Chapter One Hundred Twenty: The Name Ulysses

Time rewound slightly.

On the thirty-second floor of the Supreme Tower, in the sky garden.

Yulia Ulysses looked down from her lofty vantage point into the deep darkness beyond the window. She opened her eyes, which had long been tightly shut. Her delicate silver-gray irises naturally reflected nothingness—and beyond that, the chaos that had always stirred at the world’s foundation.

“Franks.”

Her cherry lips parted slightly as the girl spoke calmly, without turning around. “Take me to the Hephaestus Temple.”

To issue a direct order like this to the eldest of the twelve white-robed archbishops stationed at the Hemtica division of the Order, while only a nun herself, might seem a rebellious act to outsiders. Yet the elderly man in white robes showed little change in expression, merely offering a ceremonious, appropriate smile before pushing his wheelchair forward. “As you wish, Ulysses.”

He did not call her Yulia, but only by the name Ulysses.

The silver-haired girl showed no surprise at this, merely closing her eyelids again and quietly waiting for time to pass.

*Boom—*

The elevator doors suddenly opened and closed, followed by a series of alarming sparks and a thunderous roar like an avalanche. At last, they reached the bottom. Then, pulled by mechanical arms, the world outside the Supreme Tower—engulfed by darkness—opened its arms to the girl in the wheelchair.

Yet Franks abruptly halted.

“Are you sure?” he asked, his tone revealing the care of an elder for a junior despite the clear hierarchy. “Intervening in the battle of Hemtica will surely expose you to the gaze of the Chaos Sect. When that happens, everything will become irreversible. The peaceful life you long for will be lost forever.”

“Everything was already destined the moment I inherited the name Ulysses—no, even before that.” Yulia pressed her pale, bloodless lips together. “Perhaps it is because peace is forever out of reach that such an illusory hope grows within the warmth of daily life.”

“Grandfather Franks,” the girl paused, her expression still noble and reserved like a snow lotus on a high alpine plain, yet the old man could sense the fragility beneath her resolute exterior, “perhaps… it was a mistake for Father and Mother to meet. If they had never met that day, perhaps Father would have continued wandering the city-states, and Hemtica would not have become the primary target of the Dark Lords.”

“Then none of what happened today would have occurred.”

The aged archbishop remained silent.

To feel no regret, no remorse—

His colleagues of decades, the apprentices he taught to study the scriptures, the hundreds within the Supreme Tower, including the other white-robed archbishops—all had been drawn into the nightmare of the Old Lords the moment the flame was extinguished. Their souls and bodies alike were assimilated by that terrifying existence beyond mortal comprehension, twisted into a writhing mass of darkness in absolute madness.

If not for Yulia severing his link to that dream in time, he would have shared the same fate.

And this was no isolated incident confined to the Supreme Tower.

Throughout Hemtica, perhaps the lower districts separated by the Wall of Sighs fared slightly better, but the upper districts… few humans remained. The Glorious Ones and the Swordbearers, protected by the blessing of Order, were not easily dragged into the dream. But with nearly one hundred thousand souls in Hemtica, including the elderly not yet laid to rest and infants still in swaddling, there were likely fewer than two thousand Glorious descendants left. As for the Order’s Swordbearers, this was not their home turf; even without considering prior battle casualties, their numbers barely reached two hundred and forty.

In other words, the vast city of Hemtica was now but an empty city—a city of death.

For the girl, this burden was indeed overwhelming.

But it was not a fault she should bear, nor a responsibility she should carry.

So he said, “It is unrelated. Those who killed them were the Chaos Sect, the Dark Lords—you simply failed to save them.”

“No,” the delicate girl’s beautifully arched brows lifted slightly, “it’s not that I failed to save them, but that I did not try.”

“I once had the chance,” Yulia’s slender, pale fingers clenched tightly before releasing, “but I did not act—held back by fear of the Demon Lord’s will that reigns supreme above the firmament. I dared not intervene.”

You did well.

Franks never voiced these words of guidance or encouragement because he never regarded Yulia Ulysses as a child in need of his counsel, but as a solitary soul capable of bearing the crown of honor. All he could do was sigh—a long, drawn sigh for the tragedy that had befallen Hemtica.

“Perhaps you would say that my life is more important than the fate of all Hemtica, but life can never be measured simply by numbers.” The girl’s fragile, boneless hand gently traced the darkness before her, inexplicably igniting a cluster of flames in the void. Then… the long night receded, and light and warmth returned to the earth. “I do not want Amy to be sad, so I will remember this humiliation well.”

She nodded obediently, lightly brushing the topic away.

