“Not… not quite right.” The Abyss’s brows knotted like storm clouds. “I’ve missed something.”

He narrowed his eyes to a blade’s slit and sifted through the days, memories sliding past like silt in a dark river.

He combed his recollections, fingertip-fine, and yes—something snagged. Eli’s face flashed across his mind like lightning, and the Abyss froze. He squinted, tracking that human’s every move like a hunter reading tracks in dew.

Then he slowly closed his eyes.

“Interesting. How very interesting.” A crescent smile touched his mouth, a ripple on black water. “While I slept, what exactly did you do? Is all of this… because of you?” He exhaled, easy as wind leaving a cave.

He stalled again, as if he’d kicked a buried stone. He stood there a long beat before he came back to himself.

“I feel… relaxed? Curious? And… sad?” He stared at himself, bewildered, like someone meeting their shadow at noon.

In an era not his own, with his true body sealed, the titanic power gone quiet—had the feelings he once cast aside begun returning, step by step, like lost birds finding home?

The Abyss chuckled. “It’s not a bad feeling. A pity, though.”

He shook his head and drew back his wandering thoughts like a net.

Beside him, Pandora watched him freeze, then glow with joy, then dim with sorrow. Her brows pinched, baffled. This wasn’t the Abyss she remembered. Aside from that bone-deep familiar aura, nothing matched her creator.

What was going on?

“Seems I’ve got to push the thread of time further,” the Abyss said, smiling. “Right now, I still can’t confirm a few things.”

His outline faded like mist at dawn, leaving Pandora standing there, blank and blinking.

“What was that? Wasn’t the Creator coming out to help?” The Demonic Lord scowled, turning it over like a stone and finding no answer.

In the end, he blamed it on the seal being too strong. His creator, the Abyss, must’ve slipped back into sleep.

For now, he’d better pour himself into this battle that already tasted of defeat.

...

Back to the leads of this era.

Eli sighed. “Hey, that thing’s way too high. We can’t fly. How’re we getting it?”

“Easy. Climb.” Edlyn scanned the grove, then snatched at the air. A clot of demonic miasma condensed over the ground into a neat platform. She nodded, satisfied, and tugged the dazed Yiyi down to sit.

“Climb?” Eli looked up at the Tree of Life, towering like a pillar of sky.

No ridges. No knots. Just one sheer trunk, bare as polished jade.

He stared at the giant and fell into a deep, dry silence.

For a pile of reasons, I haven’t made a proper entrance in forever. And the moment I do, I eat dirt. You’ve got to be kidding me.

He eyed Raphael, who was tapping a heel against the root. He arched a brow. “Hey, Elf. You can fly, right? Go up and bring that thing down.”

Raphael shrugged. “So you do know I can fly now.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” Eli’s eyes narrowed like a cat in sun.

“Oh, nothing. I’m just thinking—here, in my Elf Race cradle—how does someone at my tier beat me again?” Raphael’s eyes flushed red, heat behind glass.

Eli and Edlyn traded a look and sighed together. “Great. He’s splitting again.”

Raphael shot into the air. Under the Tree of Life’s mysterious radiance, his speed sharpened, a hawk riding an updraft.

“Hahahaha! Come then—Eli, was it? Let me show you my might!” His laughter fell like hammers.

Eli lifted one hand. A transparent shield rose, edged with a warm gold gleam. The waves of laughter smashed it and ripples spread like rings on a pond.

Under the shield, Edlyn fished a specialty fruit from Mit out of her pocket realm, bit in, and watched Eli, calm as moonlight. “He looks stronger. Can you hold?”

“Are you kidding me?” Eli rolled his eyes. “Sit tight and wait for your man to return in triumph.”

Edlyn flushed, half shy, half mad. “Keep talking like that, and I’ll join him to beat you.”

“Uh—my lady, my bad.” Eli scratched his head and grinned, guilty as a fox.

“Get lost!” Heat flared in her voice. She snapped a swift kick. Eli got booted out of the shield and straight into Raphael’s sonic roar.

