Away from The Infiniverse.
In the Transcendent Elental Folds.
They appeared in a realm of breathtaking, frigid beauty.
Cold as cold could be!
In a small but core region of the Transcendent Elental Folds.
Here, the very concept of 'cold' was the dominant authority. They stood in a region of beautiful, frozen stellar ice and snow.
Rivers of what looked like liquid frost, carrying shimring, microscopic stars of ice, flowed through a void that was a deep, velvety black.
The silence was absolute, the kind of quiet that feels like a physical presence.
The mont they arrived, Noah's eyes flashed with a vibrant blue light. Countless data streams, overlays, and analytical readouts from RUIN/EDEN flooded his vision, a constant, real-ti dissection of this new environnt.
In the far distance, suspended in the silent void, was a grand citadel.
It was a masterpiece of elental architecture, a fortress carved from a single, colossal glacier that shone with its own internal, blue-white light.
It exceeded the size and imnsity of Aeternitas Concordia by at least two tis.
As he began to float towards it, he spoke to Khor, his voice a low, contemplative murmur.
"Since you ca back from collapse, do you ever feel like we are fighting…an uphill battle? A losing battle? Is that why, for so many of the potential possibilities and solutions, you have only ever said, 'maybe'?"
…!
He had to ask.
Khor was silent for a long mont, her own abyssal eyes gazing out at the beautiful, dead landscape.
When she finally replied, her voice was devoid of its usual playfulness. It was the sound of an ancient, terrible truth being spoken.
"Existences at the Level One Scale are extrely astute, Outsider. Terrifyingly so. When they deem sothing to be a certain way, when they write a new rule into the ga of existence, only soone of the sa stage as them, or even more powerful, can change it. A level zero trying to revert or change sothing that a level one existence did…"
Her words did not finish. They did not need to. The intent, the crushing, absolute weight of what she ant, was clear.
Without answering, she had answered his question!
Vehently. Yes. All along, she had known they were fighting a losing battle.
But even with such words, Noah smiled. It was a dangerous, predatory smile, a flash of tyrannical defiance in the cold, indifferent void.
He denied such a reality. He had already denied collapse how many tis? Apocalypses how many tis? He would simply add this one to the list, even knowing that the forces he now dealt with were utterly, unimaginably unfathomable and unfair in the worst possible ways.
At that thought, he nodded, his resolve hardening. "RUIN/EDEN," he voiced, "what are we looking at?"
The crimson-blue holographic figure appeared beside him.
|Seconds ago, a tear in existence blood. And from it… that thing has begun making its descent.|
That thing.
Their eyes focused. They looked across the stellar frozen rivers of frost, to the space just above the distant, magnificent citadel of the Living Elentals.
A massive, humanoid armored figure was descending slowly. As if it had all the ti in existence.
Noah's eyes widened. What was that?
It was a being of pure, terrible majesty. Its form was encased in a suit of massive, articulated power armor, its design a perfect, brutalist fusion of overlapping, angled plates like an armored warrior from a forgotten age, and the ornate, almost gothic grandeur of a talloid being!
The armor was a pristine, sterile white, unmarked by any symbol or insignia, yet its very cleanliness was a threat.
Its pauldrons were the size of small moons, its greaves like the pillars of a dead titan's temple.
And in one of its massive, gauntleted hands, it held an intricate, white tallic hamr, its head a block of solidified judgnt!
Noah felt a sense of suffocation just looking at it, his own Quadrillion-level power feeling strangely… insignificant!
Khor, beside him, was frowning heavily.
"What is that?" he asked, his voice a low, disbelieving whisper. "The numbers I am seeing… they cannot be accurate, right?"
Beside him, RUIN/EDEN's voice was grim.
|I have managed to analyze it so far as to deem this subject to be called… a Justiciar.|
Justiciar!
The distinction of this thing buzzed in Noah's mind!
|And the numbers are very much accurate, Master. Which ans that the default recomndation on the course of action as of now is observation and not involvent. Otherwise, you would be heading towards yet another collapse, and this ti, I would not be able to reboot you.|
HUUM!
The numbers. They were a simple, stark display that RUIN/EDEN had overlaid on the armored figure, a single, devastating line of text!
Purity: 1,000 Quadrillion.
An armored figure of pure, unadulterated Purity, a being with the power to cleanse a Folds, was descending upon a vast citadel of the Living Elentals!
At that mont, a new set of prompts blood, a rapid, efficient analysis from his ever-vigilant system.
|Target Profile: Aeternitas Glacies – The Grand Citadel of Frost.|
|Analysis: This is a primary cultural and population hub for the Living Elentals of this region.|
|Current Inhabitants:|
| - Dukes: 5|
| - Royal Living Elentals: 13,384|
| - Honored Living Elentals: 33,745|
| - Weaker Living Elentals and Fold Dwellers: ~7.2 Million|
| - Transcendent Wheels of Existence: 37 (Containing Fold Dwellers of uncountable Sextillions).|
Countless lifeforms.
All of them, now in the path of a silent, descending horror of purification.
Noah knew, with a chilling certainty, that this was caused partly by the destruction of the Lodestone.
This was the consequence of him poking the hornet's nest, of triggering a failsafe he did not understand.
His expression beca stern, the calm observer replaced by the decisive Tyrant.
His commands were not spoken; they were willed, a flash of pure, focused intent.
'Warn the Living Elental Dukes. Now. And begin using the Living Existential Authority of Quantum to move the Transcendent Wheels of Existence away from there. Save… what can be saved.'
|Yes, Master.|
And right after…
BOOM!
The Justiciar smashed into the grand citadel.
A do of protective frost, a barrier that even a being of one Quadrillion would have taken so ti to breach, shattered like paper.
Bellows of screams and horror, silent in the void but deafening in the psionic space, erupted from the city.
And as the Justiciar stood amidst the shattered do, its armored eyes began to glow with a terrible, white light.
In its hand, the massive white hamr blazed with unknown, silent white flas as thr hostility was clear!
The purification was about to begin!
The only question was why?
Why did the trigger of the Lodestone lead to this as it appearing seconds after…it had to be connected, right?!
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