Cultivation System: Elder Edition

Chapter 306

Secrets of the Lake (III)

What was its purpose?

For the longest while, it did not know--it was born into the world so long ago that it had forgotten the years, to no parents, as though the world itself gave it the first breath.

Ever since, it had roamed the realms haplessly, searching for its purpose; sometimes it was imprisoned, tortured, and dissected, and sometimes it would reveal itself and offer the struggling humans a path forward. But... it could foresee it all.

Every moment was dull, for, to it, it had all already happened--the past, the present, the future... they weren't separate concepts, experienced and understood as such; they were one and the same, in eternal dance of union it experienced.

All things would unfold before it--all intentions, all actions, all desires, whether they were manmade or natural. It would never rain unless it already had; it would never snow unless it already had; there was such dullness to it all that it understood its purpose was to suffer.

This was its hell--in its past life, it was something wholly unrepentant and evil, and gods came together to form appropriate punishment for it. To always know cause and effect, to always see everything before and after it had happened.

That was its destiny: eternity spent roaming endless plains of heaven-scourged lands, in pursuit of penance that seemed to never come.

It was so until one day when it got hit by something. No, not something, someone. A foot of a man landed against it, and it felt pain. A most beautiful sensation, beyond all others.

And, beyond it, it realized... it didn't see it. Not the man, not the action, not what it had always seen. There was only darkness around, as though the man was cloaked by a membrane of laws that nobody else had. The most beautiful of things, shorn of color, was right there, right before it.

Not a moment later, and the man saw it--the eyes, brilliantly gemmed like stars hanging on the canvas of the sky, saw it. Not like how others saw it, as planks of wood or stray fish or seaweed or even a person, no--the man saw it. The soul hidden in the ever-changing objects.

It had stayed with the man for all the moments since and was cloaked in darkness all the while. For days, it was stomped on, hit, scraped, and kicked, and it could see nothing.

All others remained the same--existing on the flux of colors and shapes that told their past and present and future in the singularity—but the man... the man was as black as the void, shorn of light. The most beautiful of them all.

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He ignored it, pretended not to see it, and played a game--and it enjoyed it. Every day, it'd become a different object and see if the man could recognize it--sometimes he did, sometimes he didn't, but every day was fun. 𝗳𝗿𝐞𝕖𝘄𝗲𝕓𝗻𝚘𝚟𝕖𝐥.𝚌𝕠𝕞

He had now gathered all his children into the room, and it stayed to listen, curious.

"The reason I summoned you all is because I have an important task. First, some background: the Lord of the city, the man who held the speech, is actually one of the Sages."

"Whoa!"

"Really, Master?!"

"Like that man who yelled above the city?"

"That means that there's a vine in this place, too?"

"Yes," the man said. "But that's not our goal."

"No?"

"No. Besides the vine, the city lord's most important mission lies elsewhere: it's in locating the Guardian of the City."

"But the way he talked about him..."

"That's just a cover; I can say, without a shadow of a doubt, that he doesn't know the Guardian's location."

"So, Master, you want us to locate the Guardian?"

"H-huh? No, no--I will say this once: if any of you so much as contemplates looking for the Guardian, I... I will badmouth you to your face for four hours straight!" To it, it didn't sound like a particularly cruel punishment; and yet, as it looked around the table and at the faces of the children, each looked more horrified than the next, as though he said that he would chop their heads off.

"M-Master, please don't!"

"We'll do anything you ask!"

"Anything but that! I'd rather die!"

"..." the man's eyebrows twitched for a moment before he continued. "All you have to do is not look for the Guardian. Instead, your job will be simple: disrupt the city lord's attempts at finding the Guardian. As you're exploring the Moon Lake, if you see anyone that stands out, follow them and see what they're doing. If they look like they're ignoring all other treasures--stones, herbs, and ores—they might be looking for the Guardian. Rayce, do you know some word that would help us track them?"

"Of course, Master; it's not perfect, but I assume none of the people looking will be anywhere as strong as the City Lord. It's just..."

"What is it?"

"For each person I track, I have to reserve some of my energy. Right now, I... I'm ashamed to say I can only track up to three people."

"Hmm. Maybe I can help? I, uh, I think my uncle, who was once a good friend with a Shaman has perhaps left behind something. Let me dig around for a bit and see if anything pops."

"Oh."

"Hm."

"Yes."

Why were they looking at him that way? Didn't they call him Master? Why did it look like none of them trusted him at all?

What an odd group! Any other time it saw a Master and Disciples, the latter would have nothing but utmost fear and respect! They would have never looked at their Master like this, and yet... he didn't seem to mind.

"Khm. Anyway, for now, simply be on the lookout; we must prevent the city lord from discovering the Guardian."

"Why, exactly, is that, Master?" one of them asked. It had felt a strange tingle whenever it would look at this boy--though he, too, was colorful, his past and future were... a mess. A tangled web of changing and distorting events that seemed beyond discordant.

It had seen it a few times before, which meant that the boy was likely one of those who had eluded death in some way--a monster in his own right.

"If you don't know already, then you aren't meant to know," the man said, and something strange occurred; the live-again boy's eyebrows twitched while everyone else around the table just barely held back from laughter.

The odd atmosphere persisted for a moment before the live-again boy sighed, stood up, and left--after which everyone else did burst into laughter.

Why?

It didn't know.

But... it also didn't care.

Because, for the first time in its seemingly eternal life, it had found its purpose.

And its purpose was the strange, beautiful man shorn of all colors, whose ends and beginnings did not intersect, and whose life could not be seen.

There was only darkness, and it was perfect.