I walked slowly toward Stella, feeling the air in the room grow slightly colder and more chilling as I moved away from the warm center of the party.

"You shouldn't be cooped up and isolated over here," I started, my voice friendly and soft so as not to startle her. "Come on, join us by the warmth of the fire."

"To enjoy inferior human sins?" Stella interrupted instantly. Her voice was laced with venom, resentment, and aristocratic repulsion. She crossed her arms and glared at the rustic, sweaty crowd dancing with contained disgust. "We were exiled from this world with a purpose, Neiva! There are lethal dragons on the loose, we've lost our status as goddesses, and the three of you are over there, drinking cheap wine and dancing among stinking mortals, as if we were rustic, vulgar village girls who had never known the clouds."

"We are just trying to survive, Stella. Trying to adapt to reality," I tried to calm her, ignoring the insults and sitting in the empty seat next to her. "We really need a moment of peace like this. We can't live fighting against the weight of the world and death every single second of our day."

She clenched her immaculate fists tightly against her legs and swallowed hard. The rebellion boiled and groaned inside her chest.

"Our mission has barely even started. Our biggest challenge so far was just having the luck to fall from Hyperion without being crushed to death. Do you really, from the bottom of your heart, think that's a grand enough feat and reason to 'need this pointless moment'?" she asked bitterly.

"It wasn't just our forced descent from Hyperion. Our feat was surviving that invasion in the palace, our frontal, bloody battle against the dragons. It was surviving a homicidal mission we didn't even get the chance to accept or decline, and yes... our descent. Each of us needs to process trauma and things at our own pace and rhythm..." I sighed deeply. I closed my eyes, and ignoring the coldness of her body, I placed my hand comfortingly over both of her freezing hands. "We don't even know what the other girls here went through in their lives in Hyperion... we don't even know them deeply. Who guarantees us that tomorrow, or the day after, they'll still be alive and whole to enjoy these mundane moments with us?"

I looked back at the naive amusement and the contagious human happiness of the party happening in the inn. With all my strength, I wanted Stella to be able to relax, lower her walls, and enjoy that moment of humanity with an open heart.

"Do you remember when we were younger and we used to have sprint races through the clouds of Hyperion, and you would always win and beat us, flying right over our bodies as we ran across the clouds below?" I reminded her of those intimate moments in a very low, soft voice, painting a genuine, honest smile on my exhausted face.

"You guys would always complain and beg me to go easier on you," Stella yielded, lowering her guard and revealing a tiny, sweet smile at the corner of her lips.

"Exactly! You used to laugh at our faces because we couldn't keep up with your pace at all... But the truth is, it was those exact innocent games with us that helped you build your strength, and that first opened and drew the eyes of the gods of Hyperion to you," I explained sweetly. "Imagine for a second if you had never flown and played with us? What path would you have taken? Where would you be today?"

Stella looked at me.

"I can't disappoint them now, Neiva..." the goddess of light confessed in an anguished, fragile lament.

Her eyes grew distant from the reality of the inn again, and her body, which was previously close to mine, pulled back, closing off and imposing a thick divine wall between us. Still, even behind the celestial cold, I could clearly feel the fragility and the trauma anchored in her heart.

"We are not going to disappoint them in any way, Stella. Believe me. But tonight is a humble, well-deserved celebration for us having survived the slaughter and for pushing forward, fighting the colossal challenges that came our way. And trust me... I am incredibly proud of how bravely you are holding up and dealing with all of this." I wasn't just smiling at her with my lips or teeth. My entire eyes were smiling, vibrating with truth and compassion.

Stella looked suddenly surprised. Struck in the chest and soul by my gentle words, she brought back that childhood smile I knew so well. She broke down the wall and gave me a warm, strong hug, throwing away the imposed fortress for a second time. She clung to me tightly for a few minutes that felt endless. Leaning against her, I could feel and count the deep, strong heartbeats of the goddess's heart. They weren't racing or panicking, but they beat very heavily, exactly like someone noble who has endured a lot of hardship in absolute silence.

Slowly, the divine tension in her soft shoulders finally gave way and loosened. She pulled back, recovering her stoic air, and looked back at the other Primordials dancing in the hall with a complex mix of superiority and tactical tolerance.

"I will be able to endure this," Stella murmured categorically, her golden eyes flashing with a cold determination in the shadows of the room. "I will endure the ignorance of this rural party, and I will endure the discomfort of these heavy clothes. And I'll even endure having to put up with these other Primordials... who, I'm certain, will only serve to slow us down and hinder us sooner or later."

The goddess of light turned her celestial face to me, and the distant firelight burned, reflected in her merciless irises.

"But never forget one important thing, Neiva... no matter what filthy, mud-covered floor they force us to walk on, we will always be Goddesses of Hyperion."

We stared at each other, eye to eye, without directing a single harsh word at one another. I didn't have an immediate answer to give her that could soften the goddess's frozen heart, but I knew full well I couldn't just let her leave the scene like that. I had to tell her something.

"Regardless of what you tell me, it doesn't change the fact that we are," she said, standing up elegantly. "Enjoy the gathering."

Stella didn't waste another second. She turned around and silently climbed the wooden stairs, disappearing completely into the gloomy, lonely darkness of the second floor, illuminated only by a few flickering, solitary candles.

I remained seated and isolated on the edge of the table for a few more valuable seconds. That moment made me dive deep, and I grew thoughtful about the heavy conversation we had just had. That human warmth raging in the room next to me and the agitation of the sweaty party no longer comforted my soul in the same festive way as before... Honestly, I just wanted to rest my aching body, lay my head on a pillow, and move quickly and painlessly into tomorrow.

"Hey, Neiva! Get off your butt and come dance with us again!" Yae yelled excitedly, bursting through the darkness toward me and vigorously grabbing my freezing hand.

My sister wore such a wide smile and was so purely, naively happy that I didn't even have it in me to refuse her.

I let myself be pulled back into the crowd of people and sweat. I don't even remember what hour the clock hands and the moon marked. I only know, and I only remember, that this fateful, simple folklore night passed in an eternal, magical, and infinite way, engraving itself in my feelings as lastingly as the full, round moon that illuminated our warm inn on a cursed, cold winter's day.