Interstellar Age

Erich knew very little about how Daelia got trapped in the Maw, or what had happened to her during the thousands of years that she was stuck there. Because of this, he answered her fairly honestly, explaining in great detail the limited amount of knowledge he had in that regard.

"In all honesty, I know very little about what Lunaria did to trap you in the Maw. I only know that she allegedly tricked you into entering, and was then exiled by her parents until a time where she could bring you back to them. How much of that is actually true?"

Daelia sighed heavily as she leaned up from her position where she lied on Erich's chest and took a sip from her wineglass, before lying back down. It was almost as if she was vividly reliving the incident in her head while she spoke about it as if it had happened just a moment prior.

"Lunaria, that fucking bitch… You see, the thing is, she and I had never really gotten along. She was the older sister, but I was the more capable of the two of us. At least in the ways that would impress our parents.

By all means when it comes to subterfuge, sabotage, and general skullduggery, nobody is better than Lunaria. But as an actual ruler, I was the more capable of the two of us. Because of this, our parents had chosen me to succeed them when the day came that they finally passed away.

This did not sit well with Lunaria, who had been born with a craving for power that one might say borderlined insanity. For a long time I knew that Lunaria was plotting against me. I mean, with her personality, how could she accept me as the heir to our father's throne?

And indeed, I had made preparations in anticipation of her attacks. But decades turned to centuries, and centuries turned to millennia. Despite the vast amount of time that had passed, she never once bared her fangs towards me, nor did she show any sign of displeasure at the prospect of me being the heir.

In fact, she went out of her way to help me prepare for my ascension. Perhaps it was an act of youthful naivety, but eventually I stopped suspecting any wrongdoing from my dear older sister. This was a mistake that cost me dearly. Hell, my ignorance and naivety had long reaching consequences that the galaxy would never truly recover from…."

Erich could see the pain in Lunaria's eyes as she sat up and took another drink from her glass, before crawling further into his embrace. It was not a pain felt over her own suffering, but rather the chaos and destruction that followed in the wake of her mistakes.

It was a sense of empathy and compassion that he had never really seen in Lunaria's golden eyes. Which something that compelled him to try and comfort the woman who was much more ancient and wise than he was.

"I mean, judging by an Elf's lifespan, even 10,000 years is considered young. Surely you could not have known what would happen if you let your guard down around Lunaria. You two are family, after all?"

However, Daelia simply scoffed at the idea of family, before lecturing Erich on the history of Elven politics.

"Erich, do you have any idea how bloody the history of the Asterion Dynasty was in the past? And I'm not talking about the schism between my sister and I! What am I talking about? How could you possibly know this? My sister has gone to great lengths to change history so that it would make her and our family more favorable?

My father ascended to the throne after conspiring against his thirteen siblings, of which none of them survived. He was actually the youngest of his siblings, and in his era, the heir to the throne was chosen by birth, not by merit. He only changed this so that my siblings and I wouldn't end up killing each other for the throne. Which we did anyway.

Lunaria didn't just try to kill me. She manipulated things in a way that saw our eldest brother, the true heir to the throne, being killed off in the Great War against the Star Vampires. Nasty creatures, those things, but I won't get into the destruction they caused to the Galaxy. Which admittedly was far less than what Lunaria and I are responsible for…

You see until I was selected as heir, the Asterion dynasty was patriarchal, meaning that only a male could ascend to the throne. And only in the case of their being no male heirs would a woman be selected to carry the burdens of the Empire.

Lunaria not only arranged the untimely deaths of our older brothers, but I have a sneaking suspicion that she is the reason our mother became sterile… It was perhaps because our society had been male dominated in the past that Lunaria so despised the opposite sex, not even willing to let another a gaze at her with lust, lest she take his eyes from him.

This hatred towards the opposite sex is no doubt the reason why she venerated our mother as the former "Empress" of the Elven Empire after she rewrote galactic history to suit her needs. Completely erasing our father's place in our people's history as she did so.

In fact, I still don't know why she developed such a fetish for the men of your race, when one considers just how long she hated the opposite sex for. It baffles me to this day that she would ever marry a man, let alone one from another species. I truly do not understand what had changed in her mind when your people became a interstellar civilization of any note."

Erich had also long thought about this question himself. From what he had been told by Celestia, her mother had long sensed hated the opposite sex in an almost fanatical manner. But that suddenly changed less than half a millennium ago when the Germanic Star-Empire became a vassal of the Alfheim Dominion.

What had caused this change, nobody except Lunaria Knew. But perhaps it had something to do with Erich's ability to time travel. If so, did that mean that Lunaria, like Daelia, knew of Erich before they ever truly met from his perspective?

Daelia could see Erich's mind was getting off track, and thus she touched his chin and dragged his attention back to her as she began to recite the long story of how she got trapped in the maw.

"Dammit Erich, you distracted me with a history lesson on the politics of my family. The point is that Lunaria wanted the throne, and she was willing to do anything to get it. I understand now that my father chose me to succeed him because of Lunaria's actions against our siblings.

But at the time, I had no idea what she had done to our brothers. Or how she had gotten rid of them in a way that legally made her innocent of the deed. Had I known then what I came to learn in the maw, I would have been far more cautious around that bitch…"