Chapter 106
Chapter 106: Feathers of Dusk, Light of Dawn
Swoooosh!
A streak of orange light, as though it had absorbed the colors of a twilight sunset, came crashing down into the heart of the encampment. From a distance it had appeared to be a massive bird, but up close it was something else entirely.
It was not a single enormous form, but a mass of energy composed of thousands of feathers. Every fragment twisted and tangled without end, radiating an overwhelming presence.
In that moment, Calix recognized a familiar flow.
……A Core.
The feathers swirled through the surrounding air yet did not vanish. They spun fiercely around the central mass, driving back any malevolent energy.
At last, the flow gradually calmed, and the enormous mass compressed into itself. The shape of the wings crumbled, and between the collapsing layers, the outline of a living being slowly emerged.
"……The Wandering One, Kailo Felderwin."
Airien revealed his identity.
The mage was of average height with the appearance of a young man. His skin was pale as ivory and his face held soft, gentle lines, making him seem young at a glance—but his deep, sunken amber eyes carried the unmistakable weight of ages.
An orange afterglow drifted around him in an otherworldly haze, and the entire Alliance encampment fell into perfect silence.
Shhhk.
Some soldiers instinctively placed their hands on the hilts of their swords. Some, overcome by fear and reverence, dropped to one knee. Yet the commanders could not issue a single order.
The western nobles in particular reacted this way.
A meeting with elves or dwarves was already enough of a shock—but now a legendary being they had only ever encountered in storybooks had appeared before them. It was nothing short of a shock to the core.
An older noble let out a sound somewhere between a cough and a gasp of amazement.
"Good heavens, a mage……!"
Hearing that, Volga muttered under his breath in Zahira's direction.
"Not even surprised anymore. How many times has this happened now?"
It was a joke ill-suited to the atmosphere, but the desert woman responded with a quiet smile. Basim, for his part, let out a loud snort through his nose. The Mountain Rabbits had long since grown accustomed to accepting chaos.
Crunch.
In that moment, a young man stepped forward.
He had not exchanged a single word with the other party, yet he knew he was being summoned. The orange energy was drawing him in, gently coaxing his Core as though soothing it.
Kailo Felderwin had called for Calix.
***
Two beings stood facing each other at the center of the encampment.
Calix's Core reacted with unexpected sharpness. As though warning the other not to encroach upon its territory, it pushed back repeatedly against the foreign presence. The orange energy, however, embraced every one of those protests. When pushed, it yielded; once it found the appropriate boundary, it advanced no further.
As a balance was gradually struck, an environment suitable for conversation was established. To those watching, however, the process itself was remarkable.
Commanders and soldiers, even the wandering refugees—those standing close were pushed back by the flow of energy, while those farther away drifted nearer as though seeking warmth. It felt like a sacred dais that drove back the darkness.
And then Calix opened his mouth.
"Did you call for me?"
His composed voice carried within it a power that quieted anxiety. He was neither surprised nor afraid. That fact alone gave those around him an inexplicable sense of relief.
Kailo Felderwin slowly nodded and replied.
But not a single person understood what he said.
It was not the language of humans.
"Child, I am the wandering one. I have cast aside my name, and I have roamed the eternal boundary—pressing through the gap between dusk and dawn. Yet when the cold night draws near, I carry what has been hidden. I have come to foretell the truth obscured by the abyss; to herald both annihilation and rebirth."
In an instant, murmurs rippled through the crowd. The brow of Barakh, commander of Kalahim, twitched. Even the elf Serylion Belrnar could not conceal his bewilderment. This was not simply a matter of race or region.
The mage's lips had closed, and his will alone traveled outward, carried on his energy. He had lived so many ages that language—the medium of communication—had faded from him entirely.
Only Calix understood the meaning in full.
The ripple gently knocked upon his heart. As wind and current seep into the earth, the power of Nature Attunement granted by Ranita's bloodline delivered the other's will to him whole.
"What have you come to convey to me?"
"Nine streams of wicked armies have crossed beyond the Land of Shadows."
But soon Calix's expression hardened. Mage Felderwin had spoken of the world's distortion in his own singular way.
"The children of Kriya are busy hiding and scattering. The place where the sun rises first has already fallen into the clutches of the Reverse-Flowing Kohtan."
"……You are speaking of the Elvra Holy Empire."
A harrowing scene reflected in those amber eyes. Along the mountain range, members of the Kriya Order were fleeing desperately. He thought for a moment he glimpsed the figure of Sier Lagrin, Ella's master.
That was only the beginning—grim news followed in succession.
