The dragon’s roar echoed, shaking Van to his bones. His breathing grew heavier as his skin blistered from Cheetah’s slashes all over his body.
’I think this is enough...’
A gust of wind swept through the root cage that trapped Van and Cheetah. The dragon’s wings flapped as it charged toward them.
Cheetah burst into shrill laughter, raising his hand to stab Van, while outside the root cage, the brown-haired elf continued aiming, ready to release his arrow.
Van finally released the invisible giant form that had stolen the Artium.
A loud boom echoed not far from the cage as the Artium crashed down after the invisible giant no longer held it in its embrace.
Meanwhile, Cheetah’s poisonous blade was blocked by something invisible before it could reach Van’s face.
Van looked at him with a smile while Cheetah fell into confusion.
Van’s lips trembled, and his body shook as well. He had imagined this exact situation thousands of times after awakening his potential.
A situation where he was cornered by his enemies.
Van began to scream. His body trembled violently, his roar clashing with the dragon as it opened its mouth.
Van created an invisible barrier from his invisible space that surrounded himself. Then he kept expanding that space until it slammed into Cheetah and shattered the root cage.
The invisible space continued expanding together with Van’s increasingly loud scream.
The elf who had been aiming at Van’s head was swept away by something invisible.
So was the dragon, which fell silent after crashing into the invisible space.
"UWAAAAHHHHH!!!"
The invisible space continued expanding. They had no idea how large that invisible force would become as it swept them away, while Van, who controlled it, suddenly stopped screaming after accidentally coughing.
’Damn... that was supposed to be my cool moment.’
Van looked around. Everyone had been swept away and was trying to get back up. He could also feel his back shiver as the explosion of black lightning drew closer to him.
But he had already decided on his goal.
Van finally flew into the sky, where the sea of stars was beginning to disappear. He kept flying without looking back below, leaving behind the chaos he had caused because of his failed attempt to steal the hill-sized Artium.
In return, he kept grimacing in pain as the wind continuously tried to enter his body through his blistered wounds.
He endured it for a while until he finally broke through several layers of clouds, where orange sunlight caressed his peeling skin.
He flew until he reached the highest layer of clouds that concealed the sun.
A warmer breeze brushed against Van’s body. Birds chirped as they flew beneath him, below the sea of clouds.
Van removed his black mask and greedily inhaled the fresh air, enough to perhaps earn the sun’s ridicule as it faced him.
He then created an invisible sofa floating above the sea of clouds, facing the sun that had just risen for the first time in the part of the world where Van was now.
Van sat comfortably. Steam began rising from his body—not because of the sunlight, but because of the effect of his regeneration.
His blistered skin slowly returned to being smooth as before, while his regenerative ability could not repair his clothes, which were torn in many places.
Van let out a heavy sigh, facing the sun as if he were about to have a conversation with it.
"They... they’re really strange. They clearly look like something out of a movie... but they have powers... and those aren’t potentials."
Van tilted his head.
"Or are they potentials? Damn. Why am I getting confused? If those were potentials, I should’ve been able to learn them immediately..."
Van scratched his dry throat. He pinched the air with his right hand, the one bearing the sunset tattoo.
A bottle of cold mineral water appeared from nowhere, and Van immediately gulped it down greedily, enough to make the sun jealous.
"Ahh... but they’re really strong. This is the first time I’ve been beaten up by someone other than the old man."
Van pinched the air again. This time, he pulled out a small notebook and a pen.
"What were all their abilities again?"
Van began scribbling in his little notebook, sketching miniature faces of each opponent one by one with his mediocre drawing skills.
"Ah, there’s the sitting elephant... he’s really strong. I mean, even my invisible space trembled from a single punch of his."
Van seriously wrote about their abilities in his notebook, making the sun, which served as his personal lamp, seem curious.
"And there’s that elf girl too... good grief. She’s definitely the most troublesome one... if she wasn’t there, Bigboy would’ve escaped already... and because of her, that fast cat was able to attack me."
Van leaned his aching back against the backrest of his invisible sofa. He clicked his pen while staring at the sun, which seemed to grow bigger and hotter.
"If I meet them again, I think I should target her first..."
Van bit his lip, then continued drawing the bull, the cheetah, the dragon, and the male elf carrying a bow with brown hair.
"That fast cat is definitely the weakest and the noisiest one... I mean, if all he can do is blister my skin, that’s not a problem... even if I hadn’t summoned the invisible giant, he clearly wouldn’t have been able to get through me."
Van let out a sigh. He thought for a moment before writing again.
"Then there’s the stubborn elf... he’s just average too. Then there’s the bull who seems hot-tempered... he looks like a strong fighter, good grief."
Van tried to recall the black-haired woman with horns on her head. He remembered her red reptilian eyes.
"She’s definitely the dragon, right?"
Van chuckled. He pinched the air, and a bag of potato chips appeared in his hand.
He ate the potato chips as his first meal of the new day.
"And there’s also the dwarf... why didn’t he fight? He should’ve been on the front line... he’s so muscular."
Van chewed his potato chips while thinking about the battle he had just gone through a few minutes ago. He kept replaying it in his mind. Several times he felt annoyed because he realized there had been better moves he could’ve made during the fight.
"Luckily I still haven’t used all of my potentials. They still don’t know about my regeneration... hahaha, old man!! I managed to keep one of my trump cards!!"
