Chapter 2453 (Patreon)

ToC: https://www.patreon.com/posts/23899958

We all understand my predictions about how long it would take me to end are comically bad, but SURELY we are so close to the end that they won't be so bad, right?

Right?!?

...maybe still three more, plus epilogues. Two today.

“To save your son.”

After Randidly spoke, he looked at the slumped form of Elhume for any hint of a response. Despite the potent physicality in that body that Randidly could sniff a mile away, his spine bent like a sagging vine, he hunched forward with hollow eyes. Knuckles that had once threatened to inflict so much hurt and pain on existence now scraped harmlessly against the ground. Only the vaguest whiff of Elhume’s image clung to his body, with so many other aspects scooped out and pilfered by others.

His words were countered by the silence and apathy of a broken man.

How strange it was, Randidly thought as he stared at one of the founding forces of the Nexus. He almost felt regretful. That I’ve spent so much time and effort trying to catch up with you… and now suddenly I’ve passed you and left you so far behind.

The moment of asking stretched. From Elhume’s psyche, there wasn’t even a ripple of recognition. Yet Randidly didn’t panic or press, despite his secret worries. He didn’t pivot and take in Pine’s response, knowing his main goal was just not to mirror the universe soul’s desperation. While others made more concrete preparations for the miracle Randidly would attempt today, he needed to lay some emotional groundwork. And this was part of the process.

A lesson he had embraced his whole System existence, but one given name by meeting the memory Devick. Not a Truth, but an opinion. A perspective by which he would live his life.

Be unreasonable, and expect the world to follow.

When it became clear that Elhume’s consciousness hadn’t even taken notice of them, a twisted shadow leaned forward. An opportunity left untouched was an opportunity that could be taken. The Patron of the Borrowed seemed to have twisted further, stewing in the bitterness of their failure to stop Randidly.

Fiero’s gaunt eyes were filled with hate, his tails limp behind him. He looked the two new arrivals up and down with a sneer. “Randidly Ghosthound, you certainly are quick to forget old grudges. We will not help you. We have no desire to help you. Not when we can finally break out of this hellish prison of pain and regret.”

The air around them vibrated briefly; although they were far away from the impact point, Randidly still knew that the reinforcements from the Alpha Cosmos had again stalled out the falling Pine.

His sharp emerald gaze studied Fiero, perhaps because he knew he still could not study the small form of Pine who he had brought here. Also because he felt a strange gush of amusement, imagining himself as the angel on Pine’s shoulder, and Fiero as the devil. Stay focused, Randidly. We aren’t out of the woods yet.

Randidly scratched his chin, considering the stance he should take opposite this twisted shade. Elhume and Fiero had possessed conflicting ideas for how the issue of the destabilizing should be resolved, which manifested in a thousand years of contentious shadowy struggles in the Nexus. But Randidly’s appearance had changed the situation; both had realized that if he had been given additional room to grow, he would eclipse them. All their efforts would become moot.

They had worked together, springing a trap against them and fighting him as one. Randidly had struggled, but overcome their combined efforts. Which left Fiero and Elhume with no choice but to invite a foreign power to settle the issue, one way or another. Yet now that Laplace had been handled…

I wonder which of them invited Pangu’s subtle touch into the Nexus. Randidly pressed his lips together as he spared the limp and wan Fiero a glance. Then he looked away, back to the inert Elhume. His eyeline traveled on there to land softly on Pine. He ignored Fiero’s vicious snarl and spoke to his target. Because in the end, the devil was powerless to stop him. “All you need to do is ask, Pine. But it needs to be you.”

“I do not understand your fixation, Randidly Ghosthound.” Pine yipped out the words while his ears flopped across his face. “Why must I ask?”

“It has to be you,” Randidly repeated without changing his tone.

Meanwhile, Pine raised his voice and looked at anything but the still form of his adoptive father. “Any other individual would be a better option for this foolish quest. In the end, my feelings on the Nexus… they remain neutral. I do not have hope that this trial can be overcome. I know the costs we bear every second we continue to resist the inevitable. I am not the best choice for this query. Your insistence is asinine.”

Ah, kid, Randidly felt strangely mature, a very inappropriate feeling for one facing off against the soul of the universe into which he was born. Yet he could sense Pine’s real fear that caused him to balk; that the universe soul would ask for help, like he had so many times before, and he would be ignored. Randidly did not release the small puppy’s gaze. “He will hear you, this time. He will answer.”

