Infinite Mana in the Apocalypse - Chapter 3762

Chapter 3762: Inevitability I
I touched the obsidian river, feeling the tremor ripple outward.

The prompt unfurled with a certainty that mirrored my own.

| Would you like to utilize Absolute Fictional Transcendence to observe Bob? |

Yes.

| Confirmed. |

Another prompt, slower this time, as if the Fable itself was reluctant to yield.

| Due to the Complexity of Entanglement, the measured complexity of the Fables of those around Bob, and other currently unquantifiable factors, the Cost will be relatively high. Full authority of all your remaining active Existential Dimensional Lattices will be required as their weavings will be entirely depleted for the next 3 hours. |

| Due to the limited number of Existential Dimensional Lattices and observed entanglement, complexity, and other undefined factors, this Fable will be observable to you in small, scattered amounts as you will only be able to perceive small details and not the larger picture. Your perspective will be affected, and you will only be able to glimpse and not be capable of affecting anything with the current level of Absolute Fictional Transcendence and your current complexity. Would you still like to proceed? |

…!

Limited. Restrained.

But the more limitations they placed before me,

The more I wanted to see.

I smiled faintly.

Proceed.

| Confirmed. Beginning Observation of the Fable of Bob. |

| Warning: All chosen Lattices will have their authority depleted for the next 3 hours. Absolute Fictional Transcendence will operate under limited authority during this period. |

| Initiating Fable Convergence… |

The river pulled me.

No, threw me.

My existence, the illusory latticework that made up my current self, fractured, folded, and scattered like stardust.

The multicolored vastness of the Fables blurred past.

And then…

A heavy tug.

I was being drawn somewhere.

The folds collapsed and reformed, paradox layering over collapse, memory weaving over memory…

And I arrived.

…!

I blinked, or would have, had I a body.

Because where I arrived was,

The Outer Wheel Platform of the Null Cradle of Fold-Breaking Ascension.

…?

Why here?

Why would Bob’s Fable be rooted here?

A whisper of disbelief curled through me.

But I had no time to ponder.

Because at that moment, as if in deference to the cost I had paid, the Fable yawned open before me.

And I lost control of perspective.

The view shifted, a third-person glimpse unraveling.

Not my voice.

Not my gaze.

Not my Fable.

But Bob’s.

—

The Outer Wheel Platform lay gloriously.

Islands of floating paradox drifted on seas of paradox.

Above it all, a shadow moved across the obsidian floor.

No.

A mass.

Grotesque and beautiful.

Bob’s Null Form.

A monstrosity of impossible elegance, tentacles unfurled like banners stitched from the dreams of dead civilizations. Its massive form stretched five hundred inches tall, a titan of folded collapse.

His Null Form gleamed, not with light, but with the absence of it.

Rings of fractured paradox danced across his tentacles, inscriptions of Existential Dimensional Lattice flowing across it.

The power he carried was not merely his, and yet it was.

He was nearly done.

Bob’s massive, elegant horror of a form curled tighter, dragging itself forward across the shattered grounds of the Outer Wheel Platform, his final steps pressing the impossibly resistant folds of Calcified Paradoxical Wheels into submission.

On the cracked surface, another figure sat as others in the surrounding stayed far away to observe this figure and Bob’s.

Unmoving.

Watching.

Thauron, the Null Monarch.

His Null Form, a colossal behemoth of dominion, rose 1,000 inches high, a throne of collapsed existence and sovereignty.

Where Bob’s form was twisted, chaotic beauty, Thauron’s was pure dominance, sharp angles and dense authority, woven from the bones of collapsed paradoxes.

His obscured eyes shimmered faintly from within the darkened hollows of his throne-like form.

He smiled.

And the surrounding existence trembled at the expression.

The Null Monarch’s smile was not cruel.

It was patient.

Encouraging.

He shifted slightly, his vast form creaking, ancient memories scattering from his movement like dust from a fallen monument.

“Well done, Little Bobby,” Thauron’s voice rumbled, not merely through the air, but through the fabric of this broken domain.

Smooth.

Ancient.

Inevitable.

“You are almost done. A few more tests, and then,” He lifted one massive hand, clawed fingers the size of mountains gesturing lightly.

“We will ascend to the Middle Wheel Platform.”

Bob did not answer immediately.

He moved forward.

Another step.

His tentacles flexed, his massive form casting colossal shadows over the ruins.

The ground beneath his passage trembled as he reached out for a recently regenerated Pillar.

Thauron watched.

Silent.

Appraising.

It was unknown whether he was appraising a Dead Thing, or a tool of his forging!

—

| The Fable of Bob, in its extremely limited capacity, has ended. |

BZZT!

I awoke.

Or perhaps more accurately, I returned.

The sensation was faint, like slipping back into flesh after being sculpted from raw existence.

My Lattices, all of them, were dim. Hollow. Depleted. Even my infinite Mana could only flood into them as if they were massive pipes, but they would not fully return in authority until a little bit of time passed.

The cost of viewing two Fables in succession.

And even then, what had I seen?

The glimpse of Bob’s Fable had not been a full weaving.

For me, it was like reading a redacted manuscript, thick black lines obscuring every other word, every other thought.

But some details had slipped through.

Some critical, undeniable facts.

First,

Bob was on the Outer Wheel Platform.

The very same Null Cradle of Fold-Breaking Ascension I stood within now.

Coincidence?

It supposedly had to be as Bob did not know I was also here.

Had he known, truly known, he would have already begun his ascent rapidly, his inevitable climb toward me.

And the second detail,

The one that mattered even more.

Bob was not alone.

Someone, no, something, accompanied him.

Powerful.

Unfathomably so.

A presence that curled even the fragmentary perception of the Fable into a knot of warning.

My existence pulsed once.

Silent.

I exhaled.

Eyes closed, feeling the quiet roar of tyranny unfurl through me, not violent, but inevitable, as sure as the turn of the Wheel itself.

Bob.

One of the few enemies to slip past my fingers and remain alive for this long.

I opened my eyes.

The river of Fables, the endless, multicolored expanse, lay stretched before me.

Countless threads.

Countless Stories.

Untouched.

Unreachable.

For now.

My Lattices were dimmed, their authority spent for the next few hours.

The sight of Absolute Fictional Transcendence, once sharp and dominant, felt dulled, sluggish.

I could not touch the Fables here.

Not now.

And that,

That was acceptable.

Because I had seen enough.

I had seen Bob.

I had seen a glimpse of who, or what, he was with. I received a name. Just a name.

Thauron!

…!

And I understood.

Preparation was no longer a luxury.

It was a necessity.

I looked around once more at the river, at the Fables I could not reach.

At the paths I would one day walk.

But not today.

Today,

I needed to grow faster.

To sharpen myself.

To prepare for all possibilities, for whatever Bob had become, and whatever followed in his wake.

I nodded once to the unseen threads of Narrative still swirling beyond reach.

And turned away.

The river of Fables blurred.

Folded, and collapsed inward.

And I moved through it, pulled, no, dragged by the invisible current of my own Will.

I returned.

My senses sharpened.

Color returned, not the radiant, impossible hues of the Fables, but the steady, solemn beauty of the Infiniverse Crucible!