Chapter 1055 - Meeting the Wise Ones (1/2)
”Joshua, what is it that you actually want? To fight? To hope? Or could it be that you love the Multiverse…”
As the infinite being darted towards the edge of origins, countless prayers and longing for him reverberated.
”Joshua, are the Infinite and the Eternal your goals? If not, why were you born unto this world?”
Most of the prayers and thoughts were meaningless static. Compared to prayers for salvation, it was better to move out and take action: the endless Evil Gods were tools that the Wise One of the Future used to extracted all memories from the Multiverse and a part of himself, which was why after every Wise One had left for the Root of the Multiverse, the rest had to depend on themselves to repel the instincts of a part of the Wise One's own body.
It was the advantage that the Wise One of Future possessed by occupying the primitive ages, a trial that all life in the Multiverse—including the Wise Ones who would later ascend—could not escape.
Still, the question from his good friend Karlis which echoed amidst the endless surges of information should not be avoided.
The reincarnated form of the Steel Python watched as the Radiance left and marked a path of light upon the Void of the Multiverse. She was one of the major contributors in awakening Joshua, the place that bore witness to Joshua's initial awakening and the key that unlocked the final conclusion. Karlis's world was where Joshua had first been made aware of the conflict between Order and Chaos, the first realm he had tried his best to rescue, and now, in the last very moments, she wanted to know what Joshua's real thoughts were after fully resolving himself.
And the answer would have actually been the same one he had in mind one hundred and twenty thousand years ago, when he had ignited the Flame in the heart of dead and barren worlds.
Love?
Hope?
Probabilities, Infinity, Eternity?
My dear friend. Just as you have viewed fighting as a 'means' in the pursuit of love and hope, infinity, and eternity—what I would do is nothing else other than to use all those things as weapons to fight.
I am the divine between the sun and the shadows, the border between light and dark.
I am the contradiction between good and evil, the conflict between life and death.
I am the miracle who stands against the Future that rules destiny, the enemy of beings that have been manipulated.
What I want is to fight, both mundanely and exceptionally. What I want is an unforeseeable future, a fight destined in life, and that is why I need eternity and infinity, courage and hope… along with my own path.
I am Joshua van Radcliffe. To all beings, if there is no freeing yourself from the conflict of eternity, then I shall be all conflict.
The boundless Flame was streaking towards the root along the light of the Mana Tide, crossing a distance that the Demi Saints could hardly cover despite having endless time. The warrior had traversed the surging tide of energies and extend his own power to the areas that the light of the Initial Flame truly covered: the Final Battlefield.
He had arrived near the Initial Flame, which was moving further away from all beings in the Multiverse.
Then, Joshua noticed at once: there were three stars that were endlessly bright, shining and cascading at the edge of the battlefield.
Even so, all of them had been extinguished and would never return.
***
He hence met Arcane.
He could see the remains of the fallen.
It was a cl.u.s.ter of light, a myriad of colors more complex than the rainbow although its center was a sheet of pure incandescent whiteness—he had been the greatest injection source of the Multiverse, and the enchanting rainbow radiance was his event horizon. Still, all matter could only leave its embrace and not enter.
He would only ever give and never take, granting blessings without wanting any offerings in return. He held no selfish agenda as he granted infinite magical energy to the entire Multiverse.
That was the corpse of the Wise One of Arcane and an origin point of an infinite, the very source of the Great Mana Tide.
The infinite singularity point of a genuine Big Bang.
His power permeated the endless worlds, with the various stars hence blessed. His power penetrated the long distance between the Initial Flame and the many cosmoses, connecting two ends that were about to be separated and providing the first path, the first road sign for all successors.
The boundless Flame went past him; the warrior felt admiration within.
***
He hence met Life.
He could see the remains of the fallen.
It was a spiraling galaxy like the cosmos itself, formed after a world had destroyed itself. The endless worlds within were repetitively destroyed and reborn, a cycle that continued with neither beginning nor end—still, powerful ripples were spreading from him, sweeping through all of the Multiverse. Meanwhile, all the remaining free matter in the Multiverse was affected by it without being seen, gradually resonating and resembling him.
