That was the kind of vile work dragons did, like smoke-stained claws raking a helpless harvest.

They wouldn’t provoke the stronger human clans, like thieves avoiding torchlight on a winter road.

If those clans chose mutual ruin, jade and stone both shattered, the dragons would bleed out like wounded stags.

So they swept the small tribes like night hawks, taking human women as breeding vessels.

The result was heartbreak, like frost cracking a tender shoot at dawn.

For those nonhuman races, human mixed blood raised the odds of bearing offspring, like rain coaxing seeds to sprout.

Even the Aesir helped in secret, a cold wind behind the hunter’s arrow, just to cull humans they despised.

“Such curious memories, Lady Brynhildr. Are they yours? The girl inside looks exactly like you.”

In the temple, the girl who mirrored Brynhildr woke from her hazy dream, like mist thinning under sunrise.

She smiled at Brynhildr, while Runes crumbled into drifting sand, the stored power spent like a burnt wick.

The girl still lingered on the vision, like a swallow unwilling to leave spring eaves.

Brynhildr limited the new Valkyries to one viewing every five years, like gates opening with measured tides.

So they waited with bright hunger, training in spans of five years, just to taste a memory again.

In those memories lived what the Asgardian Realm now lacked: laughter and light chatter, joy and anger, sorrow and delight.

Familiar yet strange, like old songs on a new zither, they became a tonic for the Valkyries’ days.

“Is that so? I don’t think it’s much. Fenrir, go train.”

“Please, Lady Brynhildr, let me watch one more time~”

The girl named Fenrir hugged Brynhildr’s arm, pleading like a kitten pawing at a silk sleeve.

Brynhildr could only sigh; the five-year rule held roots, like an old pine gripping a cliff.

She had slipped free of the ordinary timeline and worldline, drifting into this Asgardian Realm like a stray star.

No legends, no annals, only a misshapen continent, like a cracked plate under a gray sky.

Humans split by strength into so-called gods, like rivers forced into separate beds by stone.

The Aesir weren’t strong enough to sweep the world; they held a fertile land like a walled garden.

They developed behind near-sealed doors, like lamps burning day after day in a closed hall.

In her former world, such patterns had repeated countless times, like seasons turning the same mill.

Brynhildr knew those limits by heart, like a map etched into bone.

To join the Asgardian Realm, she created Valkyries with reluctance, both spare vessels and a hidden blade.

Brynhildr was formidable. With Aether in a world untouched by it, she won every bout like thunder over straw.

Neither nonhuman races nor the Aesir could pin her down, like nets cast against a storm.

But it all rested on one fragile base, like ice beneath spring sun: this world hadn’t met Aether’s essence.

If the Aesir learned Aether through Runes, how would they look at Brynhildr then?

So she had to raise an elite corps in Aether early, like pioneers blazing a trail.

Numbers small, one or two hundred at most, yet each a tidal force.

They could sweep wide territories like wildfires, growing over years like rings in an ancient tree.

By then, even Aesir who learned Aether would lag behind those first, long-striding forerunners.

But such Valkyries demanded much, like jade carved under strict hands.

First, this world lacked the tools for gene craft, like a smith without furnace or bellows.

Starting from zero would match raising a human civilization from cave to city, like dragging stone uphill.

So Brynhildr settled for clumsy means, like weaving with coarse hemp.

She split fragments of her own soul, seeds under dark soil, to birth new Valkyries.

The crafting went smooth, like water finding its level, because the mother-form was Brynhildr herself.

She knew herself by heart; one by one, Valkyries near-identical to her woke in Aether’s womb.

But that brought a grave flaw: high sameness, like reflections in a still pond.

Each Valkyrie took pieces from Brynhildr, some like her as a child, some as a maiden, some full-grown.

The closer they matched her, the stronger they stood, and their thoughts curved toward hers like vines.

That had been the plan for future vessels, like prepared shells for a spirit.

After years among them, she abandoned that path and raised them as her own children.

So she had to bend their thinking away, like branches trained from the trunk.

They couldn’t keep drifting toward her by outside pressures, like iron filings chasing a lodestone.

But in the Asgardian Realm, most field trials meant contact with still-unopened humans, like speaking to stone.

Such work barely shifted thought, much less through dealings with nonhuman races.

After long weighing, Brynhildr chose another road: let them see different futures with her power.

Across endless timelines and worldlines, like stars strewn across night, they would find a path of their own.

“Everyone gets one viewing every five years. Tell your elder sister why.”

Brynhildr sighed, then crouched gently, like willow bending, and rubbed the girl’s hair.

Her voice was soft, no blame in it, like warm rain on a cold step.

She wanted the girl to think, to own her thoughts, like a lamp lit from within.

“Mm… I don’t really get it. Is it to keep us from slacking in training?”

The girl named Fenrir tilted her head and smiled sweetly, like a peach blossom opening.

She was the last batch born, when Brynhildr had faded her soul’s imprint, like ink thinned with water.

Even so, such a near twin appeared, closest to Brynhildr, likely strongest in times ahead.

For this girl, Brynhildr didn’t want her to lose her own mind’s voice.

“This is only one reason, Fenrir. Use more Aether to sense. What did you feel in the memories?”

Fenrir closed her eyes at once, emotion steady as lake water, then let slender Aether spill from her slight frame.

Silver threads reached out, touching remnant power in the Runes, like cobwebs catching dew.

Each touch trembled faintly; her brow tightened, like a bowstring under pull.

Watching Fenrir link Aether to Runes so quickly, Brynhildr felt a quiet gladness, like embers finding breath.

She had long sought Valkyries who could wield both Aether and Runes, like twin blades in one hand.

Most, once they mastered Runes, chose Aether as main path, seldom touching rune power again.

So Fenrir was malleable talent, like gold soft under heat.

“Lady Brynhildr, I think I understand.”

After a long hush, Fenrir opened her eyes, and her Aether dispersed like smoke in wind.

She cut the link to the Runes at once, bold as a blade leaving its sheath.

If it wasn’t mere pose, then she truly had it, like a hunter hearing the trail.

“You understand? Good. Speak it. I’ll decide if you can keep watching based on your answer.”

Brynhildr set her face stern, like slate under rain, and addressed the girl.

“Eh, come on… Fine. Lady Brynhildr, you don’t want us overexposed because those memories carry power, right?”

Fenrir scratched her head, uneasy as a sparrow on a reed, and reviewed what she had sensed.

She ran it through her mind again and again, like beads passing under a thumb, before answering.

“Keep going, Fenrir. I won’t respond until you finish.

Though you’re young, you must own your words and deeds, like a blade owning its edge.

Never exaggerate, never soil your character, like keeping silk clean in wind and dust.”

Fenrir swallowed, a small ripple in her throat, then continued.

“Because those memories are saturated with your power.”