Cira wanted to take a break, but it would take a great deal of ti for her to feel rested after everything she experienced in the obelisk thus far. Her eyes which were previously determined and studious had grown stoic and sohow distant, far-reaching. As if tempered in the weathering of ti, or maybe she had just been awake too long.
Once more she reached out her hand, placing it on the third plaque.
This ti she had no form, nor could she move. Instead, she hung in an empty expanse. If it weren't for the lack of distinct elents around her, Cira would think she were in the depths of the elental chaos again. This place wasn't completely empty though.
There was a white dot in the distance, like a small bead glimring faintly in the cosmos. It gradually grew larger until it couldn't help but draw the eyes. Cira didn't know how far away it was, but it continued to grow until it appeared as a small white sun.
But it was a little misshapen. An indiscernible amount of ti flew by before Cira realized exactly what she was looking at. When a small crack appeared on top of the object. From it a small sprout grew, along with a single leaf.
Cira's heart shuddered as she understood that this was the awakening seed of that boundless tree. As she watched it sprout, it felt as if countless years had passed, but at the sa ti an afternoon. At such a scale, Cira was getting ntal whiplash.
However, the sprout rose without care for her weary heart until much later, branches ford. Along the branches grew leaves and a lush canopy was born.
Those leaves fell every now and again, and Cira watched them get caught in the sprawling roots. As ti lurched forward unceasingly, those sa leaves seed to be born anew in the canopy. The tree only expanded into the horizon as this process repeated itself endlessly.
After too many repetitions to count, Cira saw sothing new. A little green caterpillar crawled up the trunk.
Though at this distance, it was likely massive. It was the first lifeform Cira had seen within the obelisk. Well, aside from the tree.
Could it be that this tree… is the origin of life?
Cira felt that she understood sothing, but it was more like barely scratching the surface. If all life ca from this tree, where did the seed she watched grow up co from? There were faint hints of elental origin around as she observed the white speck, but it all seed diffused and faded. To draw a comparison, it was almost like the residual traces of mana left behind from spells.
Has the chaos of elents ended…? Perhaps they've settled, and what I felt really is sothing of the residual origin energy from their countless interactions. These traces amalgamated together and… created life? Is this really so special realm inside the obelisk, or…
Have I been visiting the distant past?
Cira had a great deal of ti to ponder. While she distinctly felt unfathomable years were passing, it went by quickly. Like a waking dream.
More caterpillars ca and went, while eventually butterflies fluttered out along the canopy like watercolored spatter across the green heavens. Flowers ford among the branches as if to attract butterflies or perhaps sustain them. Soon each flower appeared to grow as they were flocked by vibrant wings.
Different flowers grew near the tree's crown, in the lower branches, along the trunk, or far below at the roots. Soon, or maybe over a great deal of ti, each budding site only expanded as the butterflies grew in number. Cira witnessed the symbiosis of life, the infinite proliferation and complintary deviations of the sa origin.
As this place grew ever more vibrant by the day, more creatures sprung up around each bud without relent. Like small worlds were born upon vital points on the tree of life. Cira could practically feel the draw, being a living creature herself, but from this perspective she could see them all.
They were like stars in the sky, but sohow even more innurable. So of these worlds even ford small suns as elents began to coagulate around each one.
Ti continued forward, and earth coalesced in the roots. More life was ford as if upon newborn continents, which soon grew old and weathered. Parts of the trunk were hollowed out and beca the ho of yet more creatures. Dew gathered in upturned leaves, and Cira watched entire oceans develop on them.
But the leaves all eventually decayed and fell to the ground. Cira watched the essence of each living being wither, only to be absorbed back into the collapsing tree.
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After watching this cycle over and over, ti was begging to etch itself into her soul as if she were truly experiencing the unfathomable vicissitudes of this tree. Nothing could escape this churning of existence, and eventually Cira had grown accustod to witnessing it.
One life would be extinguished and beco nourishnt for the impending proliferation of…
This is… the cycle. Reincarnation. All must return to its origin eventually and beco fuel for the expanse of life.
Each lifeform was broken down, then traveled from the roots up the trunk. Many continued further, into the branches and even the leaves. So stretched toward the horizon into the newest growth, pioneering the path to unseen skies as the tree pushed the limits of the term 'boundless'.
Then one day, the growth slowed. After a ti, the tree no longer expanded. Parts of it wilted, and eventually the tree was a shadow of its forr self. Flowers lost their luster and the countless worlds dwindled.
