System: Daily login!!, jackpot on the first day!!!-Chapter 491 - The Story

A moment later.

Taufik and all the men of the family were gathered in the garden, seated around the gazebo as the warm afternoon light filtered through the vines above. The women, meanwhile, had taken over the garden like a small army, directing maids, ordering decorations, arranging tables, and pulling out banners with terrifying efficiency.

A welcoming party.

A grand one.

Of course.

But something tugged at Taufik, a small thread of confusion.

"...Why do they have to attend an academy outside our kingdom?" he finally asked, eyes narrowing slightly. "Don’t we have our own?"

His gaze settled on his eldest. "Aksa?"

Aksara exhaled slowly, rubbing his temple.

"Well," he began cautiously, "we do have one. The best one, actually. But Father... we all know what would happen if they enrolled there"

Taufik blinked. "What?"

Aksara stared at him flatly.

"It would be destroyed"

Taufik opened his mouth, then closed it.

Aksara continued, resigned, "There’s no instructor alive who could handle them. Or teach them. Or survive them. So the mothers decided it was safer to send them outside the kingdom to learn"

He shrugged helplessly.

"You know I can’t overturn anything once all the mothers agree"

Taufik leaned back, eyes drifting toward the distant courtyard.

His wives, his mother, his grandmother. All of them were currently orchestrating party preparations like generals planning a siege. Even Thalia was helping, wide-eyed but eager, carrying decorative lanterns under Rani’s supervision.

"...A valid point," he admitted, lips tightening.

But then his eyes narrowed again, this time toward Marzuki. "...Father?"

Marzuki wasn’t listening to the conversation at all.

His gaze was fixed on Thalia.

"...Fik," he muttered, squinting hard. "Who’s that elf girl?"

Taufik stared at him. "...Thalia"

"No, yes, I know her name," Marzuki grumbled. "But she looks... familiar somehow. Like I’ve met her before. I’m sure of it. But I can’t remember when or where," His brows furrowed deeper. "But I know I’ve seen her"

Taufik’s expression sharpened. "What do you remember, Father?"

Marzuki shook his head slowly. "I don’t know... but it feels old. Very old"

# A/N: "The one who saved Thalia at Chapter 155 was Marzuki"

Aksara leaned forward.

"When you were trapped in the past, Grandpa? During the Void Century...?" Then he turned to his father, brows furrowing. "But you changed the past, right, Father? So there shouldn’t even be a Void Century"

Taufik’s gaze shifted toward his eldest son.

"No," he corrected softly. "The past was changed... but the original events still happened"

Aksara froze.

Marzuki slowly nodded, as if the truth was stirring in the depths of his mind.

Taufik continued, voice calm, measured: "Your Grandpa’s memory... is from the original timeline. From the real Void Century. The one before the rewrite"

Aksara swallowed.

Taufik went on: "Remember this: the history we live in now is not the ’real’ history. It’s altered history... The world only remembers the rewritten version"

He tapped his temple lightly.

"But we, our family, we carry both histories inside us," A breeze rustled the leaves around them. "Your grandpa was the anchor of the original timeline," Taufik said, glancing at Marzuki. "And I was the cause of the rewrite"

His eyes returned to Aksara’s.

"And you... you’re the witness. That’s why you remember pieces. Why he remembers fragments. Why do we feel the past like a dream"

Aksara’s throat bobbed. "And the rest of the world...?"

"They only have the rewritten memories," Taufik said softly. "The original history is gone to them. Erased"

He closed his eyes for a moment.

"But for us... it remains. Hazy. Blurred. Like a dream you want to forget... but can’t"

Marzuki exhaled shakily, as if the old memories were brushing the back of his mind again.

And across the garden, Thalia, laughing as she almost tripped under a pile of lanterns, moved under the sunlight.

Marzuki stared at her again, eyes widening ever so slightly.

"...Then that means... in the true history... I really did meet that girl?"

Taufik looked at him.

And nodded.

For a while, none of the men said anything, until Aksara finally broke the silence.

"... Now that I remember, Father, where are Lembu, Basukhi, and Kl’lara?"

"Them?" Taufik replied, thinking for a moment before answering. "They should be awake by now, but for some reason, they’re still sleeping"

"... Sleeping?" Both Marzuki and Aksara showed confused expressions. "... Where?"

"In the Void. Their souls were damaged, so I had no other choice but to place them there for recovery"

"Their souls were damaged? Void?!" Aksara leaned forward in shock. "Father, how strong are you now?"

Taufik only gave him a mysterious smile. "... What do you think?"

"..."

"Don’t tease my grandson," Marzuki cut in. "Tell us the truth"

Hearing that, Taufik chuckled. "Ahaha~ How should I answer that when even I don’t know? But one thing is certain: right now, there is only one being that can threaten me"

"Only one?" Aksara echoed.

