Chapter 637 Fate and Eternal Darkness
"Tell me about Eternal Darkness and its role in the destruction of the Celestial Elysian Plane."
Kiba commanded.
The leviathan was surprised, but it nodded. It would have done anything to survive abuse from this devil. Divulging details about the great tragedy was nothing.
"To know about it, you have to know about the universe. Like you humans, my world's beings had many theories and models on its creation and evolution. But none of us knew which was right until it was far too late…"
The leviathan's eyes flashed with sadness as it recalled bitter memories from thousands of years ago. Billions had died then, many who were close to the leviathan. Losing them was a pain that even the passing of time couldn't reduce.
"When the tragedy started, the reigning emperor – Cosmic Emperor – and Lord Xeced discovered the truth or at least reached close to it.
"According to them, trillions of years ago, long before our present universe came in existence, there was nothing but darkness.
"This darkness could be called a universe of its own, despite it having no embodiment of what we believe should be the foundation of a universe - Space and Time.
"For eons and eons, this universe thrived…not on life or matter, but serenity. The serenity was its achievement, its progress, its evolution, its power…its everything.
"But then a ripple of change emerged from within… breaking countless years of tranquility.
"The darkness didn't know it then that this ripple will change everything…for this ripple will be the embodiment that will create everything anew and bind everything within a cycle."
"!!" Kiba's expression changed as the realization hit him.
He knew what this ripple of change should be… because in the universe, everything was bound by only one common cycle.
Fate!
Start or end, life or death… everything was bound to Fate.
"Fate… so it was created from Eternal Darkness!" Kiba whispered.
Before the arrival of World Fragments, people of Earth believed the universe has two great embodiments – Space and Time, something that forms the reality.
But with the age of evolution and the rise of the House of Parcae, everyone came to know about the mysterious embodiment called Fate.
"Yes, it was Fate!" The leviathan explained. "It weaves the entire fabric of reality by using Space and Time as its threads!"
"!!!"
Kiba's eyes narrowed.
Until now, he believed Fate was in the same class as Space and Time, and they worked in sync to run the universe.
After all, with the absence of even one of them, the universe would collapse, and nothing would function.
But now, his entire perception was smashed to pieces.
"Space and Time are tools of Fate!" Kiba muttered in disbelief. "Then that would mean…the entire universe is controlled by Fate!"
The leviathan nodded before resuming the story.
"When Fate was in the nascent stage, the darkness didn't react for it didn't consider Fate worthy enough to destroy… in hindsight, this was a blunder of catastrophic proportions.
"Because as soon as Fate gained sentience, it started working…believing everything should follow a cycle of a beginning and an end.
"Naturally, it included the darkness…and to achieve that, Fate orchestrated events that lead to Genesis – the Absolute Beginning!
"This resulted in an explosion so mighty that it shredded the darkness and established the universe as we know it – creating Space and Time."
Kiba ignored the last statement. He was fixated on 'Genesis – the Absolute Beginning.'
"My Extermination persona was largely created by gray particles called Genesis… that would mean these particles originated from the time when the reign of darkness ended. But given their nature, there's something seriously wrong with them. Most likely, due to Eternal Darkness!"
The leviathan wasn't privy to Kiba's thoughts, and as such, it resumed.
"As you already know, the darkness wasn't completely wiped out from the process that created this universe.
"It was then that Fate learned about the aspect called 'Eternal' - some things can never end!
"By the time Fate realized it, the remaining darkness went into hiding, existing in a domain without any embodiment.
"Fate ignored the darkness and started working on establishing what we call as the cycle.
"It has already created a 'beginning' of everything that will ever exist through Genesis…and now the only aspect left was the end.
"To do that, it needed a medium – a medium that could decide what was worthy of existing and for how long."
"Worthy?!"
Kiba's pupils constricted.
"A medium to decide who is worthy…could it be…"
He recalled something from his battle with Hyperion. Back then, he has summoned his entire strength, resulting in the golden lightning phenomenon.
