to muster enough energy to regain consciousness, even if only for short moments every few dozen years"
"What? It's... urgh, forget it, I don't even want to know why a concept can suddenly think and talk and turn into a bird"
"But in short, if you only regain consciousness two or three times a century, why waste this moment of clarity by coming to talk to me?"
"Waste? I have the impression that you don't think highly of yourself, dear little fairy"
"Don't call me that!"
Just by hearing "little fairy", the image of Noir appeared in Lum's mind, which had the effect of annoying him deeply.
"For someone who seemed to be having a good time a few seconds ago, you seem to have a lot of negative emotions inside you" Gratitude noticed.
"Anyway, since you want to know so much, it turns out that when I woke up, an old friend to whom I owed a favor contacted me to offer my help. As Gratitude, I had to return the favor, so here I am"
"Okay, I understand" Lum said. "And why as a bird?"
"The blocking of this destroyer called Noir is too powerful for me. I just managed to take possession of a passing bird. Anyway, it would be problematic if the destroyer noticed our conversation, so let's act quickly"
"No thanks. I don't know who this person is who is so keen to help me but I don't plan on escaping. I'm just going to stay here and wait to be reset, so I don't have to put up with all this pain and difficulty anymore"
Gratitude turned its little bird head towards her, and, although the bird's face was quite expressionless, Lum could clearly see the question 'what did I just hear?' in his eyes :
"So is that it? Do you choose the easy way?" Gratitude asked.
"Yes, does that disappoint you?" Lum asked.
"Honestly, yes, the portrait I was given of you is that of a fairy full of life, not of a cowardly depressive"
"Yes, and the picture I've been given of concepts is that they're just rules and ideas, not chattering entities that possess birds to serve as deus ex machina. And actually, why can you speak?"
"All concepts could think and speak in the beginning, there was just an... accident, which led us to merge and regroup in the Platonic Sea, plunging into a state of near death"
"At the beginning? How old are you exactly?"
"I don't know, I stopped counting after 83,409,585,959,508,492 years. I just know I was around 500 years old when the incident happened"
"Ah… should I say goodbye to you then?"
"No, that won't be necessary. What I'm trying to make you understand is that if I was able to hang on for so long to finally regain the strength to manifest myself in front of you, what's stopping you from persevere a little longer so that you can regain your freedom and your friends?"
Lum did not immediately answer this question, turning her head towards the center of the forest where she could hear the laughter of several fairies having fun.
"Frey and Mike are my friends, but they are my family" the fairy said. "I…I just want to be happy"
She stopped talking and looked Gratitude in the eyes but the bird remained silent, as if waiting for her to continue.
Finally, realizing that Lum had nothing more to say, Gratitude sighed:
"I understand" the concept said. "In this case, I can't force you. I'll just give you an escape route before I leave"
With these words, a blue and pink feather flew off the bird and landed in Lum's hand.
"What can this feather do?"
"It contains part of the experience of one of the most powerful Travelers in history, the one who asked me to get you out of here" Gratitude explained. "If one day you decide to change your mind and leave, this feather might give you an opportunity, who knows."
With these words, the bird's color changed back to a light brown, and it flew away. However, the feather in Lum's hand retained its distinctive color. The latter looked at her for a long time:
"Frey, Mike, I'm sorry"
Lum dropped the feather, which flew far away, carried by the wind.
"Guess I'm bad at grabbing outstretched hands"
In the world of the Ark
"So how did it go?" Frey asked, stroking the head of his falcon, which he had renamed Fal.
"I don't know, Gratitude returned to its inert state right after delivering the feather" Quinte replied.
"Aaaaand you can't, I don't know, use your omnipotence to check?"
"No, I can't interfere outside of this space" Quinte said. "If I could, don't you think I would have sorted out this awkward situation by myself?"
"So you're not really omnipotent? Honestly, it wouldn't have surprised me if you'd told me you just were too laz-"
Frey couldn't finish his sentence, because his mouth suddenly stopped making sound.
