Aphelia took the Primordial Soil, her gaze knotted like tangled vines, and faced the green‑haired woman.
“No matter what you say, I’ll remember you until my last dusk.”
“Don’t remember me. Let it fade like morning mist.”
The green‑haired woman shook her head. The moment Aphelia received the Primordial Soil, the woman’s body thinned like windblown petals; only the emerald Aether kept her from vanishing outright.
“After I die, the Aether I saved will carry you to the next mark, like a river bearing a leaf. What awaits you there, I don’t know. But I believe you’ll find a future that’s yours. In the name of a divine puppet, I promise you…”
“Your guides will grant you the strength to split the dark, like a blade of dawn.”
Smiling, the green‑haired woman gave Aphelia those last words, like embers drifting into night.
When that act ended, Aphelia hung in a strange space, a bubble between storms—neither the woman’s world nor the hellish crimson sea of flame, but an Aether‑sealed, solitary isle.
She watched, helpless as a rooted tree, the green‑haired woman fall into a king’s arms, then unravel into a flood of green Aether that surged through this world like spring meltwater.
One current drifted toward Aphelia, gentle as a palm, lifted her like a feather, then a savage tearing raked her limbs and bones, flinging her beyond the shell of that space as the view whirled like leaves in a gale.
Perhaps the woman’s will sheltered her like a cloak; Aphelia didn’t black out this time, and she saw where she was, clear as moonlight on water.
“What is this…?”
She had been dragged into the same river of time she’d glimpsed the moment she became a Titleholder, a vast current without shores.
The Primordial Soil slipped soundlessly into her body, like seed into loam, and a will spread from it like ripples on a lake.
Inside the river of time, time itself lost its name; even Aphelia, after the first crush of pain, lost her sense of hours, like a clock drowned in rain.
A year, two, ten, a hundred—the numbers fell away like sand; she let the current bear her, while the Soil’s expansion burned through her like roots breaking stone.
She thought and re‑thought her past like a prayer bead, and she touched on Enkidu’s final, release‑like peace, until one day a call rose from the river like a distant bell.
Before she could answer, her body dropped, heavy as a stone; the fall filled her skull like thunder, and then her feet found earth again.
Dizziness hammered her like surf, and she sat to steady herself, lowering her center like a grounded tree.
A woman stepped up through the wind‑ruffled grass and sent a globe of light toward her like a drifting lantern.
Aphelia moved on reflex, a spark ready to strike, but as the light neared, the nausea ebbed like tide, and her sight cleared to the face of her helper.
“Hm? You’re already better?”
Surprised by Aphelia’s swift recovery, the woman half‑turned as if to fetch something, then paused like a deer catching a sound.
She was a beautiful woman in thin travel wear, gold hair smooth as wheat, braided long like a river rope.
An armring etched with strange script circled her right arm, mottled with years like weathered bronze.
By her side stood a fine horse and a few bags, no more than a swallow’s burden.
Most striking were her heterochromatic eyes: the left a ruby spark, the right a quiet onyx, a bewitching charm like fire veiled in night.
“Thank you. But where am I?”
Aphelia pulled her gaze away like a hand from a flame. She wondered why the stranger wasn’t shocked she had been made of fire, then glanced down and saw her body back to its old calm, like embers turned to ash.
She looked over the plain, an ocean of grass with almost no sign of people, and only this girl with her horse stood like a lone tree on the horizon.
“Here?”
The golden‑haired girl smiled, took a waterskin from the saddle like fruit from a branch, and offered it to Aphelia.
She swept aside the hair at her brow, and as the breeze combed the field, the whole plain answered with a soft rustle like rain on leaves; even Aphelia let out a long breath, soothed like stone under sun.
“This is the Plain of Gold. A great tribe once lived and multiplied here like herds under a vast sky… but my people are gone, like stars before dawn.”
“Sorry. I made you remember grief, like salt on a wound.”
Seeing the girl’s easy smile, Aphelia sighed, feeling she had stepped on thorns, and promised herself to tread more carefully with questions.
The girl shook her head, open as a clear day, and pointed to the waterskin in Aphelia’s hand.
