Several days had passed since the conclusion of the Snowfield Holy Grail War.
Thanks to Novia's efforts, the city of Snowfield remained peaceful. As for Kiara, with Caubac Alcatraz handling matters for the Church, there were no real problems there either.
Thus, back in Romania, Novia finally enjoyed a few tranquil days.
Although his household suddenly grew — with Aertluqi, Kiara, and even Attila joining in — surprisingly, everyone got along rather well. If there was any "issue" at all, it was simply that Melusine had developed a bad habit of taunting people's faces — verbally, that is — and irritating everyone around her in the process.
That said, Novia couldn't help but feel that Melusine was deliberately behaving this way these days… only to instantly switch tracks and act cute afterward.
He couldn't deny it was amusing — still, the silver-haired young man thought, perhaps a little reminder was in order.
—The next day.
When Novia awoke from his dreams, he first gently shifted away Aertluqi and Typhon, both leaning against him in their sleep.
Then, before he could even rise, a familiar system prompt suddenly flickered into existence before his eyes.
He froze for a moment, staring at the glowing text—
The "Travel" option was pulsing softly.
1515 A.D. — Britain.
That was, of course, the era of the Renaissance.
For Novia, who had already lived through both Rome and the Huns, there was no real need to continue such journeys. His strength was more than sufficient by now.
And yet—
Just as before he had traveled to the Hunnic era, Novia felt it again: that strong premonition that something deeply connected to him was waiting on the other side. Something born because of him.
He couldn't help but grumble inwardly.
All I did was visit Rome — how did the aftermath spiral this far?
Still, the feeling was too strong to ignore. Even as he complained, his decision had already been made.
Though… part of him hesitated.
Should I wait a little longer?
He couldn't explain why, but a faint intuition told him to pause.
In the end, however, he simply sighed. Forget it. Let's do this now.
With that decision made, the world before his eyes suddenly went dark.
His body, losing all support, slumped against Typhon's sleeping form. The morning sun streamed through the window, glinting off the cross on his chest and the silver carving he held — a third of an ornate piece etched with intricate Arabic vine patterns.
Its brilliance flared — and then, slowly, the carving dissolved into a shadow of light.
—At the same time—
In Manaka Sajo's newly acquired apartment, the thirty-seven-year-old beauty stared blankly at the hooded, petite girl before her — a girl whose pale face was traced with crimson sigils.
Manaka's voice broke into a wail.
"You've got to be kidding me… Another one I can't beat?!"
Sajo Manaka felt that aside from Sion and Mabel Kiara, it seemed that no human could truly stand beside Novia anymore.
Did that mean she had to stop being human herself?
…Was that even possible?
As the blonde girl drifted in thought, Draco narrowed her eyes, gazing coldly at the golden-haired human before her. There was an unfamiliar, faint killing intent toward this woman—but her immediate priority was finding her teacher.
"Out of my way. Don't block the path of the Emperor."
Just as Draco lunged forward, Melusine—who had only just gotten out of bed—stepped out from her room. Instantly, she sensed the magical aura emanating from the petite girl. That magic—she remembered it well—it was the very same energy once controlled by Novia.
In a flash, realization struck her: wasn't this little one Nero's strongest dragon? Her expression immediately turned wary.
But then her eyes drifted downward—to Draco's chest.
And she relaxed.
She didn't know how it happened, but one thing was certain—she'd already won.
Who could possibly challenge her place at Novia's side now?
No one.
Not anymore.
Perhaps it was this sense of relief that made Melusine grin so broadly as she planted herself squarely before Draco.
"Well, if it isn't Nero~. What happened to you? Two thousand years gone, and you end up like this? Though honestly, it's an improvement. You should stay this way—adorable! Hahahahaha!"
"…Albion," Draco growled through clenched teeth. "What did you do to my teacher?"
She could feel her master's familiar aura lingering within the silver-haired dragon girl before her. The thought made her blood boil.
