Chapter 64:The Rebirth of Fafnir

Chapter :The Rebirth of Fafnir

Days passed after Griselda arrived and took her place beside the black-and-crimson cocoon.

Then weeks passed.

Then months.

Then years.

With each passing day, Griselda continued to wait patiently, sitting near the cocoon and watching the pulse of its crimson veins, sensing the mysterious aura emanating from within.

She did not know when Fafnir would emerge.

Perhaps after a year.

Perhaps after decades.

Perhaps after centuries.

But she did not care.

She had made her decision from the very beginning.

She would wait for him, no matter how long it took.

Eleven full years had passed since Fafnir had fallen into a coma inside the cocoon, while the process of merging with the mysterious energy continued without interruption.

And on the eleventh day after the eleventh year had passed...

Something happened that had not happened once throughout all those years.

The cocoon trembled.

At first, only slightly.

Then it trembled again.

Griselda immediately opened her eyes and raised her head toward it.

“What...?”

She stared at the cocoon with intense focus.

The crimson veins covering its surface began to glow slowly.

Then, all at once, they blazed with a brilliant crimson light, causing the darkness around them to recede slightly.

Griselda rose to her feet.

“Has the time finally come?”

No one answered her.

But the cocoon answered in another way.

Its pulse was growing stronger.

And its aura was changing.

At the same time, deep within the cocoon, Fafnir’s consciousness was experiencing an entirely different world.

In the Depths of the Void

From the moment Fafnir’s consciousness had fallen into the coma, he found himself within a boundless, pitch-black void.

There was no ground.

No sky.

No direction.

No time that could be measured.

Only endless darkness.

Yet, within that darkness, terrifying scenes began to appear.

Scenes that surpassed the limits of what the human mind could possibly imagine.

Enormous monsters appeared before him, creatures the size of planets.

Their bodies stretched across vast regions of space, and some seemed capable of swallowing entire worlds.

Then came battles.

Colossal cosmic battles in which terrifying forces collided, with every single strike powerful enough to destroy entire star systems.

Stars exploded.

Planets shattered.

And distant galaxies trembled beneath the impact of unimaginable clashes.

In another scene, he saw enormous rifts tearing through cosmic space, stretching across distances measured in light-years, as though the very fabric of the universe had been ripped apart.

Fafnir watched everything in silence.

He did not know what these scenes were.

Were they memories?

Visions?

Or remnants of events experienced by someone else?

He did not know.

But they continued appearing before his consciousness for eleven years.

One scene after another.

One world after another.

Whenever he thought one scene had finally ended, another would appear before him.

Until even the passage of time itself became meaningless.

Then...

The void trembled.

Fafnir raised his consciousness toward the darkness.

At that very moment, he felt a force pulling him away.

At first, the pull was weak.

Then it grew stronger.

The dark void began fading around him, and his consciousness gradually began returning toward his body.

And just as he was about to leave that void, he heard a mysterious voice whispering close to him:

“Now that you have returned... they will surely sense your return soon.”

The voice fell silent for a moment.

Then it continued:

“Therefore... seek strength.”

A brief silence followed.

“To protect yourself... and those you love.”

Then the voice vanished completely.

In the next instant, Fafnir’s consciousness returned to his body.

Outside the Cocoon

Inside the ancient hall, cracks began appearing across the surface of the cocoon.

One small crack.

Then another.

Then dozens more.

They slowly widened as an immense and sublime aura began leaking from within.

Griselda shuddered.

The aura was not entirely familiar, yet there was something within it that made her heart know the answer before her mind could.

“Fafnir...”

Her eyes remained fixed upon the cocoon.

The cracks began spreading across its entire surface.

Outside, something else began to happen.

Above the human capital, the sky suddenly changed.

Clouds gathered with astonishing speed, and daylight was swallowed by a strange darkness.

Powerful human cultivators raised their heads toward the sky, sensing an enormous energy gathering above the capital.

One of them said in astonishment:

“What is this energy?”

Another stared at the sky and replied:

“I don't know... but it isn't ordinary energy.”

Elsewhere, weaker humans began to feel fear.

Children started crying, while people throughout the streets stopped what they were doing and raised their heads toward the sky.

Then crimson lightning flashed between the clouds.

BOOM!

Thunder roared above the capital.

Some people recoiled in fear.

“What is happening?!”

“Is this an attack?!”

“No... I don't sense any hostile energy!”

But one of the senior cultivators spoke in a low voice:

“Whatever this is... it is coming from the Sovereign Palace.”

Inside Fafnir's hall, the process was approaching its end.

The cracks multiplied.

The light pouring through them grew brighter.

Until the entire cocoon was covered in it.

Then...

It stopped.

Silence descended.

Griselda stopped breathing for a moment.

Then an enormous shockwave erupted from within the cocoon.

BOOOOM!

The ancient hall shook violently.

The entire Sovereign Palace trembled.

Several ancient pillars inside Fafnir's hall cracked, while crimson energy surged in every direction.

Griselda raised an arm to shield her face.

“Fafnir!”

Then the light exploded outward.

Everything became white for several moments.

Griselda could see nothing.

Then, slowly, the light began to fade.

She opened her eyes.

And when her vision finally returned to normal...

Her breath caught.

A man stood amid the remnants of the crimson light.

Fafnir.

But he looked different.

He stood 198 centimeters tall, with features so perfect that they were difficult to describe with words, as though they had been meticulously sculpted to embody beauty and power at once.

His long hair was black as night, falling around him in complete stillness.

His eyes were crimson like blood, carrying a terrifying depth and an unfathomable mystery.

His skin was pure and flawless white, while his body was lean, muscular, and perfectly proportioned.

Yet what astonished Griselda most was not his appearance alone.

It was the aura surrounding him.

It was different.

Deeper.

Heavier.

And far more awe-inspiring than she remembered.

Fafnir had returned.

Yet somewhere deep within her, Griselda felt that the man standing before her was no longer exactly the same man he had been eleven years ago.

Griselda's mind froze for several moments.

She could not think.

She could not speak.

All the years she had spent waiting vanished from her mind in that instant.

Then, at last, her lips moved.

“My husband...”

Fafnir turned toward her.

His eyes met hers.

For a moment, he said nothing.

Then a calm smile appeared on his face.

It was so beautiful that Griselda's heart trembled.

Her face immediately flushed.

She lowered her head shyly for a moment, but soon raised it again.

She could not stop herself from looking at him.

Eleven years.

She had waited for him for eleven full years.

And in the end...

He had returned.

Fafnir spoke in his familiar, calm voice:

“My dear.”

Griselda froze for a moment.

That voice.

She knew it all too well.

She smiled, her eyes shining with longing.

Then she could no longer wait.

She rushed toward him.

She reached him and embraced him tightly, as though she needed to reassure herself that he was truly standing there before her.

With a voice filled with the joy of all the years she had spent waiting for him, she said:

“My husband... you finally came out.”

She closed her eyes as she held him.

For the first time in eleven years, Griselda felt that the waiting was over.

But she did not yet know that Fafnir's return was not merely the end of his seclusion.

It was the beginning of an entirely new chapter.

For the man who had emerged from the cocoon was not necessarily the same man who had entered it eleven years ago.

And deep within his body...

Something new had awakened.