"That's better" Quinte said. "Now your next exercise will be to recreate your ability to speak with Imagination knowing that I have made sure that the concept of sound no longer applies to your voice, good luck"
While beginning to Imagine his voice so that he could start speaking again, Frey gave him a dismayed look, making the phrase "is this how you use your omnipotence?" appear in gold letters.
"Yes, and I'm very happy like this" Quinte replied in a neutral tone.
"…"
"And as you said, I'm not omnipotent, I just have perfect control of the Imagination. Omnipotence is the power to be able to do "anything", when Imagination cannot be used to destroy or permanently modify Fate"
"Really? So that means that Imagination is generally an object that cannot affect itself?" Frey, who had already managed to find his voice, asked.
"Obviously, this is the exercise that you succeed the most quickly" Quinte sighed. "Well, that means you're progressing I guess. To answer your question, it is not exactly that the Imagination cannot affect itself, but rather that it cannot be forced to do so. To take an example-"
"Please, no numbers" Frey interrupted.
Quinte royally ignored him and continued:
"To take an example, let's say that the Imagination is a quill and parchment, or a pen and paper like in your time, it doesn't matter. We are what the pen writes on the paper. I can use Imagination to transcend into a plane infinitely higher than anything that exists in the Platonic Sea or in this world without a shadow of difficulty but, in the end, it will just come down to seeing the phrase 'Quinte then transcended the Platonic Sea and the Ark' written by the pen on the sheet. This is not what will tear the paper or break the pen in two. Do you understand?"
"Yes, I think I get the idea, Imagination is the author's tool and we are the characters, right?"
"Right, it's nice to see that you've become less stupid since you arrived here.
Maybe next time you won't be fooled by the first destroyer"
Frey glared at Quinte, but Quinte ignored him again.
"…In short, what about Fate?" Frey asked.
"Fate completes Imagination" Quinte replied.
Under Frey's confused gaze, he explained:
"If Imagination is the writing of a book then Fate is reading: once a reader has read it in its entirety, the story ends and all that remains is to reread it. The only way to end this cycle is to destroy the book, which for us means destroying the stories, or even the Platonic Sea itself"
"Now that you've put it to me like this, I'm starting to understand Lum and Inferno's points of view" Frey said.
"That's right, one preferred the pain of solitude to that of bonding with people who would inevitably forget him again and again, the other simply couldn't stand the idea that such puppets like him previously been able to exist"
"In that case, that means Lum will probably agree to come back with us, right?"
Even though he knew Quinte couldn't possibly know that, he couldn't help but ask the question with a hint of hope in his voice.
"Nothing is less certain" Quinte replied.
Frey felt like an ice arrow pierced his back:
"W-why?" he asked, genuinely confused by this answer.
"Little one, you're still too young, you don't know what it feels like to finally get a chance to see those you love again after years and years of waiting, nor how much you might be willing to give up for that" Quinte replied. "The reason I got stuck here in the first place was so that me and my beloved could reunite with our people"
Frey's expression gradually darkened. To distract himself from his stress, which was slowly but surely increasing, he diverted his focus to a particular passage in what Quinte had said.
"You said you have a sweetheart. Is she located here?" Frey asked.
"No" Quinte replied even more abruptly than usual.
"Ah… does she come to see you often?"
"No"
"From time to time?"
"Non"
"Are you in ice?"
"Non"
"…
Is she still alive?"
"No"
There was a blank, and Frey found it so long that he even suspected Quinte of having changed his perception of time.
"Ah... what happened?" he asked.
"I have no reason to answer you" Quinte said without an ounce of anger.
"It's true, forgive me..."
"She died. Because of Noir"
New blank. Frey felt more uncomfortable than ever before:
"I...I'm sorry for you...and for her...and-"
"Don't be" Quinte interrupted. "Death is always a more enviable fate than that of your beloved"
"…"
"…"
They resumed Frey's training without saying another word, neither about Quinte's beloved, nor about Chloé.