I gawked AGAIN. I'm really good at it, apparently. "That was ENGLISH," I insisted.
He huffed—as if correcting a child who just called a mammoth a fat cow. "Yes. The Old World was called Earth. It vanished fifty thousand years ago. This realm is the New World."
Fifty? Not ten? Old world? Earth?
Under the swirling frost-light of the rift, with cold winds painting my cheeks pink, the Troll King looked down at me— Ancient. Massive. Older than logic. Older than history. Older than the idea of history.
He lowered his head until his icy breath brushed my face, but it wasn't scary—it felt like stepping into a warm memory. "Human," the Troll King rumbled, voice rolling like a glacier crushing stone. "Your qi and your song… it woke us. It frees us."
I blinked at him, still clutching my soaked sleeves, steam rising faintly from my Spirit Qi. "I mean—I know MJ is iconic, but what do you mean woke?"
