Noah almost sighed at the ominous encouragement as he continued calmly. "I hope so too. The three destinations that are possible are...The Hunger Memorial, The Breeding Grounds of the First, and THE Living Emotion’s Garden of Feeling."
Khor’s eyes widened dramatically. She blinked several times, as if confirming she had heard correctly.
"The Hunger Memorial... The Breeding Grounds... THE Living Emotion’s Garden..." She repeated each name with increasing disbelief. "If any of those places match what I remember, you will die in each of them. The only question is how quickly."
BOOM!
Noah waited for her to elaborate.
Because an elaboration was fucking needed after such words!
"The Hunger Memorial is where Inevitabilities go to mourn what they can never have...satisfaction. Being there while not fully inevitable yourself would be like bleeding in waters full of sharks who haven’t eaten since before time was invented."
She shook her head at the second option.
"The Breeding Grounds of the First is where Early Creatures discovered themselves. It was wild. Archaic. Primal. The process was... violent. Experimental. Often fatal for all parties involved. Even I avoided that place when it was active."
Her expression grew oddly wistful at the third.
"And THE Living Emotion’s Garden seems beautiful, peaceful even. But it’s where pure emotions exist without filters or controls. You could die of joy there. Literally experience so much happiness your existence forgets to continue. Or sorrow so profound you retroactively never existed. But well, an Inevitability like your other self would survive there just fine."
She looked at him with something approaching concern.
"Each destination offers unique ways to cease existing, Outsider. Are you certain you want to risk any of them?"
The question hung in the air between them, carrying weight that transcended simple concern for his safety.
This was about whether his ambition had finally exceeded his capability to survive it!
All three possible destinations were deemed equally dangerous, each offering unique flavors of cessation.
Noah’s gaze became stern as he processed the implications, but his resolve remained unshaken. He would go through with it.
After all, he was without Fear or Doubt...those Everythings had been carved away from his existence.
And he had made this same choice a day ago when he first ventured into the Earliest Folds. Everything that had occurred there had led to this moment, this accumulation of power and possibility.
Khor observed his expression with the particular understanding of someone who had seen such determination before.
She sighed wistfully, the sound carrying eons of memory, and tapped her finger in the air. An obsidian light shot from her fingertip, curling through space to settle in his ear like an ethereal earpiece.
"Since I found you by your lonesome back then, you shouldn’t be able to take others with you..." she explained, her tone deceptively casual. "So all I’ll do is leave you a shred of my consciousness as it should be able to traverse with you. It won’t be able to act or interfere, just an accessory in your ear that can observe nearby surroundings and talk."
She turned her attention back to reshaping the Shore, as if its architecture was suddenly more important than his potential death.
"Maybe my knowledge will help ensure you don’t die too quickly, Outsider."
The nonchalance of her delivery couldn’t hide what she was doing...going above and beyond to ensure his survival while pretending it was merely convenient.
Noah smiled at the personality of this unique entity he still couldn’t fully understand. The weight of her authority settled in his ear, a presence that was simultaneously there and not there, like remembering a whisper.
A Temporal Traversal into the Earliest Folds, where only an instant or seconds would pass in the current age while he experienced hours or days in the past.
For someone who needed time more than anything else, who could accomplish ridiculous things in short periods, this was invaluable.
He closed his eyes and connected to his Early Atlas of the Folds, feeling its eagerness to bridge impossible distances once more.
"Let’s go. Initiate Temporal Traversal."
HUUM!
Reality immediately responded.
|CRITICAL TRAVERSAL INITIATING|
|Second Journey to the Earliest Folds|
|Destination Selection: Random|
|Rolling the dice...|
|Extreme Caution Required|
|Enhanced Parameters Due to Increased Complexity:|
- Time limit extended to 24 hours (previously 1 hour)
- Both bodies (Noah and Ozymandias) will traverse together
- Stability increased by 300% from previous journey
- Death still results in complete existential extinction
|Destination Selected: The Breeding Grounds of the First|
Comments
The readers' comments on the novel: Infinite Mana In The Apocalypse