THE VILLAIN'S POV

Chapter 610: The Red Moon’s Descent (1)

In the Valley of the End, for a time, three of the strongest Lightbearers made that place their home.

Three Vessels who had cast off their given names and chosen to live by their own laws, leaving the burdens forced upon them behind.

The Legendary Vessel—Audrey, as she called herself—was the lodestar for both Snow and Orsted: a woman who did as she pleased and possessed the strength to make it possible. To their eyes, she was dazzling.

For a long while, Snow and Orsted dogged her steps everywhere, begging her to take them as disciples, and each time she refused ..after beating the two of them black and blue. She seemed harsh, but that wasn’t the truth of it. She let them remain in the Valley of the End, shielding them from the Lightbearers who hunted them.

She wouldn’t teach them, yet the three still spent countless hours together—hunting, eating, talking about the world and its ages. Audrey, especially, was deeply informed. She told them about the Great Ones, the shapers of history, about the legend of Odin, and the first appearance of demons and Lightbearers.

Audrey was a riddle, and at first Snow and Orsted couldn’t grasp what she was after. Now and then she would leave the Valley for long stretches and then return out of nowhere.

In those periods, Snow and Orsted trained day and night to grow strong enough to stand near her level.

She never interfered, but watched from afar ..her gaze lingering most on Snow. The Pure Vessel lived up to every rumor: a monstrous talent she had only ever seen once before in her life. The bearer of the Light Soul ..the most destructive force a Lightbearer could wield. If he matured properly, Audrey knew he would reach her…and perhaps even surpass her.

He implored her again and again to become his teacher, but she refused each time; she had her own plans and no time to spend on Snow.

They didn’t know what her goal was ..until one day, during one of her absences, they slipped into the place where she spent most of her hours, searching for her secret.

What they found stunned them: piles of charts and scattered records everywhere—notes on every corner of the vast cosmos and every race within it. Those records could not have been gathered overnight; Audrey had clearly spent years collecting them.

It wasn’t hard to see why. Her annotations made it plain: Audrey was searching for something—or rather, someone.

She confirmed it later, once the three of them had grown closer. She didn’t say much, only that he was important to her—more important than anything. The way she spoke made it sound like love. She said he existed somewhere out there in the wide universe, and she was certain of it.

So she kept searching. How powerful must those feelings be, to spend a lifetime scouring the cosmos for a single person?

Her aim seemed impossible. The world was too vast to be measured. But neither Snow nor Orsted dared belittle it. She was their inspiration—and their savior. Thanks to her, they had escaped the Lightbearers and the Vessel commanders. That alone was enough.

And for Audrey, the two were the only companions she had ever truly made as a Lightbearer.

In time, the three began to treat one another like family, and Snow and Orsted grew far stronger.

Everything was as it should be. Perhaps those were the happiest days of the Pure Vessel’s life ..the days he lived under the name Snow.

Two years passed like that, long enough for Snow and Orsted to believe their hard-won freedom and quiet days might last. But on a bleak, starless night, life reminded them that no joy endures forever.

In a valley that had held only three souls, a fourth appeared.

A baleful presence—calamity from nowhere.

Audrey was away that day. Only Snow and Orsted remained, training as always. They didn’t sense him until the last instant—until he was standing right before them.

One look into those crimson eyes, and both of them understood: disaster had arrived.

“How unexpected,” the demon’s voice rang in their ears. “I never imagined the Vessels could be so careless as to leave the Light-Soul bearer wandering alone ..no escort, as if begging me to come and kill him myself.”

They braced to fight.

“Who are you?” Snow shouted, forcing every shred of strength into his limbs beneath the pressure radiating from the newcomer.

At first the figure wore a long black cloak. A moment later the cloak tore free, revealing a suit of crimson armor—and a strange weapon that seemed a sword one moment and a spear the next.

The demon who, at that time, held the Fifth Seat among the High Demons—the Red Moon, Crimson.

“The Lightbearers offered me nothing but boredom.”

“As for you, Pure Vessel—the one everyone sings about—I hope you can put on a better show.”

Crimson, the Red Moon—a damned demon who rose in step with the Demon King, Agaroth.

A colossal monster with terrifying potential, he climbed the ranks of the Seventy-Two High Demons faster than any before him.

He was a walking catastrophe, and the battle became a waking nightmare.

They say Crimson’s laughter carried for leagues, and every clash between his great spear, the Kingslayer, and Snow’s blade triggered natural disasters that reshaped the Valley of the End.

Orsted backed his friend, but even together they were utterly overwhelmed. The fight was one-sided.

As the brutal struggle wore on, Snow and Orsted took grievous wounds; death drew near ..especially for Orsted, far weaker than Snow. Desperation dragged the Pure Vessel back to his roots as he tried to wrench more power from the Light Soul within him.

He managed a worthy fight—he even wounded Crimson—but the gap in raw power was far too great.

The inevitable followed. Snow could scarcely protect himself, let alone Orsted.

In a single, pitch-black instant ..one that blew Snow’s eyes wide as Crimson’s laughter thundered through the valley—Snow saw that dreadful spear, the Kingslayer, punch through Orsted’s chest. His only friend ..the one who had stood with him always.

The strike was fatal, saturated with a kind of aura that unmade anything living. Orsted died in seconds, unable to speak a word. Lightbearer blood slid down the spear and splashed across Crimson, who bathed in it.

“Tick-tock, tick-tock, Orsted is on the clock! And you, Pure Vessel, appear to be nothing but talk!”

Crimson’s mockery and Orsted’s death shattered something inside Snow. With a raw, wounded howl, he hurled himself at Crimson again, fighting with everything he had.

It was a bitter struggle—a desperate war of attrition.

Light clashed with Crimson’s shadow, deepening to a dark red. Auras surged skyward and collided like a flood.

Miraculously, the Pure Vessel dragged out power beyond his stage…but the result did not change.

Broken and bleeding, Snow hung limp. Crimson hoisted him by the throat with one hand. The demon had taken some damage, but his strange crimson armor had swallowed most of what Snow threw at him, leaving him in far better shape. Snow, by contrast, was a ruin.