“Don't die?”

Those three words sank like an iron brand into Violet’s heart, a mark smoking beneath the skin. Why would Aphelia cry that out from the dark? Words shouted from the reflex gut cling like roots to the oldest memory. Could it be something buried in winter soil?

Worry pooled like dusk in Violet’s chest; she drew Aphelia close and breathed by her ear, a warm wind against frost. “I’m right here; I won’t die; I’m not going anywhere,” she said, her voice a steady flame in the rain.

But what gnawed at Violet most wasn’t the moment; it was Aphelia’s condition, a thin blade under silk. Their “Valkyrie” bodies were forged by that ancient civilization old as mountain bones, crossing eras like rivers that forget their source. Even that civilization wasn’t flawless, and the cracks showed in the Elders like hairline fractures in glass.

As Elders, they opened mind and flesh to the human limit, rivers of light plumbed from brainfield to bone. To keep them always at peak, the ancients braided their brains to Aether through a Rune lattice, wires humming like bees in a comb. It made them fierce, but it carved a price into the bark.

Elders don’t dream; their night holds no stars. More precisely, they don’t need sleep to ease spirit-fatigue, because Aether floods that hollow like molten glass filling a mold. When needed, it burns away surplus brain, pruning branches with white fire, and lets Aether run the grove.

In that state, a Valkyrie becomes the strongest weapon the ancients ever forged, a spear of noon light. Today’s war hasn’t pressed them to that edge, yet the dreamless night already claims them; even the “original Aphelia” of this world wears that blank sky.

Before this Aphelia arrived, the body’s former owner wandered through countless phantoms, hallways of mirrors and mist. That’s why she never stepped onto the battlefield, her war drum a muted heartbeat.

What did she see, to carve such an indelible scar into memory’s wood? The question pricked Violet’s heart like a thorn hiding under moss.

Everyone here has tasted Aphelia’s strength, iron on the tongue. In the American theater, soldiers already treat her as a second god beneath God, an altar set under a taller sky. Her might is beyond doubt; Daemon Beasts tear like paper in her hands, confetti in a red wind.

So what kind of enemy could make you despair, mountain asking storm, sea asking moon?

Confusion and anxiety didn’t flood Violet’s chest; instead, tenderness rose like warm tea. As their leader, Aphelia—or rather Brynhildr—can peer through the seams of Aether and glimpse a corner of time, a flicker behind ice. So pain often lands on her alone like winter hail; the Valkyries need only obey their queen‑bee’s hum.

“Shilwen, bring the kit. I need to run a sync on Aphelia,” Violet said, a bell tone in quiet air. When Aphelia loosened her grip, Violet guided her back to the bed like to a small island, then stepped out and called Shilwen, a silver thread stretched taut.

When Aphelia woke, Violet sat at her side, an anchor stone under tide. The nameless panic in Aphelia’s chest eased, flutter turning to calm wings.

“Ah, Aphelia, you’re finally awake,” Violet said, her greeting soft as a lantern glow.

What lay before her wasn’t illusion; it was day on leaf and skin. Aphelia seized Violet’s hand and wouldn’t let go, as if drinking the warmth like tea from porcelain. The sudden move sent cherry‑petal color to Violet’s cheeks; she smiled and folded Aphelia’s hands in hers, silent as snow.

“Sorry, Violet, I got carried away,” Aphelia said, words small as falling ash.

“It’s fine, Aphelia,” Violet answered, her tone a gentle river.

It’s fine, like always, a path worn smooth. As long as she could hold your hand, even if it was only a fleeting dream that fades with dawn, like warm millet crumbling to steam.

“So, Aphelia, how’s the recovery?” Violet asked, voice a quiet reed.

Startled, Aphelia pulled her hands back, nodding fast, a bird tucking its wings. “Almost there… Hrok didn’t really hurt me,” she said, a half‑laugh like cracked ice. “My power slipped its leash and bucked, and the blow landed on my own mind.”

Her explanation carried a shade of embarrassment, a blush under cloud. Fighting Hrok had thrilled her like summer thunder, and she forgot this body wasn’t wholly hers. When Aphelia burns her soul, the force she looses could flatten the Earth again and again, a red tide trampling clay.

Enkidu knew that storm, so he gifted Primordial Soil as the root for her rebuilt flesh, earth old as star ash. Only an artifact born with the world’s dawn can hold Crimson Fire and Aphelia’s iron will, a vessel etched with sky‑lines.

