Hakurei Shrine.

This shrine built on a high mountain is not dilapidated, but it can also be called deserted.

Although the shrine doesn't have to be in a crowded area, the location should not be too secluded for the sake of incense.

As a result, it is not uncommon for not a single nearby village to be seen, and there are no villagers at Hakurei Shrine, which has a staircase length that even young people with good physical strength fear, do not see at all.

Most of the inhabitants of the human world only know about the existence of this shrine, and they don't even know what kind of gods are enshrined in it.

At this moment, Yakumo Purple was stepping on the stairs step by step and walked into the approach road in front of him.

She was not surprised that the shrine with dismal incense was spotless, and she did not use the incomparably convenient gap, but stared at the torii gate in the distance and walked calmly.

In this short period of time, Omotesando, which is still quite wide, has come to an end, but Yakumo Murasaki still hasn't stopped.

It's strange that from a distance, it looks like the approach with an end, but when you actually set foot in it, the end seems to be far away.

In the face of this strange phenomenon, Yakumo's face did not change, and she continued to move forward, and as she walked, the remaining rainwater on the stone slabs of the approach became more and more dry, and from the cracks in the shade of the trees next to her, the sunlight that had been insulated from Gensokyo for the past few days was revealed.

At the end of the approach, in the torii, a black-haired boy sat quietly, as if asleep.

"I don't expect you to work, but isn't it too decadent to bask in the sun like this, I'm very busy here."

Yakumo said pretending to be angry, with an intriguing smile on her face.

"Wouldn't it hurt to put all the aftermath on the seventeen-year-old beautiful girl and rest here leisurely alone?"

"Seventeen-year-old beautiful girl......" Roland opened his eyes and looked at Yakumo Purple with some surprise.

The smiling Yakumo Zi didn't know where to pull out a folding fan, blocking her delicate face, and stared at Roland with those purple eyes that seemed to be able to speak.

The blonde beauty and the quaint shrine complement each other's beauty, but from Yakumo's coquettish laughter, Roland only reads a malicious warning.

If she continues to investigate, she will have to use her body to remember how cunning and playful a girl of this age is.

Roland turned his head, and his tone softened a lot.

"It's rude to say that you didn't do anything, isn't this space you're in my masterpiece?"

He snapped his fingers, and the next moment, the mirror-like torii gate and road to Hakurei Shrine disappeared like foam.

Yakumo Murashi is in the garden.

Centered on the vast palace, it is surrounded by seven towers, beautiful courtyards, waterways, and springs.

The buildings are almost always made of pure white stone. A grand and chic style, commensurate with the status of the residence of the princes of the gods.

Elegant man-made pools and fountains, colorful flowers and plants.

Beyond the stone floors within the confines of this garden is a bare field.

The infinite stretch of the earth is covered with grass, but there is no life or trees in sight.

Only the palace to which this garden belongs is a sanctuary isolated in this wilderness.

Such a change in heaven and earth made Yakumo Zi blink, she was not surprised that Roland could do such a thing, but because...... The light of the stars in the sky was amazing.

The monster sage raised his head, only to find that there was an exceptionally large blue planet above his head-

"Huh, Earth!?"

Yakumo thought she was dazzled.

The blue of the ocean is interspersed with the green and brown of the earth, and the white of the clouds is dotted on top.

"With such a magnificent palace, I really don't know whether to criticize your depravity of poverty and luxury or praise your ambition to pursue your dreams."

"Why can't we have them all, welcome to the [Temple of Infinite Time], although this idea of being outside of time and space is just a replica, my scale is much larger than the original."

"In other words, this is not any place on earth, but a special space, similar to the replica of the universe you used the power of the realm to create before?"

"There are a lot of differences, but you're right."

Roland continued.

"This is a sacred space where neither the material world nor the spiritual world can accommodate the other, and there is nothing but this temple, and the difference between it and that universe is that it is not based on the realm, but on the basis of the principle of longing that I hold."

"Even if I heard you say that, I can't understand it at all."

Yakumo muttered.

