Chapter 708

Vanaheim had once been the homeland of the Dark Elves.

It was also where King Bor, Odin’s father, had led Asgard’s forces in the final battle against them.

Now, however, the land was little more than a graveyard.

The earth had been scorched to ash. Life had vanished from the region long ago, leaving behind only barren ground and the wreckage of countless warships. Their twisted remains stood as silent monuments to a battle whose outcome had once threatened the fate of the entire universe.

For millions of years, no one had cared about this forgotten wasteland.

Until today.

Two unusual visitors had returned.

No, that wasn’t quite right.

They had come home.

The first was Malekith, King of the Dark Elves.

The second was his most trusted follower, Algem, whom Malekith regarded as a brother.

Malekith had been wandering across the charred earth for a long time. Algem followed silently behind him, never interrupting. He understood that his king needed time to confront the grief waiting for him here.

Eventually, Malekith could no longer contain it.

He crouched and scooped a handful of blackened soil from the ground.

"Look at what I’ve left behind, Algem."

His voice was heavy with bitterness.

"I can barely remember what this place looked like before the light came."

A thousand years of bloodshed had ended in failure.

The Dark Elves had lost their homeland. Their ambitions remained unfulfilled. Their entire world had been reduced to ash.

For any ruler with the slightest sense of responsibility toward his people, that kind of failure would have been impossible to forget.

Algem stepped beside his king and placed a hand on his shoulder.

"The survival of our people is the greatest legacy you left us."

In the eyes of outsiders, Malekith might have been remembered as the ruler who dragged his people into a catastrophic war.

The Dark Elves saw him differently.

To them, he had been a worthy king.

That war had never been about satisfying Malekith’s personal greed or wounded pride. It had been the dream of an entire people.

Every Dark Elf had entrusted their ambition to one extraordinary individual.

Their king.

Malekith had simply carried the burden for all of them.

So they had never blamed him for starting the war.

Even when everything collapsed.

Even when the Dark Elves faced extinction and their defeat seemed inevitable, they understood that their king had done everything he could.

What else could he have done?

What other person could have changed the outcome?

The universe had entered an age of light. Darkness would no longer have anywhere to hide.

Their species had been doomed.

Yet in that final moment, Malekith had still found a way to preserve a future for them.

The Aether.

From the moment the Dark Elves acquired it, they had treated the Aether as a weapon, a means of crushing enemies and turning their greatest desires into reality.

Against their enemies, its power could become almost absurd.

Armor could be transformed into fragile pieces of painted parchment. Weapons could be reduced to toys that fired harmless soap bubbles.

But Malekith had realized something else.

At the very brink of extinction, the Aether did not have to be used against an enemy.

It could be used against reality itself.

He had turned its power upon himself and his surviving people.

For the briefest instant, every unfavorable reality surrounding them, including their injuries and even their deaths, had been transformed into illusion.

At the same time, possibilities that had never existed before, their survival, their continued existence, their escape, became reality.

Malekith had stood in the narrow space between illusion and truth and forced the universe to choose the version of events he wanted.

It was the ultimate use of the Reality Stone.

"I will make the Asgardians suffer everything we suffered!"

Malekith’s voice suddenly erupted across the empty wasteland.

"I will reclaim the Aether!"

"I will restore our world!"

"And I will bring an end to this universe that has been poisoned by the light!"

The Dark Elves had survived.

Barely.

Their greatest treasure, the Aether, had been taken by Asgard and sealed away.

For countless ages, the remnants of their people had drifted through the universe like ghosts, hiding in the shadows and making no sound.

They were a people without a home.

Spirits with nowhere to return.

Then the Aether had resurfaced.

Its energy had radiated across the cosmos and awakened the Dark Elves from their long slumber.

They knew what that meant.

The time for revenge had come.

The suffering inflicted upon them would be repaid many times over.

And this time, they would finish what they had started.

In Asgard, however, things looked almost embarrassingly peaceful.

For a while, Evenson had wondered whether Odin had simply ignored his warning.

The Asgardians had enjoyed peace for too long. Perhaps they had become so accustomed to it that they could no longer see the storm gathering on the horizon.

Then Evenson noticed the soldiers.

He had been granted freedom to move around the Golden Palace because of his status as the Ancient One’s envoy. One day, while wandering through the palace, he stepped onto one of the balconies overlooking the training grounds.