"Evolution Field!"
Kiba's breathing turned heavy.
"Hyperion claimed that wherever a world ended, Evolution Field was its herald! Whenever any world died, lives there experienced the strange powers of Evolution Field!
"No wonder Earth and the mechanism left behind by Lord Xeced suppresses my powers to such an extent! They want to prove this planet deserves to exist!"
As Kiba's thoughts turned wild, the leviathan confirmed it was indeed Evolution Field that acted as the medium.
"Evolution Field allowed worthy worlds to exist… but not for eternity because the decree of Fate commanded everything should have an end. So even worthy worlds would turn unworthy with times!
"Naturally, as eons passed, many world and beings that were born in this universe learned of the cycle… they wanted to break it and achieve immortality.
"Fate never intervened to stop them because the reality it weaved made true immortality impossible. So all the beings could achieve was false immortality…dying after a few eons.
"So eon after eon, new worlds emerged while old faded, new lifeforms were born while the old waned.
" Everything was going smooth, just like Fate desired."
"…."
Kiba placed a hand below his chin as he lost in thoughts.
Given the details so far, one might mistake Fate as a living entity. But Kiba was sure it wasn't a living entity…at least not in the ways humans imagined life to be.
If he was right…Fate was a Will. A sentient principle that was incorporeal and intangible. It governed everything by its rule, perhaps including itself.
"But then the darkness retaliated, wracking havoc in the universe!"
The leviathan resumed in a grimy tone.
"The darkness didn't do it because it disliked Fate…but rather, because it hated the new world order.
"Its only desire was serenity. And life made that impossible.
"Life was poison; it needed to be exterminated! But life was a part of the cycle…it might end to only begin again.
"So the darkness acted to corrode the foundation of this cycle!"
"!!"
Kiba knew what this meant.
"Eternal Darkness corrupted Genesis – the beginning…and Evolution Field – the medium for the end!"
The leviathan agreed.
"Yes, but what the darkness didn't know was that Fate expected it to happen.
"Fate has weaved the entire reality, so how could it not expect what the only entity that was free of its cycle wanted?"
"…."
"Maybe Fate didn't expect everything, but it expected the attack of the darkness…and that's why Celestial Elysian Plane existed!"
"?!" Kiba was surprised.
What has Celestial Elysian Plane to do with Fate expecting retaliation from the darkness?
"Before the tragedy, my homeworld thought we were lucky. Our plane was rich with resources, and the higher forms of life were very close to true immortality!"
The leviathan's voice hissed with bitter irony.
"Haah~" Kiba let out a sigh.
He knew the leviathan was right.
Years ago, he experienced the memories of Asmodeus Freyr Burislav – the mad king. He has experimented with various branches of immortality and left behind the Legacy Orb that Pythia acquired.
Who knows…the king might be alive even today, scheming something or having fun.
Then there were the memories of Violent Waythe[1] – the ghost-like existence that was close to immortality. Sadly, immortality became his curse as he was split to pieces and sealed in various dimensions by Rincewind Otiluke.
As for Rincewind Otiluke... Kiba didn't know much, but he was grateful to him. Because many of his abilities- especially Meteor Shower and Gravity Cage- were inspired by the attacks he used on Violent Waythe.
"Mother Trinity even felt her children could defy Fate! But neither she nor anyone knew we were just a tool for Fate to deal with Eternal Darkness!"
The leviathan continued.
"Perhaps Lord Xeced and Cosmic Emperor realized when the Celestial Elysian Plane became the target of the darkness.
"In the start, it was just the corrupted Genesis...washing away the colors of life.
"But then the darkness learned of Lord Xeced's plan and it acted to obliterate our final hope!
"Thankfully, Cosmic Emperor stepped in... sacrificing himself to stop the darkness!"
[1] Violent Waythe and many of the figures mentioned in this chapter were shown in Chapter 293