A look of dismay crossed Nirva's face.
Of all people, he had encountered the one person he should never have met here.
"What brings you here?"
"Have you forgotten what I said? I declared war on you. So naturally, I'm here to keep my word."
Surna spoke while lightly drawing the sword embedded in the ground.
It was the sword that had pierced Nirva's wings and shot him down.
The elaborately designed sword was drawn with remarkable ease.
Nirva immediately sensed that this sword was no ordinary weapon.
But what he found even more incomprehensible was why Surna was here.
"What is this? Weren't you observing the situation from outside?"At least until Nirva deployed the Infinite Prison, he hadn't sensed Surna's presence in the deep layer.
So had he noticed it after the Infinite Prison and then entered the deep layer?
How could he possibly know how the situation would unfold?
'Besides, the goddess was resurrected at the end of the Infinite Prison. How could he have remained unscathed there...?'
Suddenly…Nirva had a thought.
From the timing of Surna's appearance to his deliberate targeting of Nirva now.
Isn't it too coincidental?
Surna grinned, noticing the change in Nirva's eyes, as if confirming that Nirva's suspicions were correct.
Nirva immediately sensed from that smile that his fears had become reality.
"You planned all of this, didn't you?"
"What do you mean?"
"Don't play dumb! Are you saying you've been orchestrating this entire situation all along?"
"Haha. Me? Aren't you overestimating me? You said it yourself. I was just a novice."
"Yes. You certainly were in the past. But you've changed now."
Surna lightly acknowledged those words.
"That's right. I've changed. And you've changed too."
"I've changed?"
"Nirva. Don't you understand why Goddess Noxana is going back to sleep?"
"What are you...?"
"Someone who loved humans more than anyone would never put humans to sleep through her own actions. Did you, her apostle, not realize that?"
Surna's observation touched Nirva's most sensitive point.
"Shut up!"
Nirva flapped one wing to create a gust of wind, but it never reached Surna.
An invisible force around Surna completely dispersed the wind.
'What? Even though it was a wing-beat infused with dream energy, it was blocked so easily?'
Has Surna always possessed such power?
Just how much stronger has he become over these hundreds of years?
'I can't figure it out.'
Nirva typically analyzed opponents through dreams, but that power didn't work on Surna, a fellow apostle.
So he needed to discover information indirectly through the dreams of those around him.
'But even that doesn't exist at all.'
Even Surna's closest confidants don't know his true capabilities.
Simply put, nothing was revealed on the surface.
Surna, who had easily blocked Nirva's attack, had a subtly strange expression.
"What's with that face?"
"Nothing. Although we were on bad terms, you were still a fellow apostle, and I respected your abilities."
Surna let out a small sigh.
It wasn't to provoke his opponent, but a genuine sigh of regret.
"You've become so broken now."
"I'm broken?"
"You used to be wiser. Between your cautious nature, you didn't hesitate to make bold decisions. But now you've become more cautious, lost your sharpness, and even grown stubborn."
Surna's gaze turned toward Noxana's body sealed in the obelisk.
"Yes. You changed completely after Goddess Noxana was sealed."
"Nonsense! Nonsense! I've changed? I am the same! No different from before!"
"If only your connection to the gods you serve had been severed like ours, you wouldn't have ended up like this. Perhaps that vague hope pushed you further into pressure."
There is no way to revive a dead god but there is a way to awaken a sleeping god.
Nirva orchestrated all of this to awaken Noxana again.
That blind loyalty had transformed into a twisted obsession after being concentrated over the long years.
Transcending the vicious cycle of suffering in reality to finally achieve true freedom.
"Wasn't that the dream you desired?"
"..."
"But what about now? You tried to extort human lives with the pretext of a falsely created paradise."
From truth to falsehood.
From happiness to unhappiness.
From a transient life to a meaningless one.
From the world of light to the world of darkness.
From the world of peace to the world of delusion.
From enlightenment to suffering.
"Something that had accumulated inside you for a long time has gradually corrupted you into something else."
"I've changed?"
"Yes. That's why you danced on this stage I set up without knowing anything."
"...Fine. Let's say I've changed as you claim. Then how do you explain the goddess' actions?"
"Didn't I tell you? She was always a goddess for humans. Of course, she wouldn't make choices that cause humans suffering. The old you would have known that immediately."
"Are you saying you calculated all that and came looking for me?"
"You're an obstacle to what's coming. Isn't it better to remove the seeds of danger?"
"...So from the beginning, your goal was to eliminate me?"
Nirva bowed his head deeply, uttering self-deprecating words.
