Chapter 298 - 298: The Years That Have Passed
"I thought fighting against Clark would be the most disgusting experience I will ever have... but this just tops it."
Around a month ago in Van's perspective, a few minutes after he brought the Platinum-rank Explorer to the Pit for Charlotte to fight, Charlotte was already surrounded by the Explorer's guts.
Perhaps one couldn't even call it a fight, as it really only lasted for almost a minute. The rest of the time was spent with Charlotte shrugging of the bits and pieces of the platinum-rank explorer. Since the skin of the explorer was probably harder than diamond, as soon as Charlotte was able to pierce it, his skin and flesh started to fly all over the place.
Some of his diamond-like skin even managed to pierce Charlotte, hence her current situation of being almost disgusted to death.
"Out of all the people he could have brought, the boy brought this one," Charlotte once again expressed her disgust as she waved her hand trying to pat away all the blood that managed to stuck on her, "...Although I suppose it's not exactly his fault this guy was the one brought by the Circle... just what exactly is going on there?"
After making sure she had cleaned herself of all the blood, Charlotte decided to step out of the Pit. However, her curiosity was already piqued.
She promised herself not to get involved with anything related to the Circle, but if Van had to be right about something, it was what he said about her being bored. And so, she wore a robe she casually stole from one of the laundries that were randomly hanging in the New Wall city, before proceeding to run towards the reservoir, where Van and the others should be.
She was talking with her daughter-in-law before Van brought the explorer, but she was sure Paris won't mind her being gone for a few hours.
***
"Oh, it's over?" Charlotte was careful not to show her face as soon as she passed by the battlefield where the members of the Resistance and the Circle drew blood. By the looks of it, the Resistance won by a landslide, a literal landslide as the body of the members of the Circle were scattered all over the place.
It would seem that instead of leaving prisoners, the Resistance decided to kill everyone. Charlotte then quickly left towards the colossal flying island that arrogantly blocked a piece of the sky before anyone could notice her.
A thundering noise trembled in the air as she pushed herself up, causing the ground beneath her to crack and form a crater. But midway towards the colossal flying island, her eyes noticed a pair of golden wings trailing from the island. Of course, since only Van was capable of something like that, she quickly recognized who it was.
What she didn't expect, however, was what followed. It was as if the sun suddenly appeared in front of her, swallowing everything in its path. She quickly clapped her hand in order to get away from it, but alas, she was still too slow.
She felt a slight burning sensation traveling through her body as the light swallowed her whole, and the second she opened her eyes, she found herself surrounded by people unknown to her. She was tied in chains, being dragged by people that were as small as Van.
"This one is awake!"
"What, you told me it was dead!? What are we going to do now!?"
"Kill it! Kill it before it notices anything!"
Charlotte could then feel something tickle her on the neck, she slightly looked down, only to see a large axe touching it. She then looked towards the small but muscular little people around her. They seemed to be talking to one another, but Charlotte could not figure out what language it was.
"!!!"
"It didn't do anything, run! Run!"
Seeing how they looked and their unusual strength, only one thing entered her mind-- she was inside a Portal, and these dwarves were monsters. With that thought, Charlotte quickly woke up from her stupor, ripping out the chains around her wrist and quickly grabbing one of the dwarves by the head.
And without her eyes even flickering, she crushed the dwarf's head. The other dwarves that saw this all quickly ran away, but their tracks were as short-lived as them, as Charlotte quickly blocked their paths, smashing their heads in one by one.
It wasn't until that last dwarf in the area was painted on the floor before Charlotte realized that she might not actually be inside a Portal. The 8 moons, as well as her System not showing no matter how much she called it… she was probably in a different place altogether, she quickly thought.
She didn't let herself panic, however, as she quickly followed the tracks on the ground until she found herself on a cliff, with the view of a town that was kilometers away on the horizon. However, instead of quickly entering it, she just watched the town's activity for a whole week.
And in that week, she didn't even see anyone that resembled a human. There were a few that got her excited, but when she was about to approach them, she noticed that their ears were longer than usual.
It wasn't until the 8th day that Charlotte finally approached the town. And as soon as she did so, the lively town became even livelier as the bells that scattered along its walls rang with her arrival.