"On the southern coast, Marcaron Who Twists the Natural Order has broken a Master's sword; at the heart of the continent, Midra Who Takes Away draws near."
Calix drew a deep breath. Names he had never heard before—yet instinctively he knew these were formidable enemies. The Core that had taken root within him trembled shallowly, as if in warning.
‘Breaking… A Master's sword. So now we must face such beings.’
In truth, he had already suspected something of the kind.
The current Alliance Forces were akin to a vanguard. Their role was to clearly identify the presence of the army commanders and hold the line until the main forces of Viale and Kalahim arrived.
In that case, their first opponent would likely be—
"……Midra."
He spoke the name aloud, and it was the Alliance commanders who reacted. Among them, Serylion Belrnar of Viale and the dwarf Vice-captain Rogarr visibly darkened.
"If it is Midra, then surely……."
"Yes. A name that has been forbidden for hundreds of years. Felderwin appears to be speaking of the dark army commanders."
At that, the elven Vice-captain Welvas exhaled heavily.
"Even knowing it would come to this, it is a devastating feeling. In the forests of Viale, their traces still remain."
Confusion spread swiftly. Elven soldiers and dwarven warriors began to murmur.
"The malevolent beings my mother once told me of—have they truly returned?"
"He was right. Calix was pointing the way all along."
The soldiers of Kalahim and the western nobles of Astria did not grasp the substance of what had been said—yet they read the atmosphere from the reactions around them.
In the end, the representatives of each army once again turned their eyes to a single person. They studied Calix's expression and waited for him to give them an answer. But he was still facing Felderwin. From somewhere deep within his chest, resolve and heavy responsibility surged up simultaneously.
"Has the heart of the continent already fallen?"
The mage shook his head. His eyes held neither sorrow nor joy. Only the weight of a watcher's obligation, carried through thousands of years of repetition, rested heavily within them.
"The city built from fragments of the stars still stands, yet it teeters on the edge of collapse. But how could that place alone be so? Not a single human kingdom anywhere is safe. If you do not rise together, you will perish without exception."
Calix felt a cold flame spreading within his chest. He sensed intuitively that this moment—this very conversation—was the turning point that would change everything to come.
And he was ready to accept that responsibility.
***
For a time, silence flowed.
The news Felderwin had brought had trampled every expectation into the dust—yet even after, the orange energy burned on in quiet, unwavering steadiness.
It was then.
That Calix opened his mouth.
"……The deeper the night grows, the more tightly we will hold to one another. As for this—I would rather hear what comes next."
In that instant, the orange energy resonated with a subtle tremor. Felderwin did not stir, but his Core wrapped around the entirety of the space as if to say: well done.
It was a compliment befitting a mage—one that only a mage could give.
And so it was time to speak of what came next.
"The dark army is spreading to every corner of the continent—but there are those who stand against it. Heroes who have returned from the Land of Shadows."
The atmosphere shifted in an instant. The gazes of those who had been watching moved to Felderwin, and then to Calix. A strange light drifted in the young commander's eyes.
"You are speaking of the Survey Corps. The Pointing One, Yelayen, traveled east. I met him myself."
Memories of a past encounter flashed through his mind.
The Mountain Rabbits had crossed the line of fire together at the request of Adrian Deconti, Prince of Latia. They had also witnessed the disgraceful conduct of Raven Saitz, son of Duke Saitz, and at the end of their journey into the Storm Forest, they had come face to face with Mage Yelayen.
He had not known every member of the Survey Corps, but he had seen at least some of them—and their convictions.
The wandering mage responded.
"The seeds of a counteroffensive have been sown. Yelayen has departed to persuade the humans of the north, and the heroes of Latia and Elvra have headed for the Resting Place of Stars. The eight swords held by humankind are also moving with urgency. One has been diminished—yet even so, its meaning has not been extinguished."
By his reckoning, the humans of the north would be the Emperor of the Niboria Empire; the Resting Place of Stars, the capital of the Astria Kingdom; and the eight swords, the Masters of each nation.
Calix repeated their designations aloud—not for himself, but for those listening in.
Barakh immediately added his voice.
"The Masters are moving. This proves once more that the situation is no ordinary one."
Elven commander Serylion Belrnar nodded in agreement.
"If it is the Master of the south, it must be Angel Gueria of the Kingdom of Gardia. If he has fallen, the other Masters will no longer be able to merely stand and watch."
As the words Survey Corps and Masters spread through the encampment, some began to feel that darkness was not the whole of it. Someone cried out that heroes would rise across the entire continent, and from every corner of the encampment, relief seeped outward.
Such was the strange nature of connection. Who could have known that a past already gone would become the foundation for today?
