A crack runs through the frozen time. Red thorns tear through the sky, spreading like spiderwebs, and soon the cracks begin to descend everywhere in sight.
Fernandez watched the crumbling barrier with his fading vision. The stopped time, the burning earth, all of it was Sadarkelisa’s ‘dream.’ The barrier that had manifested her dream was slowly collapsing.
[You, mortal!!]
Sadarkelisa’s scream, scattering into pieces as she soared into the sky, shook the earth. As if glass were shattering, the cracks fragmented, and time began to flow again.
The wind blew. Screams and roars began to echo once more. Fernandez quickly turned his back. Against the backdrop of the burning Yggdrasil, he resisted the heat scorching his back, his exhausted body, and the hellish magic coursing through his veins…
“Your, Your Excellency? What is this?!”
“Shh. Kirhas.”
-Swish.
Fernandez slowly embraced Kirhas. He had to protect her as much as possible from the heat and magic surging behind them. She, unaware of what was happening, panted in his arms.
“Your Excellency, my goodness! Your, your wounds! Your arm?!”
“Any trouble breathing?”
“I’m fine! I’m fine, but…”
“I’m fine too.”
[Is that so?]
Botan, from Fernandez’s waist, chuckled softly. He briefly assessed Fernandez’s condition and marveled.
[Such dense magic. How can you maintain your sanity?]
“I’ve done it before.”
Unlike others who had to modify their souls to survive on the earth corrupted by hellish magic in their past lives, Fernandez, who clung to spiritual purity, had to consider a different way of survival.
Filtering hellish magic, completely neutralizing its effects was impossible, but he had reached a masterful level in minimizing the side effects accumulating in his body.
As a result, Fernandez could maintain his sanity amidst Sadarkelisa’s magic. His body was dying moment by moment, but for him, sanity was more important than the flesh.
“Fernandez!!”
A sharp voice echoed from beyond the sky. Up there, a crimson dragon was flying through the sky. It was Abel. She spotted Fernandez and immediately swooped down.
“Are you alright?”
“We’re all exhausted, Abel.”
“…Right. I’m sorry I couldn’t keep my promise.”
-Boom!
Abel’s massive body landed beside him, shaking the earth. She looked down at Fernandez and Kirhas with a troubled gaze. Soon, she turned her head to look at Yggdrasil. Beneath the flaming roots of Yggdrasil, a massive presence was rising.
“She’s coming. Is there any hope?”
“Clutching onto hope is foolish. Neither I, nor you, nor this world has much time left.”
“Right. Let’s not cling to hope, but resist despair.”
-Flutter.
Abel spread her wings wide, shielding Kirhas and Fernandez. The wind blowing through the flames collided with her wings, scattering sparks. Abel calmly faced the lightning strikes, gazing at the base of the World Tree.
-Crack!
A small crack ran across the ground. First claws, then thick arms. Soon, a massive body tore through the earth, crushing and shattering the trunk of Yggdrasil.
-Crack, crash!!
A giant serpent, a winged serpent, coiled around Yggdrasil, revealing its head. The World Tree, more like a city wall than a building, was hidden beneath the serpent’s body, its boundaries blurred by the flames.
Amidst it all, two glowing eyes burned like embers.
-Crash!
The earth began to crumble, and twisted beings started crawling out. With her appearance, the ground lost its life and began to collapse. Flames, cracks, and screams echoed everywhere in sight.
In the distance, the legions of Jotun and Helheim, trapped among demons, screamed. Fernandez slowly stepped out from under Abel’s wing. Pushing him back slightly, Abel whispered.
“Do you have a plan?”
“Take me to its head.”
“Alright. I’ll lead. You follow.”
Abel grinned and looked straight ahead. Sadarkelisa, coiled around Yggdrasil, silently gazed down at her and this world.
“Sadarkelisa!!”
Abel shouted at the top of her lungs. The dragon’s roar pierced through the flames blocking her path.
“Do you remember me?!”
[Ah, of course. Abelesas. Sadarkelisa’s former sister.]
-Crash.
The massive branches of Yggdrasil crumbled, revealing the writhing body of the serpent. Sadarkelisa slowly raised her head and whispered.
[Have you come to offer your soul to Sadarkelisa?]
“Nonsense! I’ve returned to stop you, the deeds you’ve done, and the deeds you will do!”
[Stop Sadarkelisa? Stop ‘me’?]
The hissing grew louder. Even the noise of the battlefield surrounding Yggdrasil seemed drowned out by it. The serpent laughed, shaking off madness, and slowly rose.
-Crash!
The massive branches crumbled, and the serpent’s body writhed above them. Sadarkelisa raised her head high, gazing down at the crumbling earth. She glared at Abel with burning eyes and shouted.
[‘I’ am Sadarkelisa. The end of all creation, the doom of thousands of worlds, the fate of the gods! The storm of destruction, ruin, and bitter cold, and the sun of drought! No one can stop me! Even the great gods of the heavens hide in the shadows, fearing me!]
“Quite the speech.”
Fernandez clicked his tongue. Hearing it, Sadarkelisa’s eyes flickered as she glared down at him.
[Sadarkelisa’s name is Ragnarok! Your twilight has come!]
-Crash!
The earth trembled and shattered around her. The dimensional rift intensified, and the boundaries between Muspel, the hell she ruled, and Asgard began to collapse.
Fernandez lifted Kirhas onto Abel’s back and leaped onto Abel’s body. At the same time, black chains appeared from Abel’s neck, wrapping around his wrist.
“What’s this?”
“Doesn’t it bring back memories?”
“Haha!”
Magic began to resonate between Abel and Fernandez. The Chains of Control. The bond she had directly allowed burned more intensely than when they first cast this spell. The time they spent together, perhaps memories that could be called nostalgia, flowed through the spell entwined around his wrist.
The dragon’s soul, the divine spirits and magic of the elf gods that formed her body, and the divinity Fernandez himself held pulsed more fully than ever. Fernandez, brushing the scales on Abel’s neck, murmured.
“Right. It brings back memories.”
“The words we said then too?”
Now, between Fernandez and Abel, a single thought conveyed information faster and more accurately than a hundred words. Abel was reminiscing about the moment she first met Fernandez in her realm of imagination.
‘Let me tell you why this era is called the ‘Age of Humans.”
What is a human? Fernandez, at some point…
