TGS - Chapter 202

Chapter 202: Awakening

Above the Yaritu Snow Mountains, the clouds gradually parted, revealing a sliver of the sun, as if to declare that Solancia's crisis had passed.

Beneath the partially veiled, partially shining daylight, the soft ripples forming the spatial gate pulsed rhythmically, flickering in and out of sight.

Perhaps influenced by the light behind her, the figure of Solancia's Creator God also flickered between solid and ethereal. She herself gazed down upon the human and gods before her, her face devoid of expression.

Alyuin stared at her intently.

But "Lotus's" gaze did not meet the Princess's.

The major gods also realized something was wrong. The usual Lotus might wear a cold expression, but never this kind of "emptiness." The eyes of someone who looked down on everything at least held a sense of self, but the Creator God's eyes held nothing at all, not even herself. It was impossible to tell from those eyes whether this was still a living being.

Faced with this unsettling abnormality, the major gods, without exception, all became guarded.

Is this Lotus? What was the result of the divine battle? Is this strange appearance caused by Perseus's power? Did Perseus truly perish?

A series of questions that could have filled the mountaintop arose, yet the Solancian gods had no way of knowing what had transpired within the divine battle space.

Divine powers symbolizing their different authorities surged subtly, but the Creator God opposite them remained quiet and unmoved.

As time threatened to slip away in the stalemate, Alyuin turned to the confused and wary Suojia.

"Please send me over."

Suojia asked, "Where to?"

"To Lotus."

"That's too dangerous," the God of the Sky interjected, clearly disapproving. "We don't know what Perseus did. What if she influenced Lotus's will, or even abandoned her own body to hide within Lotus's divine form..."

"She wouldn't."

Alyuin's gaze was certain.

Very well. En and Suojia looked at each other, then exchanged glances with the other major gods.

Then, the Sun God Suriel raised his scepter and waved it toward the sun. The falling sunlight paved a brilliant path of light, extending from the basket where Alyuin stood all the way to Lotus before coming to an abrupt stop.

Alyuin deftly vaulted over the edge of the basket. Her toes touched the shimmering ribbon of light, sinking slightly into it.

Treading the path of light, the Princess walked step by step toward Lotus.

The words Lotus had spoken before leaving Surinia seemed to echo in her ears once more.

"Aylu, you will wake me, won't you?"

Gods did not need daily rest, and at that time, Lotus certainly didn't need the Princess to wake her in the morning. Yet she had said it, offering no explanation.

But Alyuin intuitively knew that Lotus had been referring to this very moment—that in this situation, it was up to her to awaken the goddess's will.

Finally, she reached the end of the path of light, close enough to almost feel the other's breath.

Of course, Alyuin did not feel Lotus's breath.

In the past, even though Lotus didn't need to breathe, she would subconsciously maintain the motion—a habit from her time as a human.

But now, whether it was breathing or the blinking of her eyelashes, all signs of life had vanished from the Creator God.

Coupled with her occasional flickering into an ethereal form, even the marble statue in the Kadera temple was probably more real and approachable than she was.

Alyuin felt a sense of déjà vu.

She continued to gaze at Lotus, tilting her head slightly as she searched her memory for a similar situation—and then she found it.

Alyuin was still very young then, not long after being exiled to the temple in Kadera. She had come down with a high fever, and lying in bed, she had vaguely felt Lotus reach out to check her temperature.

But before that, the little princess, half-asleep, had lifted her eyelids a fraction and seen the River Goddess's back.

Ethereal and indifferent. So close, yet seemingly untouchable, as if she might drift away with the wind at any moment.

It fit the world's—and the young princess's—impression of a deity. But Alyuin, in her daze, had felt a sense of panic. She had groggily called out Lotus's name, and the goddess had indeed turned around, gently placing a cloth soaked in cool water on her forehead.

At that time, Alyuin had called Lotus's name.

Further back, there were the lessons on the Night of the Water Day, the first meeting in a dream, and standing before the statue, gazing up.

But that wasn't all. Weren't there even more distant memories?

Those past memories, suppressed by the ignorance of human birth, resurfaced after so many years.

---

The golden-eyed princess seemed immersed in distant scenes, remaining motionless for a long time.

The Creator God opposite her, however, slowly raised her eyes, looking at Alyuin without emotion.

At this very moment, within the Creator God's spiritual domain lay a silent sea.

The vast ocean of divinity was calm and waveless. The water itself was transparent and colorless, yet the entire sea appeared a desolate, cold gray.

Lotus's consciousness was submerged deep beneath the sea. The tips of her consciousness-form's silver hair and the cuffs and hem of her dress were already stained with a faint, cold gray. Her eyes were lightly closed, as if in a dreamless slumber.

