Lord of the Truth

Chapter 2380 Help?

"...What exactly do you mean by saying that he was helping me on Nihari?" Robin asked with a peculiar smile lingering on his face, his curiosity outweighing his irritation for the briefest of moments.

"There's no need to pretend anymore, Robin Burton." Helen kept her gaze lowered, her voice calm and devoid of accusation. "I understand now that I was dragged into something far beyond my place, something so much greater than myself that it changed the course of my life forever. Looking back now, everything I once thought I understood feels laughably small."

"No, no, no." Robin waved his hand several times, still wearing that same smile. "I'm not letting you steal my victory from me." Then the smile disappeared as quickly as it had come. "I suffered too much and lost too much in that war for you to attribute everything to the Seer with a single sentence! You're making it sound as though I was simply carried across the battlefield while he did everything behind the scenes."

"Perhaps she means the guidance you received." Caesar tried to smooth things over, glancing between the two of them. "You don't have to get upset over a few words. What matters is that you won in the end, regardless of how you reached that victory."

"What guidance?!" Robin threw his hand forward in exasperation. "That damned thing told me to go and fight, that's all! If I'd actually been given guidance, would I have been thrown into one filthy situation after another? Would I have been forced to gamble my life every other day? If he truly intended to guide me, he had a strange way of showing it!"

"..."

A faint smile appeared on Helen's face.

"If that's what you believe... then very well."

"....?!" Robin stared at her with wide-open eyes. "Young lady, if you don't want to end up back in the state you were in before, tell me exactly what you mean. Right now."

"...?" Helen raised her head slightly in surprise, then glanced toward Glatheon and Caesar before returning her eyes to Robin. "Really?"

"Now!" Robin's voice rose another level.

The more Helen behaved as though everything he had achieved on Nihari had merely been hidden assistance from someone else, the more irritated he became.

Hidden help? I called that old bastard day and night through the Soul Shard, and he couldn't even be bothered to answer me once! I suffered there, tasted every kind of humiliation imaginable, sacrificed more than enough to finish that mission, and in the end she thinks it wasn't even my own victory? That it all belonged to someone else?!

"...I didn't mean to insult you." Helen rested her chin back on her knees, speaking just as calmly as before. "At the time, you were far too weak to accomplish any of that on your own. Naturally, he would have been watching over you, whether you realized it or not." After a brief pause she continued, "I don't know what exactly happened in the Northern Region... but he was definitely there."

Then she slowly lifted her eyes toward Robin.

"...Unless you know other Master Laws besides Truth. And not merely at the introductory stages..."

"...?!"

Robin's brows knitted tightly together, genuine confusion finally replacing his annoyance.

"What are you talking about?"

"You probably don't know this, but I can sense things like that." Helen showed a calm smile while lowering her gaze once more. "Before I left the Destra Galaxy, I used to accompany my father on simple training missions. Some of them involved hunting extremely powerful individuals... people who wielded Master Laws at their early stages."

"...During one of those missions, I performed well enough to kill a second-stage user of the Law of Balance." Helen continued slowly, recalling the memory without the slightest hint of pride. "As a reward, my father taught me how to perceive the Cosmic Rejection. Naturally, I can't use it anywhere near his level... but I did learn the method, and I can still perceive it."

"The Cosmic Rejection?" Robin repeated in surprise, the unfamiliar term immediately capturing his attention.

"Mhm." Helen nodded gently. "According to him, the Master Laws were the laws that created the Cosmic itself... yet they have no rightful place within the Cosmic they created. Everything that exists inside the Cosmic is governed only by Heavenly Laws, which are nothing more than weakened derivatives, miniature imitations, and incomplete reflections of the Master Laws that came into existence after creation, solely to govern everything contained within it."

"...?"

Robin narrowed his eyes immediately, his expression growing noticeably more serious as the implications of her words began to sink in.