“I do not want to be forced to wander like a lost dog as Father was,” Yulia gently pushed her wheelchair, her gaze lingering on the distant darkness. “I want my own life, my own beloved, to spend my days with the one I love—not merely to survive, to keep the world and the flame alive, to cling to life under the Chaos Sect’s relentless pursuit.”

“Therefore,” the girl opened her tightly shut eyes, shifting the gaze that had been fixed on some unseen point, “I intend to sever every tentacle the Chaos Sect has extended—especially…”

She paused, a great indignation coloring her voice.

“—Pandora.”

Realizing her outburst, she cut off her sentence at Pandora’s name, swallowing the half-spoken “detestable woman.” After a moment, she composed herself and turned to the archbishop behind her. “Will you help me, Franks?”

The aged archbishop had no objection and bowed. “If that is your will.”

Without further words, he pushed the wheelchair, carrying the pale silver-haired girl and the frost-white flames that illuminated the darkness around her, deeper into the shadows.

Light revealed the path. The longsword severed fate.

Nothing more, nothing less.

The blind nun and the white-robed archbishop were swallowed by endless darkness. The sound of the wheelchair wheels grinding on the ground echoed sharply in the vacant city of death. How long it lasted was unknown. After passing through Brulink Avenue and Third Elm Boulevard, the crystallized earth appeared beneath the firelight.

“This ends here,” Yulia gripped the wheelchair’s armrests, lifted her head to look far ahead, then closed her eyes, the faint light within them fading. Her voice was deep and solemn. “The rest… I will handle myself.”

Franks was no stranger to her, yet the person she was about to meet was not suitable for him to accompany her.

For both public and private reasons.

Meeting the Order’s white-robed archbishop alongside the High Priest of the Hephaestus Temple felt discordant, no matter how one thought about it. Moreover, on a personal level, she wished to accompany the elder who had devoted his life to Hemtica on his final journey.

Did she feel regret, remorse, or resentment over Edgar’s end? Naturally, yes. Had she intervened sooner, perhaps Hemtica’s flame would not have been extinguished, and Edgar Gorsworthy would still be alive. If only she could…

But there were no ifs. The Demon Lord’s will sat high in the firmament.

Like the Sword of Darkmos hanging overhead, she had no doubt that any overstep would bring down thunderous wrath from the founder of the Chaos Sect.

It was only shortly before the flame’s extinction that the heavy pressure lifted after a thunderclap.

She could finally breathe a little easier.

Unfortunately… by then, it was all settled. All she could do was see the High Priest of the Hephaestus Temple one last time and offer the strength she was meant to contribute to Hemtica.

For instance—

Temporarily restraining the spread of the Old Lords’ nightmare.

Or… giving a certain shameless woman a good thrashing.

A childish thought flickered in her mind as the girl’s cold face set the wheels in motion. Using the slope formed by the diminishing aftershocks, she glided steadily over the crystallized earth.

As they neared their destination, she gently pressed the armrest and leaned forward.

Her slender, pale fingers lightly probed his pulse.

—Almost none.

“Edgar Gorsworthy,” she said with a complex expression, then opened her eyes.

Her silver-gray irises were dim and unclear. At that moment, the girl’s pure and noble spirit transcended the heavens, reflecting the eternal truth of this world within the profound darkness that blocked her vision.

Then, the strings of law were gently plucked.

The blind performer played a transcendental melody.

Here—

The world became simpler.

The wounds Edgar Gorsworthy bore were erased with blunt force—not healed, but converted from existence to nonexistence on a conceptual level. In other words, the injury, once a fact, was erased from its origin in that instant.

Now, the High Priest had never been wounded, nor had he ever suffered injury.

So, even though his vitality was nearly exhausted from prior battles, and he had borne all pain through a noble sacrifice replacing Duke, with Death’s footsteps close at hand, he could still open his eyes and take one last look at this ravaged, desolate world.

Though it was somewhat unexpected.

What met his eyes was not the cold darkness after the flame’s extinction, but… a face both familiar and strange.

“Sister…”

Edgar’s voice was a mixture of surprise and joy. His dehydrated, wrinkled face forced a smile like an ancient tree’s gnarled bark. He reached out his hand, but… grasped only empty air.

The passage of life could not be simplified, at least not by Yulia, whose ability was imperfect and forbidden to tread such domains.

So—

The shadow of death had not yet left him, and Death would not release this precious noble soul.

All the girl could do was gently catch his falling hand—dry as cracked earth after a drought, revealing deep white bones—and hold it tenderly.

Then, the aged Edgar Gorsworthy closed his eyes peacefully.

“Farewell,” Yulia Ulysses whispered, bending with effort to fold the High Priest’s hands, then sighed softly as her gaze rested on his bent, frail figure. With no little sadness, she repeated, “Farewell… my uncle.”

Sadness was unmistakable on her face.