Elysia-Chapter 42: The Dance of Red and Silver

The peace that Elysia had restored to Elina’s room was absolute, a perfect sphere of silence and safety. But outside that sphere, the variable known as Nyxoria was rapidly changing its state.
In her dark grove, the Crimson Queen stared into her blood mirror. The image of the silver sapling—the child's anchor, the symbol of Elysia’s new, soft life—burned in her mind. Her earlier attempt at subtle psychological corruption had been parried too easily. It was efficient, yes, but boring. And Nyxoria, above all else, despised boredom.
“He plays the role of the gardener too well,” she whispered, her voice a silk-wrapped blade. “He has forgotten the thrill of the hunt. He thinks he can cage a storm with silence.”
She stood up, and the shadows of the forest writhed in terrifying delight. The subtle game was over. If a whisper wouldn't provoke the reaction she craved, perhaps a scream would.
The morning sun had barely crested the horizon when the alarm shattered the tranquility of the Aurora Palace. It wasn’t a sound, but a feeling—a sudden, crushing pressure that made the air heavy and tasted of copper and old blood.
In the conservatory, Elina gasped and dropped her watering can. The Elderwood sapling, which had been glowing with vibrant life just moments ago, suddenly shrieked. It was a psychic sound, a cry of pure agony that only Elina could hear. She watched in horror as the silver leaves began to turn a sickly, bruised purple. Veins of crimson energy were crawling up the bark, choking the life out of it.
"No!" Elina cried, reaching out, her hands glowing with green light, trying desperately to push back the corruption. But the red energy was aggressive, biting at her magic, hungering for it.
The glass walls of the conservatory began to vibrate. The sky outside, usually a pristine blue, was bleeding into a deep, ominous red.
Then, she was there.
Not a shadow. Not a projection.
Nyxoria stood in the center of the garden, materialized from a swirl of crimson petals. She looked breathtaking and terrifying, clad in a gown of woven shadows and solidified blood, her pale skin glowing with an unearthly light. She didn't look at Elina. She looked up, towards the balcony where Elysia stood.
"It is too quiet here, Zane," Nyxoria said. Her voice wasn't loud, yet it resonated through the entire mountain range, shaking the dust from the ceiling. "I tried to whisper. I tried to play your little house game. But the silence… it is deafening. I simply had to make some noise."
She raised a hand, and the corruption on the sapling accelerated. The little tree began to wither visibly, its leaves turning to ash.
"Stop it!" Elina screamed, tears streaming down her face. "You're hurting him!"
Nyxoria’s crimson eyes flicked to the child, filled with a mixture of amusement and pity. "Pain is proof of life, little one. I am merely waking it up."
Before Nyxoria could snap her fingers to finish the tree, the air in the conservatory froze.
It wasn't ice. It was the absolute cessation of movement. The falling ash froze in mid-air. The crimson energy crawling up the tree stopped dead. Even the light seemed to pause.
Elysia descended from the balcony. She didn't fly; she simply walked down the air as if invisible stairs lay beneath her feet. Her face was a mask of terrifying neutrality. There was no anger, no annoyance. Just a void. A deep, cold, endless void where a person should be.
She landed between Elina and Nyxoria. With a simple wave of her hand, the crimson corruption on the sapling was severed, vanished into non-existence as if the concept of it had been deleted.
"Elina," Elysia said, her voice devoid of inflection. "Go to your room. Do not come out until I return."
"But—"
"Go." The command was absolute, woven with a compulsion that Elina’s body obeyed before her mind could protest. She ran, clutching her pendant, the heavy doors slamming shut behind her, sealing her away from the horrors to come.
Elysia turned to Nyxoria. "You have violated the terms of your existence here."
Nyxoria laughed, a sound like shattering glass. She summoned a massive, ornate scythe into her hands—Crimson lament—a weapon that seemed to scream as it cut the air. "Terms? There are no terms between us, Zane! There is only the dance! You have been asleep! You are rotting in this garden, playing house with a mortal while your true nature gathers dust! Admit it! You want to tear me apart just as much as I want to flay you!"
Elysia looked at her, her eyes shifting from silver to a deep, cosmic indigo. "I do not want anything from you, Nyxoria. I require only silence. And since you cannot provide it…"
Elysia held out her hand. Luminara did not appear in a flash of light. It simply was there, instantaneously, a blade of pure, compressed starlight that warped the space around it.
"…I will impose it."
The world couldn't handle them. Elysia knew this. If they fought here, the shockwaves would vaporize the palace, the mountain, and likely the entire continent of elves.
Elysia didn't step forward. She stepped through.
