My Living Shadow System Devours To Make Me Stronger Chapter 968 - 969: New Outcomes

This was her chamber.

She cast a quick look across the floorboards.

The maggots were absent.

No tangled knots of hair remained.

Everything was empty.

Frantically, her hands swept over her own limbs.

All appeared perfectly normal.

She stood up slowly, making her way to the window.

The Moon Glades stretched out before her.

The familiar, gleaming architecture of her home stood as it always had.

Her knees suddenly gave way.

"A dream..." she murmured, her voice thin as she collapsed to the ground. "It was just a dream."

Trembling, her fingers brushed against her eyes.

Then, the voice returned.

"Indeed."

"It was a dream."

The whisper of the Unknown God vibrated gently within her consciousness.

Sylvia stiffened.

"You are—"

"Our covenant persists."

Her hands began to quiver beyond her control.

Far away...

A man reclined in a chair, a book held in his grip.

His skin was flawless and dark, silver hair falling in long waves across his shoulders.

His beauty exceeded mortal standards.

He was perfect.

Anyone who gazed upon him would feel an immediate, magnetic pull.

Yet, the longer one observed him...

A profound sense of unease would manifest.

Revulsion. Disgust. Fear.

And yet... they would remain entirely unable to tear their eyes away.

They would watch him through eternity, prisoner to their own volition.

The man offered a faint, thin smile.

"A significant cost, investing in that elf."

His tone carried a note of faint amusement.

"Ultimately, another failsafe occupies the board before Doom has even committed her move."

A fleeting shadow of doubt touched his voice.

"My intent was never the annihilation of the Lake of Tears."

He turned a page of the book with idle grace.

"After all... its destruction would hardly align with my interests."

It had been little more than a necessary deception.

Had he requested his true desire from the start, Sylvia would have refused.

Thus, he manufactured the ruse that he craved the lake’s ruin.

In truth—

It was essential to him.

"The Lake of Tears provides the anchor for my movement within Minerva’s domain."

It remained the wish Lazarak had left behind.

That lingering wish continued to fray the chains binding the Unknown God.

He breathed a sigh.

A weary utterance.

For all his intricate machinations.

For every calculation made.

For all the failsafes meticulously placed.

Despite his immense power...

The Unknown God would feel no shock if everything crumbled to dust.

If the Pillar of Conflict remained forever out of his reach.

"Then I shall simply try again."

His tone remained smooth and calm.

"Eternity is on my side."

His gaze drifted toward a small pot on the vanity.

A tiny bud resided within the soil.

A lotus.

Which was peculiar.

The seed he had originally sown was a gardenia.

Yet a lotus had sprouted in its stead.

Failure would not surprise him.

Though he doubted such an outcome so early in the game.

"Yes... I suspect the pillars shall be mine."

His smile withered slightly.

Eventually, he would falter.

But not today.

Never this soon.

He was fated to fail only when the betrayal of expectations stung the most.

Such was his curse.

His penance.

The Unknown God was understood by none.

Once...

Perhaps someone had held a glimmer of understanding.

That time had long since passed.

"My objective is within reach now."

Indeed.

The Unknown God held a purpose.

A singular, grand pursuit.

It was for himself, yes.

But it was also for every soul that harbored resentment toward the world of their inception.

For those convinced that existence was nothing but cruelty.

Unfairness.

Indifference.

After all—

No mortal had requested the burden of life.

His mission served those suffering in a world that ignored their cries.

Was that not the essence of a god?

To answer the desperate prayers of the dying?

Was a god not a creator in his own right?

Did the heavens not rise from the will of the divine?

The Unknown God smiled with soft tenderness.

"The only distinction..."

"I shall spare the mortals from suffering through their trials first."

He leaned back against the cushions.

"I shall forge the final paradise."

The ultimate.

The perfect.

The absolute utopia.

And by his long-forgotten name—

It would be accomplished.

*******

Sylvia remained dazed by the sheer weight of what had transpired.

The echo of the Unknown God’s voice still hummed within her mind. Despite his absence, the command of a god had been spoken directly into the marrow of her thoughts.

Yet... everything seemed unbothered.

Her ears remained intact and unmarred by blood.

Her head carried no phantom aches.

She felt entirely untouched by physical pain.

"What is happening?" she whispered.

Only silence offered an answer.

The interior of her room remained as it had been.

Sylvia raised a trembling hand to her brow.

It had to be a hallucination. A dream.

Naturally, that was all it could be.

The Unknown God functioned as a deity of dreams... or at least, possessed authority over that realm. She recalled Damon mentioning that one of the Unknown God’s aspects involved the mastery of illusions and dreams.

Then again...

His influence held no surprises by now.

He had, after all, forced them all to endure the Nightmare of Lazarak.

A nightmare that had served as the genesis of Damon’s knowledge regarding the Lake of Tears.

Sylvia furrowed her brows.

"Was that, too, a segment of his vast design... or..."

Her voice trailed into the void.

The dimensions of that entity’s schemes stretched far beyond her limited perception.

There was no profit in scrutinizing matters beyond her grasp.

She had to focus solely on what lay before her.

And right now, a looming catastrophe demanded her awareness.

She looked toward the bolted door.

Then toward the window.

He would arrive soon.

Perhaps an warning to her father would allow for defensive preparations.

Or perhaps...

Silence was the safer path.

From the vision she had witnessed, this entire location was destined to be reduced to ash.

Resistance might be futile.

But what if the threads of fate had shifted? What if her covenant with the Unknown God had altered the future?

Sylvia gazed through the window for a prolonged moment.

Then, she rose and strode toward the threshold.

She did not attempt to unlatch the door.

Instead, she hoisted her leg and unleashed a kick with every ounce of her latent power.

The reinforced door shattered outward, cascading into a spray of jagged wood and mangled metal.

Outside, the clattering of armor erupted as the knights tasked with her confinement were sent sprawling by the percussive blast.

Sylvia stepped into the corridor.

Her tone was frost-bitten and sharp.

"Where is my father?"