So long as they don’t step back into the cage of the ancients.

That was what gnawed at Violet like frost under the ribs; the quick win before them was dew on grass, fleeting. The fear was that human civilization would wilt next. The Daemon Beasts were teeth at the doorstep; the true threat waited out in the cold dark, a colossal shadow draped over the whole planet.

“Besides, even if we’ve cracked the Daemon Beast’s cells for now, is the truth we glimpsed through that keyhole the truth we were meant to see...?”

She didn’t finish, and the meaning hung between them like smoke in still air.

The timing of that cellular breakthrough was too neat, like bait laid on a well-swept trail. The researchers were still drunk on it, fever bright as wildfire. Daemon Beast cells were a banner for a new era, a trophy that made even the calm-hearted tremble.

But was it really a prize we seized, or a gift pressed into our palm by an unseen hand?

Violet didn’t know, and Aphelia didn’t either. As long as that world-shrouding shadow wasn’t dispelled, this nameless fear would keep circling like a vulture in everyone’s mind.

“Either way, we can only keep walking, right?”

Aphelia let out a bitter breath, like a raincloud finally leaking. This gloom had caged the thinkers of this age for too long. Anything that brushed the Eldritch Gods made you doubt your own compass, like a needle swinging near a magnet—this was the fear that bites deepest.

“Yeah... let humanity carry their own question then. The United Government delegation should be here. Aphelia, want to sit in on the Daemon Beast cell briefing?”

Resigned, Violet managed a small smile that felt like tired sunlight. She checked the time, sighed, and asked.

“I’ll listen. We should see where the United Government plants its flag.”

A knock rang—short, firm, like knuckles on a drum.

They traded a glance. Aphelia nodded. Violet set her papers down like laying a blade to rest, then opened the door. Outside stood five delegates, varied in skin and lineage like a braided river. The mature woman in front bowed slightly and offered her hand.

“Ms. Violet, our respect. The United Government delegation greets you.”

“Welcome. Come in. The materials are ready. Please, take your seats.”

Smiles like polite masks, the five thanked her and filed in. The lead woman’s gaze caught Aphelia at once. She blinked, recovered, hurried over, and extended her hand with ritual care.

“You must be Ms. Brynhildr? I’m Bilan. It’s an honor to meet a representative of the Elders!”

Seeing the woman’s earnest warmth, Aphelia also offered her hand, a brief curve of a smile like a calm wave. She gestured for them to sit. Violet moved to the projection screen; prepared data bloomed into a three-dimensional holoscape, light like mist weaving to shape.

What appeared first was the Daemon Beast that had long infested the Americas Theater, its outline a mountain of malice.

“As you can see, this is the Daemon Beast that occupied the Americas Theater for years. I trust the staff gave you the file packet before you entered. Fix your eyes on the body itself. From appearance alone, what’s the first thing that comes to mind?”

Violet marked its frame with a wash of scarlet Aether, a brushstroke across a nightmare. It looked like a creature marched out of any sci‑fi disaster film. Many scholars had said as much, and the delegates mirrored that thought with nods and tight mouths.

The common stance among researchers was simple: its current shape came from some Aetheric or alien cellular graft, a mutation like a tree forced along a trellis. Before this, we’d had no Daemon Beast cells in hand, so all we had were guesses, fireflies in fog.

Then someone voiced a different current.

“It looks a bit like the old Western wyvern. Is that a reasonable line to follow?”

Bilan’s stylus skated over her pad like a swift fin, then she looked up at Violet.

Some nodded, some shook their heads, a little wind across tall grass.

The idea wasn’t new. Once the Elders were found, researchers dug everywhere, spades in old myths and shovels in ruins. But beyond the Germanic myths that held the Norse strain and the East’s Yan‑Huang tradition, there was no clear history tied to the Valkyries. When Daemon Beasts appeared, people clawed at history for a weak seam, but all they found was similar faces and no true bones—no useful weak points, just masks on water.

So the claim that Daemon Beasts were the “异兽” of old records faded like an echo in a canyon. Bringing it up again earned no quick assent for Bilan.

