"About to meet the great 'Scourge of God,' and yet you look so displeased?"
The capital of the Hunnic Empire, within the city of Buda.
Leather tents spread like clouds, the smell of horse dung mixed with fodder permeated the air. Warriors draped in animal pelts moved to and fro, the clashing of bronze weapons mingled with shouts in the Hunnic tongue.
As a vast empire built by a nomadic people, the Hunnic Empire had waged war ceaselessly as it advanced from the East. Even this so-called "Buda City," the nominal capital, was for most here nothing more than a temporary resting point in their long migrations, rather than a permanent settlement. Thus, there were no structures piled from stone or erected purely from wood—only encampment-like dwellings, convenient to dismantle and move.
Standing before the largest of these leather tents, Lucan gazed at the bustling scene of towering figures passing back and forth, the noise filling the air. He listened to the puzzled words of the elder behind him but did not immediately respond—merely digesting in his mind the memories of the past eight months. At last, he could not help but sigh.
He had "run" too far…
It could only be said that this was the first time he had formally used the derivative application of the "Fifth Magic," fusing temporal anchoring with the Simulator. In theory it was feasible, but in practice there were still many points requiring caution.
The point in time he had originally set, of course, was not the Hunnic Empire at its height, but the more convenient "year 500 CE," the era of King Arthur's rule over Britain.
That period, that place, was also recognized by the Clock Tower and the entire Mage's Association as the "end of the Western world's mythic age"—much like Heian-era Japan in the Far East, the beginning of the end where even fragments of myth would vanish completely.
Compared to that time period, Lucan had clearly overshot.
Thankfully, though he had run too far upstream in time, as long as he lived long enough, he would still inevitably reach that point.
Thankfully, he was still on the European continent, not geographically too far astray.
Even better, in this life the simulated "himself" awakened faster than in all previous ones—he had already called forth his "true self" before even one year of age.
That he had managed so early to refine the threefold mystery of the Absolute Cycle—the foundational ability of mystery upon which his later self had been built—still surprised him. This was clearly due to having come into contact with the so-called "Sky God" of the Huns, that terrifying pale giant.
Yet in this life, Lucan no longer needed to walk any "pure path."
The spiritual lineage of the Hunnic Empire, like Japan's spirit-summoning rites to commune with deities, was merely a method left behind from the Age of Gods. Though similar in concept, it was coarse beyond measure, relying only on brute strength to achieve miracles. Nothing there was worth learning.
So Lucan thought.
His chaotic thoughts slowly settled. Now, after the long winter, with spring's first stirrings of life, it was the season when all things stirred.
Lucan drew back his gaze from "Buda City" and turned around, following the voice that had addressed him:
"Of course I'm happy," he said.
"But I only hope the 'Scourge of God' doesn't scourge me as well."
The speaker was his father in this life—the Hunnic Empire's nominal "Northern Prince," Octar Ugur.
Placed within the rigidly ordered ancient empires, Lucan's words might have been considered blasphemy against the supreme ruler. But the nomads were always rough in manner. Even after founding a vast empire and adopting rules they once never had, their customs still followed the old ways.
Hearing Lucan's words, Octar looked at his only son—merely eight months old, no taller than a meter, small hands and feet clad in a miniature robe, far too young to be called a boy. His face, however, was exquisitely carved, strikingly beautiful—rare among the Huns. Octar could not help but burst out laughing.
"With your lamb-like looks, of course being scourged would be normal!"
"Father-sama, if I am a lamb, then what are you? An old sheep?" Lucan retorted.
Octar's laughter instantly turned into coughing. At over sixty years of age, he was already a rarity among nomads. The wind and sun had aged him far more than the pampered nobility of the Western kingdoms. His beard and hair were white, his face lined and weathered—but his body remained robust and healthy. This fit of coughing did not concern Lucan in the least.
As expected.
The next moment, Octar stopped coughing and glared at his late-born only son.
This child—everything about him was fine—except his tongue, sharp as if blessed by the "Sky God" itself.
Where on earth had he learned it!?
Lucan returned his father's glare unflinchingly.
Though his body was still small, as a magus who had already reached the domain beyond the divine, no frail vessel could limit his power.
A "Divine Body" producing true ether endlessly—he had no need of growth or development.
Octar, of course, knew this.
Thus he only glared and did not lay hands on Lucan.
Because he could not win.And because he could not bear to.
He blew his mustache, half-exasperated:"Enough, enough. By now, Attila the Great Khan should nearly be here. You'd best prepare yourself."
Winter passed, spring came.
