Elysia: Am I…
Child of Anāsrava?
18: [18] – [BONUS] – Silver Wolf Beats Bronya in a Game?
Elysia: Am I…
Child of Anāsrava?
— Sever the time connection?
“Uh?” Everyone gasped at once.
What did that even mean?
“Is…
is that really possible?” Raiden Mei swallowed hard, her voice trembling slightly.
Zane explained, “Basically, this world’s history can’t be changed anymore.
No matter what happens in the Previous Era, your world will stay the same.” “Old man, do you mean a parallel universe?” Silver Wolf tilted her head, her eyes lighting up with curiosity.
“Not quite.” Zane glanced at Silver Wolf beside him and affectionately ruffled her hair.
“After the timeline is severed, the Previous Era’s progression will not branch off and create a new parallel universe either.” In other words, this was even more permanent than Kang the Conqueror’s power.
Kang could destroy time and space, change how things work, travel through history, and rewrite the past.
But Zane’s way of cutting off time was different.
It was like blocking a wild river and turning the water below into solid crystal.
No matter how strong the river was above, the frozen scene inside the crystal would stay the same.
“…” Watching Zane pat Silver Wolf’s head, Bronya’s light-gray eyes trembled.
A strange surge of longing and sadness rose in her chest.
They were isotopes.
They looked exactly the same.
Logically, their parents should look the same too.
Could Zane be the father she had never met?
Wait…
That did not seem right either.
Her adoptive father, Uncle Maxim, had told her a different name.
Still, Maxim had died when she was very young, so her memories of him had blurred with time.
Their skin tones were different too, right?
Maybe she took more after her mother?
Bronya’s thoughts became a mess.
Completely unaware of Bronya’s inner turmoil, Zane continued, “In our universe, there is an Aeon named Fuli.” “To fulfill the concept of Remembrance and preserve the entire universe, Fuli only ascends to Aeonhood at the absolute end of time.” “But the instant Fuli ascends, those Memories pierce backward through the past, establishing the entity the universe knows as Fuli.” Huh?
The girls stared at him in shock.
Did that mean everything the universe knew about Fuli, from the past all the way to the future, originated from a single echo sent backward from the end of time?
In other words, even though Fuli had not been born yet, Fuli had technically already existed?
Were Aeons always this unreasonable?
“Right now, Fuli’s crystalline body is nothing more than an empty shell.” Zane’s voice remained calm.
“We, who exist in the present, have no way of knowing who will eventually become Fuli.
What we can confirm is that Fuli will be born in the future.” “Those who have the potential to become Fuli are known as Pure Children of Anāsrava.” “One of those children chose to remain in the past of a certain world.
By closing the loop of causality, the present was permanently locked in place and rendered indestructible.” Zane turned toward Elysia.
His eyes softened as he looked at her.
Elysia froze.
Her pink eyes blinked several times, and a strange feeling stirred in her chest.
She had the distinct sense that Zane was implying something far deeper.
Could the Child of Anāsrava, who closed the loop of causality, have something to do with her?
“So my world was locked in too?” Elysia asked, still a little dazed.
“Something like that.” Zane nodded and took a sip of juice.
“To really make both worlds unbreakable, you need an anchor.” An anchor?
Everyone paused.
Evanescia tilted her head.
Her beautiful eyes, hiding countless secrets, narrowed slightly as she let out a knowing laugh.
“I understand.
The Group Chat…” Everyone suddenly understood.
Of course.
The group chat.
The group chat’s appearance was the only reason the past and present got mixed up.
Without it, there’s no way Elysia, who died long ago, could sit across from Kiana, who lives fifty thousand years later.
Mei and Bronya, however, were completely lost.
What was going on?
A Group Chat?
“Okay!
I still don’t really get it, but it sounds like I don’t have to worry about Kiana, Mei, and Bronya disappearing!” Elysia let out a long sigh of relief and patted her chest, her bright smile returning.
She really didn’t want another lively world to be destroyed because of her.
Zane did not mention the other possibility waiting in the future.
The two severed fragments of time could one day be merged back together, pulling the Previous Era fifty thousand years forward and overlaying it directly onto the Current Era’s timeline.
Or, they could just let the two worlds exist peacefully next to each other.
—•——•——•——•——•——•— Inside a Villa.
Elysia, Furina, and Raiden Mei volunteered to cook.