Wisps of chaotic divine power grew from the edges of her divine core, reaching into the void and further deepening their connection to the rules of this world.

Once the connection was fully established, her divinity would envelop her consciousness and become part of the rules, and the process of her divine body fading into a mere silhouette would be complete.

For now, the connection was still in the process of deepening.

As her connection with the rules deepened, the Creator God looked at Alyuin and spoke, as if a program had been automatically triggered. "Demigod."

Alyuin had just returned to her senses from the flood of memories of her past life when she heard the word spoken in an indifferent tone. For a moment, she almost thought Lotus had awakened.

But the Princess quickly realized this was not her.

The sprawling divine power intertwined more tightly with the formless rules.

The Creator God paused for a moment, then continued emotionlessly, "A demigod body, yet no divine authority. This is a coincidence of 【Destiny】. Princess of humanity, you..."

The Princess cut her off mid-sentence.

"I don't care what you are," Alyuin said, her expression stern. "But right now, you need to get out of there."

The Creator God said slowly, "The Creator should not remain. This is the rule."

The chaotic divine power was about to merge completely with the world, and the rules were about to touch the center of her divine core.

"Then do the rules know that I will wake her?" Alyuin said softly.

The Creator God paused, then suddenly began to float backward. But Alyuin kicked off the path of light with her left foot and leaped into the air, as fierce and precise as a great cat chasing its prey.

Her honey-colored arms clamped onto the goddess's shoulders. Suspended in mid-air, supported by the deity, she gently brought her red lips close to the goddess's ear.

"...Lotus."

"Lotus, it's time to wake up."

There was no hysterical shouting, no urgent prompting. Her voice was as gentle as a normal morning wake-up call.

It sounded completely harmless.

At that moment, the distance between the rules and the core of her divinity was as fine as a strand of hair. One more step, and they would merge.

But the next second, Lotus's consciousness opened its eyes.

The sea of divinity suddenly stirred with waves, then giant swells. It rapidly shrank back into a finite body of water, where great floodgates rose and sealed it off, isolating her divinity in a corner of her spiritual domain.

Outside her spiritual domain, Solancia's Creator God blinked, and the lively light returned to her eyes.

The rules had long since retreated, returning to the world. The sprawling chaotic divine power returned to her, free of any extraneous connections.

Lotus was still perfectly fine, a Creator God through and through. She had just woken up and hadn't had time to process what had happened when she found her lover clinging to her, suspended in mid-air. Startled, she raised a hand to steady Alyuin's waist.

The Princess raised an eyebrow and said with a grin, "You're awake."

"Mm," Lotus replied.

Ever since 【Destiny】 had mentioned the "self" in the river of spacetime, Lotus had been preparing for the possibility of losing her self-awareness.

Lotus had used the connection between herself and Alyuin, Alyuin's identity, and her own authority as a Creator God to set up an awakening mechanism.

Their souls had slept together at the bottom of the Yilu River for a thousand years. The connection between them had been strong enough to draw out the Lotus who was trapped in the statue, allowing her to move about, which was proof enough of its intimacy.

But that wasn't enough. Lotus soon realized that Alyuin was the Princess of Solancia, the future queen, and her divine office in mythology even included the important authority of "Kingship."

From a certain perspective, then, Alyuin was the true symbol of kingship, which fit perfectly with the royal secret that "the key to salvation in times of crisis is hidden within the symbol of kingship."

Finally, there were Lotus's prophetic words, spoken intentionally or not: "You will wake me, won't you?"

It was a three-pronged approach.

Using her omnipotent advantage as a Creator God within Solancian territory, Lotus had constructed an awakening mechanism with Alyuin as the key.

Alyuin was the key that could awaken Lotus.

She had thought this arrangement would only be needed later on. She just hadn't expected that the loss of self hinted at by 【Destiny】 would come to pass here, triggered by Perseus.

In any case, Lotus had succeeded.

Alyuin had awakened her.

Lotus lowered her head and smiled faintly. Only then did she have a moment to look around. As her gaze shifted, she met the silent stares of the other major gods.

The major gods, who had witnessed the entire thing: "..."

Lotus, still holding the Princess and floating in mid-air: "..."

Lotus had the urge to cover her face with her hands, but she maintained a calm and composed expression. She floated forward a few steps, landed on the path of light created by the Sun God, and set Alyuin down.

The moment the Princess's feet touched the ground, she switched from embracing Lotus to taking her by the wrist. Her smile was dazzling, making her seem like a completely different person from the one who had been standing in the basket earlier.

The major gods looked at each other again.

In the end, they unanimously decided to act as if they had seen nothing.

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