Yog seemed to be sitting on the sofa in a daze. Cheng Yu glanced at him, making it clear that he dared neither say nor ask a thing.
After a while, Yog raised his teacup and took a sip, then set it down, stood up, and stretched.
Seeing this, Cheng Yu asked,
"Heading out, Big Shot?"
Yog nodded.
"Yes."
Then Yog turned to Miss Puppet and said,
"Stay here. You can't go where I'm heading."
Miss Puppet placed a hand over her chest in acknowledgment.
Cheng Yu perked up his ears to eavesdrop. Yog glanced at him too and smiled.
"What? Want to come along?"
Cheng Yu hurriedly waved his hands. Was he kidding? If even she couldn't go, how could he?
With a single step, Yog vanished from Steel Main City.
The 999th level of the Abyss.
The sky here was dark red all year round, with a black sun suspended within it. The land was black and red, the plants twisted, and rivers of blood flowed across it.
A human man in a suit looked at the river of blood before him, then checked its course. He slowly followed its current, while the creatures along the way seemed unable to see him.
Before long, he saw the river of blood gradually turning transparent. As he continued onward, a magnificent, pitch-black palace appeared beside it.
He ignored the palace, and the immense presence within it. Eventually, he saw the river of blood turn entirely illusory as it battered against a door.
An equally illusory door, covered in intricate, ornate patterns. No matter how the river battered it, the door remained immovable.
Yog chuckled.
No wonder his true self had asked him to come in person. The symbol on this door was his own: the Door Seal. The instant Yog saw the door, he understood everything.
He murmured to himself,
"Could the reason I couldn't obtain information about the Abyss be that 'my' own power was blocking my scrutiny?"
Slowly approaching the door, Yog placed his hand against it. It grew even more illusory before finally disappearing. The river of blood instantly surged out of its illusory state and flooded the ground.
Just then, a thunderous, rasping voice rang out from deep within the nearby palace.
"Roar! Who?! Who?! Who dares interfere with the great Abyssal Will's plan?!"
Yog narrowed his eyes.
"The Abyssal Will?"
Yog closed his eyes and searched for information about the Abyssal Will, then opened them with a quiet chuckle.
"Heh. Interesting."
At that moment, a gigantic demon with a human torso, a vicious dog's head, and a body covered in lava smashed through the palace aboveground. Its upper body alone blotted out the sky, standing several million meters tall by a rough estimate.
"Epic."
Yog spoke softly.
The Dog-Headed Demon stared at Yog with eyes like that black sun and demanded,
"Are you the one who interfered with the great Abyssal Will's plan?"
As he spoke, he raised his mountain-sized fist, still streaming with lava, to strike Yog. But the instant he lifted it, the entire half of the world around that fist shattered, and half his body vanished with it.
His body had been erased at the level of rules. Before he even understood what had happened, he screamed in agony.
"Awoooo!!!"
His one remaining eye stared at the human standing between his brows. An emotion called fear surged in his heart, but his fanatical devotion to the Abyssal Will gradually began suppressing it.
Black lava welled up beneath him, then instantly erupted upward at tremendous speed.
"Halt."
A single word slipped softly from Yog's lips.
An invisible ripple instantly spread outward from Yog. Everything it swept over turned black and white.
Time stopped at that moment. Everything was suspended.
Except Yog.
He slowly reached toward the Dog-Headed Demon's head, but just as his hand was about to touch it-
Yog suddenly frowned and grabbed in another direction, catching a mass of dark, viscous substance in his hand.
Immediately afterward, a sky-blotting mass of indescribable darkness squeezed into the black-and-white world through the vanished expanse, hurtling toward the Dog-Headed Demon at an indescribable speed.
Yog held the Dog-Headed Demon down with one hand and lightly waved the other. The sky-blotting darkness and nearly a hundred levels of the Abyss vanished instantly.
The poor Dog-Headed Demon was reduced to nothing but the portion in Yog's hand.
He said softly,
"Still not coming out?"
Within the "nothingness," a mass of "darkness" slowly appeared before Yog. It gradually took on a humanoid form. Calling this being a god would have been more appropriate than calling them a person.
The being bowed to Yog and spoke in a voice that sounded neither male nor female.
"It's been a long time, Your Eminence."
Yog narrowed his eyes and said,
"Time has no meaning to me. As for you... should I call this the unfathomable greatness of fate?"
"Hehehe. As expected of the enigmatic sage, Your Eminence. Your words are as incomprehensible as ever."
Yog said nothing.
The mass of darkness continued,
"Back then, all our attention was on His Eminence Nyar... lathotep. I imagine that, apart from Dao and me, who survived by sheer luck, no one would have guessed that you were the strongest being in the 'laboratory,' Your Eminence."
Yog chuckled.
"What? You still don't dare say Nyarlathotep's name?"
The figure spread their hands.
"It can't be helped. Your Eminence left far too deep an impression on us lucky ones who gained power and thought ourselves 'invincible.' Before meeting Your Eminence, we never imagined there would come a day when we couldn't fight back at all."
Yog gently shook his head and said,
"Everything is ordained. Everything has already unfolded. I have no intention of changing anything. Since you were fortunate enough to reach this epoch, keep living your life. I won't be as extreme as Nyarlathotep. Conduct yourself wisely."
With that, Yog turned to leave, but a voice from behind stopped him.
"Hehehe. If I'm not mistaken, Your Eminence must have expended considerable effort to reach this epoch."
"Want to test that?"
Yog turned back toward the darkness and spoke softly.
"If I might have that honor."
The humanoid darkness bowed and murmured.
Yog smiled.
"Then come."
The humanoid darkness made no move.
"If you won't come, then I will."
Yog shook his head helplessly.