This body, now, is a restraint, a glass cup holding lightning. If she dropped the limits and swatted an Eldritch God from orbit, she thought, never mind what would happen to Earth; her flesh would turn to ash the instant the strike fell, white snow out of a black flame.

“Makes sense. Hrok’s waiting outside,” Violet said, a sigh like wind through needles. “She woke before you and kept asking to see you, said only you can fulfill her vow.”

Violet exhaled, helpless, the sound like reeds in rain. Hrok’s vow wasn’t about anything else; it was about her weapon, a star she’s chased since dawn.

As a master of arms, Hrok’s obsession runs colder and deeper than most, a river under ice. If not for her absolute obedience to Brynhildr, you’d think weapons were the only pulse left in her life.

From ancient age to modern, from cold steel to hot barrel, any weapon sings at twice its measure in Hrok’s hands, a forge choir. Her battle arts feel born whole, like wildflowers from bare rock; once she grips a weapon, the style writes itself from nothing into shape.

There’s almost no weapon she can’t use; if there is, it simply hasn’t been invented, a blank line at horizon.

It all began back in the ancient civilization, with the longsword Brynhildr gifted her, a seed blade. From then on, Hrok couldn’t stop; she roamed the world collecting weapons, honing craft and method, a garden of steel. Even after waking today, she never dropped that thread.

“Then take me to see it,” Aphelia said, a smile like dawn breaking on pines. “If it’s a vow, it’s worth a look—especially for Hrok.”

Aphelia rose from the bed, muscle moving like rain over bamboo. She wanted to see how Hrok now differed from the sword‑immortal she remembered, mist sliding from cliff to cliff.

And after that fierce clash, her body felt more pliant, joint and sinew limned with power like thunder under skin. Aphelia was confident; compared to before, she could unleash something close to a True God’s strength.

Violet nodded and led her out, the door opening like a thin cut of light. Only then did Aphelia realize the room was an armored truck’s cabin, a steel womb. Outside lay wreckage like scattered bones, but the heat‑haze had lifted; the air held only a thick scent of iron, rain on rails.

Following that iron breath deeper into camp, they found Hrok, a dark figure by an anvil like a squat mountain. She stood silent, eyes pinned to the broken blade in her hand, a hawk fixing on prey. Shilwen, waiting nearby, saw them like saviors and darted away from Hrok’s side, a sparrow escaping flame.

By the anvil, Hrok felt like a sealed furnace, heat caged under skin. She held it tight, but standing near her thinned your breath, air turned to glass.

“Finally, you’re here. I can’t stand this pressure; I’m out,” Shilwen chirped, her voice a silver bell.

“Shilwen! Hey—” Violet called, but Shilwen’s figure flicked away like a fish, leaving only a chime of laughter. Violet could only shake her head, a reed bowing to wind.

Hrok noticed Shilwen’s retreat, but didn’t mind; she strode to Aphelia and dropped to a knee, solemn as a blade laid flat. “Lady Brynhildr, I was foolish to doubt you,” she said, voice rough as gravel. “Please punish me.”

The immediate reverence left Aphelia speechless, silence like snow. The Elders of this era hold a near‑blind faith in Brynhildr, a white veil over their eyes. It only made Aphelia more curious—what kind of person was she, beyond legend’s lacquer?

No matter the mouths that praise her power and glory, as the heir Aphelia feels none of it except the raw strength itself, a weight without shape.

“No need for that,” Aphelia said, her words a warm breeze. “For now, call me Aphelia. Brynhildr’s memories haven’t returned fully; I can’t carry that name yet.” She shook her head and helped Hrok up, lifting like a hand under a fallen banner.

“Thank you,” Hrok said, bowing once more, a hinge creaking. “You came here to fulfill my vow?”

“Rather than promise that, let me see first what your vow truly is,” Aphelia said, eyes clear as lake water.

Hrok blinked, and a rare smile tugged at her stiff features, a crack of sunlight through cloud. Before Aphelia could catch it, Hrok turned, set the broken blade on the anvil like a wounded bird, and a hammer wreathed in flame bloomed in her right hand, a sun caught in iron.

“If you want to see my vow, then see it,” she said, voice ringing like steel.

With the words still hot in the air, the burning hammer came down on the broken blade, a thunderbolt on black rock.