The sky has turned dark. The weather is sultry and humid. He walks around the city until he is sure that Chaos and Misaki can't be found by him. He decides to head back to the fountain.

A carriage suddenly stops in front of him. Ai halts in his track, wondering if the carriage driver can see him. But the carriage driver's eyes don't focus on him.

The man begins to inhale and exhale sharply. When his lord yells at him to continue driving, he doesn't follow his lord's command. All of a sudden, he jumps on the horse's back and bites its neck.

"What is…" Ai is speechless. The horse neighs violently before it starts running ahead. The man slips off the horse, rolling on the ground. He coughs up the blood before he sits up and turns his head around, looking at everyone with wide-red eyes.

"Is he sick?" Ai mumbles to himself. However, he makes no attempt to get closer to the man.

A few people walk closer to the man who suddenly starts laughing. Ai shrugs and walks away. There are screams behind him, but he doesn't look back. If an apocalypse is starting in this world, he's not going to be a part of it. He just wants to find his mother and sister.

Just then, he sees the Dark God. More or less, he has been expecting the Dark God to arrive here. The key is still in his pocket. In reality, he has been hoping that the Dark God would be smart enough to follow.

"Where is she?" The Dark God stares at him, unable to hide desperation and fear in his eyes. "She was with you."

"She hasn't left the world." Ai replies calmly, "She won't leave without me. She is looking for Chaos and Misaki."

Adira purses his lips, knitting his brows. He can't sense Ari but there's a turbulence in the air. The people in the city are acting strange.

"They are being affected." The Dark God sighs. "Is she truly a forsaken one?"

"She's also a goddess." Ai gives him a nod. "Are they affected by her?"

"Yes." Adira narrows his eyes. A goddess? Ari? How? What does he not know? Kresi turned out to be a goddess. Now, Ari is also one. "In which direction did she go?"

"I know her scent." With a straight face, Ai walks past him. "Please follow me, Dark God."

***

Ari covers her eyes with her hands when she hears Misaki's words. Her shoulders shake. Her hands are clenched into fists, covering her two eyes. Her lips tremble as she parts her lips to take deep breaths.

"You heard her." Chaos' voice is low and languid. "She doesn't want to go with you."

Misaki holds Chaos' hand tighter as she looks down on her feet with an uneasy look in her eyes. When she hears no response from Ari, she raises her head to peer at her. Ari is still standing on the stair, trembling with fisted hands.

"Shouldn't you leave already?" Misaki asks with a loud voice. "You should return to the place you came from."

A small smile appears on Chaos' red lips. She tilts her head, feeling satisfied after seeing Ari's pain. After the last ten years, she has grown attached to this girl beside her. The girl is quite talented. It's still a puzzle why Misaki has higher chaotic powers than any other face of hers. Misaki is still a mortal. One can only imagine what would happen if Misaki becomes a god.

It's not impossible for a mortal to become a god. Ryou was also a god, but he was born as a god.

"Brat."

Chaos blinks her eyes when she hears Ari's scornful voice. She crinkles her brows, lifting her chin to look at her.

"Of all the qualities," Ari removes her hands from her face as she utters in a dark tone, "you had to pick up his unreasonable traits."

"Unreasonable traits?" Misaki blinks her eyes in confusion.

"Being stubborn and foolish." Ari steps down the stairs. There are no tears in her eyes. She looks anything but sad. "I forgot… you are only ten. How could I let a kid get the best of me? So I was acting nice because we were meeting for the first time."

Her aura is completely different. She doesn't look like the woman who was trembling with sadness in her eyes. The current Ari has a chilling smile on her lips. It sends a shiver down Misaki's spine. Does this lady have a personality disorder?

"Abyss, didn't you hear?" Chaos pulls Misaki behind her, hiding her from Ari's gaze. "She doesn't want to go with you."

"So?" Ari gives her a smile that doesn't meet her eyes. "Ah… should I honour her wishes? A ten-year-old girl's wishes? Alright! I will honour her wishes after I grill her brain out of her skull."

Misaki peeks at Ari. "You want to grill my brain out?"

"And smack your butt until it's red." Ari cracks her knuckles. "My dear daughter, do you know that I also raised your father? I was quite lenient to him. After raising him, I realized that I should not have been lenient to that man. See, men grow into thick headed idiots if you pamper them too much. Since you are so much like your father, I am going to pamper you in the opposite way."

"Chaos!" Misaki looks up at Chaos' face. "Has she gone insane?"

"I don't know," Chaos mutters, unsure of why Ari is acting this way. Then again, Ari has always been a little… crazy. "Abyss, I am not going to let you harm Misaki."

"Kresi." Ari stops at the bottom of the stairs. "That was your name once. I am going to do my best in order to erase you today. After you come back, we will start over, okay?"

Erase? Chaos pales. She can't possibly be… "You don't know my true name. Besides, you will also die if you try to erase me."

"You are scared already." Ari laughs. "I don't have to know your true name, Chaos."

The ground shakes beneath them. Before Chaos could get a grip of the situation, Ari reappears behind her. She grabs Misaki by her neck and shoves her into the tear in space, sending her straight to Iravan. The portal to Iravan closes, muffling Misaki's scream. In the next instant, sixteen blue iridescent circles appear around Chaos, locking her in the spot.

Standing outside the invisible cubicle that is holding Chaos inside, Ari stares at Chaos back quietly.

"What a lazy trick!" Chaos chuckles. "You surprised me."

"Why are you acting high and mighty?" Ari walks around Chaos, studying her as a predator. "I am trying to decide what to do with you."

"Whatever." Chaos shrugs, tilting her head to her right, locking her eyes with Ari's. "This is your style. You will never kill me… well, not unless you also want to die with me."

"I don't mind dying again." Ari crosses her arms. "Did you forget that I am a forsaken creature? Even if I erase your name and force you into a dormant state, what can you do? I won't die like you. At most, I will be stuck in my world. My powers might get sealed. It's not a bad deal considering how much I hate you right now."

"List of my haters is long." Chaos keeps trying to break the imprisoning circles around her. The walls move closer to her as she continues to struggle. What did Abyss do to her?

"You and I are just pawns in the grand chess that is called the universe." Ari clasps her hands behind her back. "Giving stupid ideas to my daughters, manipulating her in a way that she doesn't think of me and Adira as her parents, using her to hurt me and complete your selfish desires… I didn't think that you would stoop this low."

"What do you know about me?" Chaos smirks at her, seemingly not afraid of what is coming for her. If she's gone, Abyss will also suffer. And Misaki? She will carry on her legacy. Abyss doesn't know about Misaki's abilities. "I don't regret anything. In fact, I would do the same thing again if I could turn back time."

"When you were Kresi and I was Ari, I had respect for you." Ari looks at her with sorrow in her eyes. "How did you turn into this person?"