Greeting the Goddess.
It was the phrase every child on the continent learned before they learned to read. It was the words whispered at every deathbed, carved into every gravestone, spoken at every funeral across every nation on the continent.
The greatest honor a mortal soul could achieve, the moment where a life's worth was measured and the Goddess welcomed you home.
People lived their entire lives so that when the moment came, they could hold their chin high before her and say they had done their best. That they had lived with virtue. That they were worthy of her light.
It was beautiful.
It was also final.
No one had ever come back from greeting the Goddess. No one had ever held their mother again after she passed. No one had ever heard their brother's voice, or felt their father's hand on their head, or been scolded for crying too loud in the market square.
Until today.