She grabbed the fabric of reality and ripped it open. The garden dissolved. The sky vanished.
The Obsidian Ballroom – Nyxoria’s Dimension
They reappeared instantly in a world of gothic nightmare. A vast, endless ballroom floor made of polished black obsidian stretched into infinity. Above, there was no sky, only a swirling vortex of crimson clouds and weeping moons. Massive pillars of bone rose into the dark, and the air smelled of perfume and old iron.
"My floor!" Nyxoria shrieked with glee, spinning her scythe. "How courteous of you to choose the perfect venue for your death!"
She didn't wait. She moved faster than time, a blur of red light. Crimson Lament swept down, a strike that could have cleaved a planet in half.
Elysia didn't dodge. She met the strike with Luminara.
The sound was not physical. It was a conceptual collision. The impact sent a shockwave that shattered the obsidian floor for miles around them. The "clouds" above were blown away.
"You are slow!" Nyxoria taunted, disappearing and reappearing from a thousand shadows at once, striking from every angle. Clang. Clang. Clang. Sparks of raw reality flew like fireworks. "Nine thousand years of peace has made your blade dull!"
Elysia parried every strike with minimal movement. She was the eye of the storm. Efficient. Precise. "You mistake efficiency for weakness."
Elysia stomped her foot. A shockwave of silver light erupted from her, freezing the shadows in place. "Your movements are wasteful. Too much flourish. Too much emotion."
She thrust Luminara forward. It wasn't a simple stab; it was a beam of destruction. Nyxoria shrieked and blocked with the haft of her scythe, but the force launched her backward, crashing through three massive bone pillars before she skidded to a halt.
Nyxoria stood up, wiping a trickle of golden ichor from her lip. She looked at the blood on her finger, and her eyes widened in ecstasy. "Yes… YES! That is the strength! That is the Ruler of the Ninth Circle!"
She slammed her scythe into the ground. "Blood Arts: Ocean of the Weeping Saint."
The obsidian floor liquified. Instantly, the entire dimension transformed into a roiling sea of boiling blood. Thousands of skeletal hands reached out from the depths, grasping at Elysia’s legs, trying to drag her down. Giant constructs—dragons made of coagulated blood, knights with screaming faces—rose from the red ocean, rushing towards Elysia.
Elysia hovered above the chaotic sea, her expression unchanged. She raised Luminara high.
"Starfall."
It was a simple command. Above the red clouds, the fabric of Nyxoria's dimension tore open. Countless streaks of silver light rained down. They were meteors of pure holy energy.
Each meteor struck a blood-construct with pinpoint accuracy, vaporizing them instantly. The ocean of blood hissed and evaporated under the bombardment of starlight. The sky turned white.
Nyxoria screamed in rage, flying through the bombardment, slashing apart the meteors with her scythe. She reached Elysia, and they engaged in close quarters combat that defied physics. They teleported hundreds of times a second—appearing in the sky, under the sea of blood, on the fragments of floating pillars.
Slash. Parry. Kick. Blast.
Nyxoria was a hurricane of passion and violence. She laughed as she fought, enjoying every wound she gave and received. She managed to graze Elysia’s cheek, drawing a single drop of silver blood.
"I see you!" Nyxoria roared, her face inches from Elysia's as their weapons locked. "I see the monster inside! Let him out! Destroy this dimension! Break the world! Why do you hold back?"
Elysia stared into Nyxoria’s mad eyes. "Because I have something to go home to."
Elysia’s eyes glowed blindingly bright. She released her grip on the physical laws of this dimension. She didn't push Nyxoria back; she pulled her.
"We are done here."
The Obsidian Ballroom shattered like a mirror dropped on stone.
The Cosmic Ocean – Elysia’s Dimension
The noise, the blood, the screaming wind—it all vanished instantly.
They were now floating in an infinite expanse of still, dark water. Above them was a sky filled with galaxies and nebulas, moving in a slow, perfect clockwork rhythm. There was no air, only the concept of breath. There was no sound, only the concept of silence.
This was Elysia’s soul made manifest. The Cosmic Ocean.
Nyxoria floated there, disoriented for a microsecond by the sudden shift from chaos to absolute order. The silence here was heavy, oppressive. It pressed against her skin like a physical weight.
"This place..." Nyxoria hissed, shivering. "It is a tomb. It is cold. It is dead."
"It is peaceful," Elysia corrected, her voice echoing from everywhere at once. She stood on the surface of the water, not a ripple disturbing her reflection. "And it is where you will stay."
Nyxoria realized the danger instantly. In her own dimension, she was a god. Here, she was an intruder in a system where Elysia controlled every variable.
