"The God of Death and Time..."

  The elf before her suddenly murmured aloud.

  Luo Wei froze, lowering her gaze to the elf's bowed head.

  The dark elf had long, snow-white hair, identical to the color her own hair had turned after it had whitened. His hair was pure, without a single strand of another shade.

  The white hair fell chaotically over his dark shoulders, cascading down his strong and muscur back like fine, lustrous silk threads.

  At this moment, he was staring intently at the line of flowery script on the stone ptform, tears shimmering in his obsidian-like eyes.

  "The God of Death and Time, the great God of Death and Time..."

  The dark elf murmured the words repeatedly, his hands trembling as they hovered on either side of the divine inscription. He bent his back deeply, bowing in reverence.

  Luo Wei felt a bit guilty. This elf was so gullible. He believed whatever she wrote.

  She couldn't help but wonder which deity she had snatched a follower from. Would that god be furious if they found out?

  ---

  The morning wind woke Luo Wei from her sleep. She realized that the fire from the previous night had burned out completely, leaving even the ashes cold.

  She quickly shook Theodore awake, demanding he start a fire for her so she could warm up before their departure.

  Theodore, still half-asleep, struggled to open his eyes and sat up in agony. "Are you doing this to get back at me? You are, aren’t you?"

  "Of course not. The sun’s already up—it’s time for you to wake up too," Luo Wei replied, hugging her arms against the chill.

  "You’re definitely getting back at me!"

  Grumbling, Theodore reluctantly pulled out his wand and lit the fire in a few quick motions before crawling back into the tent to sleep again.

  But he barely had two minutes of rest before Hol woke up and dragged him out of the tent.

  "Get up and start packing. We're leaving."

  "Ahhh—" Theodore let out a frustrated yell but ultimately resigned himself to his fate and climbed out of the tent.

  Half an hour ter, the three of them were ready to go.

  "Are you really not going to say goodbye to Haisya?" Luo Wei asked Hol.

  "No," Hol replied, gazing out at the sea. "We’re not meant to be. Leaving quietly is for the best."

  "Alright then, let’s set off."

  "Yeah, let’s go."

  Theodore and Hol sat beneath the glider while Luo Wei spread her wings, lifting the glider into the sky. Once it reached a sufficient altitude, she let go and returned to the glider’s underside to steer it westward.

  Every so often, she had to repeat the lifting maneuver, ensuring the glider flew high and far enough to avoid the waves and the pyful sea beasts leaping out of the water.

  On the quiet western beach of the Misty Pins, all that remained was a simple leaf tent and a pile of extinguished ashes.

  The androgynous sea serpent girl swam ashore with two ftfish in her arms, only to freeze at the sight of the empty tent.

  She dropped the ftfish onto the sand and slithered into the tent, curling her body up cautiously inside.

  As the sea breeze blew through, the st trace of familiar scent in the tent faded away. Haisya stared bnkly at the sky outside, lying down with her head resting on her arm, covered in faint blue snake scales.

  The cheerful boy with the pure smile was gone. He hadn’t asked if she wanted to go with him before leaving.

  Where had he gone?

  Had he and his friends found a way back to the Western Continent?

  Would they... die?

  ---

  Seven hundred kilometers away from the beach, deep within a forest, a white-haired, dark-skinned elf stood motionless under a tall fir tree, staring at the magical rune on a broken altar.

  This had once been the Wind Elves’ settlement. After the Tree of Life withered, the Wind Elves, like the others, had vanished.

  The dark elf sensed the same aura from the rune as that of his god. Pressing a hand to his racing heart, he stood still for a long time, gradually calming himself.

  Elves were naturally skilled in magic and archery. Having lived for over nine hundred years, the dark elf’s magical reserves had reached a terrifying level.

  He pulled a sharp iron arrow from the quiver on his back and used its tip to deepen the rune’s lines. He added intricate details to the rune, reinforcing it to withstand the immense pressure of opening a long-distance spatial portal.

  This was a mark left by his god. Five hundred years ago, he had sensed a trace of the deity’s will in a dream.

  The god wanted to establish a flourishing kingdom in the Misty Pins. Thus, he had left the underground pace and returned to the ancient elven city, restoring its former yout and using it temporarily as the god’s royal city.

  If the god didn’t like it, he had scouted several other locations and could build a new city at any time according to the deity’s wishes.

  Before his fall, the dark elf had spent two hundred youthful years in the elven city. After the Tree of Life withered, he had slept in the dark underground pace for nearly three hundred years. Without the god’s gift of new life, he would have long since become a stone statue in the pace.

  ---

  Above the vast ocean, the three youths soared through the sky, covering over two thousand kilometers in a single day.

  At night, they rested for an hour on a coral reef. Once the moon rose, they resumed their journey, flying another two thousand kilometers by dawn the next day.

  "We need to calcute our route carefully from here on," Luo Wei said, gncing at Theodore and Hol. "Do either of you remember how long it took us to swim from Jormungandr’s head to the shore?"

  Theodore rolled his eyes, unable to recall anything.

  Hol fared slightly better, remembering only that it had taken them a full day and night.

  "A day and a night. We’ve now been flying for the same amount of time. Since flying is faster than swimming, we might already be in the mist zone," Luo Wei analyzed.

  "Huh? In the mist zone? I thought we’d passed it already!" Theodore asked, puzzled. "Didn’t it only take us a day to escape the mist zone st time?"

  "I suspect the mist zone and the magic-null zone are both reted to Jormungandr. The mist might be a toxic fog it releases at night to hunt prey. The magic-null zone might not actually nullify magic but instead absorb the magical elements around Jormungandr’s body, preventing us from using magic."

  "If my theory is correct, then the mist zone we passed through st time was only half of it. Crossing the full mist zone might take twice as long."

  After Luo Wei’s expnation, Hol nodded in agreement. "I think Luo Wei is right. The runes won’t work in the magic-null zone, so it’ll definitely take us longer. There’s no way we’ll make it through in just one day."

  "So what do we do?" Theodore scratched his head.

  "Keep flying as far as we can. When night falls, we’ll adapt to the situation. With the glider, we should be fine."

  Unfortunately, they didn’t have enough fabric to make a hot air balloon. Otherwise, they could have soared high above the mist zone and floated over it.

  But then fuel would have been an issue.

  Sigh, there really was no perfect solution.

  As night fell, thick fog rose from the sea below them.

  "Put on your gas masks!" Luo Wei reminded everyone.

  The three of them immediately donned their masks.

  Hol took out the compass they had made, only to find it malfunctioning. The needle spun erratically, as if disturbed by some unknown force.

  "Looks like the compass is useless. Sigh, put it away," Luo Wei said, shaking her head in disappointment.

  "We spent so much time making it!" Theodore grumbled.

  "Don’t worry, it’ll still work once we’re out of here," Hol reassured him.

  "Hold on tight. I’m going to climb higher," Luo Wei said, spreading her wings to lift the heavy glider into the sky. Once they broke through the mist, she released it abruptly, sending the glider speeding forward into the distance.

  """