[Vol. 9] Chapter 43: Source Light and Companions
The [Eternal Scepter of the World's Heart] is one of the strongest items in Violet’s hands. Even among the Primordial Artifacts, it ranks at the very top. The power it holds is at least on the level of a main god, even higher than the “Reversal” law of the God of Paradox.
With the priestess as its user, someone who can fully bring out its power, creating normal life is extremely easy. Even something like the fruit, which originally had no chance of ever gaining intelligence, could be given life in just an instant.
When Violet created Snow Wing, it took some effort, but overall it was not too difficult. This was because their “rank” at birth was lower than that of the [Eternal Scepter of the World's Heart]. But this plain-looking little puppet was different.
The so-called “rank” is actually a very broad concept. Life is made from the combination of [Matter] and [Void]. This was one of the most basic rules set down when the Primordial Light first created the world. Every living being must keep a balance between the strength of the body and the soul. Otherwise the body cannot bear the soul, or the soul cannot drive the body.
Even though the puppet’s size had shrunk a lot, Violet knew well that its body was far stronger than any common material in the world. Such a body was like a heavy iron box tightly sealed shut. It could not be easily broken, and it was extremely hard for anything from outside to enter, let alone fuse with it and make it move on its own.
To use a modern comparison, it was like a robot whose performance was far too advanced. To run it, the energy needed was extremely high, only a soul with the strength of a true god could match it. For the priestess to inject a new soul and life into it out of nothing was almost as hard as splitting the Primordial Flame and creating Little Light.
In fact, long before Moraya had awakened, Violet had already tried many times, adjusting her method little by little.
Luckily, she had already done similar things several times and had built up enough experience. Also, while the body known as the [Origin Machine] was extraordinary and very difficult to give life to, it was not as dangerous as the complete Primordial Flame. After several failures and expending an amount of SP comparable to a powerful [Ultimate Art], Violet finally managed to complete the creation without accident.
And from how the little one had acted up to now, it was clear the priestess’ investment had not been wasted.
With a smile, she rubbed the puppet’s head and looked over its rather simple body design, thinking for a moment.
“Since I created you, I should at least give you an easy name to call. Looking at your silly face… from now on, I’ll call you Dumb-Dumb. How about it?”
“~~~”
The little one sat cross-legged in a way that didn’t match its body at all, resting its head on one hand as if trying to understand the name. But soon, as if it accepted it, it happily nodded again and again.
At the very moment its true name was given and accepted, a strange realization suddenly struck Violet. The girl froze slightly, as if tracing cause and effect in the unseen, faintly catching a glimpse of something.
“...?”
The priestess frowned, her vast divine sense gathering toward the anchor point. The scene quickly became clearer.
They were dolls, wooden puppets very similar to Dumbdumb’s former body, the one called [Origin-type Machine 03]. Some of them were fighting fierce battles against strong enemies. Others stood silently, like lifeless objects not yet activated. Their total number seemed to be about five or six.
Such a blurry sensing meant that these puppets were probably very far away from her, most likely even in other worlds.
But at the exact moment Violet sensed them, all the [Origin Machines], no matter what they had been doing, suddenly lifted their heads. Their rough, stone-like eyes pierced through the void, as if noticing her gaze at the same time!
“Clap!”
With a sharp sound, all those senses were instantly cut off as Dumbdumb smacked its palms together. Violet returned from the vision and saw the little puppet gently rubbing her cheek, sending out waves of worry and care. She couldn’t help but smile, shake her head, and raise her hand to pat its head again.
“Don’t worry, I’m not some weakling. Even if they really saw me, it’s no big deal.”
“~~”
The strange link of cause and effect quickly faded. Since Dumbdumb had ended it on its own, Violet didn’t dwell on it. She raised her small hand, and from the ashes of the burnt-out campfire, a faint golden-and-silver light, flickering like a star, floated up and hovered above her palm.
This was the core source of power for this place’s rules. Everything strange in this forest had formed around that campfire. The light, which seemed like the safest and most reliable thing… sometimes was actually the root of all the chaos.
Violet closed her eyes and used her divine sense to carefully analyze it, soon understanding the truth.
This power was extremely complex. Part of it carried an aura very close to the Primordial Light she had once sensed on Dumbdumb, something like the essence of the Light element. But it also held strong traces of the [Time] law, and even… a faint breath of [Space].
The forces of Time and Space acted like chains, tightly binding the Light within them. The structure was so intricate that even Violet couldn’t help but admire it.
There was no mistake, this golden-and-silver glow must be one of the fragments split off by that silver light which, in the old vision, had suddenly descended and torn apart the [Divine Catastrophe].
So this place should be one of those “world hollows,” areas where even in an “Ascended” state one could not see the truth inside. To be more precise, it was one of the fragments that fell into the Origin Realm after the battlefield of the gods collapsed.
The complexity of this power could already be guessed from the contradictory rules that formed this forest. Yet, all these rules clearly centered around the idea of “Light,” making it hard not to connect it with the being called the Primordial Light.
Now that the information had become this clear, many things that were once uncertain started to become obvious.
—The [Divine Catastrophe] that nearly wiped out all the gods a thousand years ago was probably the Primordial Light.
But since many pieces of information suggested that the true Primordial Light doesn’t exist, or at least is not the same as what is known now, there must be a deeper secret hidden behind all of this.
As for the silver light that tore the [Divine Catastrophe] apart and almost changed the entire battle’s outcome, it was very likely the work of Hen. Even if she wasn’t the only one, she must have played an essential role. After all, at present, only she had the ability to control both [Time] and [Space] laws at the same time.
Perhaps one of the reasons she left the Ancient Spirit Realm back then was to take part in that great war of the gods’ fall.