'The Rankings? That's easy. We've got: Faint Resonance, Attuned realm, Aligned realm, and... Resonance Lord?'
Aden's eyebrows furrowed as Aden closed his eyes, his consciousness drifting through the standard knowledge banks he'd absorbed from the forr owner of this body. The Common sense of the world now feeling alien.
'... Co on, is that it?' the Entity cut in, his tone tired and slightly concerned. 'It's worse than I expected,' he whispered.
His fingers rapidly tapped against the chipped floorboard at the Entity's words. Aden could feel it, the gradual erosion of his mories, sense of self, and core existence but at the sa ti he wasn't as panicked as he instinctively knew he was supposed to be.
The Entity's silence this ti wasn't mocking; it was the heavy, clinical silence of a doctor looking at a terminal X-ray.
'Well, that will have to do for now. I'm sure Zero can enlighten you on the sequential stages later on.'
Aden's tapping finger stopped. The wood beneath his nail didn't just chip, it erased, leaving a perfectly smooth, microscopic crater where the matter had simply ceased to be.
Listen to carefully, because your Zero doesn't have the clearance for this data,' the Entity continued, its voice dropping into a resonant, hollow frequency. 'You aren't Cultivating. You are undergoing a Fundantal Inversion. While those children in the other rooms are trying to pull strings of light from the sun, you are becoming the Grave of the Sun.'
'Can you stop with the parables? I'm not in the mood for deciphering anything,' he spoke in a low tone.
If the Entity could project his consciousness to the external world, he would give a massive eye-roll to Aden.
'Unlike Resonance, Void cannot be sought. It enters through fractures — in the self, in the soul, in reality itself. It is not cultivated. It seeps in. Those who carry it are not chosen. They are convenient. The five stages are not ranks. They are states of increasing integration between the practitioner and what should not be.'
The air suddenly grew eerie at the Entity's words. Aden couldn't quite place his finger on it, but the knowledge the Entity was giving him felt... Forbidden, almost sacred and... scary.
'The Stage 1 inversion can be alliterated to Resonance Cultivators' Awakening stage. You learn of its existence, and the strength it gives you.'
'But I thought you were the one who gave the energy?' Aden interrupted, his tone slightly shaky despite how calm he forced himself to be.
'The laws of cause and effect apply to every act of any being,' the Entity replied cryptically.
'Not everyone's mind can comprehend what I'm about to explain next, so it's fine if you're confused or feel like your head is about to explode... literally.'
Aden hardened his heart at his words before nodding internally.
'The Stage 2 inversion is only possible when soone like you— who has both Resonance and Void energy manages to advance his understanding and the practitioner's Resonance begin to interact.'
'This is the most unstable phase. The two energies do not rge, they fight. The result is a dual-stream: two parallel rivers in the sa channel, running in opposite directions. The power output is enormous. The personal cost is correspondingly severe and non-negotiable.'
Aden's eyes snapped open, his breaths coming in heavy bursts.
He retraced every major stage he had experienced in the cave. Though there were slight discrepancies in what the Entity had said, he couldn't deny the truth woven through each of them.
And that only made what ca next all the more unsettling.
'Stage 3 inversion is currently the stage you're in... at least half-way in, but I will warn you— not as a friend, but as soone who needs you alive long enough for you to fulfill your purpose.'
'You have to stop fighting the Void and begin to negotiate with it — not in words, the Void has no language, but in will, in identity, in what you choose to insist is still real. This stage is called The Unwritten because those who reach it find their personal history being absorbed by the Void's vastly older mory. Their narrative is being revised by sothing with more context than any human life,' the Entity stated solemnly.
'This is where most nad antagonists in the Codex's history were eventually found to be operating. Not because Stage III makes a person evil — it doesn't. It makes them reasonable in ways that no longer account for human cost. The warmth-loss strips out the coefficient that makes most people hesitate. Stage III practitioners do not enjoy cruelty. They simply cannot locate the frequency that used to make cruelty feel wrong. They rember that it existed. They cannot rember what it felt like. This, the Codex notes, is the more disturbing of the two options.'
'The Codex notes? You've never ntioned them through any of this—co on, you can't keep in the dark here,' Aden said, his voice carrying a faint, uncharacteristic note of pleading.
'Be calm. You'll understand in due ti,' the Entity replied cooly before he continued. 'Infact, I think that's enough information for today. Your presence might be affected by anything else I say.'
'What? No way, I can take it—'
'That wasn't a suggestion, Aden,' the Entity interrupted.
The silence that followed the Entity's dismissal was absolute, a ringing void that made the mundane sounds of the safehouse—the dripping of a leaky pipe, the distant whistle of the wind—sound like claps of thunder.
Aden sat perfectly still, his hand still hovering over the erased patch of floorboard. He felt like a man standing on a glass floor over an infinite abyss; the more he learned, the thinner the glass beca.
Endless thoughts swirled in his mind, but his eyes remained fixed on the door before him. The feeling of hollowness he constantly felt whenever he was in the midst of battles or leading his Vassals suddenly made sense, but just because it felt natural didn't an he accepted it.
'Zero,' Aden called out, his voice sounding hollown in the physical room.
'I am here, Master,' the chanical voice replied instantly, though it lacked its usual sharp efficiency.
'How is Eren...'
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