"I will not be caged again!" Nyxoria screamed. She flared her aura, trying to corrupt the water, trying to turn it into blood. But the water didn't change. It simply absorbed her energy and remained still.
She roared and charged at Elysia, her scythe glowing with desperate, apocalyptic power. She intended to cut the very fabric of this dimension apart.
Elysia didn't raise her sword. She raised her hand, palm open.
"System Command: Absolute Stasis."
The water beneath Nyxoria erupted. But it wasn't water anymore. It was chains. Massive, translucent chains made of frozen time and crystallized reality shot up from the depths.
Nyxoria slashed at them, shattering the first few, but for every one she broke, ten more appeared. They wrapped around her ankles, her waist, her wings. They were cold—a cold that burned deeper than Hellfire.
"No! NO!" Nyxoria thrashed, her power flaring wildly. "Fight me! Finish me properly!"
"This is the finish," Elysia said softly. She closed her hand into a fist.
From the depths of the cosmic ocean, a shadow rose. It was colossal, dwarfing the mountains of the mortal world. Cethel, the Cosmic Whale, breached the surface in slow motion. Its body was made of stardust and deep blue nebulas, and it bore ancient scars on its side. It let out a low, mournful song that vibrated through Nyxoria’s bones, draining her will to fight.
"You seek chaos," Elysia said, walking across the water towards the bound Queen. "But chaos cannot exist without order to define it. You are tired, Nyxoria. You have fought for eons."
"I am not tired! I am—"
"Requiem of the Frozen Star."
Elysia snapped her fingers.
The water around Nyxoria surged upwards, spiraling around her, forming a massive pillar. The liquid hardened instantly, turning into a diamond-hard, eternal ice.
Nyxoria’s scream was cut short as the ice encased her. Her expression of fury and defiance was frozen in time, preserved perfectly in the crystal. The chains tightened, pulling the massive pillar of ice down.
The Cosmic Whale, Cethel, opened its massive maw and gently took the pillar of ice. It didn't eat it; it simply held it, guarding it. With a slow, graceful turn of its massive tail, the whale dived back into the infinite depths of the ocean, taking the sealed Queen of Blood down into the darkness where time did not exist.
The surface of the water smoothed over. The ripples vanished.
Elysia stood alone under the silent stars of her own creation.
She stood there for a long time. The adrenaline of the battle faded, replaced by a crushing wave of exhaustion. Fighting a being of equal power, even with the advantage of the home dimension, had drained her reserves significantly. Her hand trembled slightly as she dismissed Luminara.
She coughed, and a speck of silver blood hit the dark water, dissolving instantly.
"It is done," she whispered to the empty universe.
She had removed the variable. She had protected the peace. But as she looked at her reflection in the water, she looked older. Tireder.
She closed her eyes and willed herself back.
The Aurora Palace – The Conservatory
The transition back was seamless. One moment she was in the void, the next she was standing on the tiled floor of the garden.
The red sky was gone, replaced by the natural blue of the afternoon. The air was clear. The pressure had lifted. The only evidence of the battle was the slightly withered leaves of the Elderwood sapling, which was already beginning to recover its green hue.
The doors to the conservatory burst open. Elina ran in, her eyes red and puffy from crying. She stopped when she saw Elysia standing there, alone.
"Lady Elysia?" Elina’s voice was small, trembling. "Where is... where is the scary lady?"
Elysia turned. She composed her face perfectly, hiding the exhaustion, hiding the pain in her spirit. To the child, she must be the unshakeable pillar.
"She has gone," Elysia said simply. "She will not disturb the garden again."
Elina looked around, sensing the safety in the air, sensing that the bad feeling was truly gone. She didn't ask how. She didn't ask where. She just ran forward and buried her face in Elysia’s dress, sobbing with relief.
"I was so scared," Elina muffled against the fabric. "I thought she was going to hurt you."
Elysia hesitated for a fraction of a second. Then, she rested her hand gently on Elina’s head, stroking the soft hair between her fox ears.
"I am fine, Elina," Elysia lied softly. "Everything is in order."
But as she looked out at the peaceful horizon, Elysia knew the truth. She had won, but she had expended too much. The balance of power in the world had shifted. Malgorath was still out there, and he would sense that one of the great powers was gone and the other was weakened.
The peace was safe for today. But the winter of her soul was approaching, and she would need to rest.
"Come," Elysia said, her voice gentle. "Let us tend to the sapling. It needs our help to heal."
"Okay," Elina sniffed, wiping her eyes.
Together, the tired goddess and the relieved child knelt by the tree, pouring life back into it.