Infinite Mana In The Apocalypse

Chapter 3817: Release the Protagonist! II

In the Infiniverse Crucible, silence folded in layers over Noah as his eyes narrowed into thin slits of intent.

Within him, thousands upon thousands of golden lattices surged forward like celestial filaments unraveled by existence itself, each etched with the impossible majesty of the True Source of the Protagonist.

They did not rush. They drifted with regal inevitability, they left his being like strands of golden breath, threading through the sprawling Infiniverse Wheel of Existence with no destination and every destination.

Every destination.

Everything!

Wherever they passed, the air itself seemed to lean in reverence, Authority kneeling to its terrifying external influence.

The most terrifying thing about the True Source of the Protagonist...was its unfathomable external influence as it sought to make Noah the center of unknown entanglements!

He raised no hand. He gave no further command. His eyes slowly closed as his chest exhaled a quiet breath of controlled revelation, and in that moment, it was as if the veil between stories thinned.

Absolute Fictional Transcendence surged.

He did not activate it with force. It simply acknowledged him. The concept of fiction- woven, curated, and defied- opened like an ancient eye buried beneath all Existence.

And he saw.

Not clearly. Not precisely.

But he glimpsed fables. Just like before with Master Hannibal and the Masters of the Mannafolds and the Chronosect of Threadbound Folds.

Roles whispered by narrative forces that transcended logic.

He only smiled faintly.

Then...

Darkness came.

Not in his sight, but in the shift.

For the perspective was no longer his!

HUUM!

—

Deep within the Hollow Concord of Nullity, far removed from the glimmering madness of a certain Infiniverse Crucible, there lay a realm drenched in stillness.

Here, silence was thick. Here, the air did not move unless it was commanded. Here, beneath forgotten frequencies and across the weavings of unfinished paradoxes, a sea of blood stretched across an entire Omniverse.

A Omniverse that was alive. Inside a True Frequency of Life that was inside a living Wheel of Existence!

The sea of blood inside the Omniverse was crimson-gold. Still. Endless.

It was not metaphor. It was literal. Blood of entities. Blood of existences.

And seated upon its trembling surface atop a throne of pale bone and folded wings... was him.

Aetheron.

A crownless wonder. A forgotten prince. Draped in flowing white robes unmarred by stain, his long silver hair drifted lazily over his shoulders, though not a single breeze dared approach him.

His complexion was porcelain, but not fragile. He looked human, but impossibly beautiful. And impossibly wrong.

Eyes the color of wine- deep, somber, and utterly detached- gazed down at the figure in his grasp.

A woman. Once a proud Pioneer of Existence. Now a trembling husk.

"You’re screaming very loudly for someone so irrelevant," Aetheron murmured, his voice smoother than silk, with a drawl of apathetic cruelty.

He lifted her easily with one hand.

Then sank his fangs into her neck.

There was no resistance.

Only surrender.

The blood glowed with shimmering color as it flowed out of her and into him. Her eyes rolled back. Her existence flickered once, and then vanished.

And when he was done... he sighed.

Aetheron tossed the lifeless body into the crimson sea, where it joined countless others. They bobbed gently on the blood, some half-intact, others reduced to shimmering fragments. Billions. Each one once an Entity of hope.

He burped.

"Excuse me," he said with a bemused smirk to many lifeless corpses.

Then, with a flick of his fingers, his Authority pulsed.

Like an uncaring anomaly idly reaching across dimensions, Aetheron’s hand closed around a flickering light somewhere within the Omniverse. It warped. Compressed.

And reappeared before him.

This time... it was a Prime Source Entity.

She was radiant. Terrified. Her body screamed with the resonance of Origin. She tried to resist. To scream.

She managed neither.

His fingers brushed her hair aside gently. His voice was a whisper of sweetness.

"It is a great sin to be weak, you know."

He bit.

Blood poured.

"Because the strong will never ask. They take. And if you can’t stop them... then you die."

His eyes fluttered closed as he drank deeply.

"Most don’t even know they’re already dead. How quaint."

He dropped her.

The Prime Source Entity’s corpse sank slowly into the blood, leaving ripples of dull golden light.

He was about to continue his daily fishing for entities to drink the blood of- from those with no mana to even those who had attained a True Source in any Frequencies of this Wheel of Existence.

But then... Existence trembled.

The blood sea rippled violently. The skies darkened. Not the false skies above the Omniverse, no. The fabric of the True Frequency of Life itself began to quiver.

The entirety of the Wheel of Existence it was part of groaned like an ancient beast being suppressed and crying pitifully as it asked cor mercy!

Aetheron... simply looked up.

And saw.

Past the frequencies.

Past the Wheel of Existence itself.

A shadow. Then a shimmer.

Then...a being.

A head.

Just a head!

Looming past the horizon of the Wheel of Existence itself. The head had features that were carved from obsidian gold. His face emotionless and immense, the visage of endless judgment.

His eyes, sunless and infinite, glowed with a color that defied all frequencies.

The rest of his body...was vaster than even the Wheel of Existence.

Wings stretched from his back, each feather the size of frequencies. Behind his head, three obsidian halos rotated with mournful solemnity.

The being looked at Aetheron.

And spoke.

His voice shattered echoes.

"Have you played enough, Aetheron?"

HUUM!

It was not a question.

It was a decree.

"The only requirement I placed upon you was that you become a Master of Existence before I came for you. And here you are. An Unbound Living Paradox, wasting away in this fetid fold, playing house with corpses and indulging in unsavory appetites."

The colossal being leaned forward as the Wheel of Existence creaked as if it would break from the pressure of the gaze alone!

His eyes sharpened as the massive entity continued.

"Do you need help in breaking through?"

Aetheron didn’t flinch.

His lips curved slightly. He wiped a crimson drop from the corner of his mouth with a hand that gleamed with glorious Authority.

He looked up with the same calm he always wore.

The same cruelty.

The same weariness.

Towards...a Foldless One!