(3rd POV)
Hellfire Park had been transformed for the occasion — every corner of it buzzing with guests, conversation, and the particular energy of an event that knew it was being watched by the entire world.
Firfel moved through the crowd with ease, spending most of her time with Apollonia, the two of them falling into the kind of effortless warmth that came naturally to both of them. The guest list read like a directory of everyone who mattered in the known world — powerful politicians, industrialists, nobles, royalty from half a dozen kingdoms.
Among them came the Wales delegation: Crown Prince Drakon, composed and politically precise as always, offering his congratulations to Arthur with the practiced grace of someone who knew how to separate personal tensions from public occasions.
Beside him, Rika was doing considerably less well at the separation.
"Congrats," she said, her expression somewhere between a smile and a pout. "Hmph." She turned and walked away before Arthur could respond.
He scratched the back of his head and let it go.
He found a quieter edge of the park and swirled his wine, watching the crowd move.
"Quite the extravagant affair." Kaiser materialized beside him, already holding a glass of his own. "You're the wealthiest man in the world. You could simply retire and enjoy it."
Arthur laughed. "Retire while Solarus is coming for my head?"
"Hahaha. Your fault for wading into the Faith War."
"Faith is everything to a deity right now," Kaiser continued, his tone shifting to something more serious. "They will burn a whole world down and rebuild it from scratch if the math on faith energy works out in their favor. Losing one world temporarily means nothing to them."
"Solarus has probably conquered thousands of worlds," Keanu added from nearby, tearing into a piece of cursed chicken with complete serenity. "One more, one less — he doesn't feel the difference. But don't mistake that for carelessness. Even an insignificant world is still a faith generator. He wouldn't throw one away without reason."
Arthur savored his wine. "He won't arrive for some time yet. And when he does, I intend to already have the power to protect this world."
Kaiser shook his head. "The world alone won't be enough. You'd need to protect the entire solar system. Anything less and we're saying goodbye."
He let the wine sit for a moment, then continued. "I still remember — four years Before Solarus (BS), he sent an Angel here. Spread his name through the human empires, the Ancient Roman Kingdom most prominently. That was how the conquest began. When the calendar turned to year one, the local gods moved to resist. Three Known Gods against every deity already rooted in this world."
"The battle happened in outer space, in the Gods' Domain Expansion. The mortals below lived their normal lives, completely unaware. The struggle went on for hundreds of years above their heads. It wasn't until around year eight hundred and fifty of the Solarus Calendar that the Three Known Gods broke through and took dominion over this world officially."
Arthur listened without speaking. Something tightened quietly in his chest, though he kept his expression level.
Many gods had fought Solarus in the Domain Expansion and lost. That wasn't a small thing. That was a reckoning.
'The damn sun god is genuinely powerful.'
"He has thousands of worlds under him." Arthur turned to the two of them. "Saza's world might be worth considering. A second world for Dionysus's worship."
Kaiser and Keanu exchanged a look that suggested they found the idea considerably more complicated than Arthur was making it sound.
"If the gods of that world agreed to it," Keanu said, shrugging, "why not?"
---
The ceremony itself went on with all the spectacle the occasion demanded. When the moment came, Arthur kissed Firfel — and kept kissing her, longer than was strictly ceremonial, which drew laughter and applause in roughly equal measure from the crowd.
What drew something else entirely was the priest.
He stood under the authority of «Dionysus».
The murmur that moved through the guests was immediate and complicated.
Beyond the Three Known Gods, any deity was considered a false one — that was not obscure theology, it was common knowledge. And here, at a wedding attended by half the powerful figures in the world, the union had been performed under an unrecognized god's name.
It didn't take long to reach the press.
"ARTHUR PENDRAGON AND FIRFEL MARRIED UNDER CULT DEITY — WHO IS «DIONYSUS»?"
"Wedding of the Year Turns Controversial: Hellfire Chairman Openly Defies Church Doctrine"
"Priest of Unknown God Officiates Pendragon Wedding — Church of Solarus Silent, For Now"
"'False Deity' Ceremony Sparks Outrage Among Faithful: 'This Is an Insult to the Three Known Gods'"
"Cult or Revolution? The «Dionysus» Question Nobody Can Stop Asking"
In the demon realm, the reaction was largely indifferent — most demons had no particular allegiance to any deity to begin with, and the whole affair registered as little more than interesting gossip.
But among the human kingdoms, the elven territories, and the dwarven regions, it landed differently. Much differently. The Three Known Gods were not abstract figures there; they were woven into law, culture, and identity. An open challenge to that framework, performed publicly at the highest-profile wedding of the decade, was not something people moved past quickly.
---
After the wedding, Arthur and Firfel slipped away into their Domain Expansion.
Within its boundaries, the world belonged entirely to them. No ears, no prying eyes, no obligations. Time moved slower inside — what passed as three days and three nights in the outside world stretched into nearly a month within the Domain. They used every moment of it.
Firfel could be as loud as she pleased, and Arthur was nothing if not thorough in his explorations.
When they finally emerged, blinking back into the pace of ordinary time, Apollonia was waiting.
She'd spent the days in their residence, going out with Sylwen through the Hellfire Airport's sprawling commercial stretch, shopping and wandering and apparently having a perfectly fine time. But the moment she saw them, her face lit up.
"Brother, sister! It's been days! Where did you two disappear to for the honeymoon?"
Arthur and Firfel had, a few days prior, quietly let it be known they were going overseas.
"Hawaii Island," Firfel said with an easy smile. "The wildlife there is very exotic."
Arthur said nothing and let it stand.
He headed to Room 404.
It had been one week and four days since the portal went dark.
Nothing.
No signal, no voice, no flicker of activity from the array. He'd checked periodically and found the same silence each time.
Then, the following day, the array lit up.
The voice that came through was fragmented and distorted, stretched thin by the distance between worlds:
"I... returned successfully... Sorry... for the late response... I had to gather magic cores... for weeks... to power up the array on my end... You... you can come now..."
The connection broke off.
Arthur stood there for a moment, then went to find Firfel.
"She made it through," he said, already smiling. "The portal held. She's inviting us over." He paused. "Consider it a real honeymoon."
Firfel's eyes lit up. "When do we leave?"
"Now, if you want."
Apollonia, who had been nearby and caught the tail end of the exchange, tilted her head. "What are you two talking about?"
"Another world," Firfel said simply. "We're going. Do you want to come?"
Apollonia stared at her. Then looked at Arthur to confirm that Firfel had actually just said what she thought she said.
"Is that true, brother? We can actually go to another world?"
"Yes," Arthur said.
Apollonia grabbed his arm with both hands. "I want to come. I'm coming. Don't even think about leaving without me."