Infinite Mana In The Apocalypse

Chapter 4296: What is The Way? VI

The Justiciar, even as its existence unraveled, was still the more powerful of the two!

It radiated a final, desperate burst of its authority. A brilliant white light of pure, unadulterated Purity erupted upwards, smashing into the body of the Juvenile Early Creature.

And shockingly, the being was split in half!

BOOM!

And yet, even as its existence collapsed, the Juvenile Early Creature was undeterred.

A faint, golden Grimoire, a Living Astral Codex, shone at its side.

With a final, maddened roar of defiance, it unleashed its last spell.

An Astral Arcana Glyph, a card depicting a single, weeping eye, bloomed in the air.

From it, a beam of pure, conceptual sorrow shot forth. It was not an attack of fire or force, but of pure, weaponized grief!

The Living Existential Authority of Emotive buzzed!

It struck the already-decimated Justiciar, and the armor, which had withstood mountains and glaciers, simply... gave up.

Its light flickered and died. Its systems ceased. And then, as if in a final, spiteful act of mimicry, it too split in half!

...!

BOOM!

Both halves of both beings hit the ground at the same time.

A cloud of primordial dust and dissipated authority rose into the air!

It was one of the more common scenes in a war... mutual destruction, born from a hatred that had bloomed in the heart of the conflict.

Nearby, Noah, who had remained a nameless character this entire time, moved forward.

A small risk was taken.

A small, almost imperceptible burst of his Mana, a whisper of his true, boundless power, spread over the two decimated corpses. And in the next instant, they were gone!

When the dust settled, a Juvenile Early Creature, its form wreathed in the light of its own, terrible power, appeared above the crater.

It looked around, a flicker of confusion in its ancient, starlit eyes. It had heard a roar of defiance, had sensed a final, desperate clash of power.

But now, there was only the caved-in, brilliant earth and nothing else. It tilted its head, a silent question in the quiet aftermath. But it did not have long to ponder.

OOOH!

In the next moment, a Justiciar, its crimson wings blazing, shot down from above, and the war continued.

”You robotic fucker!” the Juvenile Early Creature roared, its own power flaring to meet the attack.

But silently, already a few light-years away, a nameless background character was walking away!

Each step was a masterpiece of controlled, quantum movement, his feet painted with the Living Existential Authority of Quantum.

With a single step, he was infinitely far away, a ghost disappearing over the horizon!

He was quietly making his exit from the chaotic and utterly dangerous war of Aethelgard.

He did not wait for Gilgamesh to come out. He did not wait for any of THE Living Existences to reveal themselves.

He did not take the risk of remaining on a battlefield where he knew, with an absolute certainty, that THE Living Concept and THE Living Spirit were watching.

He took what he had the chance of obtaining, and he left!

Because sometimes, the single best survival skill in existence was knowing when to take a risk, and when not to.

When to gauge just what could potentially happen based on the risk one took, and whether the rewards were so unimaginably grand to take that risk.

The rewards of the corpses of Young or even Juvenile Early Creatures or Justiciars... did not outweigh the risk of Noah losing his Early Veiled Shore and all those within it by getting the attention of THE Living Existences.

In the past, Gilgamesh had only heard of him and sent his curiosity over, and it had nearly killed him.

He wondered what terrifying potential danger there could be right now, when Gilgamesh inevitably heard of him from Forgemaster Vulcan. A genius Elderborn who could rapidly make Living Existential Armors.

Would he be deemed to have died in battle? Or would Gilgamesh send over another weaving of his Curiosity?

For now, he put all of this in the back of his mind. He felt himself breathing easier as he was now tens of thousands of Fold Light Years away from Aethelgard.

And even then, he continued to move even further. Around him, there were no signs of battles and terrifying eruptions of power.

There was only the vast, stretching, dangerous forests of the First Folds, where he now found himself alone and free to break down the single most profitable loot from that war.

The sensing of his Way.

He now had a few days in the Earliest Folds... to begin designing his own grand system of existence that incorporated everything he had just seen!

He slowed.

Noah arrived in a part of the First Folds that was a breathtaking, frigid wonderland.

Vibrant glacial trees, their bark a shimmering, crystalline blue, rose all around him, their branches heavy with snow that sparkled with the light of a billion captured stars.

Storming, snowy cold winds permeated the air, a constant, gentle blizzard that was a soothing balm on his senses.

He came to a stop in front of a glistening glacial tree that rose up for thousands of miles, its presence a quiet, profound monument to the serene, cold beauty of this place.

The cold here alone could freeze anything below ten Quadrillion, but for Noah, it was... refreshing.

He sat down at the base of the tree, surrounded by the billowing snow and the deep, resonant silence.

He smiled, a genuine, almost peaceful expression, and raised his hand to feel the brilliant, sparkling snow that radiated all around.

It was a unique sensation as he remained in thst peaceful state ever since he sensed his Way.

In his mind, Khor’s voice, a warm, ancient echo, resonated.

”I have seen greed kill countless Early Creatures and Living Existences,” she said, her tone holding a quiet, profound pride.

”I am proud of you, Outsider, for seeing past your greed in an area filled with unprecedented danger.”

...!

Noah only smiled at such words. He nodded lightly, looking at the landscape of stellar, sparkling snow and whiteness all around him.

He gave a small, silent command to RUIN/EDEN.

”Let us begin on the project of... The Way of Existence. Part of it...will be a system of existence that integrates and incorporates everything that we have seen so far under the banner of... Principles.”

...!

The command was a quiet, yet absolute, declaration.

A new, grand project had begun. And in response, for the first time in the Earliest Folds, the space beside Noah flickered.

The illusory, holographic form of RUIN/EDEN materialized, her crimson-blue figure a stark, beautiful contrast to the pristine white of the snow.

She smiled, a brilliant, confident expression that was a perfect fusion of Ruination’s dark elegance and a system’s cool, logical precision.

She bowed towards Noah, her voice a symphony of glorious, terrible possibility!

|I will get started right away, Master.|

As existence began to buzz around him, Noah closed his, snow falling on his body as he thought of what he knew of The Way.

Is it a path to be followed, a map to be read? Or is it something to be forged, a road carved from the raw, untamed wilderness of existence itself?

The philosopher says it is the pursuit of virtue. The mystic says it is the dissolution of the self. The warrior says it is the perfection of the blade. The king says it is the burden of rule.

Each has their answer, each has their Way.

But perhaps, the true Way is not a destination, but a direction!

Not a single, perfect path, but the act of choosing a path at all. It is the conscious, deliberate, and often terrifying, decision to say who you were and what you stood for!

And in the end, it does not matter if the path is one of peace or of war, of creation or of destruction.

Any path, followed with enough conviction, with enough will, with enough of one’s very Everything... will eventually lead to a place of unfathomable glory!

”Well...maybe” Noah smiled, opening his eyes.

Maybe!