The abyss below the cliff breathed.
Dark miasma rolled like fog across a battlefield frozen in time—bones half-buried, shattered armor fused to the earth, colossal skulls cracked by forces long forgotten.
Arata raised a single hand.
Time answered him.
The world rewound.
Not broadly.
Not recklessly.
Precisely.
Moments peeled backward around each corpse—frames of existence snapping into place. Beasts twitched back into motion, wounds closing just enough to return them to the brink between life and death.
Arata moved through them calmly.
From ancient leviathans.
From horned kings of the abyss.
From divine remnants whose blood still burned with law and authority.
He collected samples.
Each drop hovered, suspended in crystal-like spheres of time—perfect, unspoiled, caught at the exact instant before decay.
He ignored the human remains.
Not out of mercy.
But intention.
When he was finished, the land fell silent again, time resuming its natural course as if nothing had been touched.
Arata returned to the top of the cliff.
The wind howled.
He stood at the edge and raised his right hand.
Names echoed—not spoken aloud, but recognized by the world.
Wyverns.
Abyssal beasts.
Elementals.
Titan-class monstrosities.
Known monsters from every recorded dungeon.
Their blood samples appeared in the air before him, arranged like stars in a constellation.
Then he raised his left hand.
The blood of the Land of Dead Gods rose to meet them—ancient, heavy, saturated with lost authority.
The two sets drifted together.
They touched.
And merged.
No explosions.
No chaos.
Only quiet redefinition.
When the process finished, the newly forged samples scattered—vanishing into unseen vectors, dispersing across the world like seeds carried by fate.
Arata watched them go.
"…Good."
He turned and walked away.
Karveth — Kurogami Headquarters
The throne room was silent when John appeared.
Dark stone.
Crimson accents.
A presence that bent the air itself.
He sat.
The throne accepted him.
"Kaelven," John said calmly,
"what business do you have in Karveth?"
Kaelven leaned back, arms crossed, expression lazy.
"I was bored," he replied.
"So I wanted to see what Kurogami was like."
He shrugged.
"And he didn't want me in the restaurant."
John sighed—long and tired.
"…Figures."
He rested his chin on his hand.
"Tell me about Zerathis."
Kaelven's tone shifted.
"My home planet used to be beautiful," he said.
"Forests that reached the sky. Oceans so deep they reflected the stars."
Then his eyes darkened.
"The Great Decay came."
Everything stopped.
"The entire planet," Kaelven continued.
"Trees died. Seas dried up. The land cracked."
He paused.
"The Decay shattered Zerathis' protective shield. That's why monsters and beasts roam freely now—nothing keeps them out anymore."
John's eyes narrowed slightly.
"…Oh."
A faint smile appeared.
"That's interesting."
He leaned back against the throne.
"I'll pay a visit soon."
Then, as if remembering something amusing, he added,
"And I heard Alzwalt saying there are some decent guys out there…"
He tapped his finger against the armrest.
"What was his name again?"
John smiled.
"…Ah. Ifrit. Was it?"