Two months later.

Eli sat in a wheelchair, bandages on his arm and eyes like pale winter cloth. He felt the sea breeze brush past like cool silk, then let out a breath like fog. "Looks like the weather’s good today."

"Mhm." Edlyn clasped her hands behind her back. She leaned forward into the wind like a willow and smiled. "Rare mood for you to come out walking."

"Staying in one spot too long wears you out," Eli said, helpless as driftwood.

"Mm." Edlyn laughed and rested on the wheelchair’s arm. "I wish everything could end like this."

"Sorry." Eli reached out. By feel alone, he patted her head like stroking soft fur.

Edlyn arched a brow, a spark in her eyes like flint. "Sometimes I wonder if you’re conning me. Your mind’s offline, your eyes are blind. How do you know I’m right here?"

"By feel," Eli said with a smile.

"Feel?" Edlyn stared, puzzled as a cat at rain, waiting.

Eli drew a deep breath, coughed twice, then smiled. "In the last fight, I gathered what I could pull from both worlds and swung with everything I had. But that power wasn’t mine to steer. It scorched my eyes like twin suns and crushed my spirit like a falling star. For a time, I couldn’t even lock on to Zero."

"So you…"

"Yeah. I cut air." He gave a bitter smile like salt on the tongue. "I blew up four or five meters short, like fireworks in the surf. That bought him time to shield. So I thought, if I could lock onto him without those crutches, maybe I could beat him."

"...Why not try to make a body that can carry that power?" Edlyn frowned, lines like ripples.

"Can’t be done. Strap it to Zero and he still shatters in an instant. Two worlds’ power detonates on touch, like thunder tearing the sky. Nothing living can stand in the way."

"Then Zero’s that strong? We can’t do anything? We just pull cheap tricks?" Edlyn grimaced, clouds gathering in her gaze.

He shook his head with a smile like sunlight after rain. "Not necessarily. When I fought him, I was at my peak. Without the laws cocooning him, he and I are equals. But he was born bearing the universe’s belief, a tide you can’t resist by grinding. So…"

"Find something like his?" Edlyn finished, eyes lighting like stars caught in a pool.

"Right. The Origin Tree. Or the World Tree," Eli said, smiling.

"Origin..." Edlyn sighed, her breath like a fallen leaf. "That’s too much. What kind of monsters are we up against?"

"Heh. Not killing me was his biggest mistake. The future’s got a show waiting for him, me and the Abyss on stage." Eli tipped his face up. He couldn’t see, yet his gaze felt like an arrow through clouds, toward the one behind the universe.

"Back to this. You’re hurt this bad—so it’s all on you?" Edlyn’s smile thinned, a chill like frost pooling around him.

Eli coughed twice and changed tune fast. "N-not all. I got pounded pretty hard before that too. Uh…"

"Idiot!" Edlyn dove into his arms like a gust. She looked up and yanked his cheeks, hard as a crab’s pinch. "Damn cat, had me worried sick! And it’s mostly you doing it to yourself?"

"I did it to beat the enemy. Cough, cough. Easy. Easy. I’m the patient here! Ah—don’t hit the face!" Eli raised his hands like a flimsy umbrella, but the blow never came.

Heat pooled in his chest, a small hearth against winter. He dropped the joking tone, and gently smoothed Edlyn’s hair like feathers between his fingers. "Don’t cry. I swear I won’t do that again."

Edlyn lay on his chest, head bowed like a wilted blossom. She only nodded against his shirt and rubbed lightly.

Eli smiled.

Looked like their Demonic Lord had truly changed.

He let out a slow breath, cupped Edlyn’s small face like a fragile shell, and said, "Edlyn, I need to tell you something."

Edlyn wiped her tears and swung a leg over, straddling his lap like a sly cat. "Say it."

Eli rubbed his chin. He tore a slit in the air like ripping silk, then reached in and drew out a blue longsword.

Edlyn tilted her head like a curious bird. "Mm? What are you doing?"

"Uh… so… uh… uh."

"You need the bathroom?"

"No. Not that. It’s—this is complicated. You need to hear me out. Okay? Stay calm," Eli said solemnly.

"What a weirdo." Edlyn scratched her head, baffled as a fox at thunder. "Fine, I promise."

"Okay. You said it," Eli muttered, sheepish.

"Less nonsense. Show me what you’re doing." Edlyn glared, eyes like knives. Too bad the man was blind and missed it.

Eli cleared his throat. Liqianyu and Yiyi had helped shoulder part of his wounds, like trees taking lightning for a house, so both lay asleep.

Which meant… a certain little girl had been cramped inside the sword all this time, like a bird in a cage. It was very, very suffocating.

So when Eli broke the seal—

A figure even younger than Angela bloomed between them like a bluebell.

The girl wrapped her arms around Eli’s neck and nuzzled like a kitten. "Daddy~"

"...Huh? What did she just call you?" Edlyn asked with smiling eyes, gleam like a drawn blade.

