Many Depthsroot Residents had congregated by this time after seeing and hearing about all the commotion. The Depthsroot was a small village, so word traveled fast and moving about the village was easy. Just as the Otherworlders and Intensei, who were also part of the Depthsroot Residents, they would gather around the Grand Golem and this bright, shining man that appeared before them and kept calling himself 'Ophiuchus' and their king. They were more curious than anything, since some of them knew the deeper, true identity of this man, but very little about what was going on. They hurried to where he was that they may get the information they desired.

When it was noticed by Ophiuchus that there was a woman falling from the sky, he immediately stopped what he was doing and sprang into action. "Hold on," he would say to them as he sprang up suddenly rather high into the air to catch the woman. Unfortunately, his loss of focus also drained him, because he was not in a substantially stable state where his energy was fully replenished nor flowing well down in the Depthsroot, as opposed to up in the higher levels of the Veritas, where circulation was more clear. Here, Ophiuchus needed to recover, and so the jump into the air to catch the woman would immediately cause him to be lowered back into his 3rd Restriction, where his radiance was limited, as was his energy supply and reserves. "Gotcha!" he cried out, snatching the woman from the air. No longer did Ophiuchus have any luster to his hair nor his form, and instead of his golden glow, he was now completely drenched in black from head to toe. Even his eyes were now a piercing, feral red instead of a lucid crystal blue.

When he fell back to the ground with a rather reckless thud, he huffed heavily and lowered the woman to the ground. He looked at himself and realized that he'd descended once again. "... Fuck, I didn't want to use up energy before I was fully recovered..." Even his voice and demeanor had changed along with his appearance. His eyes were sunken and looked rather tired and drained. "... And before I explained what was going on." The woman who he'd saved was none other than his lover, Tsuki, but she appeared, once again, at an inopportune and inconvenient time. Part of that was his own fault, but at this point, that could be sorted out later. She needed to hear the conversation, too.

"... Uh, like I was saying," he tried to continue, casually playing off the chaos that was going on, "... Hey, can everybody kinda like... Gather around and stuff? I only want to explain this once. Then I need to recover." It should have been clear to him as he shifted between his forms of golden haired and black haired that his current situation was, more or less, unstable and he needed to recover. "I know there's a lot going on, especially right here, right now, but... Just let me explain the major parts and then we'll get through the rest of it as we go along." Black Friday was way too much to explain all in one sitting. "Whatever questions you have, come together and ask me after I'm done explaining to you about Black Friday and the movement of the Veritas." Then, perhaps he and Tsuki-chan can have some alone time, since she'd spontaneously appeared.

The Otherworlders were astounded at the events going on here in the Depthsroot. One after another, all sorts of new and strange things were occurring here. Those that had power of extended perception beyond their limited area could foresee many types of changes and all sorts of occurrences that were effects of this. "Ophiuchus!" they cried out to this so-called 'king,' "Tell us what you know and how to stop this from going any further! If you work with us, we won't have to take any extra measures." The Otherworlders were looking to put a means to an end, even if it meant taking down this 'Ophiuchus,' who looked like he'd suddenly become weaker. If there was any time to strike him, it was now, but a majority of them were a compassionate people that only wanted justice and peace; not to terrorize an innocent town. Some of them were weakened, as well; many of them, actually, but they were confident in their individual strength and training, and whatever powers they brandished along with the weapons available. "We don't want to hurt anyone, but we will if we cannot come to an understanding."

The light that was shining from above the cavern suddenly stopped. It was filled with an ambiguous darkness that blocked out the light that was from Ophiuchus and darkening the Depthsroot again. Once he'd descended into a weaker form and his light no longer shone, then the same light that had given him power from above stopped shining as well, like something was clotting its rays. The Depthsroot returned to being dark.

It was fortunate for Tsuki that she'd been caught, since if she fell from that height, being as powerless as she was due to the nature of her transition, she definitely would have died. She'd already died once and wasn't exactly trying to do that again, since the last time was so tragic. Then again, part of her wondered if she really did want to live.

Mulling over these things in her head, she was barely focused on what was going on, yet was still grateful that her lover had come to save her. He'd been acting really weird for a long time, even when they were in the Dusk, and she deduced that this was the reason. He'd taken on that form of 'Ophiuchus' as he called it before when they were above the ground, but kept shifting between the form she knew and loved and the one that was bright and radiant; a little too much for her, quite honestly. She liked him being more... dark and mellow, like she was accustomed.

