The snow never stopped falling.
For two days, the world was painted in silence. No horde ambushed them. No creature howled in the distance. No storms raged to slow them down. It was just the vast expanse of the Fallen Bridge's outer ring and the cold wind of the Longest Nightfall whispering across their faces.
Vastarael and Elyonari ran side by side as they saw the two moons hanging low over the horizon, one full and one waning.
"I can't believe we're not being chased," Elyonari muttered as she sprinted beside him. "Are we really that terrifying, or is the Frozen God saving his tantrum for the finale?"
"Maybe we've earned a moment to breathe. Or maybe… it's the calm before something worse."
"Couldn't let me enjoy it for once, could you?"
"I just think—"
"That the world is ending and we have no time to be happy," she interrupted, mocking his tone with a grin. "I know, Veneri. You're terrible at romance, you know that?"
He tilted his head slightly, amused.
"Says the woman who literally threw flaming arrows into a beetle's mouth."
"That's not romance. That's survival."
He laughed at that. That laughter made her forget the weight of their mission for a moment.
By the second night, they found themselves in the middle of a shimmering valley. The stars above were so vivid they seemed almost reachable. And it was here that Vastarael stopped and simply pointed to the sky.
Elyonari, confused, slowed down beside him.
"What?"
"Look. See that star there, just above the twin moons?"
She followed his gaze. "Yeah?"
"My father once told me that star shines brightest over Anqerise. It's one of the only ones that doesn't shift position no matter where you are in the world."
She glanced at him. "Is that true?"
"No. But it sounds poetic, right?"
She scoffed, elbowing him softly.
"Why are you like this?"
"Because if I wasn't, you'd run away from me like I was some cursed prince from a tragic folk tale."
"Who says I'm not?"
-----
They set up camp that night under a half-fallen arch of ice. Vastarael lit the campfire with a flick of his Heat Rune. Elyonari brought out a wine bottle from her inventory. Neither asked where it came from. She poured them both a cup and raised hers.
"To not dying."
Vastarael raised his with a quiet smirk. "And to giving the Frozen God indigestion."
They drank as of it was their last meal.
Elyonari watched the way the firelight painted shadows across Vastarael's features. She leaned closer, wrapping a blanket around both of them. Their thighs touched. Their shoulders pressed. He didn't flinch.
"Tell me the truth," she asked softly, almost inaudibly. "Do you think you'll survive this?"
His answer didn't come immediately. It came in the stillness between his breaths.
"I think I'll finish what I started."
"That's not what I asked."
"I don't know," he said honestly.
She hated how calm and accepting he was.. Elyonari's hand moved before she realized it, pressing against his chest.
"You're going to do it, aren't you? That… plan you and Erna talked about. I don't know what it is but I can tell they you're thinking about it."
He didn't answer. He didn't have to. After all, he only told Elyonari that there is a third option that would make everyone hate him. And if he failed the option, he would die.
She leaned forward suddenly, pressing her forehead to his collarbone.
"I hate you."
His arms came around her back without a word, pulling her into a tight, warm embrace.
"I know. You're not the first."
She laughed. Or cried. Maybe both.
---
The third morning, they rose early. The snow crunched beneath their feet as they moved south again.
At one point, Elyonari tossed a snowball at him. It hit his cheek and disintegrated.
He turned slowly.
She was already running, laughing like a madwoman as she jumped over a ridge.
He chased after her, mock-shouting curses and promising revenge. And for a few minutes in that endless frozen field, they were not warriors, not champions of Dynasties, not Ascenders trying to stop the awakening of a Forgotten.
They were just two young souls lost in winter.
------
It started with a whisper of wind.
The slope was massive, nearly vertical, so sheer it seemed like even gods would second guess skiing down it. But Vastarael didn't hesitate. His fingers glided across the air and sapphire shimmered beneath his feet, forming twin blade-like boards of crystal. Elyonari followed suit, her own boards shaped from solid Nature Energy.
Then, Vastarael lifted his glaive high.
The blade pulsed once. With a single controlled twist of its shaft, he slammed it into the slope.
The mountain roared.
