Chapter Text
If you are reading this before chapter 54 then LEAVE.
If you are here after reading the final chapter. Then welcom, welcome. to the extras I decided to include at the end of the first arc. there will not be any real coherence to the words or any grammar checking.
so let us begin!
I guess first thing first I should be talking about is the elephant of the room.
How I got the idea for this fic. There are two fics I read that contirbuted to the idea of a blind justice.
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The fic titled "Behind a mask of flower" by LaenaEverwood
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The fic title" Catastrophic impact of the seven" or something along those lines.
These two planted the idea of "Furina and focalors are blind because of the idea that justice is blind" in my head.
My friends and beta readers also pushed me into writing the fic after getting tired of me ranting to them about furina and her fics. so you can thank them too.
after that… The characters themselves yeah? I actually created a character sheet for every major playable character i plan to focus on in this fic. of course furi got the majority fo the attention but neuvi got one as well.
Lily was unplanned and was actually winged for the most part with the backlog helping me shaping her into something everyone loved. she was actually the one changed the most out of every character written. Because I did not decide her fate untill like the chapter furi decided to confront her.
even her past chapter was re written 3 times. even her death scene got changed in the official version. The original idea was that Furi would never manage to get close to her and would be surpised by how suddenly lily grew old and died from old age.
aka what agatha got instead lmaoooo. The arc was actually supposed to be much shorter with the time skip chapter being significantly earlier but things changed and now it was 54 chapters.
As for Gabriel. I intended for him to have a bigger role but honestly I did not really know how to write him but thankfully found a use for him that fits his occupation and even managed to sneak in the title de la Reynie into his name like I originally wanted.
The original intention for gabriel was that he would turn into a spy noble house where furina would basicaly ennoble him and give him an estate belonging to one of the oceanids and he would take on the de la rain suffix because it is related to the estate. This is all a reference to the irl person of course. let it be known i wanted him to be a story teller/ collecter before I decided on the name and learning that the irl reference was simialr too. so it was a great coincidence.
but returning to gabriel. the idea was to have it so furina basically use this new noble house to spy on everyone in the noble society and basically become like the fbi or cia or some shit. Even had the idea of the a saying of fontaine that is "The rain is everywhere" as a reference to how Furina and the de la rain household are everywhere and watch what you are saying.
of course none of that made it into this arc (partially. I will add the saying later on, spoilers I guess) because… I forgot why.I think I either forgot about this plot point or never had an oppertunity to properly do it this way. I think was that I couuld not come up with a good explaination on why he was ennobled that would satisfy the nobles and not cause too much problem to the readers or the nobility.
But I at least managed to use him to launch the famous fanon spy network of furina and low key established the rain saying with chapter 53.
Agatha was not too deep. she was just a side character that was elavated to a real character out of sheer happenstance. But christie nickname is a pun on Agatha Christie lmaoo.
And finally. the character that gave me the idea to make this extras chapter to confess my sins and failures as an author and a writer.
The Mask. Also reffered to unofficially by me and my beta reader as Murina.
Murina as a character is a very heavy reminder to me that I got too careless and confident in my abilities that I got lazy and never researched one of the main ideas I wanted to use in my fic:
DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder).
Whether it comes as a surprise or not. Murina was first planned to be just Furina slowly dissociating from herself and a new personality emerging that embodies her worst attributes as a diva that fights her for control over the body.
does that sound eerily similar to the mask? Well, you would be correct because this idea was in the work as far back as in the 20s chapter if not less. I finally decided on it and started implementing it during the chapter where furina brushes her hair and trains her mouth muscles in front of the mirror (idr which one).
It changed because when I published 38 and decided to look into DID for the official intro in 39 I came to the horrible horrible realization that what I am doing is insanely inappropriate and insensitive because I would be taking a very life ruining and dangerous illness that causes its people so much pain and turn it into a sick cheap prop for my fic to parade around. It was incredibly rude and insensitive of me to not research this earlier and see it.
and in the same day i released 38 not even two hours after it I decided I am scrapping the entire idea. Which was impossible to be honest, this idea has been built slowly over so many months it would ruin the story completely.
