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Berk stood in the middle of a large room.
A room filled with all sorts of creatures he raised and cared for throughout his life. So of them were young; others were old. So were big; others were small. So were in cages; others road freely in the room. So are even hostile to others. Regardless of their differences, they all see him as their father, the man who took them in, raised them, and cared for them when no one else did.
And to Berk, they’re all his children. He didn’t see them as lesser beings; he cared for them equally and kept them safe.
As for real children? Berk had long since let go of that dream. It wasn’t ant for him; the world had repeatedly reminded him of that, so he no longer concerned himself with it.
"Alright, kids. I’ll be back soon. Behave while I’m gone, okay? If you do, you’ll get a lot of treats from . Understood?"
The replies he got were a cacophony of noises from his children, which made him smile. Berk then proceeded to leave the room, closing the door behind him.
As he stepped out, the room he’d previously been in had completely disappeared. Like it’s never been there in the first place. The reason was because it’s hidden in a pocket dinsion that only he could access.
Upon leaving, Berk stood still for a bit. His mind was racing with thoughts for a bit. He then muttered:
"The chance of dying is little, but just in case..."
He then began making preparations. If he’s lucky, he’d never need this to happen, but again, just in case the worst happens, it wouldn’t hurt to be ready.
Berk worked quickly, and after three days, his worst-case scenario had been prepared.
A strange feeling settled down in his stomach after confirming his arrangents. His children might be saddened by his death, but at the very least, they’d be cared for if anything happens to him.
Berk doesn’t have other concerns after this. And with the last burden lifted from his shoulders, he made his way to his seclusion chambers to face his next challenge.
He took one stride forward and appeared inside the chamber. This chamber doesn’t have any entrance or exit. It’s completely sealed from all sides, heavily, to the point that only Berk could go in and out of here through teleportation. Others could only dream of forcing their way in here.
Every councillor has a version of this kind of seclusion chamber, and Berk was no different.
Inside the seclusion chamber, Berk sat on the ditation mat. As soon as he did, the interior lit up and began releasing all sorts of elents that allowed him to center his focus and helped him be imrsed in his own world.
Chis of concept laws began humming around him, and the manifestation of his inner world began overlapping with reality around him.
A cosmic outline traced his body, and it seed that his soul jumped out of his body and into the very center of his inner world.
Berk’s inner world might seem tiny, only occupying re ters around him. But don’t be fooled; this is an extrely inaccurate representation of it.
If Berk actually unleashes his Inner World completely, it could easily cover at least half of the Heavenly Star Chaos Realm. This little manifestation was only because he’s rousing his origin energy. It’s his deep communion with the concept of laws that’s causing this to happen.
As for that little spiritual version of him jumping into the core of this inner world manifestation? That’s him preparing to face the upcoming challenge before him.
His breakthrough to the Primal Origin Lifeform Realm.
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
As Berk’s heart steeled with resolution, it also affected reality around him. His unbending will to face the challenge ahead resonated with the world, and all of a sudden, his private seclusion chamber began shaking uncontrollably.
Soon, the commotion beca too much to handle, and the chamber exploded into bits and pieces, completely unable to contain his montum anymore.
Following this, the tiny soul that jumped out of his body earlier suddenly swelled in size. It happened so fast that before anybody could notice, it had now found itself standing at the immaterial plane of existence—hidden from the eyes of many except for a few who are capable of sensing.
Berk’s consciousness sank into this phantom. His perspective changed along with this. He was now overlooking the entirety of the Heavenly Star Chaos Realm in this state.
He was montarily stunned. Everything around him was too small, too tiny. It made him feel like he could shatter them all if he clenched his hand around them.
This was the perception of a god, he thinks. An existence that is above everything, one that doesn’t answer to anybody. The feeling was transcendental and dangerously addicting.
In this form, he’s also able to see the faces of his fellow councillors. All of them were watching him with concerned gazes.
That humbled him real quick. It’s a reminder that he’s not yet there. This was just a taste of it, and he already almost lost himself in it.
Berk sobered up. And that’s when he felt the existence of the Supre Will stirring awake, disturbed by his swollen presence.
The mont it moved, Berk found himself restrained. The shackles, which serve as his test, remind him of their presence.
Their restraint made Berk extrely uncomfortable, and he instinctively began struggling to free himself of them. But alas, it’s not that simple.
At this point, the Supre Will has completely woken up. Berk felt it inspecting him head to toe. He felt naked before it, as if it could see through everything that he was.
Following that, Berk could almost swear that he heard the Supre Will’s sigh, which turned into a tribulation cloud looming over him.
’Alright, let’s do this.’ Berk psyched himself out. Then, he began imrsing his consciousness at the shackles, starting from the one at his head.
The head shackles, which they dubbed as the ’Binding of Ideals,’ subrged his mind into realistic dreams where his ideals were repeatedly challenged at every turn.
Try as he might, Berk found it impossible to remain ’aware’ that he’s just dreaming of these. The pull and imrsion was simply irresistible; therefore, he could only trust himself.
And that trust paid off; the ’Binding of ’Ideals’—the head shackle—has been broken.
When his consciousness returned to reality, though, his face imdiately morphed into a pained one. Being struck with endless bolts of lightning tends to do that to people.
The pain wasn’t just limited to his body; it seeped through the very soul. It hurts so bad that it forced Berk to hastily begin breaking the next shackle so that he could escape from it.
Speaking of which, the shackle on the neck, now called the ’Binding of Promises,’ pulled his consciousness away from reality again.
It reminded him of every promise he made, starting from the biggest one to the smallest one. Berk remained aware of what was happening during this, and watching his promises be weighed down was honestly a little unnerving.
Even he couldn’t rember just how many promises he made in his entire life. And it turns out that he made a lot, like ’A LOT’ a lot, because it even counted small promises he made to his children—such as taking them out on walks, bringing them their favorite food/treat, letting them out of the cage every now and then, and so on.
Fortunately, due to his ticulousness, the weight of his fulfilled promises outweighed the unfulfilled ones; therefore, he passed.
Now, his head and neck were free.
Berk didn’t stop there. He tackled the wrist shackles next, the ’Binding of Initiative,’ as they now call it.
Once again, he had been pulled into a complete imrsion. Every major action that he did that made him who he was played out before him. Afterwards, it began showing him the outco of his actions—their impact on the world and people around him.
The things he ignored or didn’t pay attention to because they had nothing to do with him had been shown to him in an unfiltered manner. It forced him to acknowledge the impact of his actions. Even putting him into the shoes of the people he affected.
Luckily, he managed to hold on, and the shackle has been broken.
And then ca the ’Binding of Legacy’—the feet shackles.
This one replayed his life from start to finish. Once that was done, it restarted his life, then imrsed him into it, and then it slowly began changing the tiline.
Berk has been forced to live about a thousand different variations of what his life could’ve been, and it truly spent him.
And just a reminder, all of this was happening while his phantom was being struck by lightning.
When his consciousness returned to the real world, he felt intense weakness stemming from the depths of his soul.
All other shackles had been broken; now, only the mid-section shackle was left, one that, for now, they called the ’Binding of Mystery.’
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