Chapter 33 - An Ancient Power Looks On

There were flames. Flames everywhere, it was just a planet yet it burned brighter than most stars. The flames were a natural part of the environment, like the way sand on a beach was natural. It didn't matter where, no matter how high or low, everything was burning.

The rivers and lakes were made of magma, even the wide oceans were also made of magma.

Hundreds of thousands of volcanoes were continuously erupting every minute, increasing the amount of magma that filled the seas and oceans.

The continents and islands were not much different, there were eruptions of flames from the ground almost everywhere.

The most frightening thing was the size, the sheer size of this one planet, it had a radius of over 10 trillion kilometers, that was an entire lightyear. That was just how enormous this planet was.

Instead of moons, it was orbited by entire star systems, however one should make no mistake; it was still a planet in the end, just one that was easily mistaken for an ancient star.

On a small rock in one of the millions of large islands that existed on this planet, there was an eruption of flames of greater intensity than all others in sight, and from the midst of these flames a being walked out He was about ten meters tall, with a horned crown on his head.

His body visibly seemed to be made of rocks and fire, yet it also seemed organic at the same time.

Strapped to his back was a giant great sword, almost as tall as he was.

The lands of this planet seemed to have adapted to the heat of its continuous flames, yet the flames emitted from this beings body, were able to melt the rocks that have stood strong through countless volcanic eruptions.

With each step he took the ground trembled under his feet, the monsters that inhabited the land cowered in fear at his presence, some even took their lives out of fear. Paying this no mind, he casually walked over to the center of this island, where a giant head larger than him was rested.

The head was that of a serpent but it was too huge. The length of its body was long enough to coil round this ridiculously large planet. It was covered in ash gray scales that had various scars on it.

The flaming being spoke towards the gigantic serpent.

"How long are you going to sleep, it's been thousands of years you know? I know you can hear me."

At his words, the serpent opened its green eyes, rose its head from the ground and spoke,

"Surtr, do you not know the saying that it's not wise to disturb a slumbering serpent."

The flaming being, Fire Giant King, Surtr, laughed and replied,

"I know not of such a saying, if you really wanted to slumber without disturbance, go somewhere else, maybe Harmarti might let you stay in Jotunheim."

"We both know that's not gonna happen, that guy has hated me ever since I destroyed a part of his home world by accident, by the way, what brings you here?"

"Ah that's right, I came to have you look at something for me, it might interest you too."

As soon as Surtr said this, the serpent's eyes widened, it then began laughing boisterously,

"Despite having devoured thousands of galaxies and slurping countless rivers of stars dry, there has been nothing of interest to me in thousands of years, which is why I came here, shrunk myself and slumbered, so I may at least find solace in my dreams.

Yet, you tell me that there exists something that is worthy of my interest, worthy of me, the Galaxy Devouring Serpent, Jormungand."

His little speech divulged the identity of this serpent large enough to coil round this ridiculously large world in its shrunken state, it was none other than the middle child of Loki and the giantess Angrboða, the Space Serpent cast out into the oceans of Midgard, Jormungand.

Surtr nodded solemnly at Jormungand's words and proceeded to inform him of the prophecy of a child with the power to end the gods. Surtr had plans to recruit this child as an ally of his, however he heard a rumor recently saying that he was unable to use magic, the most common of all energies.

"I simply came to you to see if it is true, you can also check if you are fated with this child too, it's a win, at least from my point of view."

"Haha, very well then, to think such things had been happening while I slumbered."

Jormungand's eyes then glowed an iridescent light as he spoke once again.

[Authority of Destiny]

Looking at this, Surtr shook his head and sighed thinking,

'I really don't know why he decided to dabble in the law of destiny, at least he did not neglect his other strengths, his flame, space and poison control are all higher than the last time i was here.'

While he was thinking about this, Jormungand was seeing a myriad of things, with the Authority of destiny, he could peer into the destiny of a being as far as he had sufficient information about them. He was currently looking into Arthur's destiny, however to his surprise there were many things he could not see, he could only see small events of up about four years into the future, everything else was blank.

Normally, anyone of sufficient strength or casuality index could resist having their destiny seen, stronger ones could even send attacks to the ones who were trying to peer into them. However, Arthur did not have the necessary strength to do so yet Jormungand could not see much.

That was when something strange happened, he felt a gaze, this was not the gaze of Surtr beside him, it was the gaze of someone else, someone who had interfered with his Authority and was preventing him from seeing anything about Arthur.

He then heard a voice speaking.

|Do not overstep your bounds, Serpent.|

Then the connection was cut off. This was the second time he had experienced something like this ever since he started using the power of destiny, the first was with the Asgardian King Odin. He had tried to peer into Thor's destiny, unfortunately, Thor was in the presence of Odin at the time so Odin interfered with the connection and cut it off, not before sending a warning to Jormungand. At that time, he just laughed and let it be, however this time was different.

