Chapter 1947: Under The Hood The hammer was broken, and its form flickered between existence and non-existence. Rowan suspected that if not for the frozen Origin of Absolute convivtion keeping it in place, this hammer would have vanished. Surrounding the hammer head were its broken pieces that floated around it like satellites around a planet, and even though Rowan could not sense what this hammer was or who it belonged to, he had used enough reality-breaking weapons by now to know when he was in the presence of one. This hammer did not scream of power, because it didn’t need to; there was a silent aura that was impossible to describe that made chills crawl down his spine, and Rowan was surprised when Eos sent back the feeling it was experiencing when Rowan saw this hammer. It was dread, of a sort that Eos could not describe, but Rowan knew that a single piece of this hammer was enough to kill him. However, it was not the power of this hammer that was causing this feeling of dread for Rowan and Eos, because he could infer that this broken hammer had no power; whatever it had before was gone. What was causing this feeling was what this hammer did. "What sort of weapon is this?" Actions had consequences, and this became more pronounced the more often this action occurred in the higher dimension. Everything touched by Eos left a mark that would last for what lower-dimensional beings would regard as forever. This hammer had been used for something so devastating that even when it was broken, the aura surrounding it was enough to kill Rowan. It was as if Rowan was looking at a gun without bullets that could still kill him, just because this gun had killed gods and celestials before, and the mark of that act had been engraved on every particle of this weapon. Rowan did not try to touch this weapon; he was now wary of using weapons he did not fully understand, and even though there should have been no way to discover this temple yet, he would not try to change anything inside this place until he knew more. If this weapon could easily threaten him, then the chance that it could kill one of the Ancient Primordials was possible, but Rowan knew that there were subtle differences between the Ancient Primordials and everyone else, and he would not easily take a leap of faith before understanding what those changes were. This temple was relatively not a big place, as it contained three sections in a single large chamber. The first part was the memories frozen in stone, the second part was this hammer, and now Rowan could look across and see the last section of this temple. Perhaps he would get more answers from this part of the temple. Rowan walked past the hammer, making sure he was not anywhere near it, and this was not because of fear but common sense. The aura from this hammer would kill the body of this Incarnation quite easily, and touching it would be like a fly entering the sun; there was no way he survived this process. Reaching the final part of this temple was a weird experience for Rowan, although he was aware that in this temple, time and space did not exist, which meant that even if he spent a trillion years inside this temple, he would step out of it at precisely the same time he entered it. For the Archai outside, they would just see Rowan step into the temple and immediately step out of it, and they would never know how much time he spent inside of it. Rowan wondered if the missing Incarnation was in a place like this. Still, Rowan was sensing something inside his skull as he reached this final part of the temple. It was as if he was stepping back through time, and he was about to take a step forward when his body froze. It was not a conscious decision; it was just something that his body did by itself when it detected danger that was extremely subtle yet incredibly dangerous. If his foot had just gone a nanometer forward, he would have died. Cold sweat broke out across his forehead, and he took several steps back. It was a weird feeling for Rowan to be this completely helpless when he was technically walking at the ceiling of power in all of existence, and he could count on one hand the number of entities that he could call enemies. All he knew now was that he had stumbled into a place where the ceiling of power had been heightened dramatically, and somehow this place was deeply connected to him. There was no way Rowan could believe that finding this place was a coincidence. With the type of power he was sensing here, this place would carry an impossible amount of Karma, and those that were not linked to it would not be able to find it, not in a trillion cosmic eras. The last part of the temple had previously been hidden from his sight, but as if his presence was the key, it began to open up to him like a mirage, and Rowan could see the final part of this place. He observed it in silence for a long time. Rowan’s body had sensed danger before he could step into it, because ahead of him was a broken forge. Like the hammer before, this forge was cold and silent; it had already served its purpose, but whatever purpose it did serve was so terrible that the mark left upon it was something that could not be described. A hammer and a forge, tools meant for creation, but why was the aura that surrounds them filled with such horrifying power of destruction and devastation? However, it was not the presence of this forge that made Rowan observe it for a long time; no, it was the nine figures standing around the forge. They wore red cloaks, and Rowan could not see their features, nor could he tell if they were alive or dead. The fact that they were standing so closely around the forge did not give Rowan any confidence that they might be alive, as he wondered what sort of beings were strong enough to be able to stand close to this forge. Observing them closely, Rowan thought he saw etchings at the spots closer to their feet, and while ensuring that he was careful of the aura from the forge, he moved closer so his perception could cover all of the etchings, and he spoke out loud what he had just read, "Peace is the silence that remains when everything capable of conflict has been removed." Rowan’s eyes widened. He had not meant to speak these words out loud, but something in this place or in those words did not permit anything but the spoken language to express its intent. The robes of one of the nine figures rippled as if a thousand snakes were moving inside of it, and then the hood covering their face fell off, and Rowan’s heart turned to ice when he saw the face that the cloak had been covering. A part of him had believed that the faces under the hood might have been his own. It was not the first time he had come across events like this, and knowing his history, he would not be surprised if there were hidden copies of himself out there; after all, he was an experiment. Yet, that was not what he found here. The face underneath that hood was Noctis.