This is when I got inspired by a comment while researching DID: "If you really want to use DID for your plot, do not do it if you are not prepared to depict it as it is and instead will just further the quirly stereotypes it had. use something fantastical instead that is just similar enough that ot gets the idea across but completely unrelated that it might harm the already ruined image of the disorder"
of course this is paraphrased. But I digress.
Now you might disagree with what am about to say, but I genuinely believe this. But I am so inexperienced at writing and so new and such a beginner that I knew deep down that I could never write about DID respectuflly and get it to work. the only way I could do this is if I interviewed so many people and talked to a lot of medical professional and actually saw the disorder for what it is THEN decide to write it under HEAVY oversight to not be disrespectful to the disorder.
So I took the cowards way: I wrote something that barely resembles DID but close enough that I was able to use it for my own ideas without harming the story.
AKA the incomplete oceanid "The Mask".
this character was born under heavy debate between me and 3 different people over the course of five hours and some heavy researching into the genshin lore. In the end I settled on an idea that worked so wonderfully that I was fucking ENRAGED that I did not think of it earlier and this idea genuinely fit the story better than DID and in fact played into everything I built up even BETTER than I could have ever done with DID.
I got seriously lucky in this fic you would not believe it.
But there you go, this is my sin of negligence regarding this fic.
Other than this… Let's talk re written cutscenes or differently adapted cutscenes yeah?
this fic has gotten so many re writes and different published scenes than drafts that I decided to save the shorter ones of them. of course some entire chapters were changed and I think the oriignal draft still exists somewhere in my hard drive. if anyone is interested you can say and i might think of releasing it.
But I decided to include some of these scenes in this chapter as a look at what could have been. Enjoy some of them.
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Below is the original ending of 43
“I… I can’t take it anymore.”
“There is an out, you know?”
“Huh? Where did that sound come from?”
My brain buzzed and I looked around. Only the flickering clock and papers greeted me.
“It is a mystery to who it could be, wouldn’t you agree? My pitifully weak humanity?”
My neck snapped to the mirror, she was standing in it. Resting one hand on the sword like she owned it, while checking her fingers in boredom.
Our eyes met, and she smiled.
It was arrogant, prideful, and powerful.
“Perfect? The smile of a Goddess?”
A black streak formed in place of her mouth.
“I look quite dashing, don’t you agree?” She posed for me.
“How?”
“Gods are beyond mortal understanding~”
I approached the mi-
“She approached the mirror with fear in her steps. How could this happen? How can the Arrogant Goddess be real? Is this a sign from the Gods that she finally lost it?”
She-
“I held my stomach and laughed ‘Hahahahaha!’ Oh the look on your face, it’s precious!”
“Stop.” I stood in front of her.
“No.” and she did too.
“Why are you here?”
“To judge you for your sins~”
“And that is?”
“Causing irreversible harm to my flower.”
“Enough!”
I raised my arm to break my reflection… but put it down.
I can't.
“She can’t~ She fell on her knees and talked to me with a shaky voice.”
“How do you speak as if you are not the reason for us being in this situation? Why did you have to push the buttons of Josephine and the nobility as a whole? She was attacked and might die now.”
“HOW WOULD I HAVE KNOWN ABOUT IT?!”
CRACK!
…
Drip.
Drip.
Blood trailed down her right arm.
“YOU HAVE PROVIDED ME WITH A ROLE AND I HAVE FOLLOWED IT TO PERFECTION, YET YOU DARE TO BLAME ME FOR YOUR INAPTITUDE?!”
“I…”
“FOR MONTHS ON END YOU WOULD DON YOUR SO CALLED ‘MASK.’ YET YOU TREAT ME AS THE VILLAIN? IS THIS FAIR TO YOU? FALSE GODDESS OF JUSTICE?”
“They…”
“THEY? THEY WHAT? YOU BUCKLED UNDER THE SLIGHTEST OF PRESSURE AND NOW? Now…”
She got on her knees.
“Now, Lily will die.”
“Now, my flower will die.”
