Veneri left the Obsidian Runic Spire and crossed the distance to Cassandra Island. The beach house came into view under the bright island light. The second he stepped inside, he heard laughter.
His daughter, Valeria Cassie Richinaria, was in the middle of playing with Ervadelle Nei, who was trying very hard to look dignified and failing completely because Valeria kept reaching up to grab her white fox ears and tugging at her tails with the kind of curiosity only a child could have.
Valeria was asking question after question, clearly delighted by every reaction she got out of her. Ervadelle kept trying to answer with patience but the little flicker in her expression made it obvious she had not expected a child to be this persistent, or this fearless.
The moment they saw him, Valeria's face lit up and she sprinted toward him with her arms out. Veneri bent down and caught her easily, lifting her up against his chest as if she weighed nothing at all. He looked at her properly then, brushed a hand over her hair,
Ervadelle came closer after that, straightening herself quickly and greeting him with the respect she always showed when she remembered exactly who she was standing in front of.
"Master."
He glanced at her, still holding Valeria in one arm. "How are you handling life?"
That made Ervadelle actually pause. She looked away for a second, then back at him.
"Honestly? I'm shocked."
The answer was blunt enough that it almost made him smile. Never in her existence had she imagined that a Fox Therianthrope like her would meet the Dynasty Monarch of Richinaria, much less end up his student.
Veneri reached out and patted her head. She didn't seem to mind it.
"Tomorrow is a crucial day. Get ready."
Before Ervadelle could answer, he heard a behind him.
"You've been saying that often."
He turned his head and saw Asenane standing there. Before he could say anything, she reached over, grabbed Valeria and pulled the child out of his hold despite Valeria's immediate protest.
"Hey! Mommy, no fair!"
Valeria complained but Asenane ignored her. Veneri let out a slow breath and answered her anyway.
"Natas mentioned to us that on the hundredth day, the Overlord Ravagers would attack."
When Asenane and he had gotten to the island and agreed with Natas on the Timeskipping Events, it had already looked like everything would line up on the hundredth day. That had been the shape of it from the beginning as Natas told them before he left Cassandra.
Everything was going according to plan. Asenane already knew about the plan and so did his subordinates. Even Valeria and Ervadelle knew enough to understand that something big was coming. None of them were walking into this blind.
Asenane looked at him for a long moment, then asked the question she had probably been holding back for a while.
"Is this really the only way?"
Veneri did not answer immediately. He looked at the open edge of the beach house and the shore.
"The Timeskipping Event is what would destroy Sentina Erideae. It's time for me to settle it once and for all."
His voice did not waver but that did not mean the words were easy. They never were. Every time he spoke like this, it was because he had already accepted the cost and was now just dragging everyone else toward the same conclusion
"I'm going to suffer doing it but it'll help them in the long term."
Asenane exhaled through her nose.
"You really do put a lot of burdens on yourself."
"It's necessary. And they'll all get stronger because of it."
He did not soften the truth for her. The plan would work, yes. That part was not in question. However, it would not happen the way they had lived through things this time. This was not going to be a neat correction or a graceful reset. Unlike the previous Epoch Cycle, none of them were strong enough to handle Virathus.
Virathus was not just another enemy standing in the way. He was the leader of the Overlord Ravagers and he was capable of destroying them all with ease.
That was the part people still liked to underestimate when they talked about plans and victories and timelines. It was one thing to say something would work. It was another thing entirely to say everyone would survive it intact. Hence, the outcome still had to be forced into existence because the alternative was Sentina Erideae dying for good.
His plan would work but the consequences would be too dire. That was the price. He would get his punishment sooner or later once he completed it and honestly, that was not even the worst part anymore. The punishment was inevitable, sure. The suffering was inevitable too but it was also part of his Time Trial, which made the whole thing feel like some horrible cosmic joke.
It was a win win situation, if one was willing to be disgustingly literal about it.
Valeria, still in Asenane's arms and clearly not thrilled about being grounded again, looked up with bright, reckless excitement and announced:
"I can't wait for an adventure."
Asenane gave her a flat look.
"Just because you're going doesn't make it easier for me."
"Why not?"
"Because this plan will take a lot of decades to work. It might be a long time before we see each other again."
That made Valeria blink. For all her enthusiasm, she was still a child, and the thought of "long time" had a way of landing differently in a child's chest than it did in an adult's. But after a moment, she smiled with that stubborn little resilience she had clearly inherited from Veneri.
"I'll never forget Mommy."
Asenane looked at her daughter in a way that held years of love and grief and acceptance all at once. She had already accepted this long ago. Valeria was safer in his hands than in hers and Asenane knew that. More than that, she knew this was necessary for her and all of them.
At least in those ninety plus days with her daughter, she was been able to act like the mother of a young girl the way she never had with Shimmer. Sometimes the briefest chance to be ordinary meant more than all the grand, world-shaking victories combined. She had a lot of days of being able to hold her daughter, listen to her laugh, hear her complain and just be there without any trouble. It had not fixed anything but it was satisfactory for her.
Ervadelle, still standing a little apart, finally looked between them and Veneri again. Her fox ears kept angling back as if she was trying to decide whether to ask the question or not. In the end she asked it anyway.
"Master, is this really the right thing to do?"
Veneri did not pretend otherwise. He did not dress it up in heroism or destiny or any of the other pretty lies people liked when the truth was ugly. He looked at her and answered with the same blunt honesty he had used on everyone else.
"No."
That answer clearly caught her off guard but he kept going before she could get lost in it.
"I've always been pragmatic. That won't change. I'm not a hero. I would do anything to achieve my goals, even if I have to use everyone else to achieve it."
And that was the whole point, really. The world did not survive on clean choices. It survived on dirty ones that somebody had the guts to make. Tomorrow, when the hundredth day came, the world would finally find out exactly how much he was willing to lose to keep them alive.