Chapter 418: _You Can’t Protect Him

"Father?" Kali repeated, looking between Ambrose, Orion and the young man standing beside the child. "What did I—"

Time’s pace came back to normal just then.

Devon, who’d been in the middle of running to Orion before the freeze ended, bumped into his older self instead.

"Ori..." He gasped.

The older version had caught his shoulders, preventing him from falling. Devon raised his head, staring into those familiar golden eyes.

Wait.

"... Prince Orion?" Memories of the time he and the others went into Orion’s dreamscape to stop the zombie apocalypse flashed in his head. "What? H-How are you... How are you here? Where did you—"

"Can someone explain what’s going on here?" Thoth shot to his feet.

Ambrose’s forehead crumpled. "I could ask you the same thing, actually." He turned to Loki and then Kali. "No one told me about him showing up."

Loki got up. "Alright, there are way too many people talking at once right now."

Thoth’s eyes pinned on Ambrose. "I was under the impression that you went to the Amazon."

"Well, now I’m here." Ambrose crossed the room, each step heavy with anger and something else. "What the hell happened? You must’ve done something to make his powers crank up like that."

"I merely came here to ask him a few harmless questions."

"Without sending me a text or something? Are you TRYING to get a reaction from me?"

His shadow pulsed.

"I thought we’d established that Ramona was psychologically conditioning him?"

"And your presence was supposed to stop that from happening?"

"I might be the only Guide on the planet capable of making him—"

"STOP IT!"

Every single light bulb, glass cup and window in the house shattered.

Ambrose’s hands flew to his ears.

Devon did the same as all eyes turned to the kid responsible.

Orion stared at all of them, cheeks flushed with frustration. "All of you, stop yelling. I don’t... I don’t like it," his chest rose and fell with heavy breaths, voice trembling. "I didn’t mean to make you fight, daddy. The bald uncle was only trying to help."

The SS-Rank’s chest immediately squeezed with guilt.

[You’ve got to calm down, sweetheart. The Pantheon already established that they don’t intend to bring Orion any harm.]

’A little too late for that...’ He rushed to Orion, crouching to his level. "Hey. Hey, buddy. You did not make me fight. I was only worried and rushed here as soon as I could, okay? I’m not fighting any—"

Older Orion suddenly grabbed his son’s shoulder.

He pulled him to himself, ignoring the confused glare Ambrose shot him.

"What are you doing?"

"Isn’t it obvious?" The older Orion’s voice was cold. "You promised, father. You promised that you’d protect him. That you’d protect us."

Ambrose got on his feet.

He attempted to grab his boy back... only to have an impossible heat spread through his fingers, forcing him to withdraw with a hiss.

"I won’t try anything stupid if I were you," the young man’s golden eyes glowed. "You’ve had your chance. I told you. I exist for a reason."

Loki snapped. "Boy, weren’t you just a dream last time?"

Kali and even Thoth gave them a disapproving scowl.

The older Orion didn’t so much as acknowledge Loki’s question.

His attention never drifted from Ambrose.

Golden eyes, so eerily similar to Orion’s, remained completely unreadable as they studied every minute change in the SS-Rank’s expression.

It wasn’t hatred reflected within them. Nor anger.

Only disappointment.

"You told me you would protect us."

Ambrose held his stare. "I meant every word."

"Did you?"

The question landed with surprising calmness.

"You promised no one would hurt him anymore. Yet someone entered this house and questioned him until he broke. You left him behind while you fought somewhere else. And when he became scared..." The older Orion slowly shook his head. "...the whole world paid the price."

Silence settled across the living room.

Ambrose found himself unable to immediately answer.

Because none of it was entirely false.

"The people we’re dealing with now aren’t ordinary enemies," he admitted at last, forcing himself to stay calm despite every instinct screaming at him to take Orion back. "Forces are moving behind the scenes that even I’m still trying to understand."

The older Orion’s expression remained unchanged. "So?"

Ambrose frowned. "So?"

"They’re stronger than you."

The room suddenly felt much colder.

Even Kali’s eyes narrowed.

No one in humanity casually spoke to an SS-Rank like that. No one looked at the man who had defeated the Void Entity and asked such a simple, terrifying question.

Ambrose didn’t answer immediately.

"... They are."

The older Orion nodded as though that merely confirmed something he’d already suspected.

"Then why should he stay with you?"

Devon’s breathing caught. "What?"

"If you cannot protect him," his arm tightened ever so slightly around Orion’s shoulder, "then I’ll continue doing what I’ve always done."

Orion instinctively grabbed the older boy’s sleeve. "W-We don’t have to leave..."

"We do."

"I don’t want Daddy to be sad."

"I know." The older Orion finally looked down at him, and for the first time warmth appeared on his face. "But you’re not safe."

Ambrose immediately took a step forward. "You don’t get to make that decision."

"I already have."

An oppressive pressure spread through the room.

Reality itself seemed to hesitate around the older Orion, the space surrounding him rippling as though it had begun separating from the rest of existence.

Loki’s expression twisted. "He’s actually using powers too? Outside a dream?"

Thoth’s brows furrowed deeper than Ambrose had ever seen.

Even he couldn’t immediately identify what kind of phenomenon he was witnessing.

Only Kali seemed to understand part of it.

"He’s rewriting coordinates," she murmured. "Not spatial ones."

Everyone looked at her.

"Existential coordinates."

The older Orion offered the faintest smile. "You really do understand."

Without another warning, countless golden particles began drifting from his body.

The air behind him folded inward, not like Gabriel’s portals, but as though the world itself had forgotten where that section of reality belonged.

Ambrose’s instincts exploded.

"Orion!"

The little boy reached toward him, tears already gathering in his eyes.

"Daddy—"

Before another word could leave either of them, both figures dissolved into a storm of golden light.

The particles scattered. The distorted space collapsed.

And then they were gone.

Only an unnatural silence remained.

★★★★★

Somewhere thousands of kilometres away, deep within the Amazon Rainforest, time had resumed.

Javier staggered as the overwhelming presence crashed back into his consciousness, while Valentine slowly turned toward the space where Ambrose had been standing only moments earlier.

"Where did he go?"