The Blind Old Daoist raised his head slightly, as if listening to sothing far beyond the chamber rather than to Damon and Lilith standing before him.
"This very place was created using complex magic. I am not versed in the way of mana, so I am abroad in that field. I would have to admit my own ignorance on the matter. However, from my years of experience, I knew there would be a great treasure here."
Damon did not respond. He stood still, shoulders squared, eyes fixed on the old man with a steady, unreadable gaze. Even his breathing was controlled, slow and asured, as if he feared any sudden movent might disturb the fragile stillness of the tomb.
"For that reason, I decided to try my luck. Since I was going into the Abyss, who knows how many years it would take before I managed to leave that horrid place."
A faint current of air drifted through the chamber, causing the old man’s thin white hair to sway gently across his shoulders. The glowing vines embedded in his body pulsed faintly with the sa rhythm as the lake behind him.
"I used a few seals and managed to bypass this place’s protecting magics. With one sword strike, I cut through the space itself and stepped into this burial ground. I was hoping to find so ancient inheritance. Who would have thought it was only a seal made to suppress gods."
His tone was languid, almost amused by his own misfortune. Then, without warning, his expression brightened and his voice lifted with excitent that felt strangely out of place in this solemn graveyard.
"But then I saw this lake. I knew at once it was an extraordinary treasure of the heavens. My senses were not wrong. It was truly heaven defying. Hahahahah. My journey into this world was not for nothing."
Damon’s lips curled slightly. He could already guess the rest.
"Then you tried to touch the lake, unaware that it had a few more seals. You got imprisoned here. And judging by your condition, you never got a chance to use the Lake of Tears."
The old daoist smiled faintly, neither offended nor embarrassed.
"Indeed. However, I did get a chance to study it. I can say for certain this is a very important treasure. Its origins may seem unassuming, but its creation was an act born from the will of the omniverse itself."
Damon’s eyes sharpened slightly at that. He knew the omniverse, as a collective, had its own will. A strange guiding tendency that sotis pushed events toward unseen directions. Still, his knowledge was incomplete.
"When you say will of the omniverse, you an everyone’s will with the exception of the true beings?"
The Blind Old Daoist slowly raised an eyebrow and a faint sneer touched his lips.
"The true beings have a will, do they not? And they are part of the omniverse, are they not? Therefore, they are part of this collective will. I will not deny they are more powerful than the will itself, but it is also known that the true beings we see and live with are not their true selves. They are avatars carrying only fragnts of their real power."
Damon felt a quiet irritation at that thought. It was already unfair that such beings could create and destroy worlds at will. The fact that they did so without even using their true bodies made it worse.
"You ntioned the Abyss in the Sky Continent earlier. Is that a proper way of leaving this world?"
Damon asked directly. There was no point circling around the question. He knew he could not outmaneuver a monster who had lived for countless thousands of years.
The old daoist’s expression darkened slightly.
"It is not. Only a madman or soone truly desperate would brave the Abyss. It is a place of horrors and nightmares. The Abyss never is and never will be. It is always here and never was. Rules make no sense there, and rules do not exist. Even the god of the Abyss is a tornted soul within his own domain, conflicted and yet seeking atonent. He prays for silence despite being a god. Pray you never reach the Abyss."
The words were ominous, heavy with aning, yet they told Damon almost nothing concrete. His faint frown did not go unnoticed.
The old daoist sighed and tilted his head upward.
"The Abyss is old. It was here even before the pillars ca to be. Older than existence itself. It witnessed all things co into being. I once heard the god of magic, Malivon, say it was an eye that belonged to the Unknown God, cast from the future or perhaps lost. The Abyss is a mystery beyond comprehension."
He lifted one frail hand and touched his closed eyes gently, almost tenderly.
"The Abyss has seen all and knows all. Those who seek truth often seek to gaze into it. When you gaze into the Abyss, it gazes back, and you are confronted with things you should not see, things you should not know. I gazed into the Abyss once. When it gazed back, I blinked."
A soft sound broke the silence.
Drip. Drip.
Thin lines of blood slipped from the corners of his blind white eyes and trailed down his cheeks.
"I survived because I blinked. In return, I lost my eyes and saw nothing. I saw truth. That was how a re rogue cultivator like rose so high. I hope I never have to see again. I fear what the Abyss looks like. I dread the thought of seeing again."
There was no exaggeration in his voice. Only raw, unfiltered fear. His blank white eyes, lifeless and sightless, were filled with terror that seed too deep for words.
Then he added softly, almost like a warning whispered to himself.
"When you et the Unknown God, do not look into his eyes. Never look into his eyes. It is for this reason he has always worn a mask. His gaze must never et yours."
Lilith had been quiet the entire ti. Damon could hear her breathing beside him, shallow and tense. Her fingers had subtly tightened against his arm without him noticing when it happened.
She spoke slowly.
"How does the Abyss here help soone leave this world?"
She rembered Damon telling her once about a strange group of adventurers from another world. One of them had been an outsider called Unnoticed Singularity. They believed that if they reached the Sky Continent, they could leave this world.
The Blind Old Daoist tilted his head slightly.
"The Abyss is a manifestation of the Unknown God’s domain. Anywhere he has influence, there will be an Abyss. It manifests differently in different worlds, but always look for sothing that seems to spiral endlessly. These smaller ones connect to the larger one, and the larger one connects to countless worlds."
The bleeding from his eyes slowed and finally stopped. He lifted his head toward the dark ceiling above.
"The Goddess of Doom has boxed this world away in a terrible seal. Even if all of us worked together at our full strength, we could not break it."
Then he lowered his face toward the glowing Lake of Tears, its gentle light reflecting faintly on his pale skin.
"The Abyss is despair. But within it, there is hope."
He paused for a long mont before finishing.
"After all, there are no absolutes before the Unknown God."
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