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Chapter 290 - Calamity (16)
Chapter 290: Calamity (16)
TL/ED – Enuma ID
When I opened my eyes again, I was in the Deep Sea.
I clenched and unclenched my hand, casting out my Current Sense. It was calm, it was quiet, and the occasional, desolate sound of flowing water was the only noise that existed in this world.
Finding it oddly comforting, for some reason, that I couldn’t see an inch ahead with my naked eyes, I sank to the ground at once.
Ѐ n u m а
There was no time to waste. I had to figure it out.
The reason he had hesitated.
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‘Void was definitely afraid of me.’
From the very start, he could have crushed me to death with a single flick of his finger.
But he didn’t. Or rather, he couldn’t.
That was why he had been wary of me. He tried to avoid the fight, tried to win me over, and right up to the end he was reluctant to reach out his hand. Even as he spoke, what he was doing was trying to collapse my mind.
Еn̈ ŭ ḿ а̀
Which meant, perhaps.
“Was he reluctant to let me die?”
What changes if I die?
I am an Outer God. An Outer God almost never dies under ordinary circumstances, but to begin with, I’m not so much a perfect Outer God as a peculiar case of a human who became one. It might actually be possible for me to die.
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But this was still nothing more than chasing my own tail. If he was reluctant to kill me, then why was that?
For me to die means the Outer God of the Deep Sea dies.
W e b́n о̇ v еĺ Е nu m̆ а̀
The one who governs the Deep Sea vanishes.
So what happens then.
“…I don’t know.”
I let out a deep sigh.
I didn’t know. From the look of things, whether he feared my death or balked at something else, it seemed certain that Void felt some unease about facing me.
But I had far too little information about the reason why.
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If by some chance I’d had enough time, I might have figured out something else, but…
-Grrrk, screeeeech….
“Tch.”
A bizarre sound was being born up in the Surface Layer, and it reached all the way down to the Deep Layer.
The iron chains binding something indescribably enormous were being pulled to their limit, groaning as though on the verge of snapping. It was safe to say I had no time left.
Void had already set foot in the Deep Sea.
Ěn̂um а . ĩd̆
If he reached me, this time he wouldn’t allow me to flee.
Though there was nowhere left to run anyway.
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‘For now, do I have to fight?’
With the Authority of Creation, I conjured up the old foes that had tormented me over the years and sent them upward.
But even as I made them, I held no great hopes. Could something less than a speck of a speck buy any time against a universe?
‘It’d be impossible. Even in the Deep Sea, what could anything do against something that massive…’
Ӗ n̂ u̇ m̃ а̄. і̀ď
And there, in my mind, as I sighed through gritted teeth…
“…Huh?”
A strange question began to take root.
‘Wasn’t he supposed to be sealed inside the Deep Sea?’
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
I hastily fixed my mind on the Surface Layer.
Even with my Current Sense, which spanned the entire Deep Sea, I couldn’t tell exactly what form Void had taken now that he’d entered it. He was simply enormous.
Ёn̂ ū m а
Just as no one could deduce the creature known as an elephant from one foot alone, even if that single foot had filled a narrow bathtub to the brim, the scale here was far too vast to make out his form from the fraction of Void I could perceive.
If that was so, then how had it been possible?
That is, the First Wizard.
How had the Outer God of the Deep Sea sunk that thing into the Deep Sea?
As I turned this over, my face soon twisted.
“Damn it, if he were even here…!”
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
If the Outer God of the Deep Sea were alive, I could have asked what method he’d used, but to one already dead, what could I…
“…Dead?”
I blinked a couple of times.
He’s dead?
The Outer God of the Deep Sea?
…An Outer God?
Ẁ êb̊ n оv́е̂ l̀ Еn̂um̊ а
“…”
For quite a long while.
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Until the time it would take Void to reach the Middle Layer, at least several hours, I deliberated over and over.
Every thought I’d come to grasp, everything I somehow knew without knowing why, churned through my mind.
By the time a conclusion surfaced, my expression had twisted so gravely that even I could feel it.
“So he was alive.”
W е̇b̀ n ȯ v́ е̊l̈ Ё ň um̀а
I immediately used a pool of water to teleport.
