Steampunk: Sixth Era Epic

Looking at the girl in the black dress who was reaching out her arm to him, Shard sighed. After a brief exchange with the voice beside his ear, he reached out his hand to grasp hers. However, at the last moment, the girl in the black dress withdrew her hand.

"Why show such trust to someone who merely brushed past you?"

With her hands clasped behind her back, she looked at Shard, who shook his head:

"Helen, when I helped you at that banquet years ago, was there a reason?"

Helen Black gazed at Shard, her lips slowly curving into a smile. They looked at each other until Helen suddenly burst out laughing:

"Oh, sir, I thought my disguise was quite successful. It took me some effort to convince Little Zina to help me."

"A successful disguise?"

Shard said, bewildered.

"That's not important. I just wanted to see, sir, what kind of person you really were in your time."

She took a step back, hands still behind her back, moving closer to the mouth of the cave that spat black mist:

"You are an interesting man, more interesting than my sister and I had imagined. But below is not where you should be. Please wait here. I need to retrieve an item, a sacrifice for my sister's return."

With those words, her body tilted backward, falling into the abyss.

Two-thirds of the Red Butterflies followed her into the deep cavernous pit, leaving only a third still here protecting Shard.

All around, it was extremely quiet, except for the sounds of reviving Evil Spirits wandering in the distance of the mine:

"Helen... Grace... I didn't expect Sister Delphine to conspire with them to lie."

The calm did not last long, as dust began to fall from overhead again, and a tremendous roar suddenly exploded in the eerily quiet mine. The sound came from beneath the earth, from the deepest part of the Relic. Just hearing it allowed Shard to envision the twisted, monstrous creature squirming below, releasing its malice.

He was startled and quickly took a few steps back. Soon after, the mouth of the underground cave glowed with a red light, and before long, the Red Butterflies formed a staircase at the entrance.

Helen, stepping on the staircase, led two skinny little girls, no older than ten each, by the hand and walked back up.

After the two girls reached the ground, they held hands and ran down the mine tunnel amidst a series of eerie laughs, leaving only a red stone in Helen's hand.

"Look, Mr. Hamilton, this is what I came for."

She showed Shard the ordinary-looking stone, which even lacked any Whisper Element:

"What is this?"

Shard asked curiously, his eyes still following the departing girls. They were Evil Ghosts, and according to the voice by his ear, all the Evil Spirits he had seen just now combined might not match these girls.

"A sacrifice, a Sorcery Stone, a specialty from the last Era. The two girls I and my sister rescued when we passed through this village in the last Era, their souls were forever trapped here, but it allows for the production of such stones."

"They... never left in the end?"

"But they succeeded in forever being together."

The childish laughter still lingered in his ears as Shard turned to look at Helen, who had a smile on her lips:

"To call back those who have passed, a sacrifice must be offered each time. Seeking Sorcery Stone is never easy."

At this point, her expression became somewhat desolate, but she quickly returned to normal.

Throwing the stone in her hand to the side, the swarm of Red Butterflies automatically wrapped around it:

"Alright, sir, we can now leave this dreadful place," she said.

She once again grabbed Shard's wrist:

"But not by jumping off."

She winked playfully at Shard:

"Please follow me. I'll take you to the summit now; there is a shortcut here. Oh, please keep that sword further away, it really isn't friendly to me."

As she spoke, she raised her right arm and fiercely slashed through the air. A crimson trace immediately appeared, spreading like butterfly glimmers all around, and white mist emerged from the crimson rift until it completely engulfed both Shard and the black-haired Helen.

[Outlander, you have entered the Interstice of Life and Death. Flesh Power and Soul Power are reversed, please do not stay here too long.]

Having entered once before, she easily discerned the current situation.

The dense white mist nearly prevented Shard from seeing the situation in front of him, and by the time the cold damp mist had dissipated, they found themselves standing on a steep mountain staircase.

