STORY AND ILLUSTRATIONS NUMBER 01:

The Decisive Battle of the Northern Land

A young boy and a young girl whose paths crossed through a series of unfortunate events. Through their long journey, the bonds between them grew ever stronger. Nonetheless, due to an unforeseeable tragedy, the wheels of fate lost their course, expediting the curtain call of the story.

Amassing Evil
The End of Their Journey

End of Page 1.

The Two Farewells
The Mad Performers

An Awakening of Revenge
The Wrath of Ice

End of Page 2
TL notes:
1) In the phrase “[…]the door of the “system” of the branded holy maiden[…]”, the word “system” is a forced reading for the word “model/pattern” 型 .
2) For the phrase “Icejade Empress”, this is part of the name of Kosmochlor in its JP name, and it’s the title passed down to Aegirine, as mentioned in the previous VBEX. This title was omitted in the TCG name.
3) “Icejade Vessel” is one possible translation for the JP title of “Aegirocassis”. This is merely an editorial choice, as the TCG title “Icejade Creation” doesn’t convey the transfiguration very well.

Ain’t gonna let our bros down
The Struggle Diary of the “Springans” (Cont.)

The Illegimate Child of Love and Despair
The Holy Maiden in Crimson

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TL notes:
1) Regulus is referred to as 王者, which can mean both “king” and “(male) champion”. Alasia is refered to as 女王, which means “queen”, not exactly “empress”, and can also occasionally mean “(female) champion”, but with a slightly different reading from the one in the book. The general meaning of “king of the arena” and “queen of the arena” should be evident enough, but it obviously sounds odd that the “empress” holds a different title. For reference, the title of Alasia in JP is the English word “empress”.
2) For the title of the segment of Cartesia, refer to “otoshigo” in the TL note for “Fallen of Argyros” in page 8.

The Puppet Dragon Kings
Those that Appeared from the Abyss

The All-Out Assemblies in Each Camp
Golgonda, The Final Warfront

End of Page 4

The Opening Act of the Decisive Battle
The Last Stand

A Reunion Amidst Extreme Circumstances
Those that Bring Bonds Together

End of Page 5
TL note: The “Last Stand” was our initial name for “Tri-Brigade Showdown”. The JP name of the card, and the name of the section use “死線”, which implies being on the verge of death. This name is force read as “deadline” in the card, because those are the two kanji used (death + line). This obviously doesn’t translate well, as “deadline” has a different meaning in English. This is just an editorial choice.

End of Page 6

TL note: “Iron Beasts” is part of the name of the “Tri-Brigade” theme name in Japanese (“Frontline of the Iron Beasts”, force-read as Tri-Brigade).

The Finale of the Decisive Battle
The King of the True Flames, The Falling Nadir

End of Page 7

TL notes:
1) “相剣” (Souken/Xiangjian) is the JP/CN name of the “Swordsoul” theme respectively. We previously translated the first character as “aspect”, with other possible translations being “nature, essence”, and the original Chinese being “Xiang”. The second character being “sword”,and the original Chinese “Jian”. Maybe the Japanese to English explanation is enough, but we would like to emphasize that the original Xiangjian Chinese got muddied in the localization, hence why we kept the JP/CN characters in the text.
2) In the line where Maximus is confused about what’s going on, he says “did Aluber do something to the Assassin?”, with “Aluber” being a forced reading for “that guy’s other half”, and “assassin” being a forced reading for “my other half”. It’s a confusing sentence on its own, since he seems to be implicitly introducing new information about this “assassin”, but it looks even more confusing while trying to fit in both forced readings.

The Foreword to a New Disturbance
The Boundless Open Land

Secret Image

End of Chapter
TL notes:
1) The “Mother Zoa” in Aegerine’s column is not “Alba Zoa”. The “Zoas” are characters in William Blake’s mythology. “Enion” is an Emanation of Tharmas, one of the Zoas. The line says “the Mother Beast”, force-read as “Zoa”. “Beast” being used here is probably related to “zoa” being a Greek plural word for “creature/beast”, and not one of the many creatures in this story. For further reference, “Alba Zoa” seems to be based on Urthona, a different Zoa, who falls into (Alba) “Los“.
2) For “Fallen of Argyros”, “Illegitimate offspring” is a concept repeated a few times in this lore. This is commonly written as 落胤 (rakuin) in this lore, because it’s a homophone with brand(ed)/烙印 (also rakuin), and the name of this card also uses 落胤 (hence, “Fallen” of Argyros, like Albaz). However, this paragraph uses 落とし子 (otoshigo). This can also mean “illegitimate offspring”, but for this non-human entity, it would be more an undesirable result or byproduct. In other words, they are emphasizing it’s a metaphorical illegitimate child, byproduct, or bastard, much like Albaz was when this story began.
3) For The Bystyal Aluber, Golgonooza is a mythical city in the works of William Blake, from which this lore is inspired. Also, “Seed of Miracles” is the force reading for “Crystal of the Dark/Dim Brand”, the same dim crystal mentioned earlier related to Cartesia.
4) “The Boundless Open Land” is the translated name of the card localized as “New Frontier”. The main reason to keep the translated name for this chapter is that this final chapter in the saga is a direct contrast to its first chapter: “A Closed-Off Land”.