It was an enormous gamble.
He had long known that the rule of this dream was an endless cycle between finality and eternity, like that ouroboros. When one extreme developed to its limit, it would give birth to the next, and that was the rule he wanted to exploit.
So he split himself in two, one half maintaining finality while the other forcibly accelerated the process.
He entered the game himself and played against himself.
And perhaps fortune favored him.
Or perhaps it was because he was the only person who had experienced both eternity and finality.
He won his gamble.
One second before his true form was finally lost, the second finality he had created at last forced through that utterly insane reversal amid its evolution to the extreme.
"You mean..."
Lynn stared at him blankly.
The old man drew a deep breath and said:
"Yes. My true form is already dead. The me standing before you is merely the half he left behind."
One returned to eternity.
The other became finality incarnate.
And fate was so absurd and so tragic. He had been a pioneer in the struggle against eternity, yet in the end, he had no choice but to use that eternity to resist the finality he himself had unleashed.
"What happened afterward?"
Lynn trembled, struggling to speak.
The old man fell silent.
How could a single era allow two extremes to coexist? They were natural opposites to begin with.
The only possible outcome was for one to annihilate and assimilate the other. He began his struggle once again, but how could those who chose to follow him have known that the terrifying calamity they were fighting was what he himself had become?
"What meaning was there in victory or defeat? Whichever side ultimately gained control, a