Yet even amid all of this, Mage Kailo Felderwin still had his eyes fixed only on Calix.
His words were not yet finished.
"And at the center of it all, you stand."
A brief declaration.
And yet the weight it carried was something beyond measure.
"……I see."
Calix did not deny it. He answered shortly and held the other's gaze with quiet steadiness. He gazed at his own reflection in the mage's pupils.
They had not yet begun anything. They had barely reached the starting line and were about to press forward through a darkness without a single ray of starlight. Yet they had not lost their warmth.
The Mountain Rabbits had to become the flame that guided the way. Calix believed that was possible—and he understood that he must, once more, take his place at the center of events.
If they failed, every one of them would vanish beyond the horizon. But if they could only hold on—
"Indeed."
Suddenly, Felderwin spoke as though he had read those thoughts.
"You will advance to a place I can never reach, and become the light of a new dawn."
In that moment, two Cores began to resonate in quiet harmony. The energy entwined, and in an instant it spread to cover the entire encampment. Some found within themselves a courage they could not name; others lifted their heads in the midst of fear.
Though the essence of the two was the same, one of them had not yet been completed.
And it was in that incompleteness that possibility resided.
Kailo Felderwin believed in that.
***
The mage did not linger long. As though time pressed upon him, his amber eyes were already turned toward the west.
The orange energy shimmered faintly, and he quietly turned his gaze toward Calix.
"I will depart. I must carry word to the mountains and the desert. But we will meet again before long."
His voice was low, yet it spread through the entire space, echoing as though reverberating off every surface. A moment of silence drifted through the encampment. Though none had said it aloud, everyone had wished the mage would remain with them.
But Calix asked something different.
"We…… Intend to press eastward. May I ask for your guidance?"
Felderwin turned over in his mind the countless days and nights, the moments of choosing. Even so, the answer had always been the same.
"You ask of me what I cannot give. Find the answer yourself. Your choice will change everything."
No particular explanation. No comfort.
He held Calix's gaze one final time, then transformed into a mass of feathers and rose into the sky. As he traced his path away, the orange afterglow scattered upon the wind.
With each beat of wings that was not quite wings, the gathering of light gradually subsided.
"……."
"……."
The center of the camp—now empty.
And yet strangely, the vacancy that remained was not filled with emptiness, but with a vitality of unknown origin. Though two had become one, the sense of presence had not diminished.
Calix.
His Core devoured the feathers the mage had left behind with fierce, unrestrained hunger. It was not intentional—yet a storm of energy erupted, overwhelming all those nearby.
***
The soldiers lay wakeful through the night until dawn broke. After the situation had calmed, everyone, without exception, spoke of the darkness that had arisen in the east. Anxiety and fear of an unknown terror, tangled together with confusion, did not settle easily.
Yet though they swayed, they did not break.
It was because Kailo Felderwin had left something behind.
"We can do it. It's not just us fighting."
"That's right. We have the Mountain Rabbits—we have Commander Calix."
"And more than that—the heroes of the Survey Corps will lend their hand too, they said."
The wandering mage had not only delivered news and departed. Even amid the deepest, darkest despair, a small flame rekindled somewhere in the hearts of the crowd. He had planted within people of entirely different races, classes, and circumstances a reason to endure.
A difficult road lay ahead—but for a while, the soldiers forgot their troubles. Shoulders that had been hunched straightened wide, and they felt the old legends as though those stories were their own.
All through the night, everyone recited ancient songs and tales.
And the next day, preparations to move were carried out with speed. It was decided that the refugees would be divided and taken in by the western nobles, while the combat personnel would advance toward the capital of Astria.
Calix stated it plainly.
"We are not going to put down a final period. We are going to greet a new morning."
Anxiety and anticipation, fear and courage—all mingled together. That cascade of emotions passed through the camp and spread to the early-morning fields beyond.
Booooom—!
When the signal sounded, a force of seven thousand soldiers began their march toward the capital of Astria.
It was on the third day of the march that something felt wrong. One of the soldiers discovered that the grass beneath his feet had frozen over white.
"That's odd. Even for the tail end of summer, it's this cold?"
"Aren't we heading southeast? Shouldn't it be getting warmer?"
"Somehow…… It feels like winter has come."
To make matters worse, even the torches burned with a blue-tinged flame. Clearly verging on an anomaly phenomenon. And so, at the heart of a continent where light and shadow crossed, the finest among them stepped to the fore.
"Us again?"
"Aah, gotta earn that pay."
The Mountain Rabbits.
They held together with an iron will and a bond stronger still. They traded rough jokes—but their feet never stopped.