"Now that it's the end, is a bit of your old insight returning? But it's unfortunate. It's already too late."
"...You even used your subordinate, your right-hand man, as bait?"
"It may look like bait, but Franz volunteered. I simply provided a good tool to help."
"So that's how it was."
"Of course, I did guide Franz to move that way. It was a really long and difficult task."
Nirva's eyes widened at this sudden confession.
"...What did you just say?"
Nirva stared intently at Surna, asking what he meant.
Surna shrugged as if it were nothing and laughed.
"I said it was difficult. Contacting Dream Walkers from long ago and subtly brainwashing them to hide fragments of relics in Dreamland was a task that required tremendous patience."
"What are you talking about...? Don't tell me you've been aiming for this situation from the beginning? Even from decades ago, when that novice fell into the deep layer?"
Surna didn't answer, just kept smiling.
But seeing that smile, Nirva trembled involuntarily.
Nirva's eyes detected some indescribable madness in Surna.
"Don't tell me, even 500 years ago..."
Nirva recalled the dream from 500 years ago when Basara invaded a kingdom.
Why did Basara attack that kingdom?
Why was there a Dream Walker in that kingdom?
And was it really a coincidence that the successors of that Dream Walker have reached this place now?
"Are you saying you've been working behind the scenes for hundreds of years to use humans as puppets?"
Nirva's lips trembled with shock.
"I, I misjudged you. You didn't just become more cunning while I wasn't watching. You've become more evil."
"I know. That's why I was called the Great Demon."
"It's not just that level! You're not simply evil. What's inherent within you is madness that's impossible to fathom! You, those events 500 years ago..."
"That's right."
Surna easily acknowledged it.
"It was my doing."
"Why?"
"That event couldn't happen too quickly. It wasn't what I wanted. The place, the time, everything was wrong. So I just overturned the whole situation."
"By using Basara, a fellow apostle, as your comrade?"
"Manipulating someone with blind anger was a very easy task. He was an unpredictable time bomb. Leaving him alone made me uneasy."
"So you decided to deal with him too?"
"He wasn't useful to me."
"So it was also your doing that awakened me."
Originally, Nirva should have been asleep for a long time.
Like a creature waiting for a warm spring day to leave its burrow after a long winter hibernation.
But Surna deliberately provoked Nirva, causing him to awaken.
As if it were already spring.
"Yes. Decades ago, when you momentarily woke up, and periodically afterward, I sent down canaries. That's how the current you arose."
"My awakening, and the goddess opening her eyes, all of it..."
"They're beings who would eventually wake up anyway, but it's problematic if they appear after everything is over, right? So there was a need to take care of it before things happened."
Nirva felt dizzy.
"What exactly happened between you and Saint Arkenis in the past..."
"That's not what's important right now."
Surna cut off Nirva's words decisively.
Nirva let out a bitter laugh at his situation.
"So you've been waiting for this moment from the beginning. I danced perfectly on the stage setup you've been building for hundreds of years. Come to think of it, that dagger was strange from the start. The weapon Franz used wasn't something humans could make. That level of power to inflict damage on me, it indeed bore your touch."
Nirva's gaze turned to the sword in Surna's right hand.
"And that longsword too. That's actually the main one, isn't it? The dagger was just a byproduct to create the original."
"Oh my. You're suddenly becoming so perceptive, it's quite disconcerting."
"You mock me to the end. Well, I suppose the defeated don't have the right to complain."
Nirva's face, which had been filled with anger, became serene.
It was the look of someone with the wisdom befitting an apostle once called the wisest.
"But that sword isn't meant to kill me. It's too powerful to kill me. You can't use a cattle-slaughtering knife to kill a chicken, but that doesn't even look like a knife for slaughtering cattle. Surna, what exactly are you trying to kill?"
"Our goals are always the same, aren't they?"
At the word "same," Nirva nodded willingly.
"Yes. Then go ahead and try."
"I was planning to."
"But you surely won't die peacefully. You know that, right?"
"That."
For the first time, Surna's expression changed from a smile to something cold.
It was also his true feelings that he had never shown to others until now.
"I've been prepared for that from the beginning."
Surna's sword sliced through Nirva's neck.
Nirva's severed head soon disappeared like sand scattering in the wind.
The bird's body did the same.
After briefly looking down at Nirva's dispersing corpse, Surna turned his head to gaze at the [Nursery Rhyme] floating high above.
"Franz. You will surely receive the blessing of the goddess."
Surna left the place after sheathing his sword at his waist.
Leaving with final words:
"So on that promised day, fulfill the contract."