Melina awoke to a deafening crash.
Moments ago, she had been carefully working to remove the Thorns of Rejection. Worried that one wrong move might harm the mother within or damage the Royal Capital, she had been meticulous—her mind fully focused, her consciousness projected into the task itself. It was a trance-like state, so deep that she'd nearly lost awareness of the outside world.
And yet, even in that state, halfway through her work, she heard it—a colossal noise from beyond, loud enough to make the Erdtree itself tremble.
Alarmed, Melina immediately halted her work. Snapping back to full awareness, she turned to ask Lloyd what was happening.
Then she saw it.
Not far behind her, at the Elden Throne, two fools—one large, one small—were trading blows with unrestrained joy, the clash of steel ringing like thunder.
At first, the fight had been measured, even elegant—two knights in a proper duel, fierce but graceful, their movements carrying a kind of noble rhythm.
That didn't last long.
As their blood heated, civility went out the window.
With a roar, the old man hurled his Greataxe aside. The lion spirit behind him—Serosh—stepped forward, ready to join the fight. But in the very next instant, the old man's massive hand gripped the lion's throat. With a violent wrench, he tore the spirit apart, then bathed himself in the blood pouring from its corpse.
It was the ritual known as the Beast Feast.
By wagering one's life against a mighty beast, a warrior sought to find his god—and through ritual sacrifice, take that god's strength for his own.
The ritual's form resembled a dragon's communion, but its essence was closer to the Hornsent's divine descent—an ancient, brutal rite practiced by the warriors of the highlands.
However...
After strangling Serosh and completing the Beast Feast, the old man suddenly realized something.
He wasn't fighting for his life. He was fighting for fun. Maybe, just maybe, he'd gone a bit too far.
But he didn't linger on the thought.
After all, this wasn't the first time.
Across countless wars, the Erdtree's magic had always leaned toward healing and resurrection. And because each Beast Feast demanded a sacrifice, Serosh had long served as his recurring offering. That was why the act had come so easily—it was practically muscle memory by now.
...
"Hey," Lloyd said, "you sure it's fine to just kill him like that?"
"It's fine," the old man replied calmly. "Not the first time. He's used to it."
"But I could've sworn I heard him yell something—'Amnion,' wasn't it?"
There was a pause. The old man frowned.
"Let's just keep fighting," he said. "I'll apologize later."
Then, straightening up and thumping a fist to his chest, he bellowed, "From this moment forth—I am Hoarah Loux! A warrior!''
Lloyd decided not to question it. Instead, he responded in kind—by drawing his weapon.
Not the old one, but a Straight Sword from the Lands Between—an Abyss variant.
After all, what kind of knight's duel would it be without a knight's sword?
The fight resumed.
But this time, it wasn't a clash between kings. It was two warriors—stripped of pretense—communing through combat in its purest form.
No magic. No flashy arts. Just raw strength and honed instinct.
It was primal. It was clean.
Midway through, dissatisfied even with the swordplay, Lloyd discarded his weapon and armor altogether. He met Hoarah Loux with nothing but his fists.
From there, chaos.
They fought from the front of the throne to behind it, then back again. Clothes tore. Armor shattered. The distance between them closed until it was all sweat, blood, and motion.
At last, Lloyd drove his fist through the old man's heart—only to resurrect him an instant later. After a few exchanged words, the two were laughing, arms slung around each other's shoulders, drinking like lifelong brothers.
"Isn't this family tree getting a little complicated?"
That comment didn't come from Melina, but from Godwyn—who had come to investigate the commotion, the other two brothers trailing behind him.
The old man who had fought Lloyd was none other than Godfrey—the First Elden Lord, Marika's first husband, and the father of the three brothers of the Godfrey line.
Godfrey had only just returned to Leyndell.
Or more precisely, he had died abroad during endless campaigns—and then been resurrected.
Not because his enemies were overwhelmingly strong, but because sheer exhaustion had finally claimed him.
As an exile, he had fought ceaselessly, denied all aid from the Golden Order.
When Godwyn was still alive, his eldest son had secretly sent him medicine and supplies. But after the Night of Black Knives—and especially after the Shattering—communication had ceased entirely. The distance, both physical and divine, had grown too great.
And then, not long ago, caught up in the fervor of battle, Godfrey had once again invoked the Beast Feast.
Only afterward did he realize the problem.
He and Serosh, as exiled Tarnished, were no longer blessed by the Erdtree. Which meant... they could not revive.
He didn't dwell on it long, though.
After all, Serosh wasn't just a sacrifice. He was also the embodiment of wisdom—essentially Godfrey's mind itself, much like how Redmane served as the mind of Radahn.
So when he lost Serosh, he lost his reason too.
And without his mind—and with his body already failing—Godfrey didn't last much longer.
After a time, he fell in battle, bleeding out his final drop of blood.
Having lost his blessing, Godfrey assumed that marked the end of his life.
Yet before long, as he closed his eyes, something strange stirred within him.
When he opened them again, he found himself resurrected—lying amidst a field of gravestones.
Alongside him stood Serosh, wearing an unmistakably resentful expression.
But that wasn't the point.
The point was that after coming back to life and speaking with others, Godfrey quickly learned the current state of the Lands Between.
Then he slapped his palm with realization.
"Oh… so this is what Marika meant by her 'backup plan,' huh?"
...
For context: Godfrey's exile as a Tarnished occurred right after he defeated the Storm King.
It was an odd time for such a banishment. The victory over the Storm King had officially ended the Giant War, marking the Golden Order Dynasty's rise to its peak—an age of unmatched prosperity and glory in the Lands Between.