Evanescia and Miyabi handled the prep work and chopping.
As for Kiana, everyone agreed that her role was to sit quietly and wait for food.
Nobody wanted to risk tasting the Kaslana family’s famous Judgment of Shamash cooking.
Whenever Kiana tried to roast something, it usually turned into a lump of charcoal.
Her stews always ended up tasting like something no one could describe or eat.
“Want to play a game?” With nothing else to do, Silver Wolf challenged her isotope, Bronya.
“Alright.” Bronya looked up, a faint trace of interest appearing in her light-gray eyes.
Zane was intrigued as well.
The game appeared to be an arcade-style fighting game similar to King of Fighters.
After spending a minute familiarizing themselves with the controls and character combos, the two officially began their duel.
Feeling confident, Silver Wolf wanted to show Bronya how it’s done.
She picked a character and pulled off a series of flashy combos, chaining attacks and throwing bombs everywhere.
Then she used the ultimate cheap tactic.
She trapped Bronya’s character in the corner and kept throwing explosives over and over.
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
Boom!
A minute later, Bronya’s health bar was gone.
Her character fell to the ground in a big cloud of smoke and stayed down.
“Again.” Bronya pressed her lips together, unwilling to accept defeat.
She hadn’t expected Silver Wolf to play so dirty.
“Oh.” Zane was genuinely stunned.
Silver Wolf beat Bronya?
Everyone knew Silver Wolf was usually bad at video games.
She’d replay a tutorial stage over and over before beating it.
Bronya, though, was basically a pro gamer.
“Old man, is it really that surprising that I won?” Silver Wolf shot him a glare over her shoulder.
“Not at all.
Silver Wolf is obviously the best.” Zane laughed and habitually patted her little head.
Then he remembered something.
When Silver Wolf was young, her gaming skills were excellent.
She had even made a certain opponent, highly suspected to be Aha the Elation, cry in frustration.
Then Aha started cheating.
Using a character with only a quarter of its health bar, Aha completely destroyed Silver Wolf while she was still at full health.
After that, Silver Wolf’s whole approach to gaming changed for good.
If she played a game, she used cheats.
If she could not use cheats, she refused to play.
Right now, however, Silver Wolf was really skilled.
“Bronya was only careless…” Bronya’s expression remained blank, but there was clearly a temper beneath it.
“I will not go easy on you this time.” Watching Zane treat Silver Wolf like a daughter made Bronya feel a sudden stab of jealousy.
“Bring it on!” Silver Wolf did not back down.
The second round turned around quickly.
Bronya caught a tiny opening in Silver Wolf’s defense, executed a flawless combo, and finished with a flashy ultimate move.
[K.O.!] Silver Wolf sat in silence for one second.
“AGAIN!” They kept playing, the sound of controller buttons clicking nonstop in the living room.
“Dinner is ready.
Would you two gaming experts like to take a break?” Only when Elysia called out did the two reluctantly put down their controllers.
“So, who won?” Evanescia asked as she set out the bowls and chopsticks.
“Nobody.
It was a tie,” Bronya replied, looking away.
“You’ve got to be kidding me.
I definitely won one more round than you did,” Silver Wolf shot back.
In truth, neither of them kept track.
They seemed to win and lose about equally, and neither could completely beat the other.
The meal was huge, looked great, and smelled amazing.
There were roasted ribs, almond trout, udon noodles in clear broth, and light sides like bamboo shoots with seaweed.
“…” Even with all that food, Raiden Mei looked distracted.
Her eyes were dull, and she seemed weighed down by worry.
Zane took a bite of trout and glanced at her.
He knew exactly what was bothering her.
Mei was still overwhelmed with guilt about the disaster in Nagazora and the nearly one million innocent people who died in the eruption.
If he didn’t help her, she would stay stuck in self-blame and never get out.
“Why aren’t you eating?” “I…” Mei froze.
She looked up, met Zane’s eyes, then quickly lowered her gaze again.
“You think you killed a million innocent people?” Zane asked directly.
“Yeah.” Mei quietly set down her bowl and chopsticks, tears welling in her eyes again.
Zane sighed.
“You are not the one responsible for the Great Eruption.
The real culprit is Cocolia.” Clatter!
Bronya’s heart skipped a beat.
The chopsticks slipped from her fingers and struck the table with a sharp sound.
Her face went pale, and her light-gray pupils contracted.
He really does know!!
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