It began as a shudder underfoot. Then, a deep rumble echoed throughout the entire slope. Cracks split open in the snowpack. A sheet of snow the size of a small town began to tremble, then fracture, then thundered downward in a titanic slide of white death.
Elyonari's eyes widened in awe and horror, even as Vastarael grinned.
"You wanted to move fast? Now's your chance!"
The avalanche swallowed the slope behind them as the two launched down, skiing at speeds that blurred the world. The wind shrieked in their ears and snow flew up in sprays so wild they looked like two shooting stars being chased by meteors.
Vastarael crouched low, cutting across the edge of the wave of white death. The sapphire under his feet adjusted to the angle of every slope, keeping him above the flood, leaving glowing blue trails as he maneuvered.
Elyonari was right behind him, the vines of her Nature Energy coiled beneath the snow, steering her with finesse as she darted beside him. At one point, she grinned and leaped up, spinning in the air, twirling once just to show off, landing with a smooth curve beside him.
"Having fun yet?"
"More than I should be!" Vastarael shouted back, laughing as another slope gave way beside them and joined the fray. "This is what skiing on a dying world feels like!"
For hours, they zigzagged through the mountain's belly. The two had summoned not one, but five avalanches, each colliding into the next to become something greater that carved deep wounds into the landscape, altering the topography itself.
By the time the third night came, they were several hundred kilometers south. The air was thinner now, colder and more pristine. The avalanches had passed, and the silence had returned.
They collapsed onto the snow like two exhausted titans, panting softly beneath a sky of constellations.
Elyonari lay sprawled out, her arms wide, snow clinging to her silver hair. Her cloak had long since been shredded by the cold winds, revealing the bandages across her arms and shoulders. She looked like a goddess who had just wrestled a dragon and was now resting on its slain corpse.
Vastarael sat up slowly beside her. Elyonari tilted her head to look at him.
"We're really close to going back home now, huh?"
He nodded. "Almost there."
She exhaled, and it misted the air.
"But you're giving off death vibes."
"What?"
"You know," she said, rolling onto her side, propping herself up on one elbow. "Death vibes. Like… you've made your peace, you've accepted it, and you're just tying loose ends."
He scoffed, "You're delusional."
She was on top of him before he could even blink.
He flinched as her weight settled over his waist and her knees pressed into the snow on either side of his hips. Her hands gripped his coat, pulling him closer as her eyes glared at his.
"Don't lie to me. I know that look. I've read so many stories as a teenager where the guy gives that same look right before he does something stupid and sacrificial and heroic and... and permanent."
The fire in her eyes was breathtaking. Her lips were trembling from fear and feeling what he wouldn't say.
Vastarael swallowed hard. "Elyonari…"
"Swear. Swear to me on Spheraphase's name that you will not die."
He looked away. Her grip tightened.
"Don't you dare look away, Vastarael Blossom Richinaria."
He closed his eyes, then slowly nodded.
"I swear. In Spheraphase's name… I will not die."
A golden ripple shimmered around them for a heartbeat which was a invisible seal born from the name of the world herself. The promise was now bound.
Elyonari's expression crumbled. And then, she kissed him.
Her lips were soft and warm despite the cold. Her hands slid up to cup his cheeks as she deepened it, tilting her head slightly, and he responded, his arms encircling her waist, pulling her flush against him.
Snowflakes landed on their faces, melting against their heat.
They kissed until the stars above spun and blurred and their lungs begged for air. Elyonari pulled back, panting, her breath mingling with his in a frozen cloud. Their noses touched. Her eyes were lidded and glassy.
There was a sheen of frost on their lips from the chill they didn't feel.
She sighed and lay down atop his chest, her arms crossing his torso as if to keep him from ever getting up again.
"It's strange," she murmured, her cheek against his heartbeat-less chest. "You're warm but you don't have a heart."
He chuckled faintly, brushing her hair back with his fingers.
"Wonders of the divine body."
She smiled, her fingers tracing idle circles on his ribs.
"You better not break that promise."
"I won't," he whispered.
He didn't say what she feared most. He wouldn't break the promise. However...