He was affecting worlds and maintaining all cycles. He allowed the many galaxies that should have perished to be reborn time and time again, and his power was what molded the forms of cosmoses and galaxies in the Multiverse, as well as the origins of eternal independent circulations.
That was the corpse of the Wise One of Life and the origin point of an infinite, the origins of Order in worlds. It was endlessly circulating, rebirthing, and the first Perpetual Motion.
His power gave form to the countless worlds, with all realms only molded through him. His power reversed entropy and granted new life to the destroyed. As infinite negentropy overflowed in the Void, it would have been enough to remold the entire broken Multiverse had the Chaos not been present—but even if he did not succeed, he was the maker of all that lived now.
The boundless Flame went past him; the warrior felt admiration within.
***
He hence met Psi.
He could see the remains of the fallen.
It was the massive corpse of an isopod. It appeared to have died, but its brain of psionic substance was still whirling—silver-blue radiance was glimmering in its infinitely complex mental structure, resonating and reflecting all souls in the Multiverse. It appeared to have done or left nothing, but that was only the most important thing.
It was affecting the Multiverse, affecting the spreading and coverage of Chaos. It allowed all individuals amongst civilizations to develop souls, nurturing Steel Pythons which consequently complicated 'recordings' of Chaos corruption that would in turn grow Perished Eternity.
It was the soul of the Wise One of Psi and the origin point of an infinite, a materialized form of anti-Chaos processing. It provided definitions for Order, soul, and wisdom while molding souls, although it would also cut off its connection to all his creations, blessing all life with aspects of imperishable and independence.
It nullified the memory ability of Chaos and built the first Firewall for all life across worlds. Even if civilizations would fall or the Evil Gods that were Chaos incarnations had not been beside them, it would never make it in time to record and convert, lowering the chance for Evil Gods to be born from 100% and put a seal upon the Wise One of the Future's most adept move, granting the first chance to all successors.
The boundless Flame went past him; the warrior felt admiration within.
***
By then, Joshua could understand it very clearly.
That the passing of every Wise One had been a personal choice.
Even if it had been the Wise One of the Future who was the first to ascend, held advantage in the aspect of time, was aware of how the succeeding Wise Ones would ascend, as well as possessed all preemptive measures, before his recording reached 100% and hence became the Multiverse Mayfly, he could never have so swiftly defeated or utterly obliviated another Wise One.
All he did was to force the other to admit their defeat, and when they did, there was no longer a possibility to redo things even in the endless parallel universes…but in turn, perhaps to leave a hope of victory to those who would come later, a basis with which the Multiverse could be remolded and an eternity sign on the path for all living beings, the three Wise Ones chose to surrender.
And just like that, they became three stars hovering around the Initial Flame, infinitely dazzling and overflowing.
Three solid forms of eternity which could never be destroyed by the Wise One of the Future himself.
They were assuredly defeated, but because those preceding Wise Ones admitted that they could not triumph over a future, they chose to use all that they were to grow new successors, thereby fighting the future with the future.
The Wise One of the Future willed it to be so as well. Compared to staying tangled to an eternity where neither side could ever achieve their goals and interfere with his progress of recording the Multiverse's information, it was better to grant mutual chances instead.
Still, the chance of his own success was far beyond everyone else's combined—in other words, it was simply impossible to want to defeat him within such a Multiverse where he already occupied such a tremendous advantage.
Therefore, a miracle was needed.
Were miracles a probability that was unreasonable, running counter against logic and simply unable to fit within any rationale?
No, such a probability was no miracle. Instead, it would have been said to be a complete dominion if such a thing had been brought to past, and an oddity which would not have occured if the Multiverse had not been completely ruled.
Instead, could it be that miracles were a possibility that assuredly held the implicit meaning of countless acc.u.mulation of variants, which in turn brought about the impossible? If so, where would the countless acc.u.mulation of variants come from?