Before Uroboros could object, Aphelia gave her a gentle look, warm as spring rain, and Uroboros could only sigh and nod.

“Mm… Aphelia, thank you. I’m sorry for dragging you into this quarrel.” Her voice ebbed like a low tide. “If not for you, I’d have died in the forest. I’d never have a chance at this power.”

A little Aether pooled in Odin’s palm, dew gathering on a leaf. Though she’d only just gained it, she handled it like a veteran sailor reading a bright current.

“So, do you have a plan to reclaim your realm?” Aphelia asked, gaze steady, like a spear leveled before a storm.

“Of course. I have a rough plan.” Odin paused, her azure eyes soft as sea-glass, hope and reluctance braided like river reeds. “Aphelia, let me ask again. Your answer before might’ve been heat-of-the-moment. What comes next is a one-in-ten chance to live, a walk on the blade’s edge.”

“Will you truly join me in this mad revenge, even if it’s a near-certain death?”

“Of course. Even if it’s one-in-ten.” Aphelia smiled, dawn breaking over dark hills.

Behind her, Uroboros chuckled and shook her head, like a serpent shedding a small worry.

Hearing Aphelia’s vow, Odin’s vision blurred, mist over a lake. She lowered her head quickly, hiding the tremor from Aphelia and Uroboros.

“Then I have to begin with the world as it is.” Azure Aether tugged them like a tide. In an instant, they stood at the dome of heaven, peering down from a height where clouds thinned like gauze.

“We’re on the first layer of this world, the crown of the World Tree, where the Asgardian Realm lies.”

“This is the former Valhalla, the palace of the einherjar.” Her tone dimmed, like a lamp under rain. “It’s abolished now… As the top layer bathed in the World Tree’s power, the Aesir are born able to draw Runes, like seeds coaxed from living bark. That put us in the lead, balancing man and giant.”

At Valhalla’s name, sorrow rippled through Odin, a shadow crossing snow. She recovered and pointed to the ocean they’d just crossed.

“That is the Sea of the Underworld, once ruled by my kin, Hela.” The waters stretched ink-dark, a horizon of sleep. “She fell into slumber tens of thousands of years ago. No call will wake her. But if anyone dares invade that sea, they’ll learn what the Underworld tastes like.”

Aphelia swallowed her question about calling on that kin, the words sinking like stones. She glanced at the dark water; without Odin’s warning, she’d never link this calm sea to the dead.

Uroboros only yawned, unbothered, like a cat before a storm.

Seeing this, Odin carried them over the ocean to the forest they’d left. From high above, Aphelia finally saw it clearly: each colossal tree held countless faint lights, like fireflies caught in amber.

Odin’s azure eyes softened, tide to glass. “This is Alfheim, the fae’s land. I hid here because of their goodwill toward the Aesir.”

“When the giants first invaded, the frail fae couldn’t fight. Led by their queen, they chose sleep as the price, unfurling a protective veil, starlight woven to shield the Aesir and part giants from humans.”

She sighed, wind moving over graves. If that barrier still held, she wouldn’t have been found or driven to a cliff’s edge.

“…I don’t know how they are now. Their queen concealed them long ago, so giants and humans wouldn’t find them.” Her hope flickered like a lone lantern. “May they be safe.”

Odin exhaled, shook her head, and carried them down to the Golden Plain. The grass shone like ripened wheat, yet the stain of giant blood lay over it, a rusty tide that wouldn’t soon fade.

“This needs no long speech.” Her voice tightened like bowstring. “Aphelia and I met on this Golden Plain. It’s the plain of harvest and plenty, the field the Aesir depend on. Pity it’s polluted by giant blood. Who knows when it’ll heal.”

Seeing pain and hatred carve Odin’s face, Aphelia sighed, winter breath in a ruined field. Hatred sunk into bone must be paid in blood; until giants are torn like ragged banners, this feud won’t end.

“In the distance, that’s the Asgardian Realm.” Odin pointed, hand steady as a compass. “We can’t tip our hand and alert the giants. No sudden arrivals inside their den.”

Following her line, they glimpsed a golden palace standing far away, shimmering like sun on a shield.

With their sight now razor-sharp, they could read its light. The palace bore some strange ward, or the realm itself wrapped the golden halls in a blessing.

“That used to be my palace.” She smiled at herself, frost biting iron. “Now it’s surely held by giants.”

“It’s the other core of the Asgardian Realm besides the World Tree. I poured most of my power into it. Nearly all Aesir lived in that Golden Palace. Inside, power grows at a breakneck pace—each day worth a thousand.”

“Power growth?” Aphelia frowned, puzzlement stirring like leaves. “I thought you wielded Runes—tools drawn from outside.”

“Ah, sorry for the confusion.” Odin’s laugh was small, a pebble in a stream. “Driving a Rune still relies on the fire inside us.”

Beyond the Azure Aether, a second force gathered in her palm—transparent yet shaped—dense roots coiling, a lattice that gripped her hand.

“To drive a Rune directly, you must eat the fruit of the World Tree. That’s the foundation.”

“If the World Tree’s nourishment is the switch that starts a Rune, then what the fruit creates in us is the vessel that holds power.” Her voice rang clear, like steel on stone. “Of course, if I activate a Rune and hand it to you, you don’t need that whole process.”

“I see…” Aphelia’s thoughts drifted to magitech, devices driven by Mana Crystals, gears humming like bees. In a way they’re alike—the World Tree’s fruit is the device, and the body is the Mana Crystal holding Arcane Power.

“Still, Rune power can’t match Aether.” Odin looked to the horizon, storm on her brow. “Aether can upend the world, like a gale tearing the sky. What do you call it where you’re from? The word ‘Aether’ surfaced the moment it took root in me.”

“We call it Aether too.” Aphelia smiled, moonlight on water. “It feels sourced from the world’s essence. It’s too neat to be chance.”

Her own path to power had been anything but normal, a river running sideways through stone.

“Then it’s likely what you said—power that touches the world’s bones.” Odin nodded, the realm’s old weight in her gaze.

“This is only the first layer.” She gestured, a cartographer’s hand over a leaf-map. “There’s far more than my rough sketch. The realm holds the territories of each godly clan, and their civilizations.”

“Between the Golden Plain and the realm, there used to be a river that never stopped, a silver ribbon for defense. Humans blocked it by some unknown means.”

“First layer?” Uroboros leaned in, eyes a dark whirlpool. “What is your world like?”

Odin didn’t answer directly, caution pricking like a thorn under the sleeve. After seeing Uroboros’s eerie power, anyone would be wary—Aphelia had been too, at first, trust sealed only by Uroboros’s self-sacrifice, a flame offered to guard a friend.

Odin looked to Aphelia for consent. Aphelia nodded with a wry smile, twilight shading a field.

“Yes. Our world isn’t a normal continent.” Her words rose like lanterns in a night sea. “It hangs in the void: three distinct layers, equal in size, bound tight by the World Tree.”

“Suspended in the void?” Aphelia thought of mages’ domains, little pockets cut from emptiness. But this was a whole world—three worlds woven on one loom.

“Yes. Our world is fixed by the World Tree, rooted in the void like a cosmic trunk.”

“If the World Tree is destroyed, the two upper worlds that hold billions will vanish at once, breath snuffed, swallowed by the void, leaving no trace.”

“So even when humans surged from the second layer to the first, they didn’t dare harm the World Tree.” Odin’s voice was iron under frost. “Burn that bridge, and there’s no refuge left. And only the Aesir can repair it.”