The Insane Regressor: Throne of Pride

[The precise nature of the remnants has been identified.]

[The sources and statuses of the remnants have been determined.]

’What?’

Ravian could not comprehend what was happening, but this was only the beginning.

[Source: Taboo of Fate.]

[Law: Thread.]

’Thread?’

Ravian’s mind raced with mounting confusion the more he read.

[Remnant Status: An attack with an incomplete connection. (Successfully evaded.)]

[Effect: Induces misfortune sufficient to ensure certain death. (Effect greatly diminished.)]

[The second remnant has been identified.]

[Source: Third-Rank Awakened—Calamity.]

[Law: Mirage.]

[Remnant Status: A major curse whose connection to its owner has been severed.]

[The Records of its owner may already have perished. The Host is advised not to investigate the matter any further.]

Ravian was not yet thinking about any of that. He simply wanted to make sense of everything involving remnants, Laws, and all the other things that could undoubtedly get him killed if he delved too deeply into them.

But Sovereign Pride was not finished yet.

[Ding!]

[The two Law powers are in a state of mutual destruction.]

’What? What do you mean they’re in a state of mutual destruction—’

[Exactly as previously stated.]

[The Host’s soul lies within the zone of collision and mutual destruction.]

With the System’s notification, the remnants that had become visible when Ravian focused upon his soul began expanding beyond their previous bounds like opposing waves crashing into one another.

’Oh, shit! Now I get what you meant by that.’

Ravian considered pulling away, but then realized something—there was nowhere for him to escape.

Everything happening was taking place within his own soul.

He felt his consciousness splinter as visions of his death and the fabricated life in which his mother still lived suddenly seeped back into his real memories from nowhere, until he could barely distinguish the false memories from the real ones.

’Are these the effects of the collision?’ Ravian asked the System.

[Yes, and this is not over yet.]

’What—’

Before Ravian could finish, countless memories flooded into his consciousness like water held behind a dam after its gate was suddenly thrown open, the false memories surging through with such force that he nearly lost focus and returned to his physical body.

Yet Ravian’s focus possessed something neither force could erase: an unprecedented, overwhelming intensity that allowed him to control even his subconscious.

Absolute Focus.

Ravian gathered all his drifting memories into a single point.

He did not attempt to stop the flood, for that was simply impossible. These were powers of Law, not something he could confront by himself.

Nor did he try to forget the images. Instead, he focused solely upon remembering the truth within them and completely separating everything false from it.

His mother had died. True—keep it.

His mother had been murdered by killers sent after him while she was undergoing treatment in the hospital. Utter nonsense—push it out.

His father had never returned. True, and fuck him—keep it.

His old world had betrayed him. Not entirely, but it was not far from the truth—keep it anyway.

And now he was Ravian Veyr... Well, the truth might be painful, but it belonged to him, so he kept it.

Everything else was an intruder within his soul.

’This is my soul,’ Ravian’s spiritual voice rang out. ’Both of you, get out!’

The white lines throughout Ravian’s soul shuddered violently.

[Ding!]

[The Host’s Records are trembling violently due to a fundamental change.]

[Please proceed with caution and resist the Host’s Pride by every available means, lest Sovereign Pride begin taking measures based upon the Host’s emotions.]

Ravian paid no heed to any of it. The crimson eyes of his physical body began to glow, while even the eye sockets of his spiritual form blazed with a terrifying, deep crimson light.

’You were the ones who entered it, and you both know this is not your place.’

The smile upon his false mother’s face went still, and the false black paths to his death ceased flooding his consciousness for a single moment.

Ravian opened his spiritual eyes and stared at the two forces that had attempted to turn his existence into a game between lies and possibilities.

’So don’t act as though this place belongs to you.’

For an instant, a deep and ancient aura of unknown origin seemed to emerge from Ravian’s very being, and its effect upon his soul was anything but slight.

The gray portion within his soul responded immediately, without warning.

No light emerged from it, for Absolute Void was neither light nor darkness, but the thing whose absence allowed both to exist.

The gray spread from deep within the white lines and swallowed the space between the two remnants before closing around them from every direction like a black hole.

The threads of Fate’s Law thrashed violently, trying to find a path of resistance.

The illusory worlds of Mirage multiplied, attempting to deceive what was coming for them by creating an alternate target within the soul.

But Sovereign Pride remained unaffected by any of it. Instead, it expanded, drawing everything within its reach into the space inside itself.

It utterly overwhelmed them.

Fate’s possible endings vanished into the gray one after another, while the false images and worlds of Mirage collapsed before they could fully form. The two forces attempted to resist, but the wills that had sent them were no longer connected to them, and their collision had already exhausted the Law power within both of them.

They were two powers of Law.

But they had become two ownerless powers inside a soul belonging to someone else, and unfortunately for them, that someone carried Absolute Void within himself, while Sovereign Pride formed part of his very being.

The Void closed around them in a single instant.

Ravian felt as though his soul had swallowed two blazing stars at once.

[Sovereign Pride has automatically responded to the danger threatening the Host’s essence.]

[The Sovereign Absolute Void Element has been activated.]

[The foreign wills and Laws are being stripped from both Law powers.]

[Purification in progress.]

[10%...]

[30%...]

[60%...]

The pain intensified until Ravian lost the ability to see the room, even in his spiritual state.

It felt as though he were swallowing molten lava inside his soul without any painkillers to dull it—an entirely different kind of pain.

Nothing remained before him except white and gray, and between them, two masses—one black and one purple—were slowly being crushed.

[80%...]

[99%...]

[...]

[Purification complete.]