Noah’s eyes buzzed with intensity as he processed all of this while still holding The Infiniverse in his embrace.
This frozen instant stretched as information flooded his consciousness.
Why had THE Creature saved him? He had asked himself this question repeatedly during his return.
The answer beca devastatingly clear now.
Oh, it was so clear now.
THE Creature had not saved him out of benevolence or rcy.
THE Creature had saved him because Noah’s survival and return maximized the harvest for all involved.
If Noah had been captured or collapsed by THE Living Temporal, the Infinite Potential would have been lost or redirected.
But by allowing Noah to return to his current era, by ensuring the loop completed properly, THE Creature ensured that all the accumulated potential across eons would manifest.
And since THE Creature held Lumivara, Ains, Ul’moreth, and countless others locked away in The Belly of Existence, siphoning from them constantly across all those eons...
THE Creature arguably gained vastly more than anyone else from this actualization.
Noah felt the unfathomable harvest waiting within his existence like a dam ready to burst.
Ready to rush out and transform every aspect of his being.
At the sa ti, the others who had benefitted from his actions across ti also attained their corresponding harvest simultaneously.
And THE Creature, who had countless entities locked away in The Infinite Unfurling, with those connected to Noah’s Way being especially potent sources that he had siphoned from for eons...
THE Creature had gained monuntally more than before.
And since nothing of the past would change, since events had unfolded exactly as they always had, all of that infinite potential of accumulated possibilities manifested NOW across current Weavings.
An instant later, as ti resud its normal flow, Existence all around began to shimr and transform.
Whether in this region of collapse where Noah stood.
Or in the distant Wandering Territories where entities pursued their own advancent.
Or in the Transcendent Folds where reality took different forms.
Or in the Lands of the Living where most entities dwelled.
Or in the Lands of The Dead where collapsed existences gathered.
All of surrounding Existence began shimring with multicolored brilliance.
Reality itself gave off a sense of unfathomable imnsity and grandeur as fundantal changes rippled outward.
The very fabric of what was real beca denser, more refined, more potent.
Oh, Existence had benefitted trendously from the closed temporal loop!
And that massive benefit, that fundantal strengthening of reality itself, would have unfathomable and entirely unintended consequences!
Consequences that even THE Creature might not have fully anticipated.
Because when you strengthened the foundation of all reality, when you made Existence itself more potent and refined...
Everything built upon that foundation changed as well.
And not always in predictable or controllable ways.
Noah stood there holding The Infiniverse as the shimr of transformation spread across all of reality.
His eyes still burned with defiance, but now mixed with growing understanding!
Existence burned with glory.
And because it did so...
Within THE Loom, in a sea of endless paradox that had been seated over Existence itself, reality began to tremble and vibrate.
The sea of paradox churned violently, waves of impossible contradictions crashing against each other with building intensity.
And standing at the center of this churning chaos, the visage of THE Living Paradox rose to his feet with eyes shining with profound interest.
He raised his hand slowly as he felt an unfathomable ergence of paradox alongside an even grander ergence of Existence itself.
The two forces surged simultaneously, their growth perfectly synchronized.
Sotis, coincidences existed in reality.
But more often than not, everything was fundantally connected in ways that transcended surface observation.
THE Living Paradox thought about what he had just witnessed through his connection to the Agents he had sent forth.
How Osmont had arrived and eliminated the nine Agents of Paradox like they were nothing.
Crushed them with contemptuous ease and captured them in a single devastating strike.
And then, less than a second later, his own Way and Existence itself began burning with unprecedented imnsity.
Both growing stronger simultaneously.
Coincidence?
No.
No, this was no coincidence at all.
"Osmont, is it? Are you actually a weapon of THE Creature, or sothing else entirely?"
THE Living Paradox actually smiled at this mont as he spoke the question aloud.
Even though such a developnt had occurred, even though his Agents had been neutralized and Existence itself had grown stronger, he remained prepared.
After all, he knew precisely what monster he was fighting.
He understood that THE Creature had countless entities locked away in his Belly.
His Belly of Existence. His Belly of THE Beast.
And THE Loom would strike that Belly wide open and spill everything contained within.
All those from The Infinite Unfurling would be released.
All those from Ginnungagap would erge.
After THE Loom struck, after The Fallout descended fully, nothing would remain the sa.
In the previous eons, THE entities had been rare and exceptional.
This would not remain the status quo.
The Fallout would reveal it all. The Fallout would show the fundantal truth.
And then, his true battle with THE Creature would fully and genuinely begin!
THE Living Paradox smiled brilliantly as he spoke with voice carrying across the churning sea.
"Well, regardless of who you truly are, regardless of whether you’re a tool or an independent actor, your actions are taking us infinitely closer towards Midnight. Existence thrashing like this with all this concentrated power... hah. I will also let you know sothing, Osmont. If you are indeed a tool being used by THE Creature, you at least deserve to know what your role is accelerating."
Seas of Paradox churned even more violently as he spoke.
And in the next mont, the hands of a massive paradoxical clock manifested in this space.
The clock itself seed to exist and not exist simultaneously, its face showing contradictory tis that sohow all remained true at once.
The hands turned with ominous finality.
They moved from twenty-five seconds.
And rotated inexorably toward zero.
The hands of the clock turned closer and closer toward Midnight!
Until...they were 5 Seconds to Midnight!
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