The tree of life began to collapse under its own weight. Many worlds collided and shattered, turning life to death. The wood seed to turn darker, almost gray, as if all the vitality had been sucked out of it. Everything crumbled and what little life existed in this place shrunk down to a single point. A little white speck with a dim shine.
But it did not sit alone in the cosmos. Instead, remnants of the worlds of the past hung in space, surrounding the dreary seed. They orbited around it, as if clingling to a shred of the connection left along through the passings of life.
Scattered seas like the breaking of waves and crushed smatterings of earth like continents… or islands. They hung in the sky as if that was where they belonged, beneath a single sun made up from the last shreds of light in all creation. The scene was oddly familiar, except these skies held no life, only the faint traces of its origin left behind.
Cira watched in a daze as this all too collapsed inward, and the seed once again sprouted. It grew into a tree and beca more lush than ever. Other life ford yet again, and it seed sohow more diverse. This ti around, the tree reached even further into the horizon.
Then the tree of life died.
Again.
And again.
And again…
This cycle seed like it would never end and took longer each ti as the bounds of life were pushed forward with each incarnation.
Cira could truly feel the passing of ti shaping her like rivers through a valley. There ca a point when Cira lost track of how many tis she had witnessed the death and rebirth of the tree of life, of countless worlds, but she was starting to worry. Her body wasn't here, nor did her soul appear to be, but it beca clear with each repetition that her consciousness alone would not be able to escape the clutches of ti even in this dream-like state.
She was, after all, alive.
But she had no form to disperse in this place. All she could do was… observe.
This went on like clockwork. She had thoroughly witnessed the turning of the first gear, and each one after that. Now, they were truly unstoppable in their path, forced to turn forever by cycles of the distant past.
Cira watched. Each passing of life was entirely unique, and unprecedented beings ford anew each day. So were recognizable, while others were outlandish. There were furred beasts, and those with scales or feathers. Many had none of those things and quite a few creatures were completely unidentifiable.
In the end, that sa broken sky would appear around the seed, seeming to grow larger each ti the remnants of worlds dispersed. It would slowly fall in as the seed absorbed traces of everything in the cosmos. A dense ocean ford around the seed to form a globe toward the end and eventually the continents and myriad islands fell into the sea. Everything was absorbed again and the seed… sprouted anew
Life and death. Beginning and ending, only to start again.
This never slowed, never paused. It could not. Cira bore witness to it all.
The tree withered again, and the remnant skies expanded before woefully contracting. All of creation followed this rhythm, like the beating of a heart. Cira's own seed to fall in synch with it. She could feel it pushing blood through her veins as a heat burned into her soul beyond the obelisk. It was a familiar sensation yet sohow so distant.
In this place, Cira had beco a being who outlived the cycle of creation countless tis over, and she was starting to go mad. Before she could observe each and every life, but now countless worlds were born and crumbled in the blink of an eye. And she had always seen this. A re handful of years as a sorcerer was hardly a blip in this place.
By all rights it should never end. But Cira knew it would. Like the life and death of single caterpillar, all cycles must co to an end. Whether that's the beginning of a larger cycle or the end of one was uncertain. She could feel the rapid advance of ti coming to its destination. As if the present were approaching.
Her heart beat. Sowhere far but also everywhere in this place. Worlds were born, then fell.
It beat again. They always crumbled.
And again.
Oceans contracted and shattered lands dotted the sky. Her heart didn't beat. After more repetitions than Cira could count, the seed refused to absorb that last bit of sea and sparse earth.
Or has it failed…?
Cira couldn't fathom what would make that tree of life to fail to germinate, but the result was that a single world remained, ford from the shattered remains of too many others. Strangely, in this mont that seed like the wheel of creation had ceased, Cira felt a strange resonance from the center of this remnant world. It was familiar, but sothing she hadn't known in what felt like ages. It almost was as if the seed was surrounded by a faint shroud of aether.
This was not sothing she could unravel at the mont, but there was so small relief.
In this place, and at this ti… her heart refused to beat. Creation had seemingly co to a halt, and the present arrived.
Cira stood before the obelisk with a pale face. She drew in a sharp breath and her heart beat once more. This was another exhausting dream that had her head spinning. Cira didn't feel any older, but she was tired.
There was no strength left in her body, and she collapsed to the floor. Cira couldn't move, but she glared up at the obelisk.
There was only one more plaque in her way. Then she would go ho.
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