Tears flowed down our faces.
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Did you enjoy that? this scene was written when DID was the original intention. you can tell because of how fantastical it is and horror esque. in the fact that furina somehow saw a mouth when she could not be able to do it at all. this helps you actually tell how long the backlog is, I wrote this scene a day or two before releasing 38.
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The last one is a state of the art invention that has yet to become popular with the commoners, he only got his hand on it because of a deal he struck a ‘friend’ he made during a night out drinking—the poor man realized that his fiance was cheating on him due to his information.
It was a square box that was hollowed from the inside, one would need to fill it with water and some soap then put some clothes in. The last step was to push the large button at the back of the machine and the magic starts, it would violently spin and mix everything inside it. Then you would need to drain the water and have it spin another time to dry out the clothes.
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what the fuck where did the above scene come from?? it was directly below the DID scene and I did not notice it lmaooo... but this was a scene in the second gabriel scene where he goes to the bathroom, I had the idea to have him go on a rant about washing machines but decided against i .
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Below is chapter 45 opening scene original draft:
The rain was deafening, all encompassing.
Suffocating.
The only reason I was not swept alongside the rain was the Handmaiden and the new personal Maid of the Archon was holding an umbrella to shield me from the rain I am supposed to control.
The winds were howling, eating even the sounds of the father's cries and the sniffles of the Handmaiden. My only clue was their shaking postures.
The Archon of freedom must have heard of the sins committed in this nation and was furious. A ruler killing her own citizens. So he sent his winds to torment her.
What a tasteless joke.
At least the slopes of Mont Automnequi to the left of us blocked it, otherwise we could not even provide her with the decency of a burial as close to the desert as this location.
The featureless white pallbearers struggled to lower the coffin into the grave.
We simply watched in silence.
The attendees could be counted on one hand.
Two subordinates,
A hateful colleague.
A grieving father.
And a False Goddess who was the root of all the problems.
They finally rested the coffin on the ground. The only reason I could tell was because of the slip of paper glued to the coffin.
No one dared to deny me this request, one does not deny a Goddess her desires.
Even if she was the cause. And the problem.
Sigh… I should be a perfect divinity, the Goddess who everyone looks up to and worships.
So why. Why do I feel like this?
My chest felt tight, fear invaded every crevice of it. I read in this situation the heart should be beating fast and blood would rush through your head, or that you would feel a shortening of the breath. Yet I felt perfect.
There was not a single true issue in my physical body, like usual.
Since the day I opened my eyes.
The two pallbearers—the only ones willing to come out while an angry storm like this raged— got out of the grave and started shoveling the dirt back in.
Thwack.
They aggressively inserted the tool into the ground.
Thud.
Then empty it in the grave.
Thwack.
Insert it.
Thud.
Empty it.
Thwack.
Into the ground.
Thud.
Then to the grave.
Thwack.
Burying it deeper.
Thud.
And deeper.
Until there was no more dirt to shovel nor a grave to bury.
The rain and wind took care of any sweat they might have accumulated in this situation. So the two resumed their work.
I could barely hear their grunts as they fought the raindrops slamming into their bodies while carrying something heavy in their hands.
It was a tombstone, according to my Handmaiden it was in the shape of a sword and it would be inserted blade-first into the ground.
Reserved only for army members who died while on active duty.
They rested the tombstone to the side and began shoveling a hole to insert it into.
Each one picked up the shovel again and began opening the ground for the tombstone.
Thwack.
In.
What could cause this reaction? I am a Goddess.
Thud.
Out.
And Gods are supposed to be perfect.
Thwack.
In.
They are supposed to be beyond mortals.
Thud.
Out.
They might show love to their subjects. But as a whole, not as individuals.
Thwack.
In.
So why?
Thud.
Out
Why this much human sadness? Why do I grieve when I should not.
…
I stared as they threw the shovels aside and rushed to pick up the tombstone and inserted it into the ground. Using the now mud to hold it in place.
Once they were done, they finally addressed their silent audience.