Fiero cackled. “You are a fool. This bastard could so little handle his own emotions that he gave them all up. I am him, almost entirely. But I am not blinded by sentimentality. I will never-”

Even Pine seemed content to ignore the Vulpine. “There is no need to discuss this further. I have decided I will not. Upon reflection, allowing the natural progression of developments is what I, as a neutral party, should endeavor to do-”

“I can’t do this without your help. I can’t help the people of the Nexus alone. They need you to ask.”

“Your continued insistence on this irrelevant detail is beginning to leave me quite infuriated, Randidly Ghosthound. I have made my stance clear-”

“Please. I know how much has been asked of you… I don’t love being one more person to ask you to give. But please, Pine.”

“The asker will not affect the response. He will not answer. Consider his current condition.”

“And that will be fine. When you’ve done all you can, I’ll let the matter drop.”

Randidly and Pine stared at each other. Randidly had so many other thoughts to share, but none of them would be persuasive. They were half-formed memories, moments in time that Randidly’s consciousness had run his mental fingers on, over and over, until he was numb to their edges and exhausted from the fixation. How could he try and convey to the universe soul what it had felt like, to learn that Ezekiel had died silently, allowing himself to waste away, without even a single plea for help?

How could Randidly talk about the way he had buried his feelings of guilt over his father’s demise? Or the confusion in his heart when he came into the dark subconscious of the Nexus and found Ezekiel there, waiting to help him ascend?

The pressure of confronting Laplace meant he had raced forward, without those bitter emotions ever being expressed. He wondered whether he would have another chance, when this all shook out.

Yet that was just the smallest emotion ripple in a stormy sea that built itself up to ravage the land. Randidly did his best to keep his expression still and even, while a dozen other efforts were waged underneath the surface. He expanded the scope of his Nether structure, feeling Lowanna’s efforts rapidly assisting him. He drew lines and anchors and began to sketch out the new order he would create.

He resisted the growing urge to drop everything and heal the fabric of time in the Nexus. The more his awareness could freely roam, the more onerous his Grand Fate became. Resisting its pull, within an hour, would be a significant problem.

“I-” Another rumble boomed out from the distant meeting point, where darkness was briefly stayed by the efforts of the Alpha Cosmos. The universe soul upon which this entire plan hinged just looked lost. Randidly could see fear warring with desperation on its face.

“Nothing will change if you don’t take a step forward,” Randidly said.

“There is no change I am wishing for, Ghosthound.” For the first time, Pine seemed genuinely enraged. His fear caught fire. “The status quo has served me just fine for a thousand years. This small event matters not at all to me.”

“Then you just have to take that step, ask the question, and it will all be over,” Randidly replied.

“Fine,” Pine growled out the word as he barred his teeth at Randidly. He shifted slightly. Randidly could hear his breath whistling through his teeth.

“Father…”

With great deliberation, Pine rounded on Elhume. His hackles squeezed together, tight with an overwhelming hunger he had born for far too long. The powerful puncher just stared at the ground, his eyes glassy. The tension slowly drained out of Pine’s body. Already, he flinched away from the disappointment waiting for him.

“Father-” His second attempt was even worse than the first. His voice cracked on the word, shattered by all the emotions, emotions that Pine might deny, but rode upon the address. Pine blinked, perhaps catching himself by surprise. Perhaps trying to hide the tears forming in his eyes.

You don’t need to ask for anything special. You just need to ask, to feel. The emerald in Randidly’s eyes came alight. He will hear you.

Pine shivered. He repeated the word his voice dwindling. “Father. Please…”

Yet again, the question stopped there, even as the Aether and Nether in the environment began to boil. Because the question Pine tried to ask, for all that he had insisted this didn’t matter, was why he had been abandoned, forgotten, used. Why his father hadn’t protected him? Why the people of the Nexus had never appreciated him? Had treated him as a resource?

The question became so large that even a universe soul couldn’t support it.

When these words dribble out, once more Fiero filled the silence with twisted laughter. “Truly, to have witnessed such a pathetic display-”

Elhume stirred. He looked up slowly. He saw his son. He reached out with a warm hand and touched the side of Pine’s face. The dog released a low whimper of grief and pleasure. His tail wagged, just a little bit.

Sometimes, a big question will receive only a small answer. But so long as the key fits into the lock, its enough. Randidly thought.

“But…. he’s hollow…” Fiero whispered. “He’s given away all of his power.”