“It’s fine. You though—after such a long road, won’t you take a drink to ease the dust?”
“Ah… then excuse me.”
Why this girl knew she’d traveled long no longer surprised Aphelia, like footprints finding a trail. Last time, Enkidu had waited in another age; this time, perhaps this golden girl was the signpost.
“Pfft—It’s wine? I thought it was water…”
The amber liquid slid down like sunlight, and only then did Aphelia realize; by then, it was too late, and she coughed like a startled bird.
“It’s good wine. This skin gets filled only once every nine days, like a moon’s passing. Savor it, and you’ll hear the song.”
The girl winced at the spilled drink, more for the wine than the mess; with a snap like a spark, the drops sank into the earth, and lush leaves sprang up like a green sigh.
Aphelia shook her head, a helpless smile on her lips, and handed the skin back; the road‑dust tang wasn’t for her taste.
It hit the throat hot and sharp like peppered fire; lower down it turned mellow, honey‑sweet and full, warming the heart like a hearth, and at the belly it ran clean as spring water.
From that layered change alone, Aphelia could tell it wasn’t common brew, no work of human hands, but sky‑kissed craft like dew caught at dawn.
Like a weathered traveler, if a mature woman or man stood here, Aphelia would think the wine was their life in a cup, bitter and bright as a sunset trail.
“Times here aren’t what they were. If you came seeking something, miss…”
She tightened the cap and hung the skin back on the saddle, then looked to the distance with a wry smile like a cracked mirror.
“…you’re late.”
Watching her, Aphelia felt a sudden illusion, like a mask slipping; this girl leading a horse held a heart unlike her youthful shell.
With that, the girl braced and swung into the saddle, light as a swallow. Unlike the green‑haired woman, she seemed a passerby who offered a hand out of kindness, not a guide waiting in fate’s shadow.
“Wait… what do you mean I’m late?”
“Just what it sounds like. Whatever brought you here, Asgard has fallen. Ragnarok has come. Old glory’s gone like smoke.”
She looked back, and for a heartbeat, maybe it was Aphelia’s fancy, fire seemed to burn in those mismatched eyes like coals under snow.
“Sorry… I don’t really understand. When I woke, I remembered only my name and my knowledge. As for Asgard or Ragnarok…”
She wasn’t lying; the words the girl used were strange as foreign stars. Aphelia was new to this land; even if this wasn’t her guide, she needed someone to map the sky.
Clearly, this girl would do.
“I see. Then how about traveling with a down‑on‑her‑luck soul like me?”
The girl smiled and held out her hand, open as a road at dawn; she didn’t pry into origins in a place this empty.
“Of course. Thank you. I’ll do my best not to slow you down.”
Aphelia gripped her hand and hopped up, a bit unsteady, onto the horse’s back like a fledgling taking wing.
She knew how to ride—battlefields had taught her iron and dust—but since she’d feigned amnesia, she held back like a blade in its sheath.
The girl simply drew Aphelia’s hands around her slender waist, easy as tying a ribbon. The closeness set Aphelia’s cheeks aflame, and the feel of skin under her forearms made her body go taut like a bowstring.
Her clothes were little more than thin strips, leaving the waist bare; the skin was pale as mutton‑fat jade, and her faint scent rose like warm milk. Aphelia remembered, with a small, sorrowful wince, that long ago she’d been a clueless male virgin, a past like a ghost in sunlight.
“What’s wrong? Not used to riding? Hold tight anyway; once we run, it’ll bump like waves.”
Feeling the change behind her, the girl didn’t dwell on it; instead she tugged Aphelia closer, bodies fitting like two leaves on one stem, then tightened the reins and sent the horse flying over the wide plain like wind over grain.
Aphelia’s face burned like fever; she forced her thoughts to cool like water and reached for safer talk.
“Um… by the way, I don’t know your name. I’m Aphelia, miss, may I…?”
Arms around the girl’s waist, Aphelia’s mind blanked like a white page; still, the question hooked the girl’s interest like bait in a clear stream.
After a brief thought, the girl laughed lightly and answered, voice bright as bells.
“Me? Just call me Wende.”