"All in all, it's a peculiar point that doesn't belong to any world.,It's the end of the world.,Right.,No wonder you can't reach it with a gap.,You can only walk from the mirror of Hakurei Shrine.。

After pulling Roland back from the deepest part of the universe, Yakumo Murasaki temporarily placed him in the temporarily empty Hakurei Shrine.

And in order to be able to carry his own power, Roland took advantage of the characteristics of Hakurei Shrine, which is the entrance to Gensokyo, to create this space.

The sky of this temple of infinite time floated above the blue earth and the brilliant stars of the universe, just like the sky that you were looking back at on the surface of the moon.

However, compared to the scenery of this temple, Yakumo was more curious about another thing.

"What is this?"

Yakumo Zi looked at the mighty throne beneath Roland.

It is located at the highest point of the temple and is the color of gold.

And at the top of the Golden Throne, the cracked star cup was the most dazzling gem, and it emitted a soft glow that stained the entire temple with a layer of treasure.

Even the light emitted by the universe and planets that act as ceilings above us cannot be compared.

With the passage of time, the sky has turned into a crimson sky at sunset, and the throne is dyed orange by the setting sun, adding a bit of brilliant color.

In this hazy light, it is inevitable that people will wonder whether it is the Golden Throne that stains the sky red, or the sky that stains the Golden Throne red.

If you look at it from this glorious throne, you will only see the scenery of the far and wide.

But even so, it's a little strange that he's been sitting on the throne since he came in, right?

In Yakumo's impression, Roland is not a person who would show arrogance in this way.

"Don't care, it's just an amplifier."

Roland chuckled at Yakumo, who was still a little confused.

"Now that you've had time to come over, it seems that Gensokyo has almost adjusted."

"The main things are pretty much the same, but the rest of the work is not idle."

Although Yakumo Murasaki, who has the name of a monster sage, is often criticized as a monster idler because of his too casual style.

But to be honest, for Yakumo Murasaki, who is in charge of adjusting the Hakurei Great Enchantment, she doesn't have much free time lately.

In the false universe created by the realm before, the anomaly of the direct disappearance of the sun and many stars really caused a lot of vibrations in Gensokyo.

The cloudy skies and the hazy drizzle that fell from time to time were the remnants of that turmoil.

Ironically, the inhabitants of the Human World, accustomed to the chaos and lack of contact with the transcendent truth, quickly quelled the commotion and returned to their daily routines.

The self-proclaimed powerful youkai are in a panic, if it weren't for the fact that the monsters that could really affect Gensokyo were not substantially damaged, and the outside world had returned to its original state, I'm afraid that Yakumo Purple would still not be able to spare time now.

However, after appeasing the main forces and using the past reputation to pin the black cauldron of this mutation on himself, the rest only needs to be natural.

Common sense is used to smash Gensokyo, and both youkai and humans know this.

Under the subtle influence of the Hakurei Great Enchantment, those youkai who are still worried will gradually calm down, and soon this change will become the talk of the after-dinner in Gensokyo.

Except for the two sages, no one would know that this world was once only a thin line away from death.

No, even the Moon's Mind probably couldn't comprehend this emotion, and no amount of theoretical conjecture could compare to seeing the desperate battlefield in person.

"Thankfully, it's all in the past."

Yakumo Zi smiled bitterly.

"I don't want to spoil the fun at this moment, but it's a bit early to say that."

“……”

Looking at the frozen Yakumo Murasaki, Roland shrugged his shoulders.

His expression was a little calm and helpless.

"This victory only delays the time of the disaster."

"Why? When is the next one? ”

Yakumo didn't know what kind of expression she should show now, but the sense of security at Roland's side brought her back to her senses and made her start to prepare for the next apocalypse.

However, Roland's answer made her completely stunned.

"Hmm...... It's too much trouble to explain something, so you'd better take a look for yourself. ”

Roland held his face with his hand and hooked his hand towards Yakumo.

Without even half a barrier, Yakumo Murasaki's consciousness broke away from her body and began to fall under Roland's wrapping.

The location is - below the throne.

Yakumo Zi's heart was shocked, and he immediately entered a state of meditation. When you don't need to be in charge, it's easier to do this than to read and write.