“You hit close to the mark. It is linked to the wyvern idea, but that’s not the full shape. I’ll answer your questions after. For now, please note this: the Daemon Beast in the Americas Theater does connect to the wyvern of Western culture.”

After that nod, Violet asked them to hold their questions. Another projection rose like a bruise of shadow.

A serpent-like bulk, thick as a fallen pillar, uncoiled in grainy footage—no lab-crisp black line here, but a wartime grab by a trailing drone. It was blurred like a storm through rain, yet the massive serpent silhouette was a shadow no one could ignore.

And then came battle.

The holos fed them the clash of Aphelia against the Daemon Beast. The terrifying Crimson Fire roared like a burning sea, the Daemon Beast almost consumed. Then the vast snake-shadow split its carcass like a blade through bark and lunged at Aphelia, only to crumble into ash within that ocean of flame.

Seeing it relived before their eyes, the delegates couldn’t hold back a hiss of breath, like a theater gasping in the dark. When the video stilled, their gazes pooled on Aphelia, the weight a quiet bow to power.

The last to earn that respect had been Violet, proxy to the Elders, when she tore the sky above the Pacific with Aether flared full, a storm the whole world saw. The human combined fleet had failed to break that monster; yet before one person’s force, it knelt like grass in wind.

Under those looks, Aphelia could only answer with a wry curve, like a blade edge catching light. She lifted a hand toward Violet, guiding their attention back to the images.

“We’ll release this segment to the United Government afterward. For now, please focus on this portion of the footage. Especially here.”

Violet cleared her throat, the sound a pebble in a pond. She highlighted the black serpent, and the clip restarted from that point. They could see the serpent shed free, a shadow molting from flesh. After several passes, though, they still didn’t catch her meaning.

One delegate frowned, brows knotted like tightened rope. After a quick image comparison, he asked, voice edged with disbelief.

“Ms. Violet, are you saying... the Daemon Beast was controlled by that pitch-black serpent?”

All eyes swung to Aphelia, attention like a drawn bow.

“Yes. Exactly. Watch closely. It’s only around ten seconds, but the difference is stark. Before the serpent tore free, the Daemon Beast thrashed like a netted beast. After the serpent left the body, the struggle ceased.”

“That alone isn’t evidence, Ms. Violet.”

Bilan’s brows pinched, a crease like an arrowhead. If that was all, the argument had no spine.

“Of course not. What came next in our research pins it down.”

Violet dismissed the battle feed. Another clip surfaced—Aphelia from discovery to subduing the meat-mass, a scene of regeneration like mold blooming in fast forward. From a point of black vapor to that pulsing lump of flesh, the rebirth took mere seconds. If not for Aphelia’s quick eye, the researchers would’ve been swallowed like houses by a mudslide.

“These cells were extracted from the remaining corpse. Analysis says their composition isn’t of Earth. The Aether signature is alien to our living field. But this black line... we’re calling it the Eldritch cell aggregate for now. According to experiment, it seems to have no concept of death.”

Breaths grew heavier, a room full of bellows. No death meant a cliff with no bottom; they waited for Violet to throw a rope. It wasn’t that they couldn’t think it through—it was that they didn’t dare. If they followed reason, how would humanity ever face a so‑called undying Daemon Beast?

“Of course, that doesn’t mean a Daemon Beast can’t be killed. From here on, I want you to drop old frames. Daemon Beasts aren’t creatures governed by our rules. What drives them forward is this Eldritch cell aggregate.”

Violet enlarged the black line until cells were stones on a riverbed. She pointed at those strange units, a lattice like frost under glass, and went on.

“The Eldritch cell aggregate resembles our neural tissue, yet it isn’t the same. Inside the Daemon Beast, it’s relatively independent, like a second heart in its own shell. If our body is grievously wounded and can’t maintain its inner sea, brain death is only a matter of time. But the aggregate doesn’t play by that tide. It carries its own micro‑environment, and through Aether it puppeteers the host’s metabolism. That’s why we were misled to think the outer Daemon Beast was the root of it all, when it’s only the mask over the core.”