Admetus opens his eyes. His vision is blurry, trembling. He has never felt this powerless. He lies at the base of a massive rock; his back pressed against the cold boulder. He tries to lift his arm, but it won't move. All his strength is gone. All he can do is glance around with weary eyes.
A short distance away stands the demon general Zir, and farther ahead is the unidentified demoness. Both have their backs to Admetus, staring forward.
His gaze shifts again, and his powerless body trembles at the sight.
There is nothing left of Arcadia.
No houses. No men walking its streets. No trees, no grass, nothing. The ground is scorched, the soil a lifeless pitch black. For a moment, he wonders:
Am I still in Arcadia…?
He stares at the darkened earth. His vision clears just enough to reveal the shapes scattered around.
Corpses.
Charred beyond recognition. Some reduced to brittle bones, blackened like burnt wood. There is no red, no trace of life—only black, stretching in all directions. Nothing remains of the proud residents of this sacred city. What was a sacred city. What was a city.
Unable to bear it, tears well in his fading eyes. Tears of hopelessness. Tears of weakness. Tears of regret.
"No…" he whispers. None of it makes sense.
He rolls his gaze upward to the sky, offering one last plea to the gods.
"Please…"
A portal opens before the demoness. On the other side, a man stands amid a raging red storm. He steps through, immediately spotting her, and drops to one knee on the burnt soil.
"M-My lady, I wasn't expecting you to be here…"
"Kerberon. Where were you?"
"I-I… I had just returned from delivering the message to Eden! I gave those filthy gods in heaven a good lesson, yes!"
"You certainly took your time. You understand this is urgent, right?"
"Absolutely! Of course! My deepest apologies for delaying you. Please forgive my carelessness."
"Apologize to Father, not me. We were watching you the whole time. You were not there to entertain, only to deliver messages. Do you understand?"
"Y-Yes…"
"Can't hear you."
"Yes, my lady! I'll remember that, I swear!"
She sighs, pulling a cigarette from a pack in her pocket. She searches her clothes for a lighter, but finds nothing.
"A moment, my lady."
Kerberon rises, retrieves a lighter, and ignites it before her. She takes a long drag, then exhales smoke directly into his face. He forces a wry smile, but his twitching brow betrays his fear, making the smile look even more awkward.
"So? How long am I going to stand here?"
"T-They should arrive any moment now… Oh! I nearly forgot!"
Kerberon pockets the lighter, then produces three fur-lined pouches tied together. He holds them before her with both hands.
"The divine powers of the gods, my lady. I extracted them from the three—"
Before he can finish, she bursts into laughter.
"Pwahahaha!"
Kerberon freezes at her sudden outburst, unsure how to respond. His eyes dart to Zir, whose tattered form and exhausted expression offer no guidance. Finding no help there, he turns back to his superior, watching as she wipes a tear from her eye. Drawn not by sorrow, but by some private, inexplicable amusement.
"Did I… make a mistake?" he asks softly. His heart pounds, sweat beading along his brow.
"Ahahaha…" She sniffles, smoothing her hair before straightening her posture. A small giggle slips out.
"This is the most I've laughed in a while~"
Her expression shifts as she exhales deeply, her gaze fixed on the horizon.
"You really think… these shiny little beads will restrain a god?"
The question hits him harder than expected. He's never considered it deeply. All his life, he's extracted divine powers from angels and guardians. It had always seemed obvious the same method would work on gods. But now, the doubt creeps in. His mind races, the realization dawning that it might not be so simple.
"I… I don't…"
"Of course not, you numbnut. You can't strip a god of their power. And even if you could, what would they become? Humans? Ahaha." She glances over her shoulder at Zir. "Looks like you and this musclehead share the same level of intelligence."
Both demons lower their heads in shame. The insult cuts deep, but they cannot deny her words.
"The moment they arrive, true hell will be unleashed," she continued. "We won't stand a chance. The only reason you're still alive is because of the Póthos, and the gods' foolish infatuation with mortal desires."