Though Buda lay in the eastern part of the Hunnic Empire—later, the capital of "Hungary," Budapest—distant from the Italian front where Attila was campaigning, the Great Khan's style in both war and march was always swift as the wind. He truly might arrive at any moment.
Lucan nodded.
He was, in truth, very interested in this "Attila."
He looked at his father, then seemed to think of something, suddenly asking:"By the way, Father— I heard from the elders in the city that when Attila the Great Khan was born, there was once a manifestation of the 'Sky God.' Is that true?"
"…Who told you that?" Octar froze.
"The High Priest," Lucan said crisply, shifting the blame.
"That old man… why does he tell you everything?" Octar muttered, then admitted: "But yes, that is one of the rare memories of my life."
[Compared to the millennia-old races and ancient kingdoms, the history of the Huns was not long—at most one to two hundred years. As nomads, they had no habit of recording history.][When they first rose, they had only ten tribes, and called themselves such. Even as they expanded to form a "Steppe Empire," out of habit you still preferred to call them by the more symbolic "Huns."][The "Huns" were absolutely not the same people as the "Xiongnu" of the East.][From the first day this people existed, the "Sky God" had been their deity.][Yet though their faith was unshakable, before Attila's birth no one had ever truly seen the "Sky God" manifest.][On the day of Attila's "birth,"][the "Sky God" appeared in the heavens, revealing its immense pallid form, like a vast cloud-like silhouette spanning the sky.][According to Octar's account, such a holy sight was unforgettable, and from then on he vowed eternal loyalty to "Attila."][Even though Attila was not strictly of Hunnic blood,][as the child bestowed by the "Sky God," a "son descended from the heavens," he was without doubt the purest of Huns.][Yes.][Attila was, in the truest sense, one who descended from the heavens.]
As expected.
Hearing his father's description, Lucan thought: this Attila was indeed the Attila he knew—the one tied by countless threads to the "Sky God," the White Giant, almost inseparable from it.
It seemed inevitable that he would meet this figure.
The unawakened "Subotai" had not known the truth of the Pale Giant—only felt its terror, that it was no god.
But Lucan, with knowledge of later eras and the memory of his former life, could hardly fail to recognize its nature.
That being was not merely "not a god."
It was the enemy of all gods!
"The origin of the Age of Gods' downfall.""The extraterrestrial star-born race that descended to Earth more than ten millennia ago, the Star Emissaries, who devoured the energy of stars and destroyed civilizations."
In the ancient age, the divine era was flourishing and glorious. Without external interference, it should have endured.
But the White Giant was that interference.
It broke the age of myth, buried mysteries, shattered countless divine beings.
It deprived the gods of their natural incarnations as divine bodies tied to the world, forcing them into intangible spirit forms.
It deprived the world's surface of the true ether born from the planet's breath, once an inexhaustible carrier of mystery.
It even damaged the very "Divine Order" sustaining the Age of Gods.
Know this: gods, spirits, fae, even phantasmal species born of the planet—all were extensions of the planet. Yet there was always a hierarchy.
The gods were the planet itself, the carriers of its "Order," akin to how Heroic Spirits function as bands fixing the laws of the world. Tied to the celestial sphere, as long as they endured, new mysteries would continually be born.
The others—spirits, fae, phantasms—were but secondary phenomena.
Thus only the gods could link directly to the Root.
The celestial bodies themselves were nearest to the Root.
—The mystery of gods could only be perfectly embodied when carried by true ether.—Only the Divine Order could preserve the Age of Gods.
Later, "Human Order" would replace it, arising after the true gods shattered into lesser divinities, unable to maintain the world.
Later "mana" was nothing but degraded remnants of true ether, recycled through living respiration, preserved by the framework of modern thaumaturgy.
Thus, the regrowth of magical power—limited, degraded, unable to bear the full mystery of divinity.
Only usable in tandem with the "modern thaumaturgical foundation."
Afterward, though the White Giant was defeated by the "Sword of the Stars," forged by Gaia itself as a weapon of anti-extraterrestrial nature, and was confined within a dimensional prison…
The stock of "Mystery" had become finite and ever-decreasing.
The end of the Age of Gods was inevitable.
That was the White Giant's true identity.
And Attila was intimately bound to it.
One could call her its "split spirit."
The White Giant's instinctive projection toward freedom.
[Though being born in this era, this empire, this people was never part of your plan,][since you are here, you must bear witness,][to the splendor of the greatest figure of the age,][and to the one tied to the twilight of the Age of Gods.]
[Naturally,][on the very afternoon when you awakened your "true self,"][you saw with your own eyes the "Scourge of God" return in person from the front.]