To be honest, Heron had already become the unseen hand that pushes fate; or rather, fate’s dark tide had shoved her to the world’s peak. Once she set her actions in motion, even her reluctance couldn’t stop the river; her steps began to bend the world’s course.
She stirred the common folk like wind through wheat; she never pointed a road, but she handed them a nuclear button like a burning sun.
“Heron, have you really weighed the storm this could call down?” Aphelia’s soft sigh drifted like night rain; she’d seen those who got rich or strong in a single dusk. She’d cleaned up those meteors; sudden turns plant nothing but thorns.
Hand it to one person and you spark a riot; hand it to a crowd and you get a prairie fire. Power stays in few hands for a reason; even Aphelia, born gifted, tempered her heart like steel in a forge.
Aether is a serpent of charm and a shadow you fear. Because it’s strong, Aphelia keeps a blade’s wariness; even with Crimson Fire, she won’t abandon her mind unless trapped at a cliff.
That force is a sea of flame. It let Aphelia catch up to Sigdrifa fused with Brynhildr. It ripped their domain like a banner in storm, and let her wound such monsters.
That also showed Aphelia, kin to Sigdrifa’s line, had a body that could hold a tide that vast. You can imagine Aether’s ceiling; it’s a cliff above cloud, cold and terrible.
“Of course I’ve thought it through; what do you take me for? I’m a scientist, not someone sailing by gut winds; the variables are huge, but I ran the numbers. But with Aether wading in, what even counts as science—pseudoscience?”
Heron’s laugh came thin as paper; even she couldn’t sell herself that tale. For those who hold Aether, our ways of using it share patterns you can trace. Compute with Aether and the answer bends toward your will, like iron filings to a magnet.
If no answer exists, Aether hands its wielder one; its essence is the rulebook of reality. Every strike and event born of Aether twists the world like heat over desert air. So, one way or another, a result always falls into your palm.
With Aether wired into my thinking, my brain outstrips supercomputers like a storm outstrips candles. Even all the world’s quantum rigs humming at once are slower than a flicker of my thought. If you force it into numbers, it’s near infinite—like a night sky without edges.
Aphelia frowned, caught half the meaning like fish slipping a net; her body’s age helped, or she’d miss it all. Heron saw the question like light through leaves and spoke slow.
“Think of it this way: in a single second, almost countless thoughts run in parallel in my mind. I can still talk with you, like split-focus and many hands; Aphelia, haven’t you tried?”
Heron’s ease made Aphelia blush like dawn; she prided herself on Aether’s craft, especially in battle. Beating Sigdrifa with uneven strength was proof carved in stone. But Heron’s way—threading Aether into thought so countless ideas run side by side—she had never dared.
In a fight, she relied on seasoned instinct like a hawk; stray thoughts invite blades through seams. She used Aether to enter clarity, an empty sky, keeping her true self like a lotus above mud. That lifted her power sharp and fast, like spring water breaking stone.
“That’s a pity then; and no, I’m not saying your path is wrong, Aphelia. Aether sings different to each soul; maybe you’re meant to keep that clear sky, and it makes you stronger. As for me, I can’t stop the millstone in my head for a heartbeat.”
She tapped her temple and smiled; her mind ran like a furnace, hunting solutions without rest.
“Back then, to let more people touch Aether, I found force failed; charity alone couldn’t move the gentle. It might expose me like a lantern; so I asked: if humans fail, what about a god?”
Heron’s smile made Aphelia blink; her brows drew tight like bowstrings. “Gods? Do you mean that twisted thing out there, Heron? For those with Aether, what can we still call a god?”
“Of course not; I played that role myself, like an actor in sacred robes.”
Unnoticed, they had returned before the black stele; forest crowded around like waves, yet the ancient stone stood alone. Azure light flooded its script like riverglass, lending it a beauty wrapped in mystery.
“I only let those religious heads think their god revealed a sign; I cast Aether as a miracle. Genius, right—like putting wings on a prayer?”
Aphelia didn’t buy it; in her era, churches strutted like peacocks and flashed “miracles” now and then. She rarely believed, and she’d pierced those veils like needles through silk. She smiled awkwardly and held her tongue, like a fish in shallow water.
Heron caught it at once and laughed with a touch of apology, like a bell muffled by cloth. “I forgot our eras diverge; that kind of gods-and-ghosts show was common for you. In my time, humans were cut off from magic like a shore from the sea. Religion existed as culture, a lamp in a hall, never above the state.”
“Too bad; in my era, the Church always wrestled crowns with nations, starting skirmishes like brushfires. If not for the demon invasion, humans might never have stood on one line, like flags in one wind.”
“Human flaws rhyme across ages; at first, after the leaders saw ‘miracles’, some bent the knee, some fought, many shades. In the end, I held those religions like reins, and passed down ways to steer Aether. Once it spread, it turned into wildfire across dry plains.”
Heron’s smile curled with danger like a blade; she glanced at the stele, then looked away. The terminally ill were cured, the crippled stood, and markets shattered overnight like glass. Conflicts burst like thunder; once everyone held power, many did as they pleased—by will or by whip. Loads of people lit Aether and clashed, whether they chose or were driven like cattle.
The nation machine lost its teeth; inside wasn’t one plate, and Aether lured hearts like siren song. In mortal hands, this force became a root of ruin, a seed that splits the world. Wars flared again for Aether; people thinned like trees after a winter blight. Wars of this age made meat-grinders look gentle; they were storms with teeth.
As Aether shifted, the far forest bloomed a blinding fire; a mushroom cloud climbed like a black flower. A brutal shockwave rolled out like a tide across four directions of trees. Aphelia didn’t move; the sight stirred the heart like thunder, but it was Aether’s echo. Heron waved, and the cloud dissolved like smoke; the oncoming wave faded like it never was. Still, the two felt that weight, like a mountain pressing the chest.
“As for me,” Heron said, “I only gathered believers like rain into jars, hid during war, and built this stele. Whatever raged outside wasn’t my affair; governments tossed weapons like dice, and people died heavy. I only came out after the guns went silent, to heal the wounded like mending torn cloth.”
“Heron… that sounds villain-level,” Aphelia said, the body’s instinct speaking like a reflex.
“Villain? That’s not wrong,” Heron lifted a brow and smiled like a fox. “I do look like one from this angle; history is ink by the victors. I don’t plan to wash my sins clean; curse me like wind through reeds. My goal’s met; the world’s powers reshuffled like cards, and civilization strode a whole era forward. Isn’t that good?”
