As the blue web condensed into an azure orb, the night sky burned with a red might, and another wave of crushing pressure fell on Dia as a fiery hourglass manifested in the skies above.

“The God of Precision…” Nero’s voice was ragged. “He’s descending too. I suppose it had to be this way. Both the Red God and the Blue God share similarities in their domains, after all. Can you feel it? A change in your future?”

“A change?” Schwarz asked.

“Yes.” Sara clasped her hands together and dropped to her knees. “My Lord and the God of Precision collectively govern fate. When I left the Celestia Ruins, the burden on my Lord intensified, and He gave up on his authority. The burden on the Red God must have increased…”

She looked up at the hourglass, which was collapsing onto itself. Indeed, now that the Blessed of the Blue God had explained the current occurrences, Dia could see that the holy symbols of the Red and Blue Gods were undergoing massive changes. The symbols that represented their dominions had been turned into spheres of light; it was a reconsolidation of energy.

Schwarz made a noise in his throat. “Does that mean…”

“The influence the divinities wield over the future have been drastically weakened,” Nero replied. “Of course, to you and me, this probably won’t mean much, but I can’t say the same about the Bearers of Destiny.”

“Because of their Absolute skills?” Dia asked.

“You were always one of the sharpest swords in the shed,” Nero replied. “But I cannot elaborate on this either, sadly.”

As the red sphere of light continued to gather, its blue counterpart emitted multiple ripples in rapid succession. The night sky, split into blue and red, writhed and danced, and bells rang in Dia’s head. The blue sphere, which had turned into a solid globe, began to crack slowly. Pieces of blue light fell from the skies, and Dia watched on with rapt attention as the blue ‘egg’ began to hatch.

“Incarnation…” Nero looked at the Blessed of the Blue God. “How do you feel?”

“God is walking the world,” Sara replied, her voice filled with a touch of awe.

“The only question is the level of power the Blue God has at this juncture,” Dia muttered. “Is He mortal? Can he be harmed by weapons and mana?”

“Presumably so,” Farah replied. “I expect him to be extraordinarily resilient, though.”

More cracks ran through the blue egg, and azure fragments continued to peel off from the sphere of light.

Funnily enough, Dia knew that the blue orb was definitely high in the sky, so much so that most objects should be invisible. Anything she could see should have been a massive object, and yet, as she gazed at the incarnation process of the Blue God, Dia couldn’t help but think that there was some incredible illusion at work. Distance didn’t seem to pose any problem to the issue of visibility, and it seemed like the Blue God was reconstructing his body just ten metres away.

It was unbelievable, but again, this was the Last Godsfall. Dia was beginning to feel that things like logic, plausibility and common sense were just relics of a prior age, and to be honest, she was watching two gods abandon their responsibilities in order to survive.

Something as trivial as vision and distance didn’t really seem to do anything much to her now.

The blue globe, which was now completely riddled with cracks, began to fall apart entirely. A fog of bright blue light, nestled in what used to be an egg, solidified fully in real time.

Dia touched her heart as the fog condensed into a humanoid form. Her instincts were screaming and wailing at the incredible sense of wrongness that had just flooded her instincts. It was like watching someone block an overhead strike with the flat of a sword, or a world without shadows — something was so fundamentally wrong that she didn’t even know where to begin.

Her eyes fell on the new body of the Blue God. Once again, distance seemed to be ignored, and the figure of a person clad in a blue robe from head to toe appeared in her vision. Hundreds of needles floated around the Blue God, each of them sending warnings to her brain just by looking.

The Blue God surveyed the world with a sweep of his head, before breaking apart into fog once more. The wind picked up with a howl, sweeping away the faint blue fog that shrouded the heavens and bringing away a significant portion of the pressure that clamped down on Dia’s shoulders.

As the blue light receded entirely, the area of red that had taken up half the blue sky flared up with immense strength, dyeing the night sky in crimson. The hourglass, which had completely shattered, was undergoing the same incarnation process as the Blue God’s holy symbol.

“Is it me, or does the Red God’s sphere look quite bad?” Farah asked.

“Hmm?”

Dia focused on the sphere again. Indeed, when she compared the bright azure sphere of the Blue God to the dull egg that housed the Red God’s incarnation, the difference was obvious. In addition, the pressure that the red globe was emitting was definitely a few folds weaker than that of the Blue God.

Even a fool could tell that he was weakened for one reason or another.

“Quite a difference, yes.” Nero made a noise in his throat. “Maybe the Red God has tons of Blessed or he’s suffering from a chronic lack of energy.”

“Both are possible, yes…”

The red egg quivered a few times, but there were no cracks forming on its surface. Instead, it simply hung in the sky without any movement, and after three minutes of just looking at a motionless red orb, Dia and the others resumed their mana-walking again. Their little group had stopped at some point of time — probably when the Blue God underwent the incarnation process — but since there was no spectacle to watch right now, finding a safe place was all the best.

The group lapsed into silence as they continued to rush towards the Lacuna dukedom capital, and Dia found herself wondering about the Trial of Aeons. Were they affected by the fact that two of the Coloured Gods were forced to incarnate themselves into the world? Would that have any effect on the trials itself?

Dia glanced at the dim red globe once. She was interested in this topic, purely because she already knew that a slot had been reserved for her. If the incarnation of two Coloured Gods really had a significant impact on the Trial of Aeons, her task would probably grow harder and harder with each word.

It would be for the best if nothing happened, but Dia had matured enough to expect otherwise.

Their little group continued to race towards the Lacuna dukedom capital as the white Moon wheeled across the skies. The prospect of coming across the two lovebirds there was quite uplifting; after all, Claud and Lily had been summoned to this very city to protect it.

“What do you think Lily and Claud are doing?” Farah abruptly asked.

“At this time?” Schwarz chuckled. “Why, making the next generation, of course. Or maybe they’re on the road that leads that way. Why do you ask? I thought it was obvious.”

“I’m just asking, okay?” Farah replied. “I’m wondering what it feels like to share a bed with another person, especially a man. My own educators told me that men are creatures of base instinct, whose primary pursuit is that of pleasure and pleasure through carnal relations.”

“That is a very weird way of putting things,” Sara noted. “Aren’t you guys a group too? I thought you’d be more…informal with each other. Maybe even tried a fling here and there. I mean, Schwarz and Nero look plenty attractive to me.”

Dia didn’t know what to say to that, but it wasn’t like she was all that wrong. However, she had no interest in love or lust; her main priority was to just grow stronger for now. After all, once she was strong enough, she could get anything she wanted — to indulge in things like this felt a bit wasteful to her.

“We are a group,” Schwarz replied.

“But we’re polite people too,” Nero added. “I have never prepositioned any of my team members. And I don’t expect them to do the same either.”

“Good choice,” Sara replied. “Group dynamics get a bit weird if you turn someone down or if someone turns you down. Trust me.”

“You speak with the air of experience,” Nero replied. “So I will. Anyway, our group actually does have a couple, but there’s a small problem. That couple is pretty darn weird.”

“Weird?” Sara tilted her head. “Go on.”

“…Well, I think it’ll be more interesting if you met them without our introductions,” Nero answered. “Hehe.”

“That nasty laugh of yours needs to change…”