‘I’m a human who became an Outer God. Unlike other Outer Gods, I might be able to die, but there’s no way he could.’
I’d had it wrong from the very beginning.
The Outer God of the Deep Sea, dead? Had I ever once seen an Outer God die? Even the Outer Gods I’d slain had merely been stripped of their power; they hadn’t died in any true sense.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
And yet my original, the very one who had been the master of this world.
The previous Outer God of the Deep Sea, who had created the Real World, sealed every Outer God beneath the Deep Sea, and brought even Void to his knees, was supposed to have run out of strength and died “like a human” when his lifespan came to an end.
Ē n̂u mа̃
That was the very first gear that had slipped out of place.
The fact that there was no way he could have died.
‘But he never appeared.’
Because he’d lost interest?
Or because he was satisfied?
That explanation didn’t hold, though, because he had left behind the Artifacts, Mallo among them. Wishing for humans to stand against the Outer Gods who would one day revive, he had wrung out every last ounce of his strength. He hadn’t wanted the world to perish.
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With that record as his final act, he had vanished. He had vanished without dying.
Or rather, that was how it had looked.
“…What a horrible bastard.”
Gritting my teeth, I slowly took in the palace I had reached.
It was a shattered palace. I gazed at the place, reduced to grim ruins by the aftermath of my fight with Void, with not a soul left, and then walked toward one exact spot.
Had the Outer God of the Deep Sea given up?
Е n̄umа̂.і̀ d
Would he, who had handed even the throne of the Deep Sea to someone else, give up so easily on the world he’d made?
Absolutely not. The obsession of the things called Outer Gods was not to be taken lightly. He must have been alive.
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Then why hadn’t he appeared?
That was the second gear that had slipped out of place.
He had already appeared.
-Bang!
Е num̌а
I kicked the palace open and stepped into Sharmia’s office.
Naturally, there was no one there. Every human had already evacuated to the underground city.
Standing in the middle of that office, hoping someone would hear, I slowly opened my mouth.
“If there were someone who truly cherished, loved, and absolutely had to keep this world alive. If there were someone close to a divine being, who loved humanity and longed for this world to endure, yet had lost every last bit of their own power. Where would that someone be?”
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
No answer came back.
After a brief, snorting laugh, I went on talking to myself.
Е ń ūm a
“The center of power, surely. A place where one can command every human at will, without ever needing to use any power at all. The only place to warn, prepare, and respond with the bare minimum of strength is right there.”
“Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying you’re the Princess… It’s just that you’ve stayed by her side this whole time. You’ve been exerting your influence all along.”
“So it was you who triggered the Regression.”
“Making Sharmia turn back thousands, tens of thousands of times. You’re the one who set her against Void, aren’t you?”
“You do that to a single human being and feel no guilt at all?”
-Spin.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
Using the Sea Water, I turned the office chair, which had been facing the other way, back around.
In that place where no one should have been, an old man with an air of dignity sat.
The very figure I’d met before, and seen dozens of times in the murals.
[It was not just one.]
The Emperor was there.
The man who ought to have been lying in a sickbed sat with his eyes shut, leaning back into the chair, his head hanging low.
Ѐ ń um ă
[This one among them, I sent dozens of Creations back.]
He was carrying on the conversation by creating sheer will, as though it were the most natural thing in the world.
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[But the only one to endure was that child.]
“Should I be calling you senior, then. Not that I much want to.”
I looked at the Emperor, who seemed so aged.
He was using the Authority of Creation, yet not so much as a fragment of his power as a god remained in that body.
Е̊n̈ ûm̊.а́. і d̂
He was truly an emaciated god. A thing that had once been a god. A husk fit to be called as much.
[You may resent me. But it was the only way.]
The First Wizard, the Outer God of the Deep Sea, the Emperor.
The one who had loved humanity, opposed the gods, and been both Savior and master of the world raised the scrawny legs that suited none of those titles in the slightest and rose from his seat.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
[For miracles come at a price.]
“So you were beside us all along.”
Ӗ n ú mа̀_. і̊d̃
Regression was not within the domain of magic.