Raphael’s glassy wings spread and he climbed a few lengths. Then his hands swept wide.

Green orbs fell in straight lines like a toxic rain.

Edlyn’s lip curled. She knew this trick too well—the Elf Race’s mass spell that soured the land when they crushed the Demon Race who came by sea and land. Poisoned, too.

One orb hit the ground. Flowers swelled into giant blooms. From the heart, a mouth split wide and lunged for Eli.

He threw the flower a flat, cold glance, then locked back on Raphael. The blossom beside him was cut down by an unseen force, dropping like a severed head.

Eli shrugged. “You turned something pretty into something vile. I’ll probably never like this kind of flower again.”

Raphael pretended not to hear. He struck a shape in the air. A long green bow of energy formed. He drew to full moon and grinned. “You can stall with your tongue now. Soon these cute flowers will eat you, and you’ll be the finest mulch.”

Edlyn flicked her wrist. A gale thick with demonic miasma spun from nothing, swallowed every green orb, and left the sky clean. She huffed. “That move ticks me off. Stinky Hero, if you don’t shoot him down, I won’t speak to you for three days.”

Eli smiled up at Raphael. “Orders from the lady. I’ve got no choice.”

“Filthy couple!” Raphael glared, stung that his skill had been brushed aside like dust. “Die, you filthy couple! Spirit Bane!”

A strange sigil bloomed at his brow like fire ink. The bow in his hands turned heavy, real. The nocked arrow flooded with gold light.

At the peak, he loosed. The arrow screamed, carrying alien might, and dove for Eli like a comet.

Eli kept his eyes on Raphael, but spoke to Edlyn. “Hey, E-chan. You know, not long ago—when that nameless girl popped out—I grasped my Sacred Rank.”

“Huh?” Edlyn blinked, not following.

“Yeah. I don’t have flashy powers. All I’ve got is focus.” Eli smiled.

His left pupil turned white. His right stayed dark. Everyone present felt watched, a hawk’s shadow gliding over their skin.

Eli looked up at the arrow. Silence pooled around him.

“Sever.” His hand settled on the hilt of his broken sword.

He didn’t draw. He just fixed the onrushing shaft with those eyes.

The impossible unfolded. With no swing at all, the arrow split clean in midair, a reed sliced by frost. The halves, still driven by inertia, tumbled toward his face—

—and in that blink, a storm of sword-light flared and fell.

Every splinter turned to chaff, then to dust, then to nothing.

“How… how is that possible!”

...

Roll time forward again. When the Demon King fell, the Abyss returned.

He cupped Pandora’s last strand of soul like a candle from the draft, making sure it wouldn’t thin away. Then he drifted after the celebrated Birand, wandering from town to town.

Wherever Birand went, respect rose like a tide behind him.

For someone strapped in armor for too long, that warmth felt like a shirt that didn’t fit. He didn’t know how to meet the children’s eyes, bright with hope.

Truth was, he was just an executioner. Was he supposed to teach kids how to kill?

It gnawed at him.

The Abyss changed his face and came to his side.

“My friend, looks like something weighs on you.” He approached with an easy smile, quiet as dusk.

Birand had seen him coming. No malice, no killing intent. He let him near.

“It’s nothing. Don’t you know me?” Birand tapped his own face, honestly surprised.

The Abyss shook his head. “Nah. I used to be an old man who fished. Heh… not even a real fisherman.”

Birand laughed. “Don’t worry about it.”

“So, are you famous?” The Abyss asked softly, like lifting a lid off simmering soup.

Birand waved both hands. “No, no. I’m just—uh.” The words dried up.

“It’s fine. You’re young. I get it.” The Abyss chuckled.

“What’s your name, kid?”

“Ah—my name’s Bir—uh. Kaila. Yeah, Kaila.” Birand smiled. “And you, sir?”

The Abyss thought, then smiled. “Me? Yulis. Yulis Anmerhan. Pleasure, young man.”

“Heh.”