“I know how much you all would love to leave lasting words to the deceased. But unless the Lord of Hydro wishes to lighten her grieving and stop this rain. I advise against it. We are already risking much by standing here.” One of them shouted through the rain. He had to struggle to not be bathed in the mud on the ground.
The crowd turned their attention to me, their lovely Diva.
The Goddess of the nation.
The mask adorning the grieving pitiful human who refused to even come out.
The liar.
The killer.
“There is no need. She was a woman not for sentimentalities, everyone attending knew this. Let us depart from this location. May we return in a brighter day and future.” I replied in a perfect monotonous tone.
“As you wish, my Lord.” He did his best to bow before signalling for everyone else to follow him into the ship.
We all followed the professionals.
Louis was the first to board, followed by the storyteller, then me and the Handmaiden, and finally the father.
Someone glared at me from behind my back. I wonder whether it was out of malice or hatred.
Once we were all situated in the hull of the ship. The captain called from up above.
“To everyone abroad!” He boomed with an old yet happy voice. “Whether ye be a noble, a foreigner, a commoner, or a Goddess! Hold on tight because the sea is raging.” He laughed as he signaled for the large metallic beast to start sailing the sea. “I hope you bring us some protection, Goddess of the seas! Ha Ha Ha!”
Tasteless.
…
The engine slowly roared to life and the sails unfurled. It seems that this was a machine where both science and nature intertwined.
Crack!
The thunder raged, carrying the furious will of the Goddess of eternity.
Perhaps she is here to render her judgement upon me falsely deceiving the nation? What do you say? My humanity?
I tried to muse with myself. Unfortunately the audience refused to entertain.
Crack!
“O’ Goddess of lightning! I offer you the demon of the seas instead of this mighty ship. Strike them down first and you can have us another day!” The captain’s happy prayer barely reached us over the rain and lightning.
Splash!
Waves filled with murderous intent struck our ship.
“O’ Goddess of the seas! I offer you the tears of the guilty instead of this innocent ship! May they satisfy your thirst for justice!”
There is no one to listen to your prayers.
Woosh!
The winds screamed, hurling curses and insults at me specifically, I am sure of it.
“O’ God of Freedom! I offer songs of the sea instead of this willful ship! May it quench your love for stories!”
The captain continued singing until we reached the port of the court.
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did you enjoy that? did you love this absolutely disrespectful ending to lily? My original intention was to sell the idea that "No matter what you do, sometimes the world just does not care and will not give you the respect you deserve". which is insanely depressing and quite frankly borderline mentally ill. it speaks about me more than anything tbh.
But I digress. The reason I completely changed the start and the tone of the entire chapter was because when my beta reader saw this opening.
I do not remember what he said but I am confident there were a few slurs hurled my way and demands that I actually respect and give a proper burial to my first oc and such a beloved character. I think i put up a slight fight before conceding because I knew deep down this was fucked up.
But I really do not want to treat my ocs too specially. but this is my own issue that should not affect my writing.
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Below takes place in place of the scene where furina completely fucking loses it when first seeing neuvillette in 54 :
RUN. RUN. RUN. HIDE. FLEE. HE IS HERE TO KILL US. ESCAPE WITH YOUR LIFE. THE HEAVENS HAS SENT AN ASSASSIN. RUN. OUR DIGNITY DO NOT MATTER IF WE ARE DEAD. FURINA!
OUR HUBIRIS HAS FINALLY CAUGHT UP TO US FOR THE GUARDIAN OF WATERS AND THE EXECUTOR OF THE HEAVENLY JUSTICE HAS ARRIVED. ESCAPE WITH OUR LIFE LEST THE PLAN FOCALORS ENTRUSTED US WITH FAILS!
And she …
She was… stuck.
Furina was drowning in… (scene continue)
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of course the published version was much more polished but those are unrelated. what matters is the reaction of Murina. I wrote it while inspired by a scene in the story nowhere stars but sadly I am not as skilled as that author to write such gnarly and panicked reactions. so it came out incredibly cringe to me and I changed to what we have which I like much more.
