At the end of the fall, there was only emptiness.
Phainon lay on his back, his body tumbling and sinking in the deathly darkness, like a scorched awn of wheat carried away by the wind from a wheat field.
His eyes were still open, his pupils reflecting the ever-receding, ever-shrinking darkness.
Phainon recalled that moment; he had indeed slashed that face, and the golden blood that seeped from the cut was not of this world.
My vision began to blur, Nanook's absolute darkness dissipated into a layerless gray before my eyes, from which other colors slowly emerged.
A gentle light emanated from the deepest part, spreading in concentric circles, like slow ripples on the surface of water caused by a pebble.
Phainon didn't know what it was; he only felt that the light was both extremely familiar and extremely strange.
His life was too long, so long that he forgot many things, so long that all colors were worn down to one color—gold.
Golden wheat fields, golden blood... but the colors in this light felt to him like colors he had only seen in some deep, buried Remembrance.
The more transparent the light, the brighter it became, and the closer it seemed to get.
Immediately, a figure emerged from the light.
The being that hung high in the sky could not be seen in its specific form; all that could be seen was a layered, flowing phantom, as if countless folds of Years had been condensed into one place.
He has no face, yet seems to gaze in all directions at once; He has no voice, yet what falls upon the soul of Phainon is a voice clearer than any cry.
The glance from the Aeon was exactly the same as Nanook's, but Phainon felt only a faint sense of peace, like seeing a flower that had bloomed until its twilight years finally fall.
" Eternity ".
Phainon murmured the name in his heart, unable to distinguish whether it was hatred or exhaustion. He mustered the last bit of strength in his soul, wanting to see that figure one more time.
Then he saw that the phantom's hand had somehow acquired something.
A bright silver hourglass, completely transparent, filled with a kind of flowing sand that doesn't resemble sand but rather crushed starlight.
It was so light, as if the flowing light contained all the time that had passed through this universe.
The silvery hourglass did not fall into Phainon's hands— Phainon had nowhere left to catch it.
It was gently propelled by that illusory figure, passing through Phainon's forehead, through his already empty chest, and slowly, quietly, melted into his body.
As soon as the hourglass entered his body, Phainon's sensations suddenly changed. The swirling void stopped, the scattered dust dissipated, and he felt as if he had returned to his childhood.
Beneath your feet is soft, warm mud; each step leaves a shallow indentation.
Phainon looked down at himself and saw that he was wearing a short jacket. The sun was shining brightly, white clouds were drifting slowly, and the wind carried the scent of wheat, rolling down from the tips of the wheat.
The scenery of the Aedes Elysiae was still as beautiful as ever. This was when Phainon had nothing to carry yet, and a voice gently rang in his ear.
" Phainon of the Aedes Elysiae, what is your wish?"
Phainon stood in that wheat field, stunned for a moment.
Phainon suddenly remembered that when he answered with his face tilted up, he was smiling very happily.
The boy, who hadn't yet been tempered by reincarnation and only knew how to chase after the light, grinned and answered for Phainon.
"My wish?"
He raised his hand and scratched the back of his head, thinking seriously for a moment, or perhaps he didn't need to think at all, as the answer was already in his heart.
"My wish... is to fulfill everyone's wishes!"
The boy paused, his eyes fixed on the endless golden waves of wheat in the distance. His eyelashes fluttered as if he had thought of something, and his voice softened, so soft that it wouldn't even make a ripple in the wheat fields.
"If it can't be done... then send it to tomorrow!"
The words were spoken.
The wind was blowing softly across the wheat field, pushing a layer of golden waves of wheat from his feet all the way to the horizon.
The ears of wheat bowed down, then rose again, as if the entire Aedes Elysiae was nodding gently in response.
Sunlight streamed down from the tips of the wheat, onto Phainon's shoulders, onto his clean, undamaged jacket, and onto the corners of his mouth that slowly curved upwards.
Phainon didn't speak again; he slowly closed his eyes.
The instant he closed his eyes, the silver hourglass, which had already merged into his body and was formed from starlight, suddenly began to move on its own.
A bright silver light slowly spread from his body, and the flowing sand stopped falling. Instead, it was gently held up by an unseen force, and one grain at a time, silently began to rise.
The hourglass turned backward, and the golden wheat fields receded row by row with time, receding into the bright river of light at the Vortex of Genesis, receding into the clear and distant, twin-headed cry of the Abyss of Fate.
In the end, everything came full circle back to where it all began.
The Black Tide recedes, time resets, and the scars are healed.
The Phainon of the Aedes Elysiae sent all his wishes to tomorrow.
Amphoreus's Years begins anew, once again.