Countless monsters howled amid the raging blaze. The surrounding reality peeled away little by little beneath the flames, revealing its true form, like a painting burning fiercely in a fire. Jiu's pupils trembled, and when she opened her eyes again, all the scenery around her had vanished.
She stood amid the shattered ruins, trembling as she gazed at her elder sister, who had completed her Divine Descent through Ophiel.
"It's you..."
Shinsen Saya slowly opened her eyes.
She turned her head.
She looked at her Third Attendant, one of the few sisters who had survived to this day after a thousand years.
"Jiu."
For a moment, she seemed to have so much to say, her eyes filled with complicated emotions. In the end, however, she pressed her lips together. Lin En had already threatened her: if she took it upon herself to tell Jiu about her experiences up above during this descent, he would immediately switch sides. Not only would he sever her connection to the Great Sun on the spot, but he would also side with the Red Moon and launch another invasion of the entire world, one uniquely his own.
So even though Jiu stood alive and well right before her now,
she could not speak her mind.
Jiu immediately rushed forward and threw her arms tightly around Shinsen Saya, who had descended into Ophiel's body. Tears streamed uncontrollably down her face. She seemed to have countless things to say, but when the words finally reached her lips, she could not get them out.
A thousand years of separation.
As old friends from that era died one after another with the passing years,
she had become one of the few remaining witnesses to that age.
Now that she could witness her elder sister's return to the mortal world,