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now originally this was supposed to be the part where I talk about the future and show all the art I comissioned and was gifted for this fic. But I got the idea to include more things from some of the very original scenes of the fic. the drafts I wrote months ago.
Starting with chapter 53 knowledge scene:
```Why is the sea still rising?
Every single attempt ends on a failure. why is that?|
The walls? destroyed by the strongest storm the nation has ever seen.
The attempt at burying it? the team hired from sumeru faced such freak accidents that they swore off the entire nation.
expanding the sewers? bureaucracy held it for so long that everyone on the project gave up.
time and time again, the waves of fate keep violently crashing her attempts at reinforcing the sand castle.
Why?
What does she lack, Money? they have it in spade.
Power? she is the head of the nation, everyone is at her command.
Knowledge? she lacks that for sure, knowledge of the future.
Who knows what might happen if she could see the future, perhaps she could learn the end of this play.
"My Lady! I bring news!" The familiar young voice is now that of man way past his prime.
"I must admit, I didn't expect to see any trace of you so thoroughly wiped." Her last loyal follower was exclaiming and moving around as if he was not the next in line. "
"I had to travel to sumeru and dive deep into the the library of wisdom just to get hold of this poster!" Ah, news finally. She was wondering if he joined her Maid during the trip to the land of wisdom.
"And? What can you tell me?"
She saw him point at something in his hand, she supposes that elemental ink didn't exist once upon a time.
"You haven't aged a day!" He exclaimed. She chuckled.
I suppose this confirms my suspicions, the first conclusive evidence of the guilt of the suspect in this decades long case. As if she could do anything to them.
More knowledge to add to her collection...
Knowledge, knowledge, knowledge. It's always about knowledge.
Want to buy a house? know what is best for you and the prices.
Want to get a job? knowledge of what they require of you is essential.
Act in front of an audience? the knowledge to act and convince them is needed.
Fool an entire nation? The knowledge on what the mortals expect of the divine will help you.
Fool fate itself? Now that is something that needs not any kind of knowledge.
Now, where to acquire this knowedge? Perhaps the witches? No, that is a foolish thought.
they never show themselves to just anyone.
Forbidden knowledge? The desert can speak for how that turned out.
Knowledge, she just needs more. One of them will help her, for sure
Knowledge. The suspect has knowledge, but she is nowhere to be seen.
Knowledge....
Why was she born with no knowledge of humanity?
Why was she so devoid of knowledge that she didn't know what a human body is?
Why did the suspect need to teach her?
The suspect... She looks just like her. Just inverted from what she remembers of her blurry memories all these decades ago.
Inverted...
That feeling...
The confidence...
The power...
A god...
A human...
The sand castle...
A puppet...
"Is something funny, my Lady?" Oh, she didn't even realize she was laughing, her control over her body was getting sloppy.
That's right, she is laughing.
Oh, how funny. She's laughing.
Oh, how horrible. She's laughing.
Oh, how horrifying. She's not laughing.
"OF COURSE I wouldn't look any different!" She enlightens her fellow human. "Why would a GOD, age? why would the DIVINE, show the weakness of humanity?"
She just got the singular piece of knowledge she craved, is she happy?
The future she wanted to know, it is hers now.
And just like the Lord of Sands all those years ago. It bit her in the end.
How dare a Human attempt to subvert fate? How dare a mortal attempt to stop the prophecy?
The arrogance, it's laughable.
But. She supposes that humans always struggled when they learned of their fate. It is perfectly in character for her to do so.
"Thank you for your services, Gabriel. You can now retire from your post." His final act was too good for the audience, time for the star to relax.
"But, My Lady! What of your promised story?!" His exaggrations always meshed well with her. She can give him this I suppose.
"Well, my dear citizen. Why do you think I asked for you to investigate Focalors, and not Furina?" She throws him the bone.
"That..." She didn't give him down. "Dismissed."
He laughed as he left, and she laughed in return.
Now what.
Her role is pre determined, her ending is written. What is she to do?
"HAH, I am not the actress of the century for no reason, I WILL improvise the script. Fate? What a load of hogwash!"