The surroundings were shades of black, white, and gray, and unlike Shard's last visit, the black was now significantly more prominent. The Interstice itself had changed quite a bit after two earthquakes. Although Shard only felt slightly cold while moving through it last time, now he felt a bone-chilling cold that almost instantly penetrated his marrow.

[That's because you aren't holding the "Ever-Youth Leaf."]

She gently reminded him, and Shard immediately searched for and placed the leaf in his pocket watch. However, the cold did not dissipate, and the tangible malice of the world towards the living made him feel as if some colossal entity was watching him.

"Please follow me," she said.

The girl in the black dress took Shard by the hand, and together they ascended the stone steps. Swarms of Red Butterflies flitted up and down along the mountain steps, turning the staircase red.

The sky filled with Red Butterflies and crimson glimmers lent a bit of warmth to the otherwise monochrome world, as if someone had painted vibrant lines with red ink on the pages of a sketchbook.

The Red Butterflies were protecting them; Evil Spirits that roamed the Interstice were driven deeper into the mountain woods. Watching the butterflies, Shard couldn't explain why, but he felt somewhat sad.

The stone steps led directly to the summit of the Interstice World. The real world's Summit of Sicarl Mountain featured several Little Peaks and was overall flat; sparse trees dotted the summit, and a stone path connected to the steps before revealing the shimmering Summit Lake just a few dozen steps ahead.

But in the Interstice, upon stepping on the last stair and officially arriving at the summit plateau, surrounded by bizarre black dead trees, was the great rift at the summit that Iluna had mentioned.

A wild black wind surged from it, recklessly spewing ash into the terrifying grey-black sky.

This black mist was all too familiar to Shard, the black wind blowing from the Gate of Death at the mountain's base was made of the same substance. Therefore, the great rift at the summit before him was indeed a passageway to True Death from the Summit of Interstice Mountain.

The sky full of Red Butterflies retracted along the stone steps behind them before circling around them once more:

"Mr. Hamilton, please follow me," she said.

Helen released Shard's hand, and together they approached the edge of the rift.

At this moment, even the swarm of Red Butterflies could not completely protect the two from the black wind. The wind, embodying the Power of Death, passed over them, gradually dulling the butterflies' glow and causing Helen's face to turn deathly pale, while cracks began to form on Shard's body.

These fissures appeared not only on his exposed skin but also on his clothes. As the breeze brushed across his cheeks, golden Light Traces dragged behind like the tail of a flame, as if golden flames had ignited on Shard's body.

He reached out to steady Helen:

"If you can't hold on, then let me do it."

"No."

She shook her head gently, tears streaming down her face against the wind, her blue eyes fixed on what lay ahead:

"We've done it countless times, yes, countless times, so often that we've forgotten the passage of time."

The swarm of Red Butterflies, carrying the red offering—a Sorcery Stone, came to her side. Helen cut her wrist with a knife, staining the stone with her blood which was not the normal red but the bright red of a Red Butterfly.

Then, she picked up the stone and threw it into the abyss. The next moment, a crimson light surged from the bottom of the great fissure at the mountain top, and within that light, a dense swarm of red butterflies emerged from the abyss.

The butterflies enveloped a figure, a figure identical to Helen.

"Sister... Grace..."

Helen, with tears streaming, looked at her:

"We meet again."

The girl who emerged from the rift, dressed in a white dress, opened her eyes to look at Helen by the rift, and for the first time, the myriad of Red Butterflies overpowered the bleak wind of death:

"Helen..."

They spread their arms and embraced each other, the light from the Red Butterfly Pendant at their waists almost turned the entire mountain summit red. Shard took a few steps back, reluctant to interrupt this moment of reunion, and the Whisper Element from both Grace and Helen was so strong that he couldn't approach them.

"This is the ritual."

The voice of the Old Witch came from behind, Shard turned around to see Granny Cassandra, Sister Delphine, and the Witch Apprentice, Miss Rita Swift, standing behind him. Being so close to the Gate of Death, all three wore green Rune Stones at their waists to keep them temporarily safe.

