Ethereal, sacred feathers drifted through the air, framing the angel's outstretched wings in an aura of unquestionable majesty.
Silas, trapped within those wings, was soaked in blood. Thick black shadows clung to his body, making him look like a sinner awaiting judgment.
Yet the expression on the sinner's face was strangely curious.
Silas's deep blue eyes reflected everything before him like mirrors. In their depths, a gap suddenly appeared among the wings that had filled his entire field of vision.
Then more and more feathers began to disappear, erased from the world one by one without leaving the slightest trace.
The person responsible was an intruder who had appeared without anyone noticing.
Silas's vision gradually cleared, allowing him to make out the figure more distinctly.
It was a young woman with black hair and black eyes, delicate and beautiful. She wore an old-fashioned hooded robe that cast her eyes in shadow. Her face was completely blank, showing no emotion at all.
It's her!
Silas finally remembered.
He had seen this woman before, during the great smog that had covered Backlund.
At the time, he and Queen Mystic Bernadette had been interrogating Panatiya, the Despair Nightingale.
This woman had broken through their defenses and forced her way inside, indirectly causing Panatiya's death and destroying every lead that came with her.
The mysterious woman had been terrifyingly powerful. Bernadette had been completely outmatched.
And now, it seemed she could even stand against an Angel King.
Beneath her empty gaze, Ouroboros's body was slowly being erased.
"..."
Ouroboros turned his head and met the hooded woman's eyes.
Countless mysterious, translucent rings appeared throughout the surrounding space.
Not good. He's about to reset time around them again!
Alarm surged through Silas, but he could not move. He could not even open his mouth to warn her.
He had no idea whose side this strange woman was on. At that moment, however, all he could do was hope she could hold out a little longer and buy him more time.
Under his anxious stare, the hooded woman moved.
She raised her right hand. A slender, pale finger emerged from beneath her robe and lightly tapped the air.
The mysterious rings vanished one after another, replaced by a dense darkness.
It spread soundlessly, swallowing the laws that governed the cycle and radiating outward like a silent black catastrophe.
Thump. Thump.
Ouroboros took two steps back.
A trace of something unusual passed through his otherwise indifferent eyes.
Shhk.
In the next instant, the Angel King made no attempt to attack again.
He spread his torn, ragged wings and beat them against the air, shooting straight into the sky.
As he rose, his body transformed once more into clear, translucent light before fading completely from sight.
He ran!
Ouroboros had crushed Silas without effort, yet the appearance of an even more powerful being had frightened him so badly that he fled without the slightest hesitation.
A single translucent feather drifted slowly downward, the final trace he left behind.
Silas watched it fall to the ground, where it dissolved into light and disappeared.
He raised his head and looked directly at the black-robed woman.
Her expression remained blank. Her dark eyes seemed to swallow every trace of light as they stared steadily at him.
She's looking at me.
Uh...
Silas felt a crushing pressure descend upon him.
The Red Angel evil spirit inside him had gone completely silent.
The three Conquerors within him had not only stopped arguing, but had also retreated into the deepest corner of his body and fallen utterly still.
What a bunch of cowards...
Silas complained inwardly as he stared at the beautiful yet strangely lifeless woman before him.
Though, to be honest, he was feeling more than a little nervous himself.
After all, what level of power did someone need to possess to overwhelm an Angel King who had occupied his throne for a thousand years, then make him flee without even attempting to fight?
Heh...
Did he really need to think about it?
Only a true god standing at the pinnacle of the Sequences could do something like that.
Which meant this woman's true identity...
Silas did not dare continue down that line of thought.
He forced himself to suppress the emotions churning inside him.
He had encountered beings such as the True Creator and the Fool before, but those meetings had taken place within illusions or above the gray fog.
This time, he was facing something real in the physical world.
The pressure was on an entirely different level.
Although countless thoughts raced through his mind, only a moment passed in reality.
Before Silas could decide how to respond to the mysterious being, she moved first.
A faint spark of life suddenly appeared on the expressionless woman's face.
Her black eyes shifted and settled on Silas's startled expression. As though the two of them shared some private joke, she gave him a small wink.
Then her body began to erase itself as well, disappearing bit by bit until nothing remained.
Before long, Silas was the only person left on the mountaintop.
Both Ouroboros and the mysterious black-robed woman were gone.
The entire peak stood empty, as though neither of them had ever appeared, as though everything Silas had witnessed had been nothing more than an illusion.
Whoosh!
Just as Silas began to question his own senses, the air in front of him rippled.
Antia burst through it in a rush, her black skirt fluttering around her.
Smack!
She did not even stop to examine the surroundings.
Without hesitation, Antia grabbed Silas's hand.
The colors around them immediately became vivid and distorted. It was obvious that she intended to activate Spirit World Shuttle and drag Silas somewhere safe.
"Calm down. It's already over," Silas said quickly.
The ship spirit stopped the transfer at once.
Even so, she continued scanning the area warily. Only after confirming that there was no longer any danger did she finally breathe a sigh of relief.
"I thought I was going to be alone again..."
Antia's voice trembled slightly, and she still held Silas's hand in a tight grip.
She squeezed hard enough to hurt, but Silas wisely showed no reaction. He simply waited for her anxiety to fade on its own.
"What just happened?"
Once she had calmed down, the ship spirit refused to let the matter drop.
Sunlight fell across her asymmetrical black skirt. For some reason, her figure looked slightly insubstantial at that moment.
"I just happened to run into an Angel King. That's all," Silas answered honestly.
"An Angel King?"
Her eyebrows rose sharply.
"No wonder the pressure was so intense. It was much worse than Suah...
"So why did he leave?"
"Uh, well..."
Silas hesitated.
"I'm not sure I can tell you..."
This involved a true god, and one capable of descending directly into the world.
Carelessly revealing even the smallest clue about her whereabouts could bring consequences too terrible to imagine.
"Good afternoon."
At that moment, a calm and peaceful voice rang out.
In the next instant, the owner of the voice appeared before them without the slightest warning.