Two more days. That was the deadline Haru had agreed to with Micteya, enough time for her to arrive at the Great Aetherium and reclaim her brother's soul. He'd been prepared for three Supreme Gods: Micteya, Malakar, and Skarion. A manageable problem.
But six was different. He turned it over on the walk back from the Grey Dwarf Castle. Svetlana could peek into the River of Fate. What she told him wasn't a mere guess, it was a near-certainty, barring major disruptions to the threads she'd read. Six Supreme Gods descending on his empire, and not just the evil pantheon's three was a big deal.
Svetlana clarified that the other three were:
Varkath, the Titan Lord
Mordra, the Goddess of Darkness
Zakaria Nekrosi, the Lich Lord
Varkath had been recruited with Divine Treasures, the Evil Pantheon had paid for his presence. The Lich Lord was there as a favor to Skarion. And Mordra needed no payment: she simply hated the Nature Pantheon, and the Aetherium Empire had allied with it.
Destroying them meant cutting off one of the Nature Pantheon's most useful relationships. She'd come for that reason alone. Neither Mordra nor Micteya had been known to have become Supreme Goddesses. Both had apparently done it on a different planet, outside the Endless Continent's awareness.
They'd been careful about hiding it, but Micteya's ascension was exposed because of her brother Maddox. Even Mordra was willing to expose her strength as fighting while concealing her Supreme God Tier Divine Aura would be almost impossible. She'd apparently decided that this opportunity was worth the reveal.
Six Supreme Gods. Against the Great Aetherium's current four, once Nova ascended as well. He ran the math. His own strength was comparable to a peak Supreme God. Malakar and Skarion weren't problems he couldn't solve alone. Combining the Scepter's mobilization effect and the Sorrow of Time's output. It made a one-vs-two fight easily holdable.
Celestia, once she reached the peak of Supreme God Tier, would be stronger than him and could handle another pairing. Nova and Yvonne could manage the remaining two separately. It worked. Not comfortably, but it worked.
"Don't worry too much." Svetlana had said, before he left, "If something goes wrong, I'll help."
Elunara was currently in retreat and couldn't leave in between. Pandora, the Goddess of Light, Mordra's ancient enemy, was an unknown variable. But Aurelyss had made a standing offer before departing: if the Great Aetherium needed assistance, she'd come. He had options. The situation was manageable.
…
What stayed with him on the walk back wasn't the threat assessment. It was the moment just before he'd left the Grey Dwarf Castle.
He'd embraced her. Svetlana had let it happen, her comment about the veil had functioned as something closer to implicit permission than a warning, and then she'd pulled back, simply giving him a look. Her silver eyes, steady, holding the gaze until his scalp went genuinely numb, and he'd backed off on his own initiative.
She smiled after that. Small, satisfied.
"Don't worry. The development is already fast."
Hundreds of thousands of years old. An Ancient Goddess of Fate. Future wife. Currently living in his sister's territory, cooking dinner, predicting his arrival time to the minute, and commenting on the pace of their relationship with the absolute calm of someone who had already seen where it was going and found it perfectly acceptable.
He returned to the Angels City with his heart still warm, which the six-Supreme-Gods problem hadn't fully managed to cool. A strong wife like that was something any man would want. He was content to admit this privately and move on.
…
Back in the Elf Empire, Aurelyss was still thinking about the Myriad Starfall Tower; she'd been turning it over since leaving the Aetherium Empire. The white jade column, several thousand meters tall, every floor packed with God Level Runes she couldn't parse. She was the finest artifact master in the Elf Empire. Runes she couldn't read were not a common experience.
She went to the only source she knew who predated the current era: Elix, the Elven Mother Tree, planted by Elunara herself in the Ancient Era. A living fossil with memories that stretched back further than the Era of Truth.
She simulated the tower with her Divine Power, detailed enough to include the surrounding architecture, detailed enough to reproduce the rune shapes she'd memorized, even if the Divine Power behind them was beyond her ability to replicate.
Elix studied it in silence for a long time.
"I remember this…"
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