“Maybe that’s true,” Randidly’s lips curled upward as he stood aside and waited for the tableau to develop. “But that doesn’t mean that’s all that matters. People can be weak in some moments, but they can also be strong in others.”

Ready? Randidly sent to Neveah.

Are you sure about this?

Do you have another plan? He countered.

He could feel her exasperation. But outside-

I’ve got a plan for that. Randidly replied.

You always do. Haah, let’s ignore the costs for now, I suppose. Just… the results of your brilliant plans have sometimes been mixed. This is it, Randidly. I’m warning you not to act too wild, not now, not with everything on the line. But yes, we have made all the preparations on our end.

One last miracle, then. Randidly nodded sharply. His body pulsed and hummed as he spun his Nether Core faster and faster. For now, he ignored the budding possibility of a Samsara that continued to develop within him. He gushed with significance. It flowed out of him in every direction, spilling out to adjust the Nether content in the whole of the Nexus.

Randidly Ghosthound knew that just as important as the deception of the trick was the stage beneath it. With sheer force of power emerging from his Vessel, he expanded the stage to cover a whole universe.

Congratulations! Your Skill Randidly Ghosthound, Executive of Nether Reborn (GD)(U) has grown to Level 2100!

…

Congratulations! Your Skill What the Ghosthound Sows, He Will Soon Reap (GD)(U) Has grown to Level 1921!

Congratulations! Your Skill Heraldic Tongue of the Alchemist (GD) has grown to Level 1882!

Congratulations! Your Skill Randidly Ghosthound, Executive of Nether Reborn (GD)(U) has grown to Level 2237!

Randidly reached out and put his hands upon Elhume and Pine, still staring deeply into each other’s soul, a raw and vulnerable question and answer in the progress of its exchange. “We need to go. They are ready for us.”

His Alchemist's Passport flickered. While Fiero cursed and swiped out with greedy hands, the trio had vanished. The Patron of the Borrow’s power was too broken to stop them. Randidly didn’t return to the floor of the ‘Pinnacle’ chamber where the Alpha Cosmos continued to battle back the line of darkness but transported the group above the battle lines.

As they arrived a vicious wind raked across the three of them, but no one flinched. Randidly looked up, the group seeming to stand right in front of the accumulation of negative impulses, tainted images, and death from three thousand years of the Nexus. It was a wall of oblivion, swirling in front of the group. It pulsed and seethed, almost as though their presence made it restless. It bulged outward, a water balloon ready to rupture and dump tainted images through the whole of the Nexus.

“You… wish for him to fight against that?” Pine’s tone changed to one of horror and recrimination. “Even my father cannot-”

“No, not fight. Balance.” Randidly replied. He allowed himself a small moment, wondering what Ezekiel was doing within that multilayered sphere, what the dead experienced as their home hurtled on a collision course with another. With great difficulty, he wrenched himself back from the distraction.  “Right now, the issue is that all the darkness has started to crack the fabric of the Nexus. We can support the weight for a while, with images and Nether, but that will only delay the eventual collision. And they cannot be separated, not entirely. They remain connected. So we need a new foundation.

“That’s why we need Elhume. To function as the core anchor of the Nexus for our new shape.” Randidly flicked his fingers and a circular platform of golden runes flashed into existence beneath them. The complex wheels of the working began to spin. The Engraving flared with life and power, enough that the air around them began to distort. The effect of conjuring such a complex working was satisfyingly dramatic, but really, Neveah had been the one who had created this working while Randidly had been talking with Pine. Randidly just acted as a flashy salesperson. The Alchemist as magician, manipulating the audience’s attention.

Even his words were part of the trick, convincing everything that this was about that.  “We need three cores for three universes to be brought into alignment. Rotating around a central axis. Lead him over there, please.”

Around the main golden brilliance of the working Neveah had woven were three more sedate circles on the ground, lined with pulsing runes but with their central portions clear. After a hesitation, Pine moved and Elhume followed. When they stood in the middle of one of the outer circles, the writing along the edge began to animate itself.

Randidly guided the Nether connections, so the Engraving reacted to the correct bonds. In Truth, this was the one whose anchor would be the most important.

Because no one had done more to shape the Nexus than Elhume, for better and for worse. It couldn’t be anyone but him, not with his weighty history.

“He doesn’t even see me. Can this truly be enough?” Pine asked, breaking into Randidly’s thoughts. “Is this… really my role?”

Randidly smiled. “Your part is the climax, Pine. Just give me a second and you’ll be the reason everything changes.”