The Guardian gods Chapter 904

As quickly as they had acknowledged him, the deer dismissed him, turning their gaze toward the primitive primates.

Right before Tyrion’s eyes, the ambient light fractured. The air rippled and tore open, shifting violently to reveal a hidden path leading straight into an entirely different plane of existence. The scent of an unfamiliar world wafted through the rift.

The primate-like beings didn’t panic. Instead, the moment the path opened, their weathered faces lit up with pure, unadulterated joy. With a casual familiarity that made it obvious they had performed this ritual countless times before, they guided their primitive carriage forward, stepping cleanly out of Nana and into the unknown.

It took a while but then it clicked then to Tyrion what he was seeing,"The spirit realm."

It was a known, legendary realm in the world of Nana, woven into the fairy tales told to children and discussed with deep reverence in the private enclaves of high-level mages who shared his status. It was the cradle of the world spirits, Aqua and Brix, and the fabled domain of the Wardenwild, the terrifying herald of Keles, the Queen of Death. If the ancient lore and whispers among the elite were right, then these majestic, mocking deer before him were none other than the direct children of the Wardenwild itself.

Looking back at the primitive, mana-less primates as they guided their carriage forward, a flurry of questions raced through his mind. Who were these creatures? How could beings so completely devoid of magic be so profoundly attuned to the spirit realm? From the casual, joyful way they stepped through the rift, it looked as though the realm of spirits wasn’t just a destination for them, it was their home.

A sudden, feverish look came upon his face. His mind, already pushed to its limits by Tide’s flawless defensive network, saw an entirely new variable. A hidden realm. A race of anomalies. Maybe his opportunity was here.

Driven by a sudden surge of opportunistic ambition, Tyrion moved with blinding speed, throwing himself directly toward the rift to force his way into the spirit realm.

But there was no impact. Like a phantom passing through mist, Tyrion sailed right through the shimmering tear in reality. He didn’t transition to a new plane, he simply stumbled forward and found himself standing in the exact same spot in the mortal forest.

He froze, his breath catching in his throat as a wave of absolute shock washed over him. Unwilling to accept the failure, refusing to believe that a Paragon could be locked out by a crude tear in the air, he spun around and tried again. He channeled his law, wrapped himself in it and lunged.

Nothing.

He tried again. And again. And again. Each time, his body simply passed through the glowing space, completely ignored by the dimensional threshold. The rift slowly began to close as more primates passed through with their carriage, leaving Tyrion standing still in the quiet woods, his eyes wide with a mixture of rage and disbelief. The spirit realm simply refused to acknowledge his existence entirely.

Tyrion finally stopped his frantic attempts, his chest rising and falling as he stood in the silent forest. He looked up, only to find the spectral deers staring back at him. Their glowing eyes held a quietunbearable amusement, watching his desperate lunges as if he were nothing more than a traveling jester performing a clumsy trick for their entertainment.

A hot, dangerous spark of anger flared in his chest. A Paragon of his stature was not meant to be laughed at, least of all by beasts.

But just as his mana began to crackle with violent intent, he froze. He forced the rage down, his mind dragging him back to the very reason he had retraced his steps in the first place "the mysterious glint"

He swept his gaze across the clearing, the pull was still there but he saw nothing out of the sorts except for the mined resources transported by the primates.

Realizing the angle of perception was wrong, Tyrion shot back up into the sky, hovering exactly where he had been when he first caught the reflection.

From this elevated vantage point, his eyes locked onto it. There it was. The glint wasn’t coming from the environment, nor was it coming from the deer. It was reflecting off the very back of the final wooden carriage being pulled by the Apeling look alike. And that carriage was already half-submerged in the shimmering, translucent rift, about to disappear into the spirit realm.

In the blink of an eye, a streak of golden light descended.

Tyrion materialized directly beside the moving carriage. Ignoring the physical space, he reached his hand straight toward the source of the glint. It was a bound object, a heavy tome nested carelessly among the cargo. It radiated a profound, inexplicable pull, a deep, magnetic tug that vibrated against his very soul, urging him to take it.

Yet, even as his fingers closed around the mysterious book, his eyes weren’t actually on it.

His gaze was entirely transfixed by the rapidly shrinking tear in reality. The legendary spirit realm, a place of myths, was unfolding right before his face. Its ethereal, ancient light cast long shadows over his features.

And yet, despite all his power, he could only stand on the threshold, completely locked out as the gateway slowly closed shut.

Unwilling to give up, Tyrion forced his Luminous Logic to flare to its absolute limits. He cast his brilliant, golden domain law directly onto the fading rift, attempting to illuminate, catalog, and dissect the very fabric of the spirit pathway.

But the light found nothing to grasp. The spirit realm existed on a paradigm entirely detached from the physical and conceptual laws of the mortal plane, his domain transmitted absolutely nothing back to him. It was like trying to cast a shadow on a reflection.

With a desperate, frustrated roar that shook the canopy of the forest, Tyrion flew headfirst toward the shrinking tear in reality.

Snap.

The pathway closed directly in his face, the dimensional seam knitting together with absolute, silent finality. The lingering scent of ancient earth and spectral mist vanished, replaced once more by the stagnant air of the southern continent.

Beside him, the light hoof steps of the five ethereal deers clicked against the forest floor. They walked right past the floating, furious Paragon, their glowing eyes fixed ahead, utterly indifferent to his presence. With a slow, fluid grace, they stepped forward into the empty air and disappeared before his very eyes, leaving no trace, no mana signature, and no path behind.

Tyrion slowly descended to the forest floor, the silence of the wilderness settling heavily around him. He stood in the quiet clearing, his breathing ragged, his golden eyes gradually fading back to their cold, calculating blue. He had been denied. A power that could reshape kingdoms had been treated as entirely irrelevant by the primal forces of the world.

The bitter realization was a bit hard to swallow. This humiliating display of exclusion reminded him, with painful clarity, why he held such deep, visceral disdain for the origin gods, their spoiled children, and some entities of Nana.

Beings like himself had always had to claw their way up from nothing. Every ounce of his Paragon authority, his mastery over Luminous Logic, and his control over the laws of the world had been paid for in blood, sweat, and centuries of ruthless calculation. Nothing had ever been handed to him because of his lineage or divine favor. He was a self-made apex being.

Yet today, even when he had proven himself to be among the absolute strongest in this world, he still gained zero recognition when it came to forces like the spirit realm.

He was still just an outsider, like a thief trying to pick a lock he hadn’t been born with the right to open. To think that a pack of spectral deer and a tribe of primitive, mana-less primates could wander freely into the cradle of the world spirits, while a Paragon of the Sun Kingdom was left standing in the dirt like a confused child, it was an insult to everything he had built.

Shaking the lingering bitterness from his mind, Tyrion turned his full, undivided attention to the heavy tome in his hands.

His eyes narrowed into a deeply distrustful gaze. The very existence of this object, and the way it had affected him, made absolutely no sense. He was a Paragon, a being who had elevated his soul and mind to command the fundamental laws of reality. His mental fortress should have been completely impenetrable to mere physical items. Yet, only moments ago, this book had exerted a magnetic, soul-deep pull that had practically forced him to descend and snatch it.

"A hidden hand is clearly at play here" he thought, his jaw tightening.

Tyrion’s hand began to emit a bright, golden glow as he channeled his domain directly into the tome, trying to dissect, analyze, and map the exact metaphysical laws acting through the cover. He prepared himself to trace whatever divine thread, tracking curse, or mental compulsion had been woven into the pages.