And yet, instead of receiving the recognition and reward due to the First Elden Lord, the war's greatest hero, Godfrey was stripped of his title and cast out by the goddess herself.
That alone didn't make sense.
What made even less sense was how easily he accepted it. Despite the injustice, he never protested—he simply marched to the outer frontiers as a Tarnished and continued waging wars to expand the Golden Order's domain, without a word of resentment.
The reason, it turned out, was simple.
"Marika told me she'd sensed something was wrong," he recalled. "She said she needed to act, and wanted me out there as her contingency plan. So I went."
Godfrey trusted Marika completely. He didn't even question her reasoning—he left immediately.
As for Marika's later "second marriage" to Radagon?
"Aren't they basically the same person?"
"And even if you treat them as separate, their relationship was... well, hard to describe."
To outsiders, Radagon—Marika's supposed second husband—seemed to share a close bond with her. Even their three children believed so.
But Godfrey, as the one who'd shared her bed, knew better. Their relationship wasn't close at all. The only reason they hadn't killed each other outright was because they were two halves of the same being—if one died, the other would too.
If not for that constraint, they would've torn each other apart long ago.
...
After his resurrection and hearing about the current state of the Lands Between, Godfrey returned to Leyndell and met with Godwyn. There, he received a clearer understanding of the situation—particularly concerning Lloyd.
Once he understood what was going on, and since the matter involved his wife, Godfrey decided to head for the Erdtree to see for himself.
Godwyn had planned to accompany his father, but since one of the three brothers was away from the capital, he instead sent a message through the "chat group"—the cross-realm communication network Lloyd had created earlier.
Tagging Mohg, Godwyn then descended into the Subterranean Shunning-Grounds, projecting his brother's image through magical means so Mohg could meet their father remotely.
And while Godwyn was busy setting up that connection, the ever-restless old warrior set off on his own—straight toward the Elden Throne.
There, he encountered Lloyd, who had just arrived to set the Erdtree ablaze.
What followed was a battle, then understanding, and at last—camaraderie.
By the time it was over, Godfrey's opinion of Lloyd couldn't have been higher.
He had no objection whatsoever to Lloyd becoming the next Elden Lord.
In fact, he wholeheartedly approved.
If he'd had even the slightest attachment to that throne, he never would've left so easily back then.
In truth, Godfrey had always felt some resistance toward kingship. As a highland warrior, he longed for a life of battle and glory, not the tedium of politics. Being king meant maintaining a constant air of dignity—and worse, dealing with endless paperwork and petty affairs.
For a pure-blooded warrior of the Highlands, that was a fate worse than death.
So naturally, having someone else take his place on the throne suited him just fine.
...
While Godfrey was still feeling cheerful—pleased by the earlier fight and the fact someone else was willing to sit in the "royal prison" for him—Morgott stood off to the side, looking miserable.
Not because he resented his father, but because...
"These were all Runes..."
He gazed at the wreckage surrounding them—the shattered throne, the ruined hall—and his heart ached.
The capital's treasury had already been drained by years of war. Half the city was still in ruins, with repairs unfinished, and now this? The damage was catastrophic.
"Don't worry."
Seeing his brother's pained expression, Godwyn glanced around, then lowered his voice.
"When Mother gets back, he's going to regret it."
"I'm not worried about him," Morgott sighed. "I'm worried about the cost—and how much work it'll take to fix all this."
He let out another long breath and dropped the subject. There was no point agonizing over it now; better to focus on what came next.
...
Once the private conversation ended and the battle fully died down, the three brothers approached and began talking with Lloyd and Godfrey.
The discussion itself was simple—introductions, clarifications about the situation, and the obvious question: why had Lloyd come here at all?
When they learned he was here to burn the Erdtree, Melina's work happened to conclude at that very moment.
As the black-red flames faded, the massive Impenetrable Thorns that had blocked the entrance crumbled into ash.
Because the fire had been ignited from within, bypassing the tree's defenses, there was no regeneration, no outward spread—just a clear path revealed.
A golden fog gate.
The next step was clear: enter.
But before that, Lloyd had to choose who would go with him.
Even ignoring the usual four-person dungeon limit, Morgott and Mohg were out of the question—he couldn't exactly let the "village girl" wake up and find those two standing in front of her.
Since the brothers weren't going, Godwyn, as the eldest, decided to stay behind as well, waiting with them for their mother's return.
Melina was ready to enter, but Messmer was still handling matters in the Shadow City—and he wasn't mentally prepared to face his mother yet. So he would remain behind.
Godfrey, of course, was going in. He also asked Lloyd to revive Serosh first, then went off to apologize to the lion spirit in his own way.
That left one final slot.
After thinking it over, Lloyd opened the chat interface and tagged a familiar name.
[ Ashen One: @Queen of the Full Moon ]
[ Ashen One: The Thorns of Rejection are gone. Do you want to— ]
[ Queen of the Full Moon: Yes. ]
The next second, the golden summoning sigil flared to life. The Queen of the Full Moon appeared, tall hat and all.
After a brief exchange confirming the situation, Lloyd turned toward the fog gate and reached out his hand.
This time, though, he didn't push it open.
The gate flared with light and swallowed him whole.
...
When his vision cleared, Lloyd found himself in a gray, silent realm.
Above him arched a massive crescent-shaped Rune, like a sliver of the moon.
Hanging from it, bound in a posture of agony, was a golden-haired, broken puppet.
And embedded in her body—were four pitch-black fragments.