Chapter 1700: Destiny Calls

เผยแพร่เมื่อ 17 มี.ค. 2569 08:41

Chapter 1700: Destiny Calls Striking forward like a viper, Rowan grabbed the cover of the Primordial Record, slammed it shut, and kept his hand on the black book as if to prevent it from opening. The action had seemed easy, but it was far from it. His entire arm up to his shoulders had shrunken; it was as if all the vitality in his arm had been sucked away, leaving him with an arm that resembled bones wrapped by dried flesh. His regeneration, which should be insane, was barely healing the damage, but Rowan did not care about the pitiful state of his body, not when he was fighting to keep the Primordial Record close. Endless waves of soul-wrenching pain were still tearing his soul to pieces as the fusion process had not ended, even as he fought to keep the Primordial Record closed. A whisper slipped past the defenses of his consciousness and entered his heart, "You should not fight me, Eos. This was always meant to be." The voice had emerged in his heart, yet Rowan’s mouth spoke them. "From the day you touched the page of my book, this has always been your Fate..." That same voice delved into Rowan’s heart, and his mouth spoke it. The voice was calm and cold, and as much as Rowan wanted to fight against it, he could not. If he did, he would lose the chance to fuse these abilities, and when he did, all the abilities placed in the fusion would be lost. Rowan would have been willing to make this sacrifice, but he could no longer do that. He was now on a ride that he could no longer get off. The presence inside the Primordial Record would escape if he cancelled the process, and the only way to survive would be to complete the fusion, and he would become the master of this presence. If he did not, then he would become its... No, his slave. Slave to a higher power. ® Upon seeing those eyes, Rowan understood what had happened; he had swum in the Abyss between the endless void of Limbo for too long, and although the Abyss was supposedly empty, there were creatures within that Primordials dreaded. Every time Rowan did his fusion with the assistance of the Primordial Record, he was creating new techniques and abilities that had not existed before, like his Origin Land and becoming an Apex Omniversal Titan, but he was also making the Singularity stronger. Making the Primordial Record stronger had no obvious drawbacks; it would be able to enhance his abilities more efficiently and easily, while also presenting more options to him, if by some chance the Singularity was able to evolve, but all of those advantages came to nothing when something extremely special happened during a fusion. Rowan was making new abilities with each of his fusions, but what happened when he did not make a new ability, but something older... Something that had existed before but was now gone. During his evolution and ascension, Rowan had been inheriting abilities from his bloodlines, and it was a practice that he had become used to until he was strong enough to begin making techniques and spells ideally suited to him. Inheriting techniques and spells from his bloodlines were dangerous, and he had seen firsthand what that could do to him over the years, with the greatest of them being the Gilded Maw spell by the Primordials that had killed him, but this was the cost of evolving into a higher dimensional being by following shortcuts, even if the shortcut was as profound as the Primordial Record. Rowan was well aware of the risks; this was the reason he embraced the fusion abilities of the Primordial Record due to its ability to create something new from the old. With his new abilities and bloodlines, he was free from the manipulations of higher-dimensional powers. There were risks to fusion, but Rowan always thought he was able to handle it; it was always the punch you did not see coming that put you down. In this fusion, he was fusing his bloodline ability, Purgatory Gate, with his dimensional fabrics skill, which included his dimensional engine, Breath of Enoch, Astrolabe, Knowledge Well, Hollow Forge, and Dimensional Flesh. All of these skills were powerful and unique, but Rowan had made a mistake; there was one ability he should not have fused, and that was the Breath of Enoch. ® "This book was never meant to open. You did, and the price must be paid." The force pushing behind the covers of the Primordial Record multiplied, and Rowan groaned in distress as more of his body began to shrink, not just his right arm, but he did not take a step back; he maintained the pressure on the book. The leather binding beneath his palm pulsed with a slow rhythmic heartbeat, and he could feel the touch of the presence waiting inside of it, and it was coming closer. His act of completing the fusion was a double-edged sword, because it was making it easier for the presence to infiltrate his mind and body. Rowan fell to his knees, feeling the cold hand of this presence clawing at the edges of his sanity. His body, which was a vessel of pure will, had become a battleground. Rowan felt a probing sensation in his face, that slowly crawled to his eyes, and although he could not see it, he was aware that something had escaped the Primordial Record and was walking across his face, then a blinding pain shot through his eyes, and Rowan blinked, observing that his vision had become tainted with an unknown corruption. The presence inside the book has slithered through his eyes and entered his mind. It was a rot spreading through his essence like ink in water, and his thoughts were beginning to shift into alien shapes that should not exist, even by his lofty standards. Rowan groaned aloud as he fought back to keep his mind steady; the dangers were not truly in his thoughts but in his limbs. If he were to let go of the cover of the Primordial Record, the presence would have full access to him. Rowan had barely glimpsed those eyes, and he was already in such dire straits that if he were to give it a little more time, then he would fall. Despite how hard he was fighting, his flesh began to bubble and split, revealing glimpses of something underneath—Not bone, not sinew, but a shifty oily darkness that whispered in a language that was older than time. These words were imprinted into his heart even as his mouth moved without consent. "You were never real..." The voice inside of him crooned, and the sound that emerged from Rowan’s lips was that of a thousand Realities fading into nothingness. "You are my mask, and I shall wear you." Rowan screamed, but his voice was no longer his own. It came out wrong—a wet, guttural noise that split into dissonant harmonies, each note a blasphemy. His golden light flickered, dimming under the suffocating dark. An Apex Omniversal Titan was unique, even as a lower-dimensional being; he was supposed to be invincible, but he was nearing his limits. He could feel it rewriting him. His memories unraveled, replaced by visions of an endless, hungry void where things with too many eyes and too many mouths writhed in worship of the thing now nesting in his soul. His prayers became its laughter. His divinity became its feast. And worst of all—he was beginning to understand. Rowan could see him. Sitting on a throne of madness, he was awakening, as a worthy shell had finally been found after so long waiting. The fragments of his mind that still fought caught glimpses of the truth: the book was not just a Singularity, else it would not have survived for so long. It was an altar. And he was the sacrifice. His last act of defiance was a single, desperate thought before the dark swallowed him whole: "Burn it. Burn it all." But his Will was bound and could not escape, his Fate was no longer his own, and one by one, his fingers began to rise from the book, even though his undying Will still fought against this action. Rowan could only watch himself slowly failing, and as much as he wanted to scream his rage and defiance, he could not. ’No, I refuse to believe this is how it all ends.’ With more of himself slipping away, Rowan’s thoughts were not in order, but something was aggravating his consciousness, something important that he was forgetting. ’What is it... What am I missing?’ His thoughts were already gone; he existed only in darkness, but the last fragments of his Will refused to die... ’What have I forgotten?’ ’What.... ’What.... ’What have I forgotten!’ It should not have been possible, but in that darkness, a single spark shone before it extinguished, and Rowan remembered, ’Ah, I see... It was my Destiny. It had always been calling me; how could I not have listened? My Destiny calls, and I will answer.’ From the darkness, Rowan’s consciousness that should have ended reached for his Destiny; he reached for the eighth dimension.

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