Taufik nodded. "Yeah. Only one, across the entire multiverse"

Aksara frowned, leaning forward. "... Only one across the multiverse? Who?"

Taufik didn’t answer immediately.

He let the wind pass through the garden first, rustling the leaves, swaying the lanterns his wives were hanging, carrying the faint laughter of the women preparing the celebration.

Only then did he speak.

"... Fate"

Aksara froze. "... Fate?"

Taufik nodded once, slow and certain. "Fate. The only being across the multiverse that can bind, redirect, or rewrite even what I create... is Fate itself"

He leaned back slightly, eyes half-lidded. "It doesn’t attack. It doesn’t fight. It simply... decides"

Aksara’s brows pulled tight.

Marzuki’s hands curled on his knees. 𝘧𝓇ℯ𝑒𝓌𝑒𝑏𝓃𝘰𝘷𝘦𝘭.𝒸ℴ𝓂

"So yes," Taufik continued softly, "only one thing can threaten me now. Not through strength... but through inevitability." He exhaled, almost amused. "Though even Fate struggles to predict me now"

Marzuki finally let out a long breath. "Enough with this talk. Tell us already, what happened after you closed that gate above the sky years ago?"

"You mean the Hell Gate?" Taufik said. "... I didn’t do much. After I closed it, we faced countless demons inside. We conquered every layer of Hell. That’s why Lembu, Basukhi, and Kl’lara’s souls were damaged, more precisely, when we faced the Sin of Sloth"

Aksara stiffened.

"After that," Taufik continued calmly, "I ended up alone. And I faced the army of the Original Sin, the army of the Seven Deadly Sins themselves. Eventually, Hell collapsed. I thought I died with it... but instead, I woke up in a different universe entirely. With a new power running through my body"

Aksara swallowed. "And after that...?"

"And after that... an endless journey to find my way back home." He smiled faintly. "The last universe I visited was unexpectedly Thalia’s universe, Yggdrasil. That’s where I met Odin"

"Odin?" Aksara blinked. "But isn’t he here now? On our Earth?"

"That’s the plot twist, my son." Taufik’s smile deepened. "The Yggdrasil I visited was the Yggdrasil of the past. Odin hadn’t come here yet. Or... should I say, hadn’t returned here yet?"

Aksara’s eyes widened slowly.

"Well," Taufik stretched his arms casually, "thanks to him, I managed to return home. I should probably thank him properly when I meet him"

"... Yeah, you better go meet him, Father," Aksara said with a heavy sigh that didn’t match his tone.

At that, Taufik tilted his head. "What’s with that sigh? Are the Gods acting up again? Have they forgotten my lesson that day?"

"It’s not them," Aksara replied, rubbing his forehead. "It’s the new gods. The new outer gods that entered Earth after you were gone. They’re too arrogant... always doing whatever they want"

"Huh?" Taufik blinked. "Then what’s Zeus doing?"

"I... I don’t know." Aksara shook his head, frustration slipping through. "He hasn’t done anything to stop them. That’s why those new gods keep getting worse. So you’d better visit them as soon as possible"

"Hm~ I see," Taufik murmured.

His eyes slowly lifted, not at the sky, but beyond it.

Toward a hidden realm.

A cradle of divinity.

The place that held all the gods from every pantheon that entered Earth.

The Sanctum Aeterna.

It was still there.

Still under his command.

But just as Aksara said... Taufik could feel many new, foreign presences lingering inside it.

Finally, a grin tugged at his lips.

"Interesting," he whispered. "Alright. I’ll take a look later. For now..."

He lowered his gaze back to his father and his son. "I’ve done my part. Now it’s you two, tell me what’s changed on Earth while I was gone"

"What? No, no, no." Marzuki raised a hand sharply. "You’re not done yet. You still haven’t told us about the new power you gained, or the universes you visited"

"Yes, Father," Aksara chimed in. "What Grandpa said is right. You should tell us about that too"

"That too?" Taufik exhaled, leaning back. "That... will be a very long story"

"Well," Aksara said, glancing toward the women still bustling about with decorations and lanterns, "we have all the time we need. So yes... please tell us"

Taufik let out a long, resigned sigh.

"Alright... fine"

He closed his eyes briefly, gathering the first thread of an impossibly long journey. "For a start... the first universe I ended up in was an apocalypse"

He paused.

The wind rustled the garden.

Marzuki and Aksara subconsciously leaned in.

Taufik continued, voice dropping slightly as memory flooded back, "... Not like the apocalypses in the Movie. Not zombie. Something... worse"

His fingers tapped the armrest once.

"... It’s a universe that was already dead when I arrived"

Marzuki’s breath caught.

Aksara stiffened.

"And that," Taufik said quietly, "was only the beginning"

....

...

..

.