Infinite Mana In The Apocalypse

Chapter 3875: Existence is Unfair IV

Moiraine didn’t move.

Not when the golden seas of Paradoxical Authority began to around her.

Not when every single Living Paradox present began to shift in demeanor.

Not even when the thousand protectors that once encircled them with Authority pulsing...suddenly quieted and turned still, their complex weavings flickering with unspoken weavings as their eyes... turned to Noah.

She only stood there, half-broken, half-blazing, holding what little remained of him.

Her arms tightened.

Her flames trembled.

"You all do not understand. Someone as old as you should easily see the bigger picture!"

...!

The rising golden sea churned gently now, but beneath its placid surface was a current of so deep it made her insides burn.

The cause?

One woman.

One voice.

Honored Diviticus stood tall amid a storm of reverence and tension, the lick of her white paradoxical flames casting light on all who beheld her.

Her wings were unfurled in glory. Her lips, curved in the slightest smile. She didn’t flinch beneath the weight of so many eyes. If anything, she grew sharper under their gaze.

"You asked..." Diviticus echoed, the words clipped like they was beneath her. "You asked why I did this? You say I do not see the bigger picture?"

She turned slowly, white flames curling off her skin in lazy trails as she held her hand aloft. A single drop of dull gray blood slowly rose and hovered at her fingertip.

"I give you answers," she said coolly, her voice cutting across the golden ocean like a wire. "Little Moiraine simply chose to keep them to herself. A pity, really."

The drop of blood floated in silence.

And then right after it wss brought out, every Living Paradox here felt it!

A terrifting intoxication!

A pull. Deeper than need. Wilder than hunger!

Older than any logic they had long depended on!

Their entire existences trembled in response, like puppets caught on strings they never knew they bore!

Even the Honored Ones could not mask their astonishment.

Six of them appeared around Diviticus in a flash of desperate movement, surrounding her like hounds.

She raised an eyebrow and looked between them. Her hand did not waver.

"You all feel that?" she said softly, her tone slipping into something darker, heavier.

Her gaze found Moiraine and narrowed.

"That’s your bigger picture, is it?" she asked. "To sit on this? To keep such a wellspring from the hands that could wield it best?"

She didn’t wait for an answer.

Instead, she turned to the gathering of Honored Paradoxes.

"You need not beg me for this small drop of blood," she declared, her tone now commanding. "There is more. Far more. This drop is but a sample. The Young Paradox... bleeds it."

A collective breath trembled through the gathered crowd.

Moiraine felt the silence thickening. The shift in loyalty that always came, subtle as a knife.

Diviticus continued, voice low but insistent.

"This is logic," she said. "He was a child. Barely capable of surviving a single attack from Living Origin not too long ago. But now...now, because of what I’ve done, there are two Paradoxes who do not produce Inevitabilities. Two. Do you know what this means? We are no longer dependent on the uncertain rise of a single impossible anomaly."

She raised her chin, her tone deepening into steel.

"No more waiting. No more gambling existence on the survival of one boy. We can grow now. Multiply. Spread."

She turned her gaze to Honored Gold, her tone sharpening.

"And with each drop of his blood, we become more."

Silence. Again.

Until Honored Gold stirred.

The golden waters glowed softly around him as he hovered before the paradoxical dome Moiraine had crafted in desperation. His expression was calm, unreadable. Only the faintest flicker in his eyes betrayed the storm he carried within.

Moiraine, with golden eyes burning with flames staining her cheeks held her silence as the Honored Living Golden Paradox spoke.

"My dear student," he said gently. "Little Moiraine. If there was ever care in my weavings for you, I ask now... let us see the full shape of this. You say there is a bigger picture."

His voice echoed with reverence, but also weight.

"I have enacted my authority over these Goldfolds by spreading out this golden sea. None here can utilize their Paradoxical Authority but me. There is time now. Time to speak. So speak. Help us understand why you think Honored Diviticus is wrong."

Moiraine’s grip on Noah’s remains trembled.

He continued.

"You brought him here. You sheltered him. Promised him safety. And now..."

He gestured to the broken form resting in her arms.

"...this is what remains. It’s not fair. I know it isn’t. But existence is not obligated to be fair to everyone. Especially when the unfairness of one can mean salvation for the many."

His gaze drifted to the white fire dancing around Diviticus, still pulsing with rising complexity.

"She has become stronger. Twenty-five percent more complex so far from what I can see. And no Inevitability was born."

He looked at Noah’s still eyes.

"From the ruin of one, we may find salvation for all. Would the Royal Paradoxes disagree? If the Kleos Living Paradoxical Council stood watching us now... what judgment do you believe they would pass?"

A hush fell over the gathered Paradoxes.

All looked to Moiraine.

To the golden dome that now held a future in its trembling hands.

And behind that silence... Noah’s gaze never left Diviticus.

Honored Diviticus stood, poised like a queen who had already won.

She looked down at him, voice curling into the cold cadence of command.

"There is no misunderstanding here," she said sharply. "There is only clarity. Clarity you were too weak to grasp, Moiraine."

She stepped forward once, white flames coiling like snakes around her limbs.

"You brought something sacred into our fold, but you didn’t understand what it was. I did. I do. And I will not let your sentimentality squander it."

She didn’t blink.

"He was never yours to protect. He was a Panacea. A gift from existence. And I took what was offered. Not in cruelty. In necessity."

She turned back to the others, her voice resonant, hypnotic.

"You want strength? You want evolution? You want an end to eons of stagnation? Of the other Living Existences growing bolder and bolder? Then take him. Drink of his blood."

Her eyes burned.

"Because if you don’t...I will!"

HUUM!

Moiraine shuddered.

Noah’s gaze glowed faintly.

And all around them, the wolves of paradox drew closer!