Chapter 464: The Shepherds of Stories! V
The words buzzed in his vision with the weight of law being revealed!
Every choice he had made, every life he had saved or ended, every ripple of consequence from his actions…they hadn’t just been events!
They had been narrative threads, story beats in Fables he had been unconsciously weaving.
In the next mont, the truth of it beca visible even to those who lacked his newfound perception.
The entire vastness of Ethemia and the Sea of Thalassara seed to ignite with invisible fire.
Platinum waves of light erupted from every living thing his actions had touched, creating an ocean of narrative energy that surged toward him with the inevitability of stories seeking their author!
The farr whose Colony City had been saved from Evolutius Beasts contributed a thread.
The factory worker whose sister had been healed by technologies he had made possible added another.
The Dragon whose rivals had been eliminated by the chaos before he killed the Primordial Light of Darkness gave up a strand of narrative that blazed like stellar fire.
The authority was unfathomably potent, each thread carrying not just energy but aning!
More prompts materialized, each one reshaping his understanding of what was happening to him.
|Due to the influx of the Existential Authority of Fables flowing into your existence for the first ti, you are undergoing a Baptism of Purity.|
|Your existence has truly accepted the inheritance of The First Nar’Thyss and embarked on a path of no return.|
|The techniques of how to manipulate Fables of Existence are now sprouting within your existence like seeds given perfect soil.|
|As of this mont, your Existence Corruption Value is rapidly being reduced towards 0, and your existence can handle much greater loads compared to before.|
Achilles read these words as his eyes blazed with terrifying light…purple-gold shot through with platinum threads that moved like living text!
His emotions were tumultuous, a storm of understanding and rage, power and revulsion.
He was sensing just how terrifying the power of the Nar’Thyss truly was, feeling it integrate into his being with the intimacy of poison becoming blood.
But more than that, he was realizing with crystalline clarity that this was how the Star Seas had been manipulated for eons.
Every war that seed inevitable, every betrayal that felt like destiny, every cycle of revenge that appeared to be justice…they had all been stories!
Fables written by beings who fed on narrative tension, who created conflict for the sa reason a farr planted seeds: to harvest what grew.
Even as he processed this terrible understanding, the prompts continued, revealing the tools of his new trade.
|Inherent Exclusive Ability Awakened: Narrative Oversight|
|You can perceive the active Fables surrounding any existence within your observation range. See the threads of their stories, the potential plot points approaching, the narrative weight they carry. Understanding a being’s Fable grants insight into their likely actions, their destined encounters, and the dramatic monts that will define their existence. The deeper your observation, the more clearly you can read the story they are living.|
|Inherent Exclusive Ability Awakened: Fable Redirection|
|You can alter the trajectory of ongoing Fables through subtle influence. Place the right object in the right place, speak the right word at the right mont, arrange coincidences that feel like fate. You do not write new stories but edit existing ones, changing their genre, their tempo, their eventual conclusion. The more narrative authority you possess, the more dramatic the alterations you can make while maintaining the Fable’s believability.|
…!
Achilles read over the details of these abilities, his eyes burning with lividity that made the Sea of Thalassara around him begin to boil.
The water turned to steam in perfect spheres around his form, only to imdiately recondense, creating a cycle of destruction and restoration that mirrored his emotional state.
“Okay,” he said, the word carrying enough weight to make reality itself pause and listen.
His voice was quiet, controlled, but beneath it lay fury that could unmake stars. “If that is how they have been playing it, then that is how I will also play it.”
Rose drifted closer, her water form expressing concern through subtle currents. “Achilles…”
He turned to look at her, and she saw in his eyes not rely anger but cold, calculating purpose. The kind of determination that had led him to break ti itself, now focused on sothing far more ambitious!
And he could fucking be ambitious!
“The Nar’Thyss find it fun to direct stories and feed off them. They steer these fables as this gives them power…a trendous amount of power, in fact.” His smile held no warmth, only the promise of poetic justice.
“Then I will find them. These Outsiders…these…mbers of the sa lineage that I now share! They did send one of their own to the First Adrastia Emperor King, did they not? And they have only gotten stronger from the fable of revenge and decimation since then, right?!”
HUUM!
The seas seethed and trembled as Achilles had a stern gaze, feeling how powerful the energy of Fables was as with just how much he just absorbed…he could likely reach the Sixth or Seventh Echelons for his Assimilated Regulations!
His words continued as he thought of the future.
“So…without them even knowing, I will direct their Fables.”
His father’s voice carried careful concern. “We will have tk be careful. They are likely much more powerful than us after all these years…”
“Mmm” Achilles nodded, platinum light beginning to weave patterns around his form that looked suspiciously like text being written.
“Carefully. We will make them characters in their own ga. Let them experience what it’s like to be moved by forces they don’t understand, to make choices they think are free but are actually scripted.”
The Hive Queen’s form shifted, her many eyes focusing on him with interest. “You would beco what you hate to destroy it?”
Achilles considered this for a mont, then shook his head. “It is a power. Like any power, it can be used for good or bad. The power to direct Fables is not sothing monstrous…it is simply what they did with it. There’s a difference between a doctor learning about disease to cure it and soone spreading infection for their own purposes. I’ll cure what these fuckers have destroyed…and then do more than that!”
HUUM!
He raised his hand again, watching the platinum particles still falling toward Ethemia below.
Each one carried potential stories, possible Fables, narrative seeds that would sprout in ways the Nar’Thyss could never predict because they ca from one of their own…or at least, soone with their power who thought nothing like them.
“They’ve been playing this ga for eons,” he said quietly. “Writing tragedies for their entertainnt, creating cycles of suffering for their sustenance. They think they’re the ultimate authors of reality’s story.”
His hand clenched into a fist, and every platinum particle still falling suddenly stopped, hanging in space like paused snow.
“They’re about to discover what happens when one of their characters learns to fucking write. So, at this mont…”
…!
“ASSIMILATE!”
BOOM!
A command was given.
To the platinum particles that the Nar’Thyss enjoyed!
Oh!!!
2/2 Onwards!
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