"Is this what you meant by they would catch up?"

Sighing, Shard asked.

His body still bore the Glimmer of Divinity, yet the Old Witch seemed unsurprised, as if she already knew it would happen. Sister Delphine who "saw" everything didn't ask anything, only the young Witch Apprentice seemed both curious and hesitant to ask.

She was curious about the current situation, the traces on Shard's body, and the human-shaped object he was carrying on his back.

"Look, didn't we catch up in the end?"

The Old Witch said with a smile, then looked up at the two embracing amidst the myriad Red Butterflies at the great fissure at the mountain summit:

"The ritual, a ritual that occurs once every 22 years. The teachers can only reunite once every 22 years for a duration of one year. After this, the one who has lived alone for 21 years returns to death, and the one awakened from death walks the world alone. She will live alone again for 21 years until she returns here to greet her sister's reunion, spend a year together, and then enter the next 22-year cycle."

She sighed. As the one who had witnessed the most ceremonies in the past hundred years, Zina Cassandra felt it most deeply:

"This is the blessing of the great Bygone Days, the Twin Gods, eternal togetherness. As long as the cycle of the ritual is observed, they will always be together... Hamilton... Shard, do you know what the Red Butterfly signifies?"

Shard looked intently at the two in the Red Butterfly swarm:

"Red Butterfly, is the Holy Emblem of the Old God, the Twin Gods."

"The Twin Gods are Duality, united in purpose."

Sister Delphine gave the correct answer for Shard.

The Old Witch nodded, explained softly:

"In this ritual, the Red Butterfly symbolizes separation. When the reunion every 22 years ends, the teachers return here, and it is the one who must wait another 21 years who personally kills her sister and throws her body into the fissure at the mountain's peak. This is not only to begin the cycle again but also a method used by the Benevolent God who once descended upon Sicarl Mountain Region to suppress the Interstice."

The Witch Apprentice gasped.

Shard bit his lip:

"I once saw in a dream the Phoenix beneath this rift, and around it, densely packed bones (Chapter 708), those are..."

Shard didn't continue, but he understood.

"Red butterflies."

Sister Delphine asked softly:

"These fluttering Red Butterflies, they must be related to the ritual, right?"

"Yes, what do you say, what do Red Butterflies resemble?"

Shard had already guessed.

"The bodies fall into the great fissure, and the red marks on the neck fly out again, transformed into Red Butterflies."

The four people by the cliff looked together at the Red Butterflies fluttering in the sky, the Old Witch's voice was soft:

"Each of these Red Butterflies represents a long separation, the sadness of killing a sister, a twisted ritual of love, and the next reunion... Mr. Hamilton, do you know how many Red Butterflies are here?"

Shard was now unable to describe his feelings. He envisioned this wasn't going to be a warm story, but he never imagined it like this:

"I don't know, but... it must have been a long time, right?"

They originally participated in the Divine Banquet to escape the separation of life and death, and to free their family's future twins from this fate. They got the answers they wanted, even achieved immortality, but still, they couldn't escape the fate of separation.

However, permanent separation turned into a cycle of 22 years of pain and waiting. This would be an eternal torment, all for the sake of a reunion and encounter every 22 years.

It seemed as if someone in the wind was singing, and the "her" by his side also echoed that faint voice. The ancient language from across the veil of time was telling a story of reunion, waiting, kinship, and romance:

"Red butterflies take flight,"

"Flying over towering mountains,"

"Crossing dark rivers."

"May the wind carry eternal longing,"

"Straight to the ends of life and death."

This was a nursery rhyme once mentioned by Professor Manning, and also the technique Old John used to make pendants. But it was only at this moment that Shard understood the true meaning of this nursery rhyme.

It wasn't a ritual step or an alchemical formula; it was simply a story.

A true story, their story, spanning two eras, representing longing and bonds, the story of the Red Butterflies.