Van smiled broadly. He chuckled for a while over his simple achievement.
"Now that I think about it... they’re really like the cast of a fantasy movie... so, they’re real? They really exist? But where did they go in the future? I mean, they have powers... but it doesn’t seem like they existed when the Sea Gate opened."
Van licked his fingers after finishing the entire bag of potato chips without sharing any with the sun that continued staring at him.
A weary sigh escaped him.
"In the end, I failed this time..."
"They’re strong... very strong."
Van blinked several times as his skin reflected the increasingly hot sunlight.
"The language is also a problem."
Van suddenly remembered Andis, Arsy, and the people he had just met.
"Right... there’s still them..."
Van frowned. He then stood up on the invisible sofa and made the small notebook, pen, and potato chip trash disappear.
"I wonder if they’re awake? The battle was pretty intense earlier..."
Van opened his jacket. He also took off his shirt and removed his long pants. Now he was only wearing shorts.
He then took his gray jacket and flip-flops, changing his clothes right in front of the sun.
"Maybe I should take them a little farther away?"
Van then walked to the edge of the invisible sofa. He looked as though he were preparing himself like a diving athlete about to perform a beautiful dive from a great height.
"Ahh...I’ll think about it later. Better go back, have breakfast, and reorganize the plan... I have a feeling that if I’m gone any longer and they feel the earthquake, they’ll think the gods are cursing them."
Van immediately jumped into the sea of clouds below him. He disappeared into the sea of clouds wearing only a pair of sandals, shorts, and a gray jacket.
"Let’s steal again later."
───
The sound of ice cracking echoed from the frozen crater in the middle of the city that no longer looked like a city.
The warm sunlight melted the frozen lake surrounding the giant tree that had formed a few hours ago.
A cold breath escaped from the lips of a horned woman whose red reptilian eyes stared at the giant tree blocking the sunlight.
The horned woman remained silent with a face as cold as ice, letting her skin be brushed by both the warm and cold wind.
The sound of small footsteps approached, followed by the heavy voice of a man.
"Everything is a mess. But thanks to your dream, at least we managed to move the ship beforehand..." the man sighed. "...otherwise it would have added to my work because now everything is in complete chaos... the artium has been moved far away, everyone is injured."
The horned woman raised her head to the sky. She watched a flock of birds flying toward the giant tree that had only recently come into existence.
The man spoke again after receiving no reply.
"What about that golden-haired figure? Was he the same as the one in your dream? He was a human, right? Or was he different in your dream? You know? He really caused all of us a lot of trouble... and his power... what do you think, Kalula?"
Kalula looked back, lowering her head slightly because the one speaking to her was an old dwarf with a long white beard and long white hair.
Kalula rubbed her eyes and yawned lightly. She also glanced at the artium that was now resting at the edge of the city right behind the old dwarf.
"To be honest, I didn’t see him clearly... I never saw us fighting. Everything was only prevention, Dorn."
Dorn’s expression became strange. He scratched his forehead.
"Then? What was the clearest thing you saw?"
Kalula fell silent for a few moments. She hesitated to speak, but eventually she did.
"Us, the humans, and him building a city together? Maybe something like that...?"
Dorn’s expression became even stranger. He wanted to say something, but the sound of bright laughter echoed not far from them.
They turned together.
There, an elf woman was sitting on top of a large rock that had once been the wall of a house. Another elf was applying something that smelled like flowers onto her hands and feet, while her wet hair was being dried with a cloth.
"Building a city? Wasn’t your dream about building a family with that man? You’re getting weirder, Kalula..." the elf woman covered half of her face. "He was even wearing a face covering... are you sure he’s handsome? What if he’s actually an old grandfather? Hahaha."
Kalula tilted her head, trying to remember her dream and the face of the golden-haired man without the face covering.
"I think he’s fairly handsome by my standards. Well, by your standards, he’s definitely very handsome, Elena."
Elena frowned and scratched her nose.
"Wanna bet?"
Kalula chuckled.
The two of them eventually started talking and arguing with each other until Dorn finally interrupted.
"Hey, hey... isn’t there something more urgent? That man stole the artium... why are you two making bets? He’s on the opposite side."
Kalula chuckled. She sighed and glanced toward the opposite side from where Elena was sitting.
There, an elephant sat cross-legged on the ground wearing his battle armor.
Kalula lifted her head once.
"What do you think, Bong? You were the first one to meet him."
Bong looked at Kalula.
He remained silent without answering. Instead, Dorn spoke to Kalula.
"Bong said that man was crazy and strange... he was so fast that even Bong didn’t notice him. If he hadn’t approached Bong first, the artium might have disappeared in the blink of an eye... and Bong’s attacks couldn’t reach him."
Kalula sighed.
She remembered herself, in her dragon form, being swept away together with everyone else by something invisible.
Dorn stroked his beard.
"But didn’t the Lord say humans shouldn’t have any power in this era—"
Dorn’s words were cut off as the sound of two sets of footsteps approached, accompanied by heavy breathing.
The black-furred bull walked over carrying his axe, while the cheetah followed behind him.
The black bull drove his axe into the ground.
Steam escaped with his breath, and his black eyes reflected Kalula.
"Let’s kill those humans."
Silence fell over everyone gathered there, while far in the distance the noise of thousands of people carrying out their own tasks continued to echo.