My Living Shadow System Devours To Make Me Stronger Chapter 964 - 965: Oedipus Effect

Silence reigned here.

Tranquility enveloped the area.

Crisp air circulated through the woods, weaving among the myriad trees. The aroma of pine, soil, and vibrant timber hung in the atmosphere, blending with the subtle hint of enchanted formations.

Rock and foliage merged seamlessly with sorcery.

All was immaculate.

Much like the ethereal stunning inhabitants of this place.

In ancient times, when the Demon Lord of Domination first set foot on this land, he too was struck by its splendor.

Sylvia was familiar with that tale.

Such lore suited her perfectly.

In fact, every bit of lore did.

After all, she held the gateway to boundless wisdom.

Nevertheless...

Grief weighed on her.

Her lovely face betrayed none of it. The melancholy lurked deep in her serene gray gaze.

Her lengthy silver locks shimmered softly as they cascaded beyond her waist and trailed onto the ground behind.

A refined silver tiara sat atop her brow.

She donned an elongated gown featuring emerald sleeves that swept along the floor.

Sylvia perched solitary at a vast study table.

In front of her rested one volume.

It was the very tome she had perused for months on end.

Each leaf she flipped unveiled responses to inquiries she hadn't posed.

At times, even solutions to dilemmas she hadn't known existed.

Upon attaining her Fourth Class Advancement, she had unlocked the power to wield the tome with diminished constraints.

Presently, it disclosed much more.

Insights into numerous matters.

Occasionally, even occurrences not yet transpired.

Though the majority held no value for her.

For instance, it could inform her of an elderly mendicant on the Sky Continent's impending demise.

Or that a tiller's bovine in Soltheon was on the verge of calving.

Trivial occurrences.

Insignificant events dispersed throughout the realm.

Acquiring them demanded no toll from her.

At other moments, it displayed the history.

Such as the reality of how a minor realm's monarch had been tainted by his progeny.

On different occasions...

It exposed facts she preferred to remain ignorant of.

Like how a lord's sire had covertly orchestrated his offspring's demise merely to claim the boy's spouse.

The deeper her understanding grew, the more warped the world seemed.

Still...

Occasionally, it held a peculiar allure.

Certain leaves imparted wisdom from distant realms.

Novel tongues.

Unfamiliar scripts.

Alien doctrines.

But each time Sylvia sought to glimpse the destinies of her companions beyond superficial facts...

The tome exacted a fee.

And the greater the worth of the insight...

The harsher the cost.

Once, back in Lysithara, the tome had proposed to disclose a basic urban layout.

The toll had been her fertility.

She would forfeit the capacity to bear offspring eternally.

Certain costs proved far too exorbitant.

At other junctures, the responses arrived solely as enigmas.

Sylvia leaned her forehead on the tome's exposed sheets and offered a subtle grin.

She commanded endless wisdom.

Merely lacking the means to seize it.

The most chilling epiphany, though, lay elsewhere.

Sylvia found she could alter few of the visions presented.

Certain destinies remained unyielding.

Despite the tome's master once assuring her that selection remained possible.

"Choice is an illusion," Sylvia murmured softly.

Maybe she addressed her own thoughts.

Or maybe she conversed with the Enigmatic Deity who bestowed the tome upon her.

She had attempted to alter the scenes it depicted.

One instance, the tome foretold a nearby woodland tree's felling.

Sylvia journeyed there personally and shielded it.

Yet ultimately...

The one who felled it was Sylvia in person.

She hadn't intended such.

But it transpired regardless.

Another foresight depicted a youthful elven lad destined for execution over an offense he hadn't perpetrated.

To rescue him, Sylvia herself extended an invitation for him to dwell beneath her safeguard.

Safety awaited with her.

But the instant he attempted to board her conveyance...

Her guards slew him.

Per her sire's command.

Repeatedly she endeavored.

Repeatedly she faltered.

In time, she grasped a singular verity.

The Enigmatic Deity had once declared to her:

"Fate is a choice. What we call fate is merely the collection of our actions and decisions that lead to an outcome. The choices we make, and the choices made for us, shape the future we despise."

Sylvia regarded the tome with a desolate look.

"I was wrong..." she breathed.

"We were wrong, Damon."

Throughout, they had assumed the Enigmatic Deity implied fate's malleability.

But that wasn't the essence of "choice".

Its implication proved far darker.

A lone individual's selections cannot sway the cosmos.

Fellow beings select too.

Their determinations weave into the identical result.

No solitary resolve can surmount the unified.

Thus, fate emerges.

Fate constitutes a choice.

Simply not yours.

"Haha..."

Sylvia laughed gently.

Her grin remained composed, nearly deriding herself.

Even the Enigmatic Deity could select.

As could the remaining divinities.

As could fiends.

When no individual resolve holds the strength to shift the firmament...

Then all find themselves ensnared in the result forged by innumerable selections.

That defined fate.

That embodied hopelessness.

And the earlier Sylvia embraced it...

The preferable.

Gradually, droplets traced down her face.

Naught existed.

Utterly naught she could perform to avert the approaching events.

If fate embodied a choice...

Then whose choice had birthed this one?

Her sight returned to the tome.

Upon the displayed leaf stood a depiction.

A youth bearing shadowed orbs and extended ebony tresses.

A blade had pierced directly into his core.

His vital fluid spilled onto the earth.

But what halted Sylvia’s respiration was the expression in his gaze.

He appeared shattered.

Completely shattered.

As if he had beheld something inconceivable to his belief.

The figure was Damon.

Sylvia had never solicited this revelation from the tome.

The tome unveiled it solely after her complete surrender to fate's immutability.

That all bids to resist foretelling merely hastened its realization.

Underneath the depiction lay script.

Script Sylvia had uttered to Damon in Lysithara during her comrades' divinations.

She perused them anew.

"I offer a gentle warning... a caution."

"Beware. Your peril has only begun."

"That, I guarantee."

Her digits quivered faintly.

Beneath those were the concluding phrases.

"The truth is a steel horse."

"Your lies will be broken. Your truths will be revealed."

"And when they are..."

"You will be betrayed by one you cherish."