With Lynn's current status, it wasn't easy for just anyone to meet her.
Damien might've been a mythical existence in the Human Domain, but that worth was only attached to his name.
Not many people knew his face, so he couldn't use his status without causing a lot of unnecessary trouble.
That's why, even in his current state, Damien was prepared to wait a while before seeing her.
Yet, it seemed there was no need.
"I've been waiting for you."
Standing at the edge of what was now essentially a floating continent was none other than the blonde-haired researcher Damien came to see.
He wasn't happy. If anything, the strange feeling in his chest worsened.
Lynn Carter was known to the universe as an innovator, but she was much more than just that.
She was a strategic genius whose mind terrified even Damien.
Once a slave to the Nox, Lynn Carter used her mind alone to free herself and her people.
The plans Damien and the girls discovered during their first visit to Earth where he also saw Lynn for the first time, the Nox's movement in the Human Domain, was not solved by Damien.
What culminated in an all-out war with Niflheim was possible because Lynn Carter had already been destroying Wrath's plans from the inside for many years.
When Damien was added to the equation, he sparked Wrath's irrational powerlust and created a situation that she took advantage of to gain her freedom.
The amount of patience and time required was something Damien simply didn't possess.
When a woman who had a mind like that said a sentence like, "I've been waiting for you," it usually wasn't anything good.
Damien didn't return her greeting, nodding and following her lead deep into the facility.
It mirrored Evotech a great deal, perhaps because it was also a research-dedicated organization.
Still, a few of the steampunk aesthetics of the original Hub City Avalon were mixed into the bland research environment, giving it a twinge of character one wouldn't expect from such a place.
Here, whether it be a common blacksmith or a scientist at the peak of his field, anyone could find the opportunity to become great as long as they had the potential or skill to match their ambitions.
Damien silently appreciated the environment Lynn cultivated in this place as he followed her through the place and into the large skyscraper at its center.
They stepped into an elevator-like structure, which teleported them to the top floor in an instant.
"How convenient."
"Thanks. You were the inspiration."
"Should I be flattered?"
"Yes. Yes, you should."
Damien raised his brow.
She seemed a bit different from before.
She walked to her desk and sat in the large chair meant for the leader of this place and motioned for him to sit in the seat across from her.
Damien didn't know how to describe this feeling.
Was she…more human now?
"Yes, it is likely what you're thinking."
"Hm?"
"Guard your mind here. Your thoughts will be visible otherwise."
Damien once again raised his brow and sent his awareness through the room.
There was indeed a formation he'd never seen before hidden in the folds of space.
"As expected of the God's Hand."
"Don't call me that."
"You know what I came here to ask, right?"
Damien moved their conversation to the main subject, taking his seat.
"I do," Lynn responded, clasping her hands below her chin.
'As expected…'
Damien had some time to ruminate over it while he was coming here.
Logically speaking, there was no way for Tiamat to know of Avalon's existence.
Because of the restrictions placed on her, her awareness couldn't travel outside Apeiron, so even divining its existence was beyond her influence.
The only way she could know—
'—is if someone told her to guide me here.'
He turned his attention back to Lynn.
His worry had completely faded by this point.
Because this situation did not seem like a crisis, but something intentional.
"Your mother…" Lynn began, not wasting any time.
"…is a far greater existence than you can ever imagine."
***
Claire Watson.
Damien knew her as a mortal woman, a struggling single mother who did everything she could to help him through life, even if her efforts didn't always reflect the way she wanted them to.
Yet, as he grew he began to understand.
His talent wasn't possible regardless of his father's position.
And because of his father's position, his conception itself was an unsolved mystery.
After all, gods could not descend into the lower universe.
The story Damien heard from Lynn's mouth was absurd.
But that was exactly why it made sense.
Claire Watson…was also a Divine from the Heavenly World.
Dante Void and his Void Palace held great status in that world, and she was the woman who became the Mistress and Empress of that great influence.
However, tragedy struck.
Even Lynn didn't know the whole story, but somehow, Dante Void's Divinity was shattered and he fell from the heavens, choosing Earth as a place to hide and recuperate.
Claire chased him, unwilling to part from her love, and fractured her own Divinity to descend.
Until this point, there were no problems. If everything went the way it was supposed to, they would've recovered and returned to the Heavenly World within a few dozens of years.
The problem was elsewhere.
With her Divine Soul injured and in stasis, a new consciousness was born in her empty vessel.
This consciousness became Claire Watson.
Her original memories were locked away with her true soul, and when Dante found her, his power was nowhere near enough to bring her back.
What was worse was that the unborn child they'd conceived before the tragedy was still living in her stomach.
They couldn't abandon that child.
Damien was born, and Dante and Claire began a life as mortals on Earth.
What came next, as Damien knew well, was Dante being forced to leave him and his mother early in his life.
Claire's condition went unsolved and when the World Awakening took place, the mana in the atmosphere shook her Divine Soul, putting her in a coma from what looked like mana sickness.
After Damien fed her the Elixir, however, her body and even her Divine Soul experienced a boost.
When Claire awakened the dream affinity, her two separate consciousnesses were finally given the chance to merge, returning her to the person she was when as a Divine while retaining her feelings and emotions as Claire.
This was the story Lynn Carter knew.
There were naturally many holes that ruined its continuity, but even this much already gave Damien an idea of many things he'd been curious about.
As for "how" Lynn knew…?
"I am her Avatar. I was created for the purpose of aiding you, keeping the Nox away from you long enough for you to grow into your power."
Right, Lynn Carter was never a true human, but a reflection of Claire Watson's will.
"Then…your sister? Your ambition? All of it…?"
"Real."
The answer was unexpected.
"I may have been created and tasked with aiding you, but my ambitions were very much my own as well. The relationship I had with your mother, while she is my creator, was more one of cooperation."
Avatar was perhaps the wrong word to use in the first place.
It was better to say that Lynn was an "Apostle."
Still, her nature as an Avatar granted her access to a portion of Claire's memories, and that portion was what she shared with Damien.
"Then, right now, my mother is…"
"…likely in the Heavenly World."
Damien's eyes widened.
He was expecting it, but he wasn't prepared.
In fact, right now, he was bubbling over with questions he needed to ask.
This frustratingly vague story had to be grounded.
He had to know the rest.
Because, unexpectedly, this event was the key to learning the mysteries of his origin he didn't even know he should've been seeking!
