Taylor began conversing with THE Osmontian in a way that made Achilles genuinely marvel at her capability.
Most beings of considerable power who found themselves standing before sothing of this magnitude either perford elaborate deference or attempted to project confidence they did not possess, both responses communicating the sa underlying awareness of the gap between themselves and what they were addressing. Taylor did neither.
She spoke with the natural ease of soone who had decided the most practical approach was simply to be exactly what she was.
It turned out that what she was happened to include a complete absence of performative... anything.
THE Osmontian had not destroyed her after the introduction. She had provided information about Vireth and the assembled force above them with straightforward efficiency, laying out the situation with accuracy.
She crossed her arms and addressed the general direction of the sky with the bearing of soone delivering a verdict.
"Frankly, I don’t think it’s fair. They are sore losers who can’t kill you in the future, so they co back and try to kill you now? Fucking scrubs, man. If you and I were fighting or we were mortal enemies, I would sche to kill you directly." She pointed at THE Osmontian without apparent concern for what that gesture might communicate.
"Oh, but again, I am not your enemy. Or really, I don’t want to be. If only these people knew what existence was saying about you—"
"Focus for ." THE Osmontian’s voice was deep in ways that communicated depth rather than simply volu.
"Continue. Concisely without rambling."
...!
His voice arrived with the particular quality of sothing that had long since stopped requiring emphasis to communicate authority as it carried an overly strong sense of...was it tyranny? Pride?
Achilles couldn’t quite place it!
Achilles found himself focusing more intently on THE Osmontian as Taylor redirected herself, and the more carefully he examined this being through the fragnt of consciousness she carried, the more the examination resisted completion.
Sothing about THE Osmontian refused to resolve into a fully assessable picture, each aspect of his existence suggesting further depth that observation could not reach.
Then his existence sent the warning as he thought what would happen if he tried to assimilate this being.
The sa signal he had felt before when contemplating Infinity directly, blinding and unanimous and entirely without nuance.
It arrived not as a gentle advisory but as the sa categorical refusal his foundations had produced the first ti he touched Infinity’s edge and understood what drowning in it would an.
THE Osmontian triggered that warning!
Not a being who wielded Infinity. Not an existence who had developed an extraordinary relationship with it through eons of careful cultivation!
Sothing closer to synonymous with it, a lifeform for whom the distinction between possessing Infinity and being Infinity had beco a distinction without practical content.
Was this why he could strip Infinity from others? Was he a lifeform born of Infinity in its truest expression, able to reclaim from other existences sothing that was fundantally his in a way that transcended cultivation or ownership?
Was he not mad with infinity? Just what the hell was thid monster?
Achilles continued mulling this silently while Taylor navigated the interaction with exceptional skill, maintaining a conversational quality that sohow made the exchange feel like two beings reaching a reasonable agreent rather than one entity deciding whether to destroy the other.
She moved through the relevant information with efficiency, eventually arriving at the practical proposition that she and Achilles simply wanted safe return to their respective Observable Existences in exchange for what they had provided.
Achilles was not particularly concerned with the tiline of his return.
His spores were spreading through the Observable Force saturating the Citadel above, threading themselves through the currents cycling through Gilded One after Gilded One with the patient invisibility of sothing that had been designed to be indistinguishable from the dium carrying it.
He was waiting to see if the operation would bear the results he was calculating, whether he could genuinely Assimilate dozens of Gilded Ones from this distance through the Observable Force they were breathing into their foundations with each passing mont.
Taylor eventually conveyed the information about how Vireth and the others were concealing themselves from THE Source’s awareness, explaining why the concealnt was necessary and why it ant that obscenely powerful Gilded Ones had been excluded from this operation entirely.
THE Osmontian listened without interruption.
Then he spoke.
"I reached out to soone. They’ll reach out to whatever relevant party exists with a connection to THE Source. They communicated that it will be handled."
He looked toward the distant space.
"So it will be handled."
...!
Such words delivered with such complete and effortless confidence.
Achilles was not complaining. If THE Osmontian’s casual reach into whatever network he operated through was genuinely sufficient to resolve the entire situation that had brought Vireth back through ti with carefully assembled allies and a Bronze Relic Fragnt of Persevere, he had no objection to the resolution being that clean.
THE Osmontian continued.
"You and Adrastia. Since you were the ones to co forward, we’ll get you back to your respective Observable Existences in due ti. I’m sowhat...busy at present."
The mont Achilles processed that his safety had been effectively confird, his attention shifted entirely to the operation he had been running throughout this entire encounter.
Observable Force had spread across the vessels of the Gilded Legion arranged in formation, flowing through the atmosphere that connected the assembled force to the Citadel beyond.
His spores moved through those currents invisibly, integrated so thoroughly into the Observable Force he had seeded through this environnt that nothing moving through those currents could distinguish his presence from the dium itself.
And Gilded Ones possessed organs functioning similarly to lungs for Observable Force, drawing it in continuously and cycling it through their foundations with each breath of the substance that sustained their advancent. As they breathed the Observable Force saturating the Braneworld Observable Existence, they breathed him alongside it.
His Observable Force was flowing into multiple Gilded Ones simultaneously.
What had begun as a terrifying calamity that threatened everything he had built across his entire existence was demonstrating a genuinely remarkable tendency to beco sothing else entirely!
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