"A war?" Knight said while looking toward me. "What do you think?"
"I think we’re definitely going to war if Amun is saying it like that," I replied calmly. "But there’s no point worrying about it right now. The key is with me, which means we’ll be involved no matter what." I looked between both of them afterward. "Our next goal should be reaching Saint rank. All of us."
"That part isn’t difficult," Knight said while flexing his fingers slightly. "I can already feel it within reach."
"What worries me more," Lyrate said slowly, "is the fact that nobody else was guarding this place besides Amun." Her eyes narrowed slightly. "You were the one who told us not to trust anyone before leaving."
I smiled faintly after hearing that.
"Who said only Amun was watching over us?"
Lyrate frowned slightly.
"You’re forgetting something," I continued. "There’s someone whose eyes and ears spread across the entire Blue Spiral Galaxy."
I paused briefly before correcting myself.
"Or I guess Violet Spiral now."
I turned my head toward my right.
"Vivi," I said calmly, "why don’t you come out already?"
The space a few feet to my right rippled softly like disturbed water before finally parting apart, and Vivi stepped out from within it. She looked exactly the same as before.
The flowing violet gown. The graceful posture.
And those shining violet eyes that somehow always carried both elegance and quiet danger at the same time.
Knight immediately relaxed slightly after seeing her.
"Why were you hiding?" I asked with a faint smile.
Vivi looked completely unbothered by the accusation.
"I was not hiding," she replied calmly while stepping closer toward us. "I simply do not enjoy speaking with Amun." Her expression remained perfectly composed. "He asks far too many questions."
"How was your mission?" she asked. "Did it proceed successfully?"
I nodded slowly.
"Yes," I replied. "It went better than expected." Then I looked around the drifting asteroid base briefly before asking, "I assume everything here remained stable while we were gone?"
"Yes," Vivi answered. "Things have been running smoothly."
Her gaze shifted toward Knight and Lyrate afterward.
"It is good to see both of you again as well," she said softly. "Everyone missed the three of you."
"Good to see you too, Vivi," Knight replied while giving a small nod.
Lyrate smiled faintly. "I’m glad things are going well here."
Vivi inclined her head slightly in response. Then I asked the important question.
"Did you inform anyone that we returned?"
She shook her head immediately.
"No," she replied. "Do you wish for me to notify them now?"
I smiled slightly.
"No," I said. "We’ll go see what everyone is doing ourselves. But first I need to retrieve the leaders trapped inside the Crimson Zone."
"You mean the Matriarch and the others?" Vivi asked.
I nodded.
"Yes."
"Oh," Vivi said as though suddenly remembering something important, "that reminds me. A Griffon Saint arrived here some time ago. Apparently she was related to the griffon you killed earlier and came looking for revenge against the Order." A faintly amused smile appeared on her face afterward. "Lady Order captured her and imprisoned her instead."
Before I could even respond, Lyrate immediately cut in.
"I don’t care about the Griffon Saint," she said flatly. "Who exactly is this Lady Order?"
Vivi’s violet eyes gleamed mischievously.
"Aurora," she replied smoothly, "is referred to by everyone as Lady Order nowadays."
I slowly turned toward Lyrate. Her face remained perfectly straight. No expression whatsoever.
Which somehow felt more dangerous than anger.
Beside her, Knight coughed quietly into his fist while making the very intelligent decision of staying completely silent.
Vivi looked entirely too pleased with herself. I ignored all of them before the situation became unnecessarily troublesome.
"It’s good that Aurora captured the Griffon Saint," I said calmly. "We might be able to make use of her later."
Then my attention shifted toward the distance beyond the asteroid base.
Toward the Crimson Zone.
The endless crimson mist spread across the void like a giant curtain draped over reality itself, slow-moving and silent while distorted energy pulsed faintly within it.
"I need to figure out where exactly the leaders are trapped inside that thing," I said quietly while staring at the crimson mist.
"I can help you with that."
Vivi’s voice cut in calmly as she looked toward the Crimson Zone.
"I cannot fully observe what is happening deep inside the zone itself," she continued, "but I can still sense living presences within it and roughly where large concentrations of life are gathered." Her violet eyes shifted toward me afterward. "I can take you directly to them."
I looked at her slightly surprised.
"That would actually help a lot, Vivi."
Then she asked the more important question.
"But do you truly intend to free them?" she said. "What if they object to your rule over the Blue Spiral?"
I looked back toward the endless crimson mist drifting across the void.
"Let them object," I replied calmly. "There’s nothing they can realistically do about it anymore."
The Order of Absolute already dominated the galaxy.
The Eternals had been pushed out. And after everything I had gained inside Oriel, I no longer viewed the Blue Spiral the same way as before. Things had changed.
I turned back toward Knight and Lyrate afterward.
"You two stay here for now," I said. "We’ll return soon."
Lyrate simply waved one hand dismissively. "Just come back before Knight starts talking too much."
I ignored both of them and looked toward Vivi again.
"Alright," I said. "Take me there."
Vivi stepped beside me without another word and raised her hand lightly. The moment she moved her fingers, space shifted around us.
The black emptiness of the void vanished instantly, replaced by an endless sea of deep crimson mist stretching in every direction. The transition happened so smoothly that it almost felt like reality itself had quietly changed colors around us instead of us actually moving anywhere.
Soon the asteroid base behind us disappeared completely beneath the mist.
"You know," I heard Vivi’s voice echo directly inside my head, "the galaxy nearest to ours has already been completely devoured by the Crimson Zone."
I looked around silently while the crimson fog drifted endlessly through the void around us.
"It was much smaller than the Blue Spiral," she continued softly, "but it still disappeared entirely." A faint sigh escaped her afterward. "The speed at which the mist spreads is slow... but it is inevitable."
I remained quiet for a moment before replying.
"Don’t worry," I said calmly. "I already found a possible solution for stopping the zone."
That immediately caught her attention.
"Really?"
"Yes," I replied. "First we get the leaders out of here. Then once we return home, we’ll deal with the Crimson Zone properly."
There was clear disbelief in her voice afterward.
"How exactly do you stop something like this?"
I smiled faintly.
"Honestly," I admitted, "even I don’t fully know yet." My hand moved slightly through the drifting crimson mist around us. "We’ll test it first and then see if it can be replicated on a larger scale."
Vivi went silent after that.
Meanwhile the deeper we moved into the Crimson Zone, the stranger the surroundings became.
The crimson color around us intensified continuously until it almost resembled moving through liquid blood rather than mist. Visibility dropped further and further while the pressure in the surrounding void steadily increased.
Then I noticed something else. The green essence normally visible through my Insight Eyes had completely vanished.
More accurately the essence itself had been eroded entirely by the Crimson Zone.