Below him, Asgardian troops were drilling.

A great many of them.

Evenson stared for a moment.

"So that’s it..."

Odin wasn’t ignoring him.

He was simply keeping the danger hidden beneath the surface.

A ruler could not govern through panic. If Odin declared a nationwide state of emergency based on nothing more than the possibility of a Dark Elf attack, and nothing happened, he would have needlessly undermined his own authority.

Instead, Odin had gathered Asgard’s elite forces under the harmless excuse of a grand military exercise.

Officially, it was training.

Unofficially, it was preparation.

That way, Asgard could remain calm while its best soldiers stayed ready for war.

"The All-Father is called the Truth-Seeker for a reason. His wisdom is beyond our understanding."

Sif had been accompanying Evenson these past few days.

On the surface, it served as a gesture of Asgardian hospitality. A respected member of Thor’s circle was hardly an intimidating escort.

Of course, there was another possible reason.

Having Thor’s personal "external brain" nearby wasn’t a bad way to keep an eye on Evenson.

The problem was that Sif seemed to have forgotten the surveillance portion of her assignment.

Whenever they were alone, she would immediately pull out the book titled Meniscus and bury herself in it.

Every so often, she’d turn to Evenson with another question.

"Look at this part. What is this supposed to mean? ’When the Qin King first met the Half-Moon, she wore men’s clothes and carried herself with exceptional grace, unlike ordinary women...’"

Over the past several days, Sif had become completely absorbed in the two books Evenson had given her.

She had been deeply impressed by humanity.

Apparently, humans had an extraordinary talent for making marriage complicated.

Still, she disagreed with some of what she read.

Take that line, for example.

Wore men’s clothes and carried herself with exceptional grace?

Sif glanced down at her own armor.

Was this not already heroic enough?

If she dressed any more masculine, Thor probably wouldn’t even think of her as a woman anymore.

He’d just consider her one of the guys.

That thought led somewhere else.

Sif suddenly remembered a certain dangerous prisoner currently locked in an Asgardian dungeon.

Someone with a rather complicated relationship to Thor.

Someone who, under different circumstances, might have been able to become the ultimate male role model in Sif’s eyes.

If she could somehow become more like that...

Maybe her chances would improve.

The thought made her look down at her armor again.

It was fitted to emphasize her figure.

Far too feminine.

What she really needed was something more masculine.

A flatter chest would probably help.

Evenson, meanwhile, had absolutely no idea what kind of catastrophe he had accidentally unleashed.

He was focused on something else entirely.

Down on the training grounds stood a peculiar military unit.

Their armor was crude. Their weapons were nothing more than long rune-carved staves.

Yet every soldier radiated a vicious, almost feral hostility.

Unlike the other troops, they were not participating in the drills.

Evenson pointed toward them.

"What about that unit? They don’t seem to fit in with the others."

Sif glanced over.

"Those?"

She barely spared them a second look.

"The Berserker Legion. They’re reasonably strong, but they’re only useful as cannon fodder."

Evenson frowned.

"Reasonably strong, yet they’re used as cannon fodder?"

Wasn’t the entire point of cannon fodder that it was weak?

Sif shrugged.

"They’re called Berserkers for a reason. Once combat begins, they lose control. They can’t maintain formation, so they can’t function as a proper military unit."

Her tone became colder.

"And every one of them is a shortcut."

Evenson looked at her.

"They’re drawn from criminals, convicts, and people from the lowest trades. Most have no real combat ability. The magic staves they carry simply force their bodies to unleash their full potential."

"They get strong enough to be useful, but they can’t fight with discipline."

Sif didn’t sound particularly sympathetic.

"That makes them expendable."

It was simple mathematics.

Finding criminals and prisoners was easier than raising trained soldiers from childhood. Hand a new conscript a magic staff, and the Berserker Legion could be replenished almost immediately.

Heavy casualties were therefore considered acceptable.

Their inability to maintain formation only made them even better suited for one purpose.

Throw them at the enemy’s defensive line until something broke.

"They’re being deployed today," Sif said flatly. "They’ll serve as the first defensive line against the enemy."

"Deployed?"

Evenson stared at her.

Of all the things he’d expected, Odin moving troops out of Asgard had not been one of them.

"Is that really wise right now?"

Sif gave a dismissive snort.

"The All-Father himself is in the Golden Palace. Heimdall is stationed outside. Who exactly is going to attack Asgard?"