Oh how freeing this feeling is, all bets are off. She can do whatever she wishes.
Time for her to begin the next act.
But before that...
"Be prepared! Ms. F~" She teases the mirror in her room. "This will be a story like no one has ever seen." She winks and leaves the room, off to do who knows what.```
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man you can see so hard how much my writing changed since those days. It was so bad and incoherent. thank god it got better.
regardless, as you can see some things chnaged, some things got removed, added, improved. But the core idea was there. The she was laughing scene is directly inspired by the breakdown scene in the fan fiction titled "The lights are still on upstage" which I re read so many times and adore and even think it is what actually happened before the sq of furina. although I do think it got too overdramatic at the end.
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Below is the very first short draft and idea on how i want to kill lily with the original intention in mind before changing it:
another invitation.
"Gabriel" she mentioned for him
he silently left the room.
"Lord Focalors, this is the latest report..." the sea is still rising.
she attended another tea party...
"Lord Focalors, the Ordo is requesting..." another request approved.
"Gabriel..." he left the room.
another case to handle...
"Gab..."
a ballroom....
"Lord..."
"Focalors..."
a case a report a tea party a case a report a tea party, one after another. this song and dance day after day.
"Lord Focalors." everyday that title is repeated.
'Lord Focalors!' they call her name.
'Lord Focalors!' they ask for her wisdom.
'Lord Focalors' they ask for her secrets.
"... Medical leave" an old husky voice interrupts her
Not even close to the final version, just a very short imagination of how it looks like
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You can see how this scene got broken up into 52, 53, and 54.
The suddenly growing old lily turned into agatha in 52.
the fact that gabriel de la rain was the main spy turned into micheal in 53 (reaching but I meant it in a way that she had full control over nobility)
and finaly the scene where everyone begs focalors for wisdom in 54.
I wrote this scene in november 11th 2025.
9 months ago lmaoooo.
oh wow I was going through the conversation around the above scene and i decided on how lily dies that day as well. In fact this chapter was my demo on how the time skip in 52 would go and not how lily would die. lily dying is just a byproduct.
Anyway here is a tid bit of my originla plans I yapped about to my beta reader, I am just so proud at how much I actually implemented.
The general plan I have going rn is:
Do what I said.
Time skip for a little bit, mention mid time skip that furina noticed that she felt like someone is stalking her, and it started after lily came back one day with a very bad mood. (she recruited the informant even though she didn't want to)
A little more time skip and the informant kinda gets to meet furina one way or another, she convinces him to work with her exclusively and he resigns from lily.
She sends out a question to all attendants of the minister meeting but.
"what is justice to you".
Maybe Send the informant to infiltrate some noble house or something. How she kinda gets rid or just threatens that house to get in line.
After that we establish the full status quo and we do the big time skip
Of course not everything got in but the vast majority did. and I am glad.
Okay. with this I got nothing more to talk about. So bellow will be a gallary with the art I comissioned for this fic.
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The very first art piece I comissioned and the one I was heavily directing. I even used the milastra wonderland engine to create the scene in genshin. crudely at that. send love to @chasikuu on twitter https://x.com/chasikuu/status/2048652785105711132
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Ah. the two lily art pieces I had made (with a cameo from agatha!). These two are close to my heart because this is the character I made and Lily looks so incredible in the first one. I will once again put the link to the first one go give insane love to cloudy for making it.
https://x.com/i/status/2067761761663471947
the second was made as a surprise by my best friend.
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this one was also made by cloudy but I am not sure if he posted it on his twitter.
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and finally. the one used in chapter 53, this one had many versions. But the one I used in the official chapter was the one that was least unpleasant on the human eyes. not the canon version furina most likely saw.
Below will be the official one and the two that were most likely canon:
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most likely canon version:
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second most likely:
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the one used officially:
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all made by cloudy too of course: https://x.com/Claudyartt/status/2085041900722008111
And twith this, I have said everything I wanted to say. See you all next week and yall gotta pray I get a backlog or we are all fucked.
and as a teaser. The next chapter will be focused on Neuvillette~
look forward to it.
toodles!