"Who are you, really? To this world, to this era, Miss Wende—no, that may not be your true name."

Wende didn’t flinch; her smile was soft as dusk light on water. She reached into the air, casual as a breeze.

What settled in her palm wasn’t a pale-cyan Rune, but a fistful of Aether, bright as living Thunder.

She crushed it like dry snow. It flared into a thousand strange shapes, then drifted away like sparks into night.

"My name—Odin. Head of the Asgardian Realm, the one who rules Thunder, the one who led this era’s world."

"Sadly, Asgard faces a drowning doom, a black tide ready to close overhead. As its chief, I don’t intend to return and save it."

She shook her head with a bitter smile, eyes lifted to the jewel-strewn sky, her gaze a tangle of tides.

Aphelia wasn’t surprised; her lips curved, and she too looked up at that cold scattering of stars.

She had suspected Wende’s mask. She hadn’t expected Wende’s True God-self to be the sovereign of this era.

Perhaps… it was time to call her Odin.

"Then don’t save it," Aphelia said, voice level as a flat sea. "An era has its own push."

"Even the strongest person is a leaf in that flood. Against the age’s power, we’re small."

Surprise flickered, then admiration in Odin’s gaze—then another wry smile, thin as a knife.

"You’re right. Asgard’s fall may be the age’s push," she said, words steady as drumbeats in rain.

"I once drove that age, led Asgardians as overlords of the world. Even so, I think gods should step down."

"We should climb down from the altar and hand the future to humanity."

She looked at her revival, at the new power in her grasp, without a spark of longing—calm as a still lake.

"And the giants?" Aphelia asked, frost under her breath. "You looked shocked to see them here."

"They’re the opposite of Asgardians, born with fangs for ruin and slaughter," Odin said, voice low as thunderheads.

"This time, for reasons unknown, humans drove them—made them the vanguard assaulting the Realm."

She drew out a heavy hammer and a keen blade from nowhere. Pain washed her eyes like a storm’s bruise.

"These are my kin’s weapons. If they rest in giant hands, my kin met misfortune."

Aphelia exhaled, a tired wind through pines. She could already see what Odin would do next.

Words aside, when the important dead are faced, the heart can’t lie quiet. It was true for Odin; true for Aphelia.

"Yes… I’ll take revenge."

Odin slid both weapons into the void with a calm like glass. Aphelia knew this calm was the eye of the storm.

"Before, we restrained our use of Rune power. When the giants struck, the Asgardian Realm had no defense."

"Now, with this new power, giants won’t be my match. Not a tribe, not a nation—no, not their whole race."

Her last words came through clenched teeth, a wolf’s snarl. The killers of her people felt an arm’s length away.

Reach out, tear, shred—her mind made their bodies dust.

Aphelia knew that face too well. She’d worn it.

A self built on revenge, worshipping power; each new strength was fuel, stoking hatred’s fire to ash.

Stop her—should I?

The thought rose like smoke in Aphelia’s chest, shaped by old scars and old nights.

"I can even sense this world’s power now," Odin said, voice like a path lit under soil.

"When you revived me, I felt a road toward the world’s Origin, a resonance with a nameless will."

"This new power still has caverns to plumb, ores to vein."

She stood. Pale-cyan Thunder gathered in her hand, its glow brightened like a dawn crossing the ridge.

"Aphelia, you’re my benefactor. I don’t expect you to walk with me," Odin said, eyes steady as iron.

"Your memories aren’t back. My revenge may be reckless suicide, a march into a storm with no map."

"Even with new power, this war won’t end in days. Giants sprawl across the land like weeds."

"They even breach this Underworld Forest. I can’t promise victory."

Thunder in her palm tightened, becoming a blade of light. Aphelia sensed traces of Sigdrifa’s pure-white Aether within it.

"But if I succeed, I’ll reclaim this era," Odin said, a crown of dawn in her tone.

"The Asgardian Realm will stand above all again, shoulder to shoulder with the world."

"Then whatever I have, you will have—whether or not you share my mad revenge."

Her pale-cyan eyes flickered with a flood of Runes, then settled into pure, sharpened Thunder.

"But I still hope you’ll stand as my companion," she said, simple as a hand extended in rain.

"Not Odin the avenger asking, but Wende—the last ember of an extinct people—asking."

The harsh light finished forming.

It wasn’t pale-cyan Thunder, nor Sigdrifa’s pure-white Aether. It was Aether-born, beyond Aether—a force that marked existence.

Odin offered the light to Aphelia without a tremor, waiting for her answer like a hunter at the treeline.

A ticket, cut from Thunder, Aether, and Rune—a pass into a mad precipice.

"Heh, so eager to drag me into deep water?"

Aphelia eyed the “power,” a crooked smile in her voice, and turned her head like a cat.

Odin’s laugh turned awkward, her hand beginning to withdraw, a small emptiness opening like dusk.

A companion with the same thought—this was her first since becoming lord of the gods.

"Hey, I never said I’d refuse."

Aphelia caught the not-yet-drawn-back hand, her grip warm as a brazier.

Odin stared, stunned; Aphelia squeezed, rose, and grinned at her.

"A chance this good? I’ve got no reason to say no."

She took the radiant light, and under a nameless will, guided it, slow as moonlight, into her chest.

"They came for me too. I hold grudges," she said, playful as a blade’s glint. "I’ll take this ticket to mad revenge."

Looking at Odin, Aphelia couldn’t name the feeling—favor or fury. Yet when that hand reached out, the battle-born heart found a banner.

She wanted to stand beside her.

The light entering her chest bloomed like spring after frost.

The Primordial Soil that had built Aphelia’s body shattered; the ruined shell turned to ash and blew away.

A green core remained, merging with the light. Before Odin’s eyes, it spelled the word “miracle.”

Crimson Fire spread from the Primordial Soil, shaping a figure like Aphelia from flame.

The Primordial Soil nested in her core, blending with the light. Guided by the Crimson Fire, it diffused and filled the form.

Power that shook heaven and earth drew flies.

At the forest’s edge, countless giants slipped from the dark, weapons in hand, closing like wolves around lambs.

They didn’t even glance at Odin. Their eyes feasted on Aphelia’s remaking body, hungry as winter.

"Heh—ignoring me?"

Thunder fell without warning, a white axe from the sky, turning a charging giant into ash mid-step.

The heavy hammer and keen blade sat in Odin’s hands. Her pale-cyan eyes shone with taunt and challenge.

"Which of you isn’t afraid of death? Step forward!"

The forest burst with electric light. Giants charged, fearless, weapons whirling like storm-blown branches.

Odin didn’t rage; she laughed, a bell in thunder. Her eyes deepened to richer cyan, a sea before storm.

Endless Thunder fell, sweeping the mad giants like scythes through grain, and she walled Aphelia behind her.

Meanwhile, back on the plain, a giant in heavy armor watched his vast army, smugness like oil on water.

He barked charges now and then, sure of victory over Odin within the forest’s shade.

But when the forest flared with savage Thunder, his calm shattered like glass. He leapt onto his warhorse and drove forward.

Before their charge crossed the plain, blazing lightning struck, tearing the leader from the saddle in a single bolt.

The riders froze, silent as grave stones.

The leader wasn’t dead yet; he clawed upright against his mount, slow as a rusted hinge, pain crawling his limbs.

He stood and roared as if tasting victory. The chorus of giants rose to meet him.

Another Thunderbolt fell. This time, he burned into charcoal, as dead as a spent star.

The culprit drifted from the forest, wrapped in an ocean of lightning, calm as a moon over waves.

"Who’s next?"

Odin wiped her blood-red lips and smiled coldly.