Wide-eyed, Diligence stared at Vale’s form.

"Yes, a threat."

Vale clicked his tongue.

"Come full circle back to being fate’s bitch, have you?"

Diligence chuckled.

"You really should learn to respect wielders of fate."

"Since when do lust and respect go together?"

"Ah, you’re right. I made an error by thinking you had unlocked civility."

After Diligence said that, the grating pain in his chest tightened; she seemed to have forcefully intensified the effect she had on Lust.

As Vale reeled from the slight shock, Diligence began rattling off her ’prophecy.’

"Three choices lie before you in your confrontation with Envy. Take the fight to her and you will lose three you cherish greatly. Let her come to you and you will lose five of slightly lesser importance; however..."

Diligence’s eyes looked over toward Ximena.

"Use that sword to free me and you’ll lose nobody to Envy."

Clutching his chest, Vale grimaced, then spat out:

"So, finally admitting it would free you?"

To that, Diligence stayed silent.

She seemed intent on letting her words sit in the air and slide into Vale’s mind — words that he tried to ignore at first, but simply couldn’t.

He’d already witnessed the overpowering magnitude at which fate operated — and all that Diligence could do to influence it. Well, he’d seen a portion of what she could do. Diligence had undoubtedly done more than Vale would ever know. It was also clear that his goal of becoming a sun that burned the hands of fate was simply not achievable in the timeframe between now and whenever he fought Envy.

One of those three options she presented was an inevitable reality.

Meaning...

Unless he unleashed Diligence, either three or five would die — the three who would supposedly be of great importance to him, and the five still important, but lesser than the three.

’Fuck...’

Vale tapped his foot on the water’s surface as he stared at Diligence’s deplorable, haughty smile.

This was most definitely her revenge on Vale even daring to resist her whispers.

’Think, think!’

What would be the consequence of freeing her?

That one seemed obvious...

Whoever sealed her there wouldn’t take it too kindly.

That being most likely Sloth, one of them. Likely the Master. Not to mention he’d already been warned not to do so.

’I’ll lose nobody to Envy because I’ll lose everybody to them.’

There was no way Diligence didn’t know that.

’Seriously? Was that her goal?’

The look in the reflection’s eyes seemed like the oracle knew Vale wasn’t going to choose option three, no matter what. Her only goal with the ’prophecy’ was to let him know his people were going to die, and there was nothing he could do about it.

Still, she had presented him with a choice.

The question was...

How would he ever make that choice?

Choose a bloodier route, one that he assumed would protect Salome, Ximena, Awilix, and Toy,

or choose the former, in which nobody’s fate was certain.

Let alone...

’I don’t even know what the facts will be...’

If the two choices were defend or attack, that was a decision he’d have to make in the moment after their battle began in earnest. Though... would Diligence’s words influence his choice no matter what?

Would he decide to save the three even knowing it would mean losing?

That...

’Shit.’

Even if it meant losing...

Vale shook his head and grumbled:

"It seems I have to apologize."

"Oh? Finally coming around to accepting my clemency?"

Vale sighed.

"Not even close. I have to apologize to Greed for even comparing you to her. You’re much worse. You’re insufferable beyond comparison."

"Now, do you really want to keep pissing off fate’s wielder?"

Vale scoffed as he rose from his throne of water.

"Fate’s wielder? Such a laughable, pretentious thing to call yourself. All I see is a pitiful woman subject to fate no different than I am. If you truly had dominion over it, you wouldn’t be stuck in the plunge basin of a waterfall, now would you? How about this... go take your prophecy and shove it up your ass alongside the thousands you’ve killed to prolong your pitiful existence."

Diligence shook her head.

"Well, well... I really thought we’d gotten somewhere. But alas... some dispositions are fixed."

Vale turned his back toward the bastard oracle, stepping over the churning waters.

"Nah, I’m quite subject to change, I’d say. My thoughts only became fixed in hatred when you decided to try and control me."

From the very start, it was Diligence who’d made a terrible impression.

Diligence looked away.

"Such a shame. We would have made a great team if we had worked together from the start. I guess I’ll have to wait until you come around. But are you trying to leave so soon? There’s so much we haven’t talked about. The Virtues, other Vices, Akkuron, Celestia, Sigils, history, Inscriptions, Enchanting, who will die, Hope, the Council of Vice, the other Sloths... Don’t you want to know it all?"

"Don’t speak as if I’ll come around to you in the future. And no... I’m done listening to your half-truths. Sure, I’ll believe what you said, I can’t deny truth, but don’t dare think I hold it as important."

The reflection sighed.

"Oh, Val, but you will. You will come around, begging on your hands and knees for me to save you. One day."

Vale climbed off the water bed.

"Maybe... Maybe I will one day." Vale vaulted up, landing near Ximena’s frozen form. "But that day is most definitely not today."

Standing there on the bank, Vale looked up at the starless sky, which was about to cry.

’Well, I’ve gone and done it...’

Vale had thoroughly pissed off an oracle.

***

Floating in everything while bound to nothing behind the Void’s veil, Diligence watched the hazy pink specter walk toward the sky.

’Ah, such a shame.’

She hadn’t even gotten to mark him.

On the bright side, she’d perfectly constructed his doubt and hatred for her.

So that when the truth came to light, fate...

’Fate, that awful existence, can be defied.’

All oracles wielded fate. And because of that, they hated fate more intensely than any other.

There were many things she’d withheld from Lust. Mainly...

Her goal differed from the Real Sloth.

After all, she wished to defy Sloth’s will.

Diligence wished to save Pandora, not let her home be sacrificed and used as a bastion for a nameless future hero, nor be used as a stopgap for Axioneth.

Sadly, the price for her future — defying that terrifying being — was ever so costly... and ever so harsh to those she wished to wield.

Finally...

It wasn’t twenty-five or fifty years she could see in the future, but five hundred — with declining clarity.

’I had to give him some hope he could trick me.’