In a unique area in the Seas of Tian.
In a region very few others could actually arrive to, where the golden rivers that connected the Nine Seas converged before diverging again toward their respective destinations, there was an obsidian sea filled with rivers of gold flowing all around.
The obsidian was very potent as it distinguished nothing else other than Chaos.
Chaos... in its most primal and terrifying state was not disorder. It was the absence of the necessity for order, the raw potential from which all possibilities erged before differentiation forced them into specific forms. It was the state before states existed, the condition that preceded conditions, the formlessness that contained all forms within its infinite lack of definition. True Chaos did not destroy order. It simply existed in a way that made order’s presence or absence equally irrelevant.
At this mont, that definition of Chaos seed to be swirling in the eyes of The Groundskeeper.
He stood in the center of this obsidian-gold sea with posture that held weight beyond his already unfathomable Depth. His golden crystallized features reflected the darkness surrounding him while his gaze remained fixed upon sothing that commanded his complete attention.
An encased crystalline structure rose from the obsidian waters before him, its surface perfectly transparent despite the chaos that should have corrupted any attempt at ordered form. Within this crystalline prison lay the body of an obsidian serpent that was eating its own tail, the ancient symbol of infinity made manifest in flesh that radiated wrongness so profound it made reality itself uncomfortable.
An ancient and heart-shaking air of Chaos radiated from this slumbering serpent, pressure that would have collapsed any THE entity foolish enough to approach without sufficient protection. The figure of The Groundskeeper actually had a complex gaze as he stared at this body, emotions flickering across his features too quickly to identify.
Around this ti, in the surroundings, one could notice faint forming flickers of Corrupted Growths that were actually much more nurous in this area than the Sea that Achilles and the others had been privy to. The proximity to concentrated Chaos seed to accelerate their generation, corruption blooming from the tension between order and its absence.
When these Corrupted Growths reached critical enough levels, The Groundskeeper would simply wave his hands with casual authority that made the gesture seem almost unconscious. They beca golden streams of stability that flowed into Existence and into himself, purification achieved without apparent effort or attention.
And yet at this mont...
A phenonon occurred that made The Groundskeeper pause his contemplation.
The Corrupted Growths that were forming actually flickered and blazed with intensity that exceeded their normal ergence. Then, in the next mont, they beca extinguished even before anything exerted Depth on them. They simply ceased, not purified but negated, as if sothing had erased the corruption before it could fully manifest.
The Groundskeeper was barely paying attention to this routine maintenance, but his perception was heavy and unfathomable enough that he still caught the anomaly despite his focus being elsewhere.
He got out of his musings about the slumbering serpent and looked over while tilting his head with curiosity and confusion that seed almost out of place on features that usually held only ancient patience.
What exactly was that?
---
In the First Sea, Abzu.
Rose was heavily focused on the Corrupted Growth in front of her as she tried many things within the Alchemical barrier she had constructed. She prodded at its fundantal structure, attempted to replicate its patterns, tried to understand the codes that made corruption what it was.
And in the next mont...
BZZT!
An obsidian flash of light erged from the Corrupted Growth she was ssing around with, her experints triggering sothing she hadn’t anticipated. An instant later, dozens of Corrupted Growths blood from the single source she had contained, multiplying with speed that shattered her boundary as they began to swirl around her in patterns that seed almost hungry.
She was shocked and alard as the corruption she had been studying suddenly beca corruption that was studying her.
She quickly waved her hands and exerted her authority.
Her THE Surface Depth pressed down upon the swirling Corrupted Growths with weight that refused to acknowledge their attempts at expansion. All the corrupted formations around her instantly shriveled under her Civilizational Authority, geotric wrongness collapsing into simplicity before transforming into rivers of golden light.
The light flowed into her and the surrounding Existence with warmth, her Depth very noticeably increasing from the concentrated corruption she had just processed.
...!
Nearby, THE Endless Dream looked over with expression of astonishnt that made her jeweled eyes widen dramatically.
"What did you do?"
Her voice carried concern alongside curiosity, the foreboding she had felt earlier seeming justified by what she had just witnessed.
And Rose, as if she had been caught doing sothing she shouldn’t have been doing, looked over seriously as she shook her head with expression of innocence that fooled no one.
"Nothing. Nothing at all."
She waved her hand dismissively.
"You hang tight."
Even though she was saying this, her eyes seed to be glimring with imnse profundity of light and brilliance. A riot of fascination and calm shock was being stifled within her gaze as if she had understood sothing significant, sothing that her casual denial was designed to conceal until she could process the implications fully.
She waited briefly over the next few seconds, her attention fixed on the surrounding waters with intensity.
The mont she saw a distant Corrupted Growth forming from the golden depths, she swept her hands as she scooped it up inside a circular barrier of her authority. She remained utterly still, observing, calculating, her mind working through possibilities that her earlier experint had revealed.
---
Far from the Nine Seas of Tian.
Inside one of the few Seas of Thalassara that Achilles had relocated under his protection, life continued with peaceful cultivation that contrasted sharply with the trials his other bodies faced elsewhere.
The figure of Rose, her main body that always remained inside the Sea of Thalassara for safety, had been resting in ditative cultivation when information from her other self flooded through their shared consciousness.
Her eyes snapped open with light that held discovery rather than alarm.
She appeared inside a wide hall where Achilles was talking with his grandfather Thalsian, the two of them discussing the implications of their newly achieved THE distinction. Around them, the other Adrastia Emperor Kings were surrounded by waves of buzzing Civilizational Authority as they familiarized themselves with power that had been gifted rather than earned.
Rose burst into such a place with urgency that made everyone present turn toward her with expressions of concern.
She was looking at Achilles with heavy gaze, her copper-green eyes twinkling with excitent that she made no attempt to suppress.
"I discovered sothing."
Her voice carried weight that demanded imdiate attention.
"Co!"
...!
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