Chapter 4840: The Hollow Echo! I
Chapter 4840: The Hollow Echo! I
Noah’s eyes flashed as he gave her a look.
The grand and imposing visage of THE Infiniverse floated toward Pebanista Yacuruna, her blue-gold form radiating authority that spoke of vast domains and countless resources accumulated across Noah’s journey.
"This place is vast."
Her voice held welcome that was also assessment.
"Let us choose a location that fits you the most."
...!
Noah had already communicated with THE Infiniverse for them to extract as much information as they could from this ancient entity. Every secret she held. Every truth she had accumulated. Every piece of knowledge that might prove useful in the conflicts to come.
While he...
He was about to make his return to The Interstices.
There was much he wanted to do.
So he looked toward RUINATION and THE Infiniverse.
"Get her settled. I may have a trip... across time."
Pebanista Yacuruna floated ahead before she turned around and glanced at Noah one last time.
"Pathways without definitions will have many things."
Her ancient voice held warning now.
"But even Absolutes are the least of your worries. There are Undefined Lifeforms from before THE Infinite Unfurling. There are The Watchers, Hollow Echoes. And you run the risk of Definition Collapse."
She paused, letting those words settle.
"Spending too long in The Interstices causes the traveler’s own definition to weaken. The space between Observable and Unobservable doesn’t want defined things in it. It constantly pressures travelers to become undefined."
Her ancient eyes held his.
"It is not a place to explore and play around in. Go to the point in time that has your answers, and treat The Interstices as just that... passages to get you places you otherwise could not go to."
...!
Noah’s eyes shone brightly.
Was this ancient creature actually going out of her way to look out for him? Or simply trying to make sure her new landlord didn’t die too quickly?
Whichever it was, he nodded with a smile.
In the next moment, Pebanista Yacuruna began enlarging in size again. Her ethereal form expanded, becoming thousands of miles long as a fat ancient aquatic beast materialized fully within THE Infiniverse. The pages of The First Tongue swirled around her vast body, crimson-pink light painting the surrounding existence in stellar hues.
She began floating forward as THE Infiniverse and RUINATION moved alongside her.
The latter sent a prompt to Noah.
|Don’t worry, Master|
|We will wring this dolphin dry of all the knowledge it has|
|The more she becomes exposed to your First Tongue here, the more information I can extract|
|I know the assignment|
RUINATION knew what needed to be done.
Noah nodded with a smile as he alone remained in this region of THE Infiniverse with its forming landscapes of Muspelheim.
He breathed out and got ready.
The process was familiar now.
Noah reached past the known Phonemes, past the established Logos, past everything that had been codified and understood across eons of linguistic mastery. He reached for the space between words.
And he opened his mouth and spoke utter gibberish.
Reality shuddered. Space folded. And in front of him, another entrance to The Interstices opened, that familiar moment where space simply forgot to be solid.
He stepped through.
When he entered this time, the prompts that bloomed were different.
|Entry Confirmed|
|You did not arrive in the Primary Veins of The Interstices this time|
|You have entered the Capillary Threads|
|Narrow passages that branch off Primary Veins|
|Lead to more specific locations|
|Less stable, with rules that fluctuate|
|Distance compression varies wildly here, sometimes greater, sometimes lesser|
|It is very easy to get lost in|
...!
The Capillary Thread he found himself in looked nothing like the Primary Veins.
Where those had been vast corridors of Primordial Gray pillars rising from endless darkness, this was narrow. Confined. The pathway beneath his feet was barely wide enough for two beings to walk abreast, and even that width seemed to fluctuate as if the passage itself couldn’t decide how large it wanted to be.
Murky mist covered the distant areas behind and in front of him. The mist swirled and shifted, making it impossible to perceive anything beyond a few dozen meters in either direction.
Darkness pressed in from the sides, hungry and patient.
He could be walking toward salvation or oblivion, and he wouldn’t know until he arrived.
And when Noah looked around, he sensed the overflowing Corrupted Growths.
They were everywhere.
Denser than in the Primary Veins. More concentrated. As if the narrowness of these passages had compressed the corruption that accumulated here, packing eons of twisted existence into spaces that could barely contain it.
Even though it carried a level of danger, Noah still waved his hand.
He sent his Immensity out, exerting himself to cleanse everything within his perception.
HUUM!
Invisible silent golden waves flowed through the surrounding existence. The Corrupted Growths shriveled and collapsed, their twisted forms unraveling as purity replaced corruption. Golden light streamed back toward him, sinking into his foundations.
|Purification Complete|
|Another Absolute Everything is forming within your existence|
|At this rate, you could establish a factory here|
BOOM!
The weight of another Absolute Everything coalesced inside of him!
Two now.
From just walking through The Interstices.
But while it formed, Noah felt his existence buzzing.
A foreboding sensation flared.
His gaze changed as 27 Seals of Absolute Tongue instantly bloomed behind him, manifesting in a corona of blue-gold authority that surrounded his form with concentrated power.
BOOM!
Something heavy smashed onto his back.
His entire existence vibrated with impact that should have sent him flying across The Interstices. But because he was an Absolute Immovable Object, he stayed still.
His Seals, however...
He was stern to realize they bent.
Creaked.
Strained under weight that they should not have had to bear.
And behind him was...
...!
Noah was astonished to see an illusory gray hollow-like humanoid figure of an entity surrounded by gray flames.
Gray billowing flames spilled out of the nose and mouth of this humanoid entity, corrupted fire that felt wrong in ways that transcended normal wrongness. The figure was massive, towering above Noah with presence that pressed against reality itself.
And Noah recognized it.
It looked exactly like the form of THE Creature he had seen in Ginnungagap. That same humanoid shape. That same overwhelming presence. That same sense of Existence given form.
But where THE Creature had been surrounded by multicolored flames and the Immensity of all Existence...
This one felt vile.
Hollow.
Like corrupted existence wearing a face it had no right to wear!