He turned to Surtr and spoke,

"I did find that the child truly does not have the ability to use magic, as for the reason, that is unknown, secondly, tread carefully around that child, he seems to have a protector on the same level of strength as me."

Surtr was shocked, he knew that there were beings that wanted to protect this child from the shadows, however he did not expect them to personally move, at most he expected them to send a few subordinates. However, someone on Jormungand's level of strength could not be subordinated to someone else, at least as far as he knew.

"What are you going to do Jormungand?"

"Nothing, even if I went over to where the child is, there would not be a point, he is much too young and too weak to interest me for now, as for his protector, fighting them would be nothing but a waste of time and strength.

If I fought everyone who was on my level, then I would not have survived this long, besides, whoever they were, they were not hostile."

"In other words, you're going back to sleep?"

"Yes, wake me up when the child has become an adult, I'd see him then."

Surtr just sighed and nodded in affirmation before walking out. Just before he teleported away, he grinned mischievously before saying,

"I have other things to do than to wake up a big snake like you, I'd tell your big brother to wake you up."

At his words, Jormungand visibly trembled before glaring in Surtr's direction but unfortunately, by then the fire giant was already long gone.

'Well, it's his loss, Fenrir isn't exactly one who would listen to such nonsense.'

Jormungand ignored Surtr's words before returning to his slumber.

◇　◇　◇

Much like Surtr and Jormungand, many other powers tried to find out if the rumor of Arthur's inability to use his energies was true. They tried various means but while some were able to confirm its authenticity, a lot also failed in doing so.

The spies sent were personally rooted out by the combination of Cattleya, Belphegor and Duke Hollis. The Hollis family was one known for their exceptional summoning techniques and the summons controlled by the Duke himself were the most powerful, with some even being in the inferior stage of the high tier deity realm.

These powerful summons and the subordinates of Belphegor and Cattleya, made short work of the spies and assassins who were sent.

Naturally most of the universal powers did not believe the rumors, but the devils simply didn't care if they did or not.

◇　◇　◇

As for Arthur, he could be seen wandering around as usual, except this time he was flying instead of walking. Except the royal family or during emergencies, flying is prohibited within the capital world of the Devildom.

For Arthur, the skies were practically his territory as he flew to almost everywhere and hardly walked anymore. The citizens who saw him began to doubt the rumor that his magic blooming had failed but Arthur usually just laughed whenever he heard their words.

This continued for months and eventually, the attacks by the other powers and pantheons died down.

◇　◇　◇

One Random morning, Arthur was sitting on a bench in one of the parks and was thinking on what to do to kill his boredom.

Layla was preparing for her entrance exams into the Royal academy that would take place in a few weeks. Arthur also ought to be preparing but he simply dismissed it saying it was impossible for him to fail, naturally because he's a genius.

The Royal academy was one of the most prestigious known schools in the Devildom. It was located on one of the planets in the same solar system as the capital world and was also one of the largest.

The entire planet was the property of the school, everything the students would possibly need for the six years they were to spend there was provided. They were allowed a few vacations but they needed good reasons to take them.

Another feature of the school was that it was a place where your status did not matter, this applied even to the royals.

The aim was to teach the young devils to rely on themselves and not the status and power held by their families. Although this was the aim, it was an unspoken rule in the academy that the statuses of every individual still mattered.

There are some who still bully those of lesser status or those who only seek to curry favor form those of higher status.

As Arthur was thinking about how he was going to make sure Layla takes first in the exams, simply for the reason that being the freshman representative is too much work, he noticed a presence in front of him.

Looking up, he met eyes with a blue haired, blue eyed woman. As he tilted his head in confusion, wondering why she was staring at him, she finally spoke.

"Um.. I'm not exactly familiar with the capital, and you seemed less busy so I was wondering if you could show me around, not for free of course, I'd treat you to a meal afterwards."

Arthur scrutinized her for a few seconds before nodding in agreement.

"Really? Thanks, you seemed like you weren't going to agree for a moment there."

She seemed visibly happy at his agreement, Arthur replied while staring at her skeptically.

"You sure you didn't come to me on purpose?"

"Huh? What do you mean?"

"I could have sworn I'd felt your gaze before, just can't remember when."

Arthur was not looking at her when he said that, if he was, he'd have noticed that she flinched slightly at his words. Recomposing herself, she replied.

"This is our first time meeting though?"

"Yeah I know, I'm Arthur By the way, what's your name?"

Seeing that he seemed to have reduced his suspicions, she smiled brightly and replied,

"Alexia, nice to meet you Arthur."

That was his first meeting with Alexia, the one who protected him from Jormungand's Authority.