She gestured toward the city.

"Asgard is heavily defended. Any enemy invasion would have to attack another realm first and use it as a foothold. In all these ages, no enemy has ever managed to launch a direct assault on the Golden Palace."

Evenson opened his mouth.

Then closed it again.

History had a nasty habit of making people overconfident.

He could hardly stand there and reveal exactly how the Dark Elves would attack. The first question he’d get would be how he knew.

What was he supposed to say?

That he’d studied the stars and predicted it?

Besides, Odin wasn’t leaving Asgard defenseless.

The royal guards remained at their posts, and now they were secretly drilling as well.

The Golden Palace itself was protected by its legendary defenses.

Breaking into Asgard would not be easy.

Evenson’s thoughts were interrupted by a familiar voice.

"There you are."

He immediately straightened and bowed.

Beside him, Sif did the same.

"All-Father."

Odin approached while dismissing his guards with a wave of his hand.

Sif received the same silent order.

She bowed and withdrew.

That alone told Evenson this was not a casual visit.

Odin stopped at the edge of the balcony and looked down at the troops below.

"What do you think of my army?"

Evenson knew exactly what kind of answer a king expected.

"Your soldiers are as numerous as rain, your generals as plentiful as clouds, and your weapons form a forest of steel. This army is unmatched."

"Hm."

Odin seemed satisfied.

He nodded absently, then turned back toward Evenson.

"Something occurred to me. I wanted to ask you about it."

"Please, Your Majesty."

"The last time I met the Ancient One was more than a thousand years ago. In all that time, she has never sent anyone to Asgard."

Odin’s eye sharpened.

"Many important things have happened since then. She never sent word."

"But now, with the Dark Elves returning, she sends you."

"Even though the threat is still uncertain and no one can yet say for certain that they survived."

He paused.

"Which makes me wonder whether she has another motive."

Evenson blinked.

"Another motive?"

He genuinely had no idea what Odin was getting at.

The truth was much simpler.

Evenson had borrowed the Ancient One’s authority to make himself sound more impressive.

There was every chance she didn’t even know he was in Asgard.

"Mighty King, what do you mean?"

"I am nearing the end of my life."

The words landed like a hammer.

Evenson immediately felt a cold bead of sweat form on his forehead.

Odin continued calmly.

"For certain people, this is no longer a secret."

"The Sorcerer Supreme possesses extraordinary abilities. She has also met me personally."

"Surely she knows."

She knows nothing of the sort.

As far as Evenson could imagine, the Ancient One probably considered Odin’s lifespan to be very much Odin’s own business.

But his face remained perfectly composed.

"The All-Father will live for countless ages yet. The Ancient One sent me solely because of the Dark Elves. There is no attempt to investigate your condition."

"Heh."

Odin smiled.

He clearly didn’t believe a word of it.

"We are all intelligent people here. There’s no need for this."

Evenson’s stomach sank.

"Do you think I don’t know how many disciples the Ancient One has?"

"If she merely wanted to send a message, she could have chosen any of them."

"Why send an outsider like you?"

Odin clearly knew that Evenson was not a disciple of Kamar-Taj.

Evenson hurried to explain.

"I am connected to one of the Ancient One’s disciples through marriage. I can hardly be considered an outsider."

"And I also have a history with Thor. That makes me a reasonable choice to deliver the message."

"That certainly played a part."

Odin nodded.

Then his tone changed.

"But there is something more."

His eye fixed on Evenson.

"Your magic has given you an unusually acute perception of life force."

"In that regard, you may even surpass the Ancient One."

He leaned slightly closer.

"Do I really need to continue?"

There wasn’t much left to say.

Odin had basically spelled it out.

There were rumors that the All-Father was dying.

The Ancient One wanted to know whether those rumors were true.

So she had sent someone with an exceptional ability to perceive life force.

Evenson swallowed.

"Your Majesty... I believe you may be reading too much into this."

It was a lie.

A necessary one.

Because Evenson really had sensed Odin’s condition.

The All-Father’s life force was already approaching its end.

There might not be many years left.

But there was no universe in which Evenson would say that out loud.

For the love of God, can’t this old man leave my mind-reading abilities alone?

He had come here to warn Asgard about the Dark Elves.

Somehow, he had ended up being interrogated about Odin’s mortality instead.

And that was one mystery Evenson had absolutely no desire to solve.