Robin had always noticed the similarities between the Master Laws and the countless paths of the Heavenly Laws. Until now, he had simply assumed that everything ultimately possessed ranks and stages, so some degree of resemblance was only natural... yet it turned out that every Heavenly Law path was actually derived from the Master Laws? Merely weakened imitations created from something far more fundamental?

Thinking about it...

Every new fifth-stage Master technique can became a Fundamental Heavenly Law that others could cultivate and wield, just like the laws used by Sevar's followers and the Cosmic Elder's descendants.

Could it really be...

That the entire framework of the Heavenly Laws had originated in exactly the same manner?

As nothing more than countless derivations?

"...According to my father's explanation, Master Laws can be used within the universe only with tremendous difficulty. Even though they do not truly belong inside it, forcing them into the universe harms the Heavenly Laws themselves. It disrupts the balance between them and causes them—for varying lengths of time—to regress toward their original chaotic state before they were organized into the universe."

She continued in the same calm tone. "To put it more simply, every use of a Master Law leaves injuries within the fabric of the Heavenly Laws in the region where it was used. Those injuries may persist for days, years, or even entire eras before they naturally heal. The more frequently Master Laws are used inside the universe, the more widespread this phenomenon becomes, causing the Heavenly Laws to grow increasingly unstable... while instances of the Universe's Rejection become both more frequent and far longer-lasting."

"Is that what he told you to justify why he hunted down Master Law users throughout the universe?" Robin asked, his eyes twitching with restrained anger. Even if he had never agreed with the Seer's methods, hearing another justification for them only made his expression darken further.

"..." Helen struggled to lift one shoulder before answering after a brief pause. "Yes, and that's what I personally verified."

"Nonsense." Robin waved dismissively without the slightest hesitation. "I've used Master Laws countless times and never sensed anything remotely resembling what you're describing."

"Do you even know what you're supposed to be sensing... or how?" Helen asked calmly. "The use of Master Laws doesn't leave destruction visible to the naked eye. It leaves behind traces that can only be discovered through deliberate investigation if you're searching for the history hidden within a particular region."

She continued patiently, "To perceive the Universe's Rejection, you must sense the damage hidden between the layers of the laws themselves—the fractures created whenever one law is forced too close to another. After every time you've used a Master Law, did you ever stop and search for phenomena like that? Is your understanding of the Major Law of Destruction, and your affinity with it, actually deep enough to perceive such subtle changes?"

"....."

Robin remained silent for several moments before finally speaking.

"Go on."

His understanding of Destruction?

It wasn't particularly profound.

He had recorded its contents, but never truly practiced it. The same applied to Death. Even his knowledge of Life and Reshaping remained superficial at best.

Studying those four laws merely paved the road toward the Master Law of Creation.

They were not the Master Law of Creation itself.

Each one remained a completely independent law with its own nature, principles, and limits.

"...."

Helen fell silent for a moment as she searched through memories that had remained untouched for countless years.

"That day, when I descended upon Nihari as a soul fragment to inspect the newly discovered planet my followers had found, I activated the Universe's Rejection, just as I had grown accustomed to doing ever since my childhood."

"There..."

"...within the Northern Region..."

"...I detected the use of Master Laws."

"Master Laws... in Nihari's Northern Region before the war had even begun?" Robin's voice rose as he instinctively stepped forward, every trace of casualness disappearing from his face. "Which laws? What stage were they? Tell me everything you know."

"I don't know." Helen slowly shook her head. "The traces were buried extraordinarily deep. Normally, the Universe's Rejection can be detected from entire planets away. My father can sense it across whole sectors. But in this case, had I been even slightly farther away—even in the Eastern Region—I wouldn't have sensed it at all. It was obvious that those Master Laws had been used several decades earlier... and with extraordinary restraint, leaving behind only the faintest residue imaginable."

Then she slowly lifted her face and revealed a faint smile.

"So then..."

"Were you already wielding several Master Laws decades before the war ever began..."

"...or did someone quietly help you defeat me?"