"Calm down! Calm down, Edlyn. I’ll explain right now! You have to stay calm!" Eli waved his hands, moved Alice aside, then caught Edlyn’s hands in his, one in each, like anchoring ropes.

Edlyn smiled, slid her left hand free, and twirled it in the air. The Demon Sword Ashill flashed into her grip, its tip touching Eli’s throat like an icy fang.

Eli swallowed, Adam’s apple jumping like a hooked fish. "C-cal m down!"

"Speak!"

....................................................

Only after he laid out everything—Abyss, Zero, the whole tangle—did Edlyn believe him.

The Demonic Lord looked at the tiny bundle curled in Eli’s arms with a complicated gaze, clouds snagged on a ridge. She sighed. "So this is Alice?"

"Yeah. Same bloodline as the future Alice. We can be pretty sure," Eli said, a taut note in his voice like a drawn string.

"Forget it. If that’s the case, I can’t say much." Edlyn turned her head like shutting a window. She looked very unhappy.

Then Alice poked out of Eli’s arms and burrowed into Edlyn’s. A big loli and a small loli, eyes meeting like lake and sky.

Alice moved first. She hopped up and hugged Edlyn. "Mom~"

Behind them, Eli flashed Alice a secret thumbs-up, a little flag in the wind. Good job. Worth all that coaching.

Edlyn squirmed under the hug. And the kid really did resemble Angela in a few ways.

Like… smearing her with drool.

That kiss on the cheek left a glossy stamp like a fish scale.

The Demonic Lord couldn’t take it. She gritted her teeth, peeled Alice off, and pinched her cheeks. "You’re as much trouble as your dad!"

"Ahem. Ai-chan, I’m innocent."

"Shut it. You don’t get a line. Sit still," Edlyn shot him a vicious look, eyes like cold steel.

He hunched his neck and kept quiet, a turtle in its shell. Seeing the two bond, he let himself relax, a stone sinking into still water.

Edlyn held Alice with tangled feelings, wind in crossed branches. "Fine. If it’s true, she can’t be blamed. Some of this really isn’t on Eli."

She set Alice down and, resigned, wheeled Eli back like pushing a boat through calm tide. Alice trailed behind like a small shadow, pinching the hem of Edlyn’s skirt and following with careful steps.

Edlyn’s heart loosened, burdens melting like frost in sun.

When the three returned home, two masked figures stood in the entry like statues.

Edlyn stopped with a frown, killing intent seeping off her like cold mist. Eli felt the chill in her aura and lifted his head. "What is it?"

"...Nothing. Just two bastards," Edlyn said with a cold laugh, eyes like flint.

The two turned to face them, heads swiveling like owls.

Edlyn sneered. "Talk, you rats. Why pretend to be my parents?"

"Parents?" Eli blurted, shock rising like a wave. "You mean… the Bruyal couple?"

"Yeah. Eli, tell me—how mad am I now? They copied my parents’ aura, slipped past every screen, and broke into my house," Edlyn said, voice like ice.

"...I get it," Eli sighed, wind in reeds.

"Hey. It’s me. It’s me. Really me," the Abyss said, taking off his mask. He sighed. "You little brat."

"...I need a reason," Edlyn said coldly, voice flat as a blade. "Or I flip the table."

Abyss gave a bitter smile, luck gone gray as rain.

Earlier he’d stopped her from breaking through to save Eli, and they’d split over it. Then Eli must’ve done something to rile her again.

Abyss said, "No other reason. I am Yalman Bruyal."

"I am Yuliye." The woman removed her mask and revealed the face of the Celestial God, dawn clinging to her features. She looked at Edlyn with a complicated gaze and a hint of apology.

"...I don’t believe you." Edlyn’s face went still, a haze of confusion drifting in her eyes like fog.

"I don’t believe you!" she repeated, voice like a snapped string.

Edlyn folded her arms and slowly crouched, small as a storm-shaken sprout.

Alice hugged Edlyn’s arm, worry welling like rain. "Mom…"

Eli set his jaw, face dark as iron. He stood while needles of pain stabbed through him like hail. Blood rose in his throat like rust, but he stayed upright. He felt for Edlyn with everything he had and pulled her into his arms. "It’s okay. They won’t bully you. Let’s hear them out, slowly. Okay?"

"Parents back from the dead deserve at least a reason or two." He kissed the corner of her eye like a falling petal, heart aching.

He knew. Learning her mother was the Celestial God would spin bad thoughts like strangling threads—her life under someone else’s hand, and so on.

Edlyn lifted her head to look at Eli. She wiped her tears. "Go sit back down."

Eli smiled, and a line of blood slid from his mouth like a red thread. "I’m fine."

The Celestial God and the Abyss exchanged a look and sighed together like twin tides. The Celestial God said, "Easy, child. I’m here to help you this time."

Edlyn kept her face cold and studied the Celestial God, her gaze as complicated as stormlight.