The royal family was the direct bloodline of the First Wizard, and it was possible because they carried that thick blood. That was all I’d understood it to be, but the truth was, it had simply been this one’s doing.
The Outer God of the Deep Sea had not given up on the world.
He had only never shown himself; all the while, he had kept on helping us.
It was a method I quite disliked, but…
“There’s a lot I want to say. Why you made us, why you didn’t bind that bastard properly. But that’s not what matters.”
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I strode toward him.
“Why did you only reveal yourself now?”
How to bring Void down.
Or how he had sealed him in the Deep Sea. Those were the things I should have asked about first, but for the moment, I wanted to resolve the absurd question nagging at me.
“I’m asking why you only now bothered to drag that heavy backside off the seat.”
I was the one who’d found him. And yes, I was the one who’d gone looking.
Ēń_um а̂
But if this Outer God of the Deep Sea had sought us out first.
If he had told us first how to deal with Void, things would never have come to this.
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Many more would have survived. And on top of that, this one had tried to keep from appearing right up until the very, very end.
If I hadn’t realized it, he might well have stayed hidden until the world had already ended.
That was rather infuriating.
“You said you made us because you loved the world. You sent her back, and back, and back again, killing Sharmia tens of thousands of times. While that bastard Void was killing wizards over and over, you could at least have said a single word.”
Ẅ е bñ o̊v e l̈ Е n ům̂ а
[…]
Under my frost-cold glare, the Emperor was silent for a while.
With an expressionless face that betrayed not a trace of guilt, anger, or anguish, he opened his mouth.
[Let me correct that.]
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“…What?”
[You speak as though I can do something, but I cannot.]
Eňům_ӓ.їd̈
“What is that supposed to mean.”
[I can do nothing for you, for humanity, for this world.]
“After putting Sharmia through Regression over and over?”
[That was nothing but flailing. To begin with, I am not the one you seek.]
“??”
[You take me for the Outer God of the Deep Sea, but that is mistaken. I am merely a degraded copy that inherited His blood. One that lives parasitically off His blood… yes.]
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
The Emperor pointed at my collar.
[I am the same as that robe. Though, since I was made last, they would not know me.]
The robe he pointed at was Mallo.
In other words, this one was an Artifact, something like a safeguard left behind by the Outer God of the Deep Sea.
“What the hell…!”
Had I gotten it wrong again?
W̃.е bǹо̃v̄êl̀ Еň ú m̄_а
That didn’t quite fit, though, because he was unmistakably wielding the power of an Outer God. The mere fact that he’d appeared in this office…
[By rights, even appearing before you like this should have been impossible. But you wished for me.]
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
“I never wished for you.”
[No. I, the master of this world, wished for myself. Here within the Deep Sea. That is why I was able to appear.]
Which meant.
This one wouldn’t be of much help either.
Wе̇b n̄ о̆ v̂ ё.l Ӗnŭ_ṁ ӓ
“Ngh…”
I clenched my fists and ground my teeth.
Even now, Void was steadily crossing the Middle Layer, drawing closer to the Deep Layer.
Was this how it ended?
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Or was there some other way…
[Jern.]
Ѐ n̆um̌а
“Don’t go saying my name so carelessly…”
[The Creator was afraid.]
At those words, I looked up at the Emperor.
He had shriveled far more than when I’d first seen him.
[The reason I kept my mouth shut, the reason not a single word ever reached you, is that the Creator wished it so.]
“…? Of Void?”
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
[Not of something like Void. He was afraid of you. He did not want the one who would succeed him to learn this truth. So he stopped it. And I, too, believe that judgment was the right one.]
Having said that, the Emperor stroked his own neck.
[But now the Creator is gone.]
[And the one who brought me into being in this place is you.]
[There is nothing to stop me. And my own judgment, too, has shifted, if only a little. Watching you, that is what I came to think.]
“…What are you trying to say?”
Еnùm а̂.і̆ d́
I glared at the Emperor and his strange words.
Meeting me with those same emotionless eyes, he slowly opened his mouth.
Dilarang mengopy novel dari Enuma.id.
[I will tell you. The thing you must never be allowed to know.]
*****
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