Crossing the Vast Ocean

Chapter 43: Crossing the Vast Ocean

Mors sat on the tiles atop the clock tower, leaning against the gilded spire reaching into the night sky, his eyes closed.

He could find no answers through questioning, and he had always opposed delaying action until after all things fallen had revealed themselves and committed evil.

His morality always refused to let him carelessly erase the vessel inhabited by Chaos when he had the ability to strip away the vile thing of Chaos; his patience, meanwhile, sternly refused to let him suppress his impatience one person at a time, carefully examine mortal hearts, and decide in turn which form of purification to use on each mortal.

So he took matters into his own hands ahead of time.

Several black strips of cloth wound around his fingers silently loosened. Frigid psychic energy poured outward, and the sharp shift in entropy brought a drop in temperature. Frost bloomed across the tiles in crystalline patterns.

Yet thanks to the precise control of their owner, the frost spread outward from the tower's spire for only thirteen inches before stopping with absolute precision, forming a perfectly standard circle around it.

If someone could infinitely magnify the tips of that frost, peering all the way into the smallest structures of frozen vapor, they would discover that every curve and stroke formed part of countless ancient runes.

Those innumerable runes descended like heavy objects falling, drew together like magnets, and answered their owner's summons of their own accord. As though imprinted from a master template within him, they formed a small round boat, lifting him above a vast ocean and gazing across its hull at an even broader, boundless void.

Mors opened his eyes. His shell did not move, but his spirit stood upon the surface of the vibrant sea of all living beings.

He seemed to rise with infinite slowness, yet in the next instant he was already beyond the entire planet of Olympia.

The planet, unimaginably vast compared to a single human, shrank within his sight into a round, colored glass marble. Its surface, once covered in mountains and shattered stone, became an ocean beneath dark, surging currents.

He saw lamps going out deep within the ocean's reflection, while others gradually lit up in places of deepest darkness and brightest light. They held back the rising dim tide even as their wicks concealed blackened cotton threads.

Countless souls believed themselves to be the agents of action, yet those actions were merely carried out by the currents of nature.

The endless dark void and the light of reality eroded each other into dazzling colors. Like the countless planets scattered carelessly through the boundless galaxy like broken strings of beads, the currents rolled on, returning and departing, eternally balanced through competition.

Mors blinked. His perspective locked on, and layers of superfluous patterns peeled away from his observation.

Olympia enlarged once more within his perception, becoming a spherical projection much like a crystal ball used for divination.

All stray thoughts had been cleared from his mind before he began observing, for he was about to actively touch the edge of that fallen will. One without desire was precisely the throat-piercing blade most difficult for hungry things to swallow.

His thoughts became pure and sharp as he cautiously reached into the sea of emotions, seeking those auras that were especially violent, mutable, turbid, and extreme.

Perhaps it was the next second, perhaps the last, but an overwhelming sweetness suddenly flooded his tongue, like the thickest honey and the strongest spices, rushing toward his will in an instant.

A string of runes, sharp as golden blades, severed the invisible thing. Mors immediately moved upstream along the edge of that fragrant color, and within a single breath, he was already in Kardis, a thousand miles away.

Within an artificial crystal hall containing six empty seats, six high priests occupied positions to east and west. The goddess of life and blessing gazed down upon the earth through a merciful golden face, banishing mortal terror, banishing mortal unease, harboring only boundless compassion and goodness, forever accompanied by supreme bliss.

Whether the faith had once been merely a local religion with good intentions, whether it had truly been a tentacle of the Dark Prince, from this moment onward, it had been, was, and would forever be so.

That reeking fragrance was still gestating, not yet born into the material universe. It spread outward from the faith's sacred origin mountain in Kardis through the Spring of the Goddess's Birth.

This was the best time to eradicate the corruption.

Mors's black robes billowed in a wind that did not exist. Icy golden sigils emerged from his garments. Without wasting a moment, his thoughts followed the six empty seats, tracing the whereabouts of the six high priests of the faith's branches.

He heard laughter murmuring by his ear: men's voices and women's, elders and children. Their joy was entirely real; its delight followed him like a shadow.

But such tricks had never held any appeal for him. The time since the curtains first began to sway in the scorching wind was not even as long as the time he had spent growing accustomed to lying in a wicker chair and basking himself in the sun.

"Accomplice of the usurper..." a young voice sang softly to him, then abruptly changed into a sweet yet venomous recitation. "Why must you take him away too? We can no longer see him clearly—the soul of steel and the echo of iron..."

"We remember you, thing of nothingness..." she sobbed quietly. "What can you give for this child, to repay the debt of his birth..."

Mors ignored that thing.

The only thing he needed to care about was controlling his strength, lest he tear a hole in this place's veil before the Great Pain annihilated the mortal world.

The first high priest was in Kardis. He was having a pleasant conversation with the usurper.

A short letter lay flat on the sand table beside them. The paper was soft as gauze and pale as snow, far beyond what Kardis's current technology could achieve. In truth, only one nation on present-day Olympia possessed such technology.

Mors immediately crushed his soul and sealed the remaining contamination units, which could not yet conveniently be broken down, within invisible ice. Ignoring the terrified cries and frantic glances around him from the usurper of Kardis, he left at once.

In the material universe, a crystalline gem appeared in the palm of the hand wrapped in black cloth, shifting through a thousand colors while inexplicably evoking filth and terror.

The second high priest was in Axos, delivering an impassioned speech in a military camp. Mors noticed that at least half of Axos's camp had been emptied. He killed this man as well.

He already knew the predicament Peturabo would face, but if that child could not resolve it, then he would be surprised.

The third high priest was traveling through a wilderness amid the mountains. Mors confirmed that he was still on his way to some unknown destination, and so killed him.

The fourth high priest had sunk into the boundless pleasures of the night. Mors killed him.

The fifth high priest's location nearly made Mors laugh. Of course, a religion that spoke every day of revering doomsday and judgment was undoubtedly closely tied to this black apocalypse itself.

He killed the fool who was sending messages to Olympia's satellite through the few remaining communication devices.

As for the satellite itself, the stark contrast between the stability of reality there and the utter lack of limits on its conduct was laughable.

He had no intention of forcibly clashing with their anti-psychic legacy born of dark technology before making adequate preparations—especially when he had more urgent business at hand.

The lingering aura of the sixth high priest was especially fragrant, dreamlike as dew, pure and beautiful. Mors pursued it with a heart as still as water until he pinpointed the man's exact location.

He opened his eyes, took a quick breath, stored the five gems in his hand inside a black cloth bag that appeared from nowhere, and leapt down from the top of the clock tower.

Thanks to Withered Lamp Night Talk, boss. orz