Things were getting pretty noisy around this place, the Depthsroot, which she'd been sentenced to by the will of the Oversoul, who had given her his mask to give to her beloved one. Holding it in her hand, she looked at the pale white ghostly face and thought deeply about how and why she was here. He said something about her not being ready, which was why he put her underground. She was grateful that there was someone here to meet her, but those last sentiments before she was basically pushed back into the ground like a seed no one wanted to bloom were irking her, especially since she knew that the Spirit that had spoken to her and decreed this was none other than her lover's. Did he really think that? Was it an insult, or a form of protection? Did he not trust in her abilities? The more she thought, the more frustrated it made her. Although, before she got too much in a huff, she really did think about where she was right now. Powerless, to say the least; Tsuki had been revived from a sacrificial death that expended all her previous power, which wasn't even that much in the first place. She couldn't deny that she was weak and helpless, but she didn't really want to accept that, being as strong and independent as she was in her spirit. In spite of that, she wasn't a fool and was not stupid. This place was chosen for her by him as a place to grow stronger, and that's all she'd see it as. It wasn't an insult. He wasn't looking down on her. He was protecting her and trying to help her grow. She wouldn't be so childish as to misinterpret that, since she knew what he'd done was only out of love.

This didn't change how she felt about herself, however. She gripped the mask tightly, narrowing her eyes a bit at the reflection. Instead of saying anything about all the things going on in her head, she simply let the thoughts go by and payed attention to what Tomon was saying, since he was explaining what happened involving she, herself, and her own death. At least, that was the one part she knew about in terms of 'Black Friday;' the part where she died and destroyed a world in the process before being reborn in the Veritas. Her memory was hazy of her previous life, but she did remember the time of her death and being extracted from that place that was left in the destruction of Black Friday. She wondered why she couldn't access that power on her own... And how she would be able to. Maybe, if she really focused, she'd get the info she needed about being able to use and control that 'Black Friday' that destroyed worlds. That would be pretty badass.

Now, the Depthsroot Residents, who, some had prior experience with this person calling himself 'Ophiuchus,' were not as upset as the foreigners were to this land. Though the Depthsroot Residents were kept in the dark about many, many, many things that were going on, and were now in the middle of what looked like more of Khrona's madness as Kage over the Dusk, they weren't exactly distressed by it all after the Grand Golem saved them from destruction and started helping them reconstruct their underground village. They weren't aware of how vast the changes were to the Dusk up above, nor what Khrona -- whom they knew 'Ophiuchus' as before he started call himself 'Ophiuchus' -- had done up above. They had never been above the surface ever since the remainder of the Depths became the Depthsroot in the first place, so seeing ANYONE from the Dusk come down to greet them was already a rarity. Of course, they had tons of questions for Khrona, especially those that knew him better than others.

"KHRONA!!" they cried out to him, gathering around once he'd taken his more familiar form before them; the one they remembered him taking on in years past, "We have been waiting for you to spill the beans for long enough! First, that thing that looked like Kham came and destroyed part of our town, then we find out that whatever you and your girlfriend did caused some kind of otherworldly calamity, then, we get these foreigners here that are all pissy about what you did." This was the general synopsis of what the Depthsroot Residents knew after witnessing the 'Black Friday' happen and also being exposed to the results, which also included the Otherworlders being salvaged from their realms here in the Depthsroot as refugees. "Now we're happy we get to see some of our favorite heroes and superpowered people we've read about in comics and seen in video games or on TV," they said, "But, NOT when they're mad at US for something YOU did. So, we're all here now and ready for an explanation."

Carl, who DEFINITELY was within this group, damn near the front of the crowd, also cried out, "AND WHO WAS THAT DAMN MONKEY?!? WAS HE ONE OF YOURS?!?" Before Khrona appeared, the monkey-man, who had strange powers, had been monkeying around in the Depthsroot and had some affiliation to the Grand Golem that was now protecting them as their Earth God. That was also something they wanted explained to them more deeply. They were gathered 'round, waiting for the FULL explanation this time.

The Otherworlders were patient with the man who was calling himself 'Ophiuchus,' because for some reason, he seemed tired. They'd seen him make this shift before when he was explaining about himself previously when Black Friday began, but he hadn't been calling himself 'Ophiuchus' at the time. Whatever sort of honorific he'd given himself wasn't of any concern to them, but they would respect it if that was the custom. Their only concern was with their own homes and the fate of worlds like their own, which he neglected to explain to them when he spoke to them before about the Veritas and himself. They grouped themselves with the Depthsroot Residents and awaiting the answers to their questions about Black Friday, their worlds and how to stop Black Friday peacefully.