Gospel of Blood-Chapter 669 : The End and the Beginning

In the endless void, above the river of time.

The “slumbering” Charlotte quietly floated above countless fragments of history.

Her figure was illusory, not a true body, but merely a projection of will.

If one were to look closely, they would discover that behind that projected figure, her true form was not divine spark and divine flame, but a crimson book.

Charlotte calmly gazed at the river of time below.

As she personally wrote history, more than half of the shattered river of time had already been repaired.

From the moment she traveled back to the ancient era, to the moment she bid Artemis farewell and chose to “slumber.”

The missing stretches of history were no longer blank—they had been filled in by her own hand. And the empty parts after her “slumber” had also begun to manifest, continuously unfolding under Artemis’s guidance.

The river of time had jumped beyond both time and space.

Here, Charlotte could clearly see, through the countless newly added scenes of history, everything that had happened after she left.

She saw the elves’ eastward migration, she saw the rise of the bloodborne, and she saw “Lilith,” just like in the former history, become the true True Ancestor of Blood.

She also saw the premature awakening of the Will of Origin, saw the schism of the bloodborne, and saw the isolated, helpless Artemis anxiously searching for the place where she slept.

Watching the bloodborne she had personally created once again be corrupted by the Origin, seeing Artemis’s face sink into despair, there were moments when Charlotte almost couldn’t help but reach out.

But she knew she could not.

“Hold it together. I have to hold it together.”

“No matter how badly it’s been wounded, the history in this river of time is still fundamentally the Origin’s home field.”

“The power of the Origin is buried in all things. Unless I destroy the world itself, there is simply no way to kill it completely.”

“Right now, the history of Myria still revolves around it. If I act now, it will still only be a destined-to-fail ‘change.’ What I need isn’t to change history, but to… create history.”

That’s right—Charlotte had never truly fallen into “slumber.”

So-called “slumber” was just a lie to deceive the Origin. Back during that clash where she destroyed the Western Continent, Charlotte had already recognized a fact she was forced to face—relying on conventional means alone, she could not drive the Origin out, nor kill it.

She had no choice. The Origin was bound far too tightly to the Myria world.

Its laws were everywhere, its power buried in all things in existence.

Even the river of time had long since had its endpoint set by it. No matter how the history in between was filled in, the final endpoint would not change.

That endpoint was that the Origin would awaken—and… would reclaim all of its power.

In other words, unless Charlotte chose to destroy the world ahead of schedule—obliterating the entire world together with time and space before that final node arrived—she had no way to kill it.

However…

“If I destroy the world, then what meaning is there in anything I’ve done up to now?”

Charlotte shook her head.

Destruction is always easier than creation.

She had already reached the Creation-rank. If she chose to destroy the world, it would not be beyond her ability. But once that was done, nothing of Myria would remain.

Perhaps, with her vast power, she could create a new world. Perhaps she could leave this universe and seek out another world that might be reshaped.

But if she did that, then aside from herself, everything she had once known and everything she had experienced would cease to exist.

That would be true, absolute nonexistence—so absolute that even she herself would have to “forget” it, otherwise it could not be called “world’s end.”

Yet even so, it still wouldn’t necessarily mean the Origin would truly die.

After all, the Origin was also Creation-rank—and it could also run.

Besides, what meaning would there be in that?

By now she already had the capital to oppose the Origin. If she only wanted to live, she could simply escape this world. And the Origin, which used Myria as its nourishment, might not even pursue her once it fully regained its power.

The reason she still chose to stand against the Origin was not because of survival—it was because she refused to let it devour the Myria world. She wanted to eradicate this hidden threat once and for all.

So…

“I can’t fight it on its home field. I should… fight it on mine.”

With that thought, Charlotte once again looked toward the river of time.

Without her balancing presence, the Origin had quickly regained control over “history.”

She saw “Lilith’s” “fall.” She saw the bloodborne fracture. She saw the furious Harald break with the bloodborne and establish the Holy Court, hunting down those corrupted bloodborne who had besieged “Lilith.”

She watched Harald develop the Holy Court, attempting to use their faith to call her awake. She could even hear the prayers and pleas rising from those fragments of history.

But she did not respond.

She saw the Origin’s power reappear in Harald, saw it attempt to wrest control of the Holy Court from him. She saw Harald once again use himself as a prison, hoping to bind the Origin within.

Yet all of it failed to alter the course of history.

“History that has already happened cannot be changed.”

Once Charlotte stopped intervening in the repair of the shattered river of time, this law the Origin had left behind began to fully exert its effect.

And once the Origin realized that Charlotte existed as such a formidable enemy, it too began to move.

It started actively repairing those stretches of lost history, and began frantically searching across Myria for any trace of Charlotte.

Unfortunately for it, it was destined never to find her.

Charlotte had already stepped out of the river of time, standing high above in the endless void, watching it all with cold eyes.

But the Origin could not do that. It therefore had no way to find her trace.

This, too, was the price of becoming one with all things.

By fusing its power with the Myria world, the Origin had obtained the highest authority and successfully turned everything in Myria into nourishment for its own growth. But at the same time, it was also shackled by the “weight” of the Myria world.

The river of time existed at a level higher than the present world.

Unless it stripped its power away from Myria, the Origin could not step beyond all this.

And this was precisely why it had to leave behind the law that “history which has already happened cannot be changed.”

As for now, all it could do was fill in all the missing history, thoroughly sealing up any gaps where Charlotte might meddle with the history of the present.

Charlotte did not stop it.

She continued to watch from on high.

She saw the Holy Court grow stronger. She saw the establishment and downfall of the Yunette Empire. She saw the Origin’s feelers touch every corner of the world—leaving not even the elves untouched.

She saw… the Origin pretend to fall into slumber once more, while in reality it continued to watch everything, waiting for her to appear.

And so…

A thousand years drifted by.

In the Year 1428 of the Holy Calendar—

Duchy of Bolde, Castell Manor.

With a crisp infant cry, the ancient Castell family welcomed the birth of an heir.

The young Count of Castell was overjoyed, and gave his newborn daughter a resounding name—Charlotte.

Unfortunately, only a few years after the young countess was born, the young couple perished in a balor-fire catastrophe that swept through Bolde City. The little countess’s spiritual foundation was damaged by the magic, leaving her ever more frail and sickly from that day on.

Fifteen years later—

The frail, sickly young countess finally failed to withstand the torment of her illness and closed her eyes forever.

A familiar call rose from the mortal world.

Through the continuously evolving fragments of time, gazing toward the old woman of the Castell family whose mind had long since been eroded by the Origin’s power, Charlotte knew her time had come.

This was the end of everything.

And it would also be… the beginning of everything.

Crimson light blossomed across her form as her gaze fell upon the old woman.

The muttered incantation on the old woman’s lips quietly shifted; the target of her summoning changed without her knowing.

At the same time, Charlotte transformed into a streak of crimson light and, together with a foreign soul that had successfully crossed time under her guidance, descended upon Castell Manor.

In the next moment, the jewel of Castell—the prematurely deceased young countess Charlotte de Castell—slowly opened her dazed eyes.