Hearing them out, the Valkyrie smiled and nodded. Crimson Flame slid around her like dancing serpents, then knit itself into a miniature array.

“Since you want an explanation, you pay a price. I’m a True God, not your errand hand—carve that in ice.”

She kept smiling, but her gaze was winter steel; it pricked backs cold and tight like a north wind.

Because she’d helped, they’d let the boundary blur, treating the Valkyrie as a convenient ally, a mist-thin line crossed without thought.

The array’s pressure pressed their lungs like mountain air at dawn—only a warning tap, not a crushing avalanche.

“Fine. Name your terms, as long as we can pay.”

If it were anyone else, Senro would’ve doubted, even pushed with knives of questions.

But this wasn’t anyone else. This was a True God in the room, a storm that stood still.

Her legend ran through both the human world and the Demon World, with dusty annals tracing back to the age when the family behind Zhe and Jasmine first rose.

A living legend, ink and blood.

Any True God, upon ascension, gets shoved out by the world’s repulsion, driven into the realm of gods. Yet this Valkyrie felt no such tide; the world’s push didn’t lay a finger on her.

That’s why scholars and warlords have doubted her legend, some claiming she’s an Eastern bluff crafted to frighten enemies.

Senro was different. She’d seen the Valkyrie strike—saw the world itself bend like grass under wind. Doubting now would be the true stupidity.

So Senro believed without a pause and said straight: she’d pay for the truth.

“Decisive, aren’t you, eldest daughter of the Hydra family.”

The Valkyrie’s tone was teasing. Seeing Senro’s resolve—steel, not show—she quickly wrote out a list.

Soon the small sheet was filled, strokes like blades, and she handed it to Senro.

“Oh, and you, little Crimson Dragon over there—I plan to hire you.”

The red-haired mage froze. Her words tangled like threads under a gust.

“Th-this… Valkyrie, if you need anything, I’ll—I'll do it even if it kills me…”

It was funny to the Valkyrie, but to Zhe and Nero it was chilling, and here’s why—

This red-haired mage was a top figure of the Crimson Dragon Clan, a young Demigod compared to most, born with storm-fire talent.

The Crimson Dragon temperament—blunt, or say, volcanic—gave her a loud name in the Demon World.

“Don’t worry. Like my deal with the Hydra heiress, I’ll pay proper wages. I don’t bully people just because I’m strong.”

She rose, walked to the red-haired mage, and clapped her shoulder, then reached into the Crimson Flame like into a river and pinched out a blaze of a different red.

That blaze wasn’t the Crimson Flame. The moment it appeared, heat rolled like noon desert, and everyone stepped back on instinct. Only the red-haired mage stood her ground, eyes bright with fierce joy.

“Is that… the pure Crimson Dragon Source?! Purer even than Oz’s Crimson Dragon power?”

Her voice trembled. Her golden eyes narrowed into savage vertical slits, and scales threatened her skin like embers under silk.

“Correct, little Crimson Dragon. So? Do we have a deal?”

Seeing the hook set, the Valkyrie squeezed the Crimson Dragon Source. The heat vanished like a snuffed candle; the faint dragon might died to silence.

The red-haired mage almost lunged, hands hungry for the Source. When she realized, the Valkyrie had already caught her flustered posture like a mirror.

Even a Demigod like her blushed, unable to meet those gentle eyes.

“T-this… the Crimson Dragon Source is too precious. I don’t think I can meet your demand.”

She swallowed hard. The Source tugged at her instincts like a tide, but she knew the cost would be steep.

The Crimson Dragon Source is the clan’s most ancient Origin, the very concept of “Crimson Dragon” split from the Origin itself, a seed of the first flame.

Even a newborn hatchling, if granted the Source, could leap to Demigod in a heartbeat, with a path toward True God burning in its marrow.

Because the Source carries the clan’s primordial legacy—the ancient red dragon was a creation shaped by the Creator’s own hands on the wild earth.

“Relax. I’m not asking for your life. Little Crimson Dragon… hm, that’s not ideal. Your name?”

“Ah—uh? I’m Lilo, Lilo of the Crimson Dragon Clan.”

Asked for her name, Lilo answered without thinking, then regretted it, a drop of ink in holy water.

A Demigod famed in the Demon World, yet before the Valkyrie she was like an unawakened girl, stiff with shyness.

The Valkyrie’s smile deepened. She opened her palm, and heat surged like a tide; dragon roars scraped the air like iron.

The Source’s power called to Lilo. Without thinking, she answered with a thunderous dragon roar, voice-to-voice, storm-to-storm.

“So, Lilo—do you want this power?”

A holy True God, yet her words tasted of soft temptation, like a demon’s whisper under silk. Lilo, already pushed and pulled, couldn’t resist.

Looking at the face so close, Lilo nodded as if bewitched.

“Wonderful, Lilo. My request is simple: for the rest of your life, serve Aphelia. Or rather, serve me.”

“Mm… ah?”

At the nodding edge, dragon instinct jolted her. She stopped, pupils like blades locking on the Valkyrie.

“Trade freedom for power?”

She said it, then crushed the feral glare herself, lowering her head, no longer daring to meet those eyes.

In the instant she might have exploded, the Valkyrie’s cold gaze met hers again, and the borrowed courage melted like frost in the sun.

“Or think of it this way—become the Valkyrie’s first vassal deity.”

She still wore that smiling spring. Lilo, seated, was anything but calm.

“Y-you mean… the first vassal deity?!”

Not only Lilo. Senro’s beautiful eyes widened, staring like at a monster, silently scolding Lilo for dawdling at an open gate.

Blame Lilo less—dragons prize freedom almost as fiercely as treasure. Her resistance was bone-deep instinct.

But if that freedom crowns her as a True God, the scale tips differently.

This world has gone too long without a new True God.

If Lilo, the Crimson Dragon prodigy, ascends—and becomes the Valkyrie’s vassal deity—then the next supreme race of the Demon World will be the Crimson Dragon Clan.

Thinking that, Lilo hesitated no more. She dropped to one knee and bowed to the Valkyrie.

“No need. I dislike fussy rites. Swear before me, that’s enough.”

Simple rites save time like cut knots. An oath before a True God is simple—when divinity stands in front of you, no grand arrays are needed.

The witnesses around them, in their own way, stepped into history like footprints in wet clay.

“Then… Valkyrie, may I ask—are these materials prepared for Aphelia?”

After learning everything about Aphelia from Nero, Senro studied the list and felt a shape in the fog.

“It’s best if you understand. For the royal line, these materials shouldn’t be much, right?”

Senro nodded. Many items were rare, yet to her sprawling collection, they were pebbles in a river.

Any mage who becomes a Demigod is a tycoon in their own right. In the human world, there’s even a Mage League’s mage nation—more banner than country, lacking the two empires’ backing.

“In that case, you swear too.”

Facing the Valkyrie’s demand, Senro didn’t hesitate. She swore, and the Crimson Flame touched the back of her hand, leaving a petal-bright mark.

“Since the bargains are struck, I’ll give you the truth you want. Believe it or not—that’s yours to decide.”

With everything set, the Crimson Flame rushed out in a blink, sweeping the whole room like a red tide, and threw them into the blaze before resistance could even rise.