Chapter 1448: I Will Play Your Game [Part 2] "You said you prepared a Hero for me," Thirteen said calmly. "But if you really prepared countermeasures, contingencies, and layers upon layers of probability..." He pointed at her towering form. "Why are you here, trying to shake me up? Trying to make me feel inferior? Do you think that I’m playing a game with you? That your foolish attempts to goad me, and make me say ’Okay, I give up! You win!’ and let things go back the way they were?" The fractures spread upward, climbing the Goddess’ enormous body like cracks on porcelain. "You fear me," Thirteen smiled. "Not me as I am, but what I represent." His Soul Core pulsed, making his body slowly rise until he and the Goddess were face to face once more. The multiverse around them flickered like a glitched illusion. "Because I represent deviation." Thirteen declared. "I represent the one variable you can’t perfectly account for." The Goddess tried to stabilize the space, but her fingers passed through the cracks as if they were beyond her authority. "You’re still inside my domain," The Goddess said, her voice no longer playful. "And you’re inside my will," Thirteen replied. His aura erupted outward. Not chaotic. Not wild. It was sharp and focused. Like a blade forged from defiance. "You watch over outcomes," Thirteen smiled faintly. "You control probabilities. You guide inevitabilities." His eyes locked onto hers. "But I’m not chasing victory." The space between them suddenly had cracks forming, spreading outward like a spiderweb. "I’m chasing freedom." His words echoed. It wasn’t just sound. It was the law. The cracks exploded outward, severing invisible threads that stretched endlessly across the cosmos. Golden strings snapped one after another like harp strings cut by an unseen blade. The Goddess staggered a single step back. A single step. But that was enough to make her eyes widen in shock. "Impossible..." the Goddess muttered. Thirteen’s voice turned steady, unyielding. "You mistook inevitability for authority... prediction for ownership... and control for supremacy." He raised his hand and grabbed one of the golden threads that tried to wrap around his wrist. It burned. Then it resisted. But he did not let go. "You want to know how I’ll fight you?" Thirteen asked. His palm tightened. The thread shattered. "I will fight you as the System of Cannon Fodders." Another thread that bound the multiverse snapped. "I will play your game." More threads snapped. "I will become the anomaly you cannot control. Since you treat me and everyone around you like a bug, I will become that unresolvable bug in the System. Do you know? System bugs can be very annoying." The dream began collapsing entirely now, stars falling like shattered glass. "If my rebellion was written, then I’ll rewrite it." The Goddess’ towering form flickered violently. "If my defeat is decided, then I’ll overturn it." Her size shrank until she returned to her original form. "If my death was ordained..." Thirteen said akin to a whisper. "Then I will die standing, spitting in your face and laughing as your so-called inevitability burns with me." Silence spread far and wide in the multiverse. And due to this silence, the sound of something cracking boomed like thunder in the Goddess’ ears. The entire dreamscape shattered like a broken mirror. The Goddess’ voice echoed faintly as her form dissolved. "... So this is your answer." The Goddess placed her hand behind her back. Thirteen stood alone in the collapsing void. "No," Thirteen replied softly. "This is my beginning." The Goddess didn’t answer right away. She simply observed the teenage boy in front of her, looking at his very existence. "You’re chasing a dream that will never be reality," the Goddess commented, her body completely transparent. "I didn’t ask for your opinion," Thirteen replied. "We will never see eye to eye. So come at me with everything you have. Do your worst. You started this game... and I will be the one to end it." "Famous last words." The Goddess sneered. Thirteen didn’t reply. There was no need to continue this discussion. The time for them to fight would come soon, and frankly, he was already looking forward to that moment. The Goddess’ form began to dissolve into particles of light, scattering like stardust across the fractured void. But before she completely vanished... She smiled. Not mockingly or arrogantly... But knowingly. "You are mistaken about one thing," The Goddess said softly. Thirteen’s eyes narrowed. "And what would that be?" "You think I came here to intimidate you?" Her faint chuckle echoed across the multiverse. "I’m not here to shake your resolve," the Goddess continued. "I simply wanted to confirm something. And now I have." Thirteen didn’t flinch. "Confirm what?" "That you have finally stepped outside the line." The cosmos did not return to its previous state. Instead, it reconstructed itself differently. The constellations were no longer in their familiar positions. The golden threads did not reconnect. For the first time since the birth of countless worlds... There was a gap. A blind spot representing a future she could not fully observe. "You have become a singularity," the Goddess said. "A point where prediction collapses." "That was the goal," Thirteen replied calmly. "Yes," The Goddess agreed. "And that’s precisely why you are dangerous." The void darkened. A pressure descended upon him. It was heavy, ancient, absolute. "You speak of freedom," the Goddess continued. "But freedom without structure breeds collapse. If you break Fate... you break causality. If you break causality... you break existence." Thirteen met her gaze without hesitation. "Then existence needs to grow stronger." The pressure intensified. Stars reappeared, but now they orbited him instead of her. "Do you truly believe you can shoulder that burden?" the Goddess asked. "I don’t need to shoulder it alone," Thirteen answered. Images flickered behind him. Countless faces, races, and beings across the entire multiverse appeared around them like different channels on a TV. "I stand for every person who has suffered because someone higher up decided their pain was ’necessary’," Thirteen said firmly. "I’m not fighting you for revenge. I’m fighting YOU so the next child who is born doesn’t have to be told their tragedy was ’inevitable.’" The Goddess fell silent, and the pressure wavered. "Do you know what happens," The Goddess asked quietly, "when a variable like you is introduced into a Sandbox?" Thirteen replied calmly. "It evolves." The Goddess’ smile disappeared completely. "No," The Goddess corrected. "It resets." The void trembled violently. For the first time since the Goddess appeared inside his dream, Thirteen felt it. Not fear, but an unfamiliar heavy feeling. Something more ancient than Gods. "You think you’re rebelling against me," the Goddess said, her voice now echoing from everywhere at once. "But you know, Fate... is not on the top of the hierarchy." The stars dimmed. The reconstructed constellations cracked again. Not because of Thirteen this time. But because something else was stirring beyond them. "Even I can’t overwrite certain laws," The Goddess added. "But your defiance has... awakened them." A distant sound echoed through the void. Like gears turning, opening a door that had remained tightly shut since the primordial era. Somewhere out there, something vast shifted in its sleep. Thirteen’s expression hardened. "What did you do?" The Goddess’ form faded further, her voice growing faint. "I didn’t do anything." She paused. Then looking at Thirteen, she whispered. "You did." And with that, the dream collapsed completely. —--- (A/N: Sorry for not being able to post yesterday. I’m still feeling fatigued, and in pain due to my Gym Training and the new diet that I switched to.)