(A summary of events so far is here.)The temple was abuzz with practitioners, the brightly illuminated corridors crowded with priests, guards, and soldiers, half of them shouting commands and the other half rushing to follow them, all in a hurry to corner and trap the two rogue heathens that had invaded their holy ground. There was a heavy undercurrent of anxiety and desperation in the air -- there were a number of reasons to want the boys caught, and sacrilege was one of the least of them. Word had already spread of the 'divine punishment' Pesca Luminosa had visited upon the priests who had let the boys escape, and the rest of the Sect was more than eager to avoid a similar fate. Word also had it that the temple's mysterious benefactors were not too fond of the situation either, and a number of priests and acolytes alike had had enough secret dealings with them to fear more of the same.
Amid the fervor and the chaos, however, there was a small bubble of affected calm. The priest Raki had led Aoko and the other girls from their quarters, perhaps suspecting the room to be a target for the heathens. Instead they were lead to one of the temple's outer quarters, one with a balcony where they might gaze upon the magnificence of the Pesca Gigantessa.
Raki had left the room at the summons of Pesca Luminosa, and in his absence the girls continued to laugh and chat easily with one another, as if all the recent events were routine for them.
"It's so amazing," one long-haired girl sighed, leaning on the bar of the balcony's railing as she gazed at the giant cloud sculpture that was the Gigantessa. It drifted just beyond the outer edges of the city, floating high above the surface of the Celestial Sea as it was shaped. The puffy curves glowed with the colours of light reflected from the Sea and sky. "A true testament to the glory of God."
"I feel like I'm enlightened whenever I look at it," another girl added with a slight, dreamy smile. "Don't you think so? It's like an embodiment of all the greatness in the world, everything that transcends the human experience. It's almost too much to take in."
A girl with short hair, perched on the end of one of the benches in the room, lowered her sunglasses on her nose in order to get a better look at the sculpture. "What more would you expect from a holy artifact crafted on the Celestial Sea?" she asked rhetorically. "Born of divine inspiration from Lord Pesca Himself."
"Amen," the other girls chorused. One of the younger girls, her light-coloured hair in pigtails, tucked her hands under her chin excitedly. "Oooh, I just can't wait until it's finished!" she declared. "Just think, we have a chance to be a part of something as grand and wonderful as the Gigantessa."
"We just have to wait for Father Raki to give the word," the long-haired girl added with a smile. "It won't be long now..."
( And on we go. )