Charlotte was quickly ambushed by hundreds of dwarves, all looking at her with their eyes filled with either fear or awe.
"A High Human?" One of the dwarves, who was wearing a full armor that almost made him look spherical, carefully approached Charlotte, "Did you need something from our Realm? Have you come here to request something of us?"
Although the tone of the dwarf's voice was respectful, Charlotte could still clearly hear the inquisitiveness in it. There was a high chance that they already found the bodies that Charlotte left last week, and considering the nerves she could hear popping left to right from the other dwarven soldiers, all of them were aware of it.
Charlotte did not immediately respond, instead, she raised her hand after a few minutes, causing the group that surrounded her to immediately raise their weapons.
"You called me a High Human," Charlotte said calmly, "So tell me, where can I find more of my kind?"
Similar to Van, Charlotte was quickly pointed to Vanaheim. She was also advised to use the River but found that she could not use it. And so, instead, she had to go on the Branch. It took more than a month for her to reach Vanaheim, even with only one Realm in between as the Branch seemed to rest at a random interval in each Realm it passes through. Random, but never less than a week and not more than 6 months.
She was quickly welcomed at Vanaheim, but what she found there weren't friends, but strangers. There were no signs of anyone she knew there, not even the Olympians that should have left their marks in this world one way or another.
And so, for the first time in her stay in this unfamiliar world, she lost hope… but she persevered. Only the thought of meeting her family kept her moving. If there was a place that her acquaintances and friends would eventually end up in, it would be in Vanaheim, she thought as she stayed there for years. But an event happened that caused her to be exiled from Vanaheim, once again making her a nomad that traveled from Realm to Realm.
She doesn't know when she decided it, but eventually, she decided to stay put on the Branch, making it a routine to always check each entrance of the Realm to try and see if someone she knew would eventually ride it.
She had a stall on the very end of the Branch at first, but with the years passing, her place regressed bit by bit… until she found herself creating a tavern at the other end of the Branch… and without her knowing, she had already given up.
The only reason she was still walking to the entrance of each Realm was because of a routine that her body had already memorized all through the thousand years she had spent here.
Until finally, her eyes met with Van's. It wasn't happiness, it wasn't relief, nor was it excitement she felt-- it was fear. A feeling of fear that she knew who the young man was in front of her, but at the same time, she didn't. It was as if he was a ghost of her past that tried to break the routine that had already been programmed into her.
It wasn't until another memory resurfaced from her mind that she finally remembered who Van was. And so, here she was, surrounded by dwarves as the bells that were scattered on each wall of the town rang as soon as she arrived.
She was quickly surrounded by the dwarves that held eyes of either fear or--
"Miss Charlotte, you've already told me that."
"Oh, did I?"
Charlotte's awkward chuckle once again echoed throughout the dilapidated tavern, "My, I don't know what's gotten into me. Angela's weirdness has probably infected me."
Charlotte then stood up from her seat as she walked around the tavern. Van could only grit his teeth lightly as he saw Charlotte's state. If her memories were already scrambled, was it possible that she was missing a lot of information?
She might have even met someone she knew, she just doesn't remember it.
"Or maybe it's just my age showing, you know?" Charlotte's face then turned older, her features returning to how Van remembers it. But as soon as Charlotte did that, a spark was quickly lit up inside Van's mind.
"I saw your son!" Van stood up, accidentally breaking the table as he slammed his fists onto it, "Your son… I saw him!"
"You saw… my son?" Charlotte could not help but blink a couple of times from Van's words, "W… where?"
"It's been bothering me for a while now. Why I couldn't remember who the old man was that I saw before the Gates of Jotunheim exploded," Van started to stutter as his breaths slightly became erratic, "It was because he was younger when I met him."
And now that he had once again seen Charlotte's old face, he could not deny the likeness that the two shared.
"If it's him… then he didn't go through the River," Van then looked around aimlessly as thoughts rushed into his mind, "He teleported!"
"Evans… what are you saying? When did you see my son?" Charlotte's eyes trembled as she slowly approached Van, her lips also shivering. Van, however, was lost in his own thoughts.
"He could teleport," Van whispered, "Then it's possible that…
...he isn't even in Asgard."