Then he lightly waved his hand. Every level of the Abyss, from the first to the 999th, vanished, taking some of the "bubbles" in the deepest reaches of the Chaos Sea with them. A hollow appeared in one corner of the Chaos Sea's depths, while the humanoid darkness became a writhing black hair lying in Yog's hand.
As those worlds vanished from the depths of the Chaos Sea, an immense consciousness appeared from somewhere above it, constantly scanning the entire sea before beginning to probe deeper.
Yog murmured,
"What a bother..."
Then he looked at the black hair in his hand and said softly,
"Not wanting to doesn't mean I can't. My coldness doesn't mean you can provoke me.
"You already experienced the might of the Unspeakable in the last epoch. I am not Nyarlathotep. Experiments don't interest me, because I know every answer.
"This is the first time, and the last. Across countless future times and spaces, I have 'seen' your end. I hope you'll prove me wrong.
"And I know what Shub gave you. Let me tell you this: even Shub would not be foolish enough to try to anger me as you have."
Setting down the hair, Yog snapped his fingers. The entire Abyss returned to its original state, including the 999th level he had first erased and the "bubbles" that had vanished from the depths of the Chaos Sea.
The instant those "bubbles" returned, the immense consciousness disappeared. Of course, only Yog noticed any of this.
The lump of black flesh also turned back into the Dog-Headed Demon, who stared blankly at the humanoid darkness. Yog lightly tapped the demon's head, and the enormous demon became a little black dog.
Yog said,
"Then I'll take this little fellow as compensation for your provocation."
The humanoid darkness remained silent.
Yog chuckled, then took a step and vanished from the Abyss.
After Yog left, the humanoid darkness murmured,
"The ruler of space and time, the All-in-One, the all-knowing and all-seeing, the king of the endless void, the lord of a billion splendors...
"Such terrifying power, and this was only one of his avatars. He's even in a weakened state. I truly can't imagine what would have happened if he had been the one to attack us back then..."
"No wonder the Mother Goddess said we should be grateful that he wasn't the one leading that experiment, and that he always remained a spectator..."
The Final Void, beyond all space and time.
In one hand, Yog held a transparent gray sphere containing a little black dog. In the other was a mass of viscous "darkness."
Yog looked at the viscous "darkness" in his hand and murmured,
"Shub..."
Having gathered his thoughts, Yog tossed the darkness into a golden orb of light, then stepped forward and vanished from the Final Void.
Inside Steel Main City.
Cheng Yu jumped when Yog suddenly appeared.
"Uh, Big Shot, finished your business?"
Then Cheng Yu watched Yog drop a black dog not far from the sofa. The dog showed little reaction, merely lying obediently on the floor.
"Big Shot, did you go out just for this dog?"
Yog gently shook his head, then teased Cheng Yu.
"No, I picked this dog up along the way. But I did discover an interesting enemy for you. Perhaps they'll become one of the few enemies you'll remember vividly."
Cheng Yu gave an awkward laugh. His attention instantly shifted from the dog to the enemy Yog had mentioned, and he grumbled inwardly,
Did the boss seriously go out of his way to stir up trouble for me? No way, right? Surely not? ヽ(*.＞Д＜)o゜
Yog sat on the sofa, sorting through the gains from his trip to the Abyss and the information from the past.
The Door recovered from this trip had restored portions of his "weakest" aspect, time, and of space, by roughly five percent each. Not bad. Then Yog thought of the humanoid darkness again.
"They actually tried to batter my Door with life and souls, intending to contain it-or rather, corrupt it? How foolish..."
Yog thought to himself.
Next came the information he had brought back from his true self.
His return had stirred the Door in the Abyss, bringing part of the previous epoch's Abyss into this epoch as well. As for the humanoid darkness, they were probably one of the little ones Shub cherished.
The little ones who had attained Mythic status during that experiment in the previous epoch had all been favored by Shub. As the ruler of life, she loved all living things and was the mother of all life.
But lives that were too weak could not face her at all. Only powerful beings could look directly upon her body and listen to her words.
Yet most Great Old Ones were beasts driven solely by instinct, while the few others had no wish to approach the Outer Gods. So when Mythic beings appeared in that experiment, Shub-not Nyarlathotep-was the happiest.
At last, there were "children" who could look directly at her, listen to her words, and even understand her. Thus, when Nyarlathotep wiped out those rebellious "children," Shub secretly saved Yuan and Dao.
Nyarlathotep had once visited the Abyss to see whether the so-called Abyssal Will possessed reason and intelligence. Yuan had deceived him about all of it. But how could Nyarlathotep, a god wielding authority over deception, truly have been fooled? He had merely thought it more entertaining this way and chosen not to expose the lie.
Yog had kept all of this within his "sight" from beginning to end, but he had no desire to meddle. Nyarlathotep had complained to Shub, but, intent on "protecting her children," she had no intention of taking his advice. Gradually, Nyarlathotep stopped overseeing those two variables-or rather, gave them even greater freedom to roam.
Still, Yog had been somewhat surprised when Shub gave Yuan a portion of her authority over darkness and Dao a portion of her authority over life.
Later, Dao fell at the hands of those who came after, while Nyarlathotep used his authority to seal the Endless Abyss where Yuan resided. After that, Shub returned to her own domain, the Darkness Forest, and Yog had rarely seen her since.
His recollections ended, and Yog sighed softly.
"What a pity. Their path of growth was too 'smooth,' leaving them far too arrogant. And in a new epoch riddled with danger, what proves fatal isn't weakness, but arrogance..."
With that, Yog glanced at Cheng Yu, who was perking up his ears to eavesdrop on his musings.
Seeing Big Shot look his way, Cheng Yu put on a slightly smarmy smile. (oﾟωﾟo)
Before you continue