Chapter Ninety-Two: Dialogue in the Shadows

On the other side of Evolution Island lies the Abyss of Death, a fathomless trench into which light has never dared set foot. Yet today, it seemed as though radiance once more yearned for this forsaken place—a mysterious beam pierced through from some unknown realm, startling fish both great and small. Creatures who had never once glimpsed light in their lives scattered in terror, fleeing as instinctively as humans recoil from the most filthy and wicked things.

"A land steeped in sin, darkness, and death ought long ago to have been consumed by the light. Such filth is unworthy of the blessing from the higher realms." A voice echoed through the stillness of the abyss, emanating from the end of the brilliant ray—a dim silhouette faintly traced the outline of a person at the convergence of the light.

"Enough! Does a mere servant of light, who has only just set foot into the seventh tier, dare swagger about in my domain?" A wholly different voice rang out from nowhere, and to nowhere did it seem to go—sardonic, sinister, and utterly uncanny. Though there was not a trace of tangible energy, the rampant light quaked as if it had met its nemesis, shuddering, shrinking back inch by inch, as though ceding ground to the abyssal darkness.

The radiance seemed to resist, but before the infinite gloom, it was helpless, vanishing as swiftly as a night-blooming flower. The Abyss of Death was restored to shadow, only deeper, only more silent. The fish, wounded by the brilliance, now seemed to return to a mother’s embrace, gliding in peace, swiftly healing under the nurturing of their dark matron.

"Clown! What are you doing? Do not forget the promise you made to the master!" A shrill, terrified cry pierced the trench, sending the newly recovered fish fleeing once more. Unnatural currents unsettled the silence of the abyss.

Again and again, the voice of the servant of light reverberated through the trench, but no reply came. The man called Clown was like a capricious lord, wholly ignoring the trespassing intruder’s pleas.

"You… you cannot kill me." The servant of light gazed in bewilderment at the near-solid darkness around him, as though he were witnessing the most dreadful thing imaginable. His trembling could no longer be suppressed; his body shook in time to the chattering of his teeth, like a broken machine. His voice was so tremulous, it nearly drowned out the words themselves—one would be hard-pressed to discern what he was saying.

Yet Clown, as if the tyrant of this shadowed world sentencing a criminal, brusquely interrupted, scoffing, "Enough! You’ve already spoken one word too many. My patience is a gift—know that not everyone is permitted speech in my presence."

"No, officer, help me—" The servant of light looked around in despair, trying to scream his last, but all his words were choked in his throat. Though a feeble whimper escaped, who could have possibly heard him? To understand would be a fantasy.

"Oh-ho, ha-ha, hee-hee, are you still hoping the officer will come save you? Don’t be childish—none who enter my domain have ever left alive." The Clown, as though hearing the most hilarious jest, let loose a string of grotesque laughter, pronouncing the servant of light’s verdict in a bizarre, chilling tone.

"Gurgle, gurgle… gurgle, gurgle…" Strange sounds emerged from where the servant of light once stood, like the murmurs of ghosts, the decrees of death. For four or five seconds, the noises persisted, then faded away. In this abyssal darkness—so deep it seemed death itself—the servant of light vanished without a trace, not even a ripple disturbing the trench. Everything returned to its former stillness; the fish of every kind swam quietly, as if no soul had ever trespassed here.

The magnificent, awe-inspiring magma flowed slowly, its dark-red streams like the blood of ancient demons, and yet within pulsed new life—ruin and rebirth, again and again, ceaseless and eternal. Today, two shadows arrived, strolling atop the flickering magma, sometimes kicking at the rising flows as if strolling leisurely along a muddy lane after dinner, utterly at ease, ignoring the might of the molten earth.

"Clown! Was that not going too far?"

"Did you really think that officer would come?"

"You provoked him so brazenly—if he does not appear for this, can he still be called an officer?"

"Officer’s busy! Why would he care for trivial matters here?"

"Clown, you’ve gone too far. This is no trivial matter anymore."

"It was only a servant of light, after all."

"Why pretend ignorance? You know very well what I mean."

The two shadows appeared to be arguing, yet no sound escaped them, as if underworld spirits communicated in silence—debating matters of life and death.

"You are right. Since I’ve taken action, I should see it all through. I should never have hesitated."

"You should have done so long ago, long ago."

"Thief, I must see you anew."

"There is no need. I have always been a thief, as you have always been a clown."

Their exchange ended, and they slipped away without a trace—one melting into the dark-red magma, the other dissolving into the pitch-black earth.

"In the face of ice, I have no choice but to become a ghost—so, too, do you." Lance did not continue his entanglement with Luo Hanya. He spoke in a low, distant voice, and at once the world shook—the glacier fractured into shards, its smooth surface shattered. Amidst the broken bedrock rose the king of the polar wastes; all around, there was only that dreadful white—the white of ice and snow, the white of death.

"You—"

"The snow and ice have turned me into a white specter. From the moment I set foot in these polar lands, I ceased to be human. I am nothing but the white warden of this icy realm."

"So this is the truth?"

"What stands before you is but a part of it. Perhaps only by breaking free of this place will you glimpse the true truth." Lance caressed his crystal-carved form with a sigh; his eyes, frozen into blue crystals, brimmed with a lifeless pallor, wholly out of place with the ghastly white that choked the world.

"Perhaps this is his true self," Luo Hanya mused, gazing into Lance’s eyes. Once caught, he could not look away, as though there was an infinite power hidden within them.

"Offer up your whole self; let us join as one, share in glory and in loss, and together, let us behold the truth." The seductive voice peeled away Luo Hanya’s defenses, seeping into his soul, whitening all it touched.

That dreadful white—the white of death.