Even if it can't be spread, at least it can bring back some information that can be called a clue.

"It's ...... Universe? ”

Countless stars are scattered in the dark space.

This image emerges from the inside of Yakumo's tightly closed eyelids.

Underneath the throne, darkness envelops everything like an eggshell.

But in this void, pitch-black egg shell, there is a crack, and the golden throne where Roland sits is located right above the rift.

In this seemingly endless crack, there are dots of brightness.

Sun, Moon, Mars and Venus.

Stars outside the solar system are in the shape of "dots", while those objects right next to the Earth are the size of a football.

But......

The place where the sun illuminates is not the blue earth, but the golden throne itself.

Even the Sun, which can build the orbits of celestial bodies with its own gravity and form galaxies, is under the constraints of the throne.

If the Golden Throne is like a big tree with lush foliage, the current sun is the size of a beautiful bonsai in the impression of Yakumo Murasaki.

"It's like looking at the world from a higher dimensional perspective, but is there still a crack in the world that hasn't been repaired......

At the moment when Yakumo murmured, her gaze dived deeper again.

Immediately, she noticed

- The reason why the crack was not repaired.

It's not that the world doesn't want to recover, it's that it can't.

A huge black snake hovered over the outside of the rift, like the snake that surrounded the World Tree, and it lay on top of the rift, as if it would burrow in the next moment.

Intuition told Yakumo that this wingless black snake was exactly what the snake phantom that was dissipating on the battlefield when she rushed to save Roland was alive.

Because the brilliant red eyes are the chaos that is similar to the illusory shadow.

The snake's eyes were only slightly open, and there was no movement, as if half-asleep and half-awake.

But it seemed that Yakumo's gaze was too sharp, and the black snake's eyelids suddenly trembled, and just as Yakumo Zi subconsciously held her breath and was at a loss, the temple that radiated light returned to her field of vision.

At the crucial moment, Roland pulled her back to the surface and avoided the worst.

"In order to prevent you from waking it up, I can only show you this level of intelligence, but this level should be enough for you to understand that I am not alarmist, as for when the next disaster will be......" Roland suddenly changed his words.

"I can't say for sure, but the specific omen should be when I leave this golden throne."

Roland smiled and sighed.

"The emperor's name is really inseparable from the matter of the soul returning to the Golden Throne, and I knew that they should not be allowed to spread this name."

"When you leave the throne?"

Yakumo Zi frowned, and suddenly had an ominous premonition in her heart.

"That's right, because I'll come back to life when I leave the throne that amplified the principles of eternal calamity."

"Come alive?"

"Well, didn't you notice? I'm dead right now. ”

Looking at the stunned Yakumo Purple, Roland showed a light smile.

"In order to maintain the status of the Most High Angel disciple at this moment, I must die, otherwise this apocalypse will not end at all."

Yes.

The dragon god thought that killing the winged serpent would be considered a victory, and this answer based on the future of the world was not wrong, but it was incomplete.

This temporary victory is only the beginning of disaster.

In the course of his battle with the Winged Serpent, Roland realizes this.

That's why he will let the winged serpent swallow his possibilities in his final state, not because he wants to take risks for victory, but because he is certain to die, which is the basis for temporary victory.

"As soon as it senses my breath of life, this snake will immediately break free from my eternal calamity and wipe out the world and me in a single thought."

"Incomprehensible ......"

Yakumo Purple was even more puzzled.

If Roland is in a state of death, then why can he still enter his realm of power, and why can he come into contact with himself?

Although repeatedly jumping sideways in the realm of life and death is also Yakumo's specialty, according to the level of the enemy, she doesn't think that the black snake even has the ability to tell whether Roland is dead or not.

"As a result, there's no doubt that Roland is dead."

Roland glanced at Yakumo Zi strangely, and said meaningfully, "As for why you were able to contact me, have you forgotten how I communicated with you at that time?" ”

"At night, of course, you trespassed into my dreams......"

Before the words were finished, Yakumo Zi's pupils shrank suddenly, and her pretty face suddenly froze.

In the Temple of Infinite Time, the sleeping Roland Houru fell asleep.

(End of chapter)