She was already furious—ever since that damned Flower Magician had hit her with some illusion spell right after her descent to Earth, delaying her for days on end. And now this smug dragon woman stood before her, oozing arrogance.
Worse still—she could feel her teacher's aura emanating from several rooms around them. It wasn't as though her master had been dismembered—no, this was something else entirely.
Something she herself had never been allowed to experience.
Her fists trembled.
She was this close to killing someone.
"Well, you see~," Melusine licked her lips, eyes gleaming with a self-satisfied smirk.
"It's exactly what you're thinking. Everything. We did everything. Hahaha! You're the eighth one, if you're keeping count!"
"I'll kill you!" Draco roared. "I'll flay your skin, peel it off, and scrub you all clean!"
The magical power that erupted from Nero-Draco was terrifying—but Melusin was hardly one to back down. In an instant, her body shimmered and transformed into her true draconic form, meeting the raging blonde head-on.
After all, last night had been Typhon and Altrouge's turn—but Melusine had snuck in midway through the night anyway, slipping back out at dawn. She hadn't been satisfied with such little time, and her foul mood demanded release.
"Heh… how confident of you," she sneered. "Then let me teach you a lesson on Novia's behalf. You'll soon remember who's truly number one!"
---
1515 — The State of Europe
What kind of world was Europe in the year 1515?
It was the final century of the Renaissance—a time when the natural sciences had at last broken free from medieval restraints. Revolutionary progress was made in astronomy, mathematics, chemistry, and physics. Beyond the famed literary and artistic masters of the age, there were figures like Andreas Vesalius, the Imperial Court physician of the Holy Roman Empire, who laid the foundations of modern anatomy through dissection, and Nicolaus Copernicus, who formulated the heliocentric model.
Two years later, in 1517, Martin Luther would publish his Ninety-Five Theses, igniting the Reformation across Europe.
He proclaimed justification by faith, teaching that salvation came through belief rather than church authority or good deeds.
He elevated the authority of the Bible above that of the Church, thus giving rise to the new Protestant faith—opposed to both Catholicism and Orthodoxy.
It was also the thirty-fifth year of the Witch Trials, a persecution that began in 1480 and would last for more than three centuries. In 1484, Pope Innocent VIII issued a papal bull declaring:
"Witches must not be spared.
They are vile, shameless, and unforgivable."
Following this, the clergy across Europe were mobilized to hunt and purge supposed witches.
Two years later, in 1486, the inquisitors Heinrich Kramer and Jacob Sprenger published Malleus Maleficarum (The Hammer of Witches)—a gruesome manual detailing how to identify and prosecute witches. It compiled all contemporary superstition about demons and witchcraft, providing "divine" instructions for how to detect and punish witches.
The book became the "Bible" of the witch hunts.
And as its lies spread, tens of thousands of innocent women were condemned to the stake—burned alive by fearful, ignorant mobs.
In the name of witch-hunting, any woman accused was beheaded, her body burned before the crowd. The number of unjust souls who perished was uncountable, particularly across Reformation-era Europe—one of the darkest chapters in Western civilization.
Meanwhile, on the small Italian island of Montecristo, long before The Count of Monte Cristo would immortalize it in literature, a mysterious object—engraved with Arabic vine patterns resembling encrypted script—lay embedded within the so-called Christ's Treasure.
Across the ocean, in 1519, the Spaniard Hernán Cortés—mistaken by the Aztec emperor Montezuma II for the prophesied Feathered Serpent—used deceit and six hundred men to annihilate the Aztec Empire. He razed their temples and rebuilt Mexico City upon their ruins. The ancient Aztec civilization vanished into dust.
And far to the south, the cosmic being Ortlinde, which had fallen to Earth before recorded history and slept peacefully within the Crystal Valley of South America, was disturbed one day—by an object inscribed with the same cryptic Arabic vine pattern, drifting ashore with the endless waves of the Atlantic.