Chapter 4849: Silver Platter!
Chapter 4849: Silver Platter!
Noah looked at the scene with shining eyes.
At this moment, definitely, the ranking had changed in his perception. THE Primordial Paradox was really up there. Perhaps higher than anyone else he had encountered. The casual nature of his dominance, the effortless way he handled beings that would have required Absolute’s full attention and resources to even challenge...
It was something else entirely.
And in the next moment, this calm figure of THE Primordial Paradox turned to stare at the torn Impundulu heaving atop the ship.
He did all of this while holding another Absolute in his hands.
Popobawa continued to struggle and sought to erupt with Embodiments, with Declarations, with anything that might break the grip that held it. Each attempt failed. Each effort was negated before it could even fully form.
THE Primordial Paradox regarded the split form of Impundulu with contemplative eyes.
"This one’s Weavings are already unraveling."
His voice was clinical, detached.
"What remains of its existence is not protected by its former wholeness. Its defenses are not present. Its resistance is not capable of withstanding sufficient weight."
He paused.
"Anyone who is capable of applying adequate authority relating to The First Tongue will not be prevented from collapsing what remains."
BOOM!
The Apophasis settled over Impundulu like a death sentence written in negation. Its already torn form shuddered as the last of its protections were systematically removed. Not destroyed. Simply declared to not exist.
Noah looked on with shining eyes as truly and ridiculously, the figure of THE Primordial Paradox turned to him with an expression of generous offering.
"THE Tongue Whisperer."
The title felt strange to hear applied to himself, but Noah accepted it without visible reaction.
"I have already set the table for you."
THE Primordial Paradox gestured toward the heaving, split form of Impundulu with his free hand, the other still wrapped around Popobawa’s neck.
"If you possess the capability, you can collapse this Absolute and obtain what you can from it."
His obsidian eyes glinted.
"This other one I want to consume myself."
...!
The actions of THE Primordial Paradox continued to be utterly dominating.
In the next moment, he turned to the Absolute he held in his hands. Popobawa’s singular eye widened with terror that transcended anything it had displayed before, because it could sense what was coming.
THE Primordial Paradox opened his mouth unnaturally wide.
His jaw extended beyond what any humanoid form should have been capable of, obsidian features stretching to accommodate an opening that could swallow things far larger than the entity he held. It was not a mouth anymore. It was a void given the shape of consumption.
"I am not incapable of consuming that which I hold."
His voice emerged despite his impossible gape!
"My hunger is not limited by the nature of my prey. My digestion is not prevented by the power of what I devour."
BOOM!
The Apophasis of self-negation took effect.
And the existence of Popobawa, THE Singular Eye, began to be pulled into that impossible mouth as if it were nothing more than smoke being drawn into a vacuum. The Absolute’s form stretched and distorted, its crimson eye blazing with final desperate power as everything it was flowed toward the void that THE Primordial Paradox had made of himself.
Its Civilization.
Its Way.
Its accumulated authority from eons of existence.
All of it pulled inward, consumed, devoured by something that had simply negated its own limitations regarding consumption.
...!
The moment the last of Popobawa’s existence vanished into THE Primordial Paradox’s form, from the position where he had been holding an Absolute, an obsidian pillar of light shot out.
It crossed Helheim in an instant.
It would continue to permeate across Observable Existence, a beacon announcing the death of a being that had existed since before THE Infinite Unfurling had finished establishing itself.
One of the fastest deaths of an Absolute that Noah had ever witnessed.
One of the most casual!
THE Primordial Paradox closed his mouth, his obsidian features settling back into their normal configuration as if nothing unusual had occurred. He turned to look at Noah with eyes that held patient expectation.
He was waiting.
Waiting for another collapse to occur!
Noah rose from his throne, setting aside the treasures of the crystalline table as his attention fixed entirely on the split body of the heaving Absolute before him. Impundulu’s eyes, divided between two halves that could no longer coordinate, were filled with incredulity and terror as they looked toward THE Primordial Paradox.
Not toward Noah.
Toward the being who had reduced it to this state with nothing but words.
But THE Primordial Paradox was no longer interested in Impundulu.
He had offered it to someone else!
Oh!
Forget everything that Noah had said about any ranking regarding THE Four.
Forget THE Creature and his overwhelming presence!
Forget THE Primordial Chaos and his shifting, impossible form!
THE Primordial Paradox was number one.
Because at this moment, this being had offered him a heavily injured and almost collapsed Absolute on a silver platter. A being that had existed since before THE Infinite Unfurling. An entity whose Civilization and Way and accumulated authority were now defenseless, stripped of all protection by Apophasis that had declared its resistance to simply not exist.
And Noah would take.
Oh, he would take!
His Seals blazed to life around his transformed form, blue-gold light erupting from the crown of burning books above his head. The First Tongue stirred within his foundations, linguistic authority reaching toward the torn existence of Impundulu with hunger that had been cultivated across a journey that defied normal progression.
The Absolute’s divided eyes finally turned toward him.
And in them, Noah saw the moment when terror shifted from THE Primordial Paradox to the being approaching with intent that promised consumption.
It was already over!
It had been over the moment THE Primordial Paradox decided to share his hunt.
Noah reached out with authority that burned with the weight of everything he had accumulated, and he began to collapse what remained of THE Storm That Hungers!
His second Absolute to collapse would actually be eons before he was even born!