A heavy silence settles over them. Then her tone sharpens.
"However… if we strike before they recover, we might have a chance. Do you know what that means?"
Kerberon glances at Zir, then folds his left arm and bows slightly.
"I'll do my utmost, my lady. You can count on me. I won't disappoint you this time."
"Hmph. We'll see," she scoffs, unconvinced.
***
Erastos stands at the brink of what feels like the end of Eden, his gaze fixed on the endless banks of cloud that mark the boundaries of heaven. It is a surreal sight. White stretching into infinity, with no land in view. He wears full armor, prepared for battle. Behind him stands a host of more than three thousand gods, warriors of Eden. Demons surrender at the sight of even one, yet here stands an army beyond imagination, all clad in heavy armor. They are not riding out to clear a few demons from the earth, they march to end the Holy War.
The warriors sit mounted on their horses, ready for swift travel. One of them dismounts and approaches.
"My lord, it is time. We should move toward our destination."
As he speaks, a large carriage halts beside them. Inside, Zenobios, Athanasia, and Areios lie unconscious, tended by maid-servants who keep them from toppling over.
"Alright," Erastos replies. He turns to the vast clouds ahead, unsheathes his sword, and points it forward.
The clouds begin to swirl, parting and shaping into a descending bridge of limestone. It stretches downward into the endless white, its far end hidden from sight.
Fweeeet!
Erastos whistles. A horse clad in armor matching his own gallops toward him and stops at his side. He mounts it.
"Let's go, Lykos," he murmurs, patting the horse's neck.
He turns back to face the warriors, then bellows,
"Onwards!"
Lykos surges forward. The carriage follows, keeping a short distance behind, and the three thousand warriors race after it. An unbroken line of horsemen streaming toward the end of the bridge. They plunge into the clouds, the white mist giving way to shifting beams of light that streak past like glowing rods, surrounding them in a tunnel of radiance.
The tunnel ends. A thin veil of cloud remains, then parts to reveal the earth below, an endless expanse of land, mountains no larger than fingertips from this height. They have entered the mortal realm.
Erastos inhales deeply. The cool air at such heights is invigorating, and with it, his heavenly powers, granted at birth, return to their full strength. For him, it feels natural; for the world, it is unnatural. Yet there is no smile, no joy. Only a sudden, cold emptiness as the beacon's influence fades.
His eyes fix on the far end of the bridge, still building itself ahead of them. Their pace is so great that, should they push any faster, the bridge itself might fail to keep up.
***
"Please…" Admetus' plea to the heavens does not cease, nor do his tears. He sits amidst a sea of corpses, unable to move even his own limbs, making him no different from the dead.
As another tear gathers in his eye, the sky blurs. Through the shimmer of moisture, he spots something strange. A bridge, building itself from nothing, descending straight from the clouds to the scorched earth. At first, he thinks it must be another creation of the demons, but something about its form refuses to fit that thought.
No matter how one looks at it, it is a divine bridge.
"Huh…?" he mutters, squinting against his blurred vision.
Through narrowed eyes, he makes out a legion of horse-mounted warriors galloping down the bridge. The sight is almost too much to believe. A faint, exhausted chuckle escapes him.
"Am I… that desperate…? That I'm starting to see things?"
His weary eyes tell him it's real, but his heart resists accepting such a convenient miracle.
Zir, standing nearby, notices the trembling human slumped against the boulder. At first, he assumes it is just another corpse not yet cold, but then he sees the man's eyes moving. Recognition strikes. It is the same man who had once carved his body full of wounds.
Curious about the tears on Admetus' face, Zir steps closer, his boots crunching over the pile of decomposing corpses. Bones and skulls shatter under his weight with dry, splintering cracks.
"You… you're still alive…" Zir's gaze shifts to the side, where Admetus' divine sword rests—its blade the same one that had cut him so deeply in their last battle. In its reflection, something glimmers. He narrows his eyes, trying to make it out, but the image remains unclear. Finally, he looks up.
The bridge is nearly at the ground.