Chapter 175

Arc 16 - The Fastest Man Alive - Part 12

The World:

In a place so far above everything in the creation, the Supreme One who now gained a humanoid form looked at Aizen for answers.

Before he began a barrage of questions, he asked a simple question about a certain someone.

“Is this the level which Nazar...”

The Supreme One was forced to swallow his word as Aizen laughed.

“You...” he shook his head while laughing. “Are you serious?”

“...”

Seeing how the Supreme One was serious, Aizen stopped laughing and cleared his throat.

“This is where he should have stopped, but his power was too much, so he kept adding more and more levels, and sad for him, he kept transcending it.”

“Oh...” the Supreme One nodded.

“Now then, ask away your questions.”

“What is this place, really?”

“The origin of everything.”

The two of them were standing in a busy street on an Earth-like place, people were passing by them, but no one could see them or interact with them.

“The origin of every light, every hero, every villain, every leviathan and monster, every power… Everything. The origin and the source of everything.”

Aizen paused for a moment, waiting for the Supreme One to digest what he had told him.

He was waiting for him to finally be on the same page with Aizen, so he could drop another bombshell on him.

“And the origin of 「Stories」.”

The Supreme One was taken back slightly.

“Let me tell you the true origin of this omniverse.”

Aizen created a construct of energy which showed nothing but darkness. Slithering, live darkness.

“There was nothing, then came darkness. The darkness birthed the World. These people unleashed the torrent of their epic power upon the lower worlds and created lights. I should remind you; they did not know about that power they had. They did not know how their dreams, wishes and stories are real down there.“

In this dark construct, a white utopian planet appeared.

“And so, our good friend Null created Virrasil to be a conduit of their Godly power.”

“If this is the origin of everything, including the stories, does that mean…?”

Aizen smiled thinly, “You caught on.”

The construct he had created changed slowly.

It showed many people in different art styles or word formats.

“Yes, everything began because the World wanted entertainment.”

Aizen spread his arms widely, and shouted out excitedly, “It all began as a story.”

A wave of cold chill ran through the Supreme One’s now human body and widened his eyes.

“Everything began as a story, and still is. Everything down there is a story. You were a story.”

“Were?”

“You are protected from the control of these Gods because he lives there. He nullifies their control.”

The Supreme One found himself quite disappointed for some reasons.

Was it because Nazar was saving them? Or was it because he was jealous of that power?

He clicked his tongue in a displeased manner.

“Who was the writer?”

“A nobody,” Aizen shrugged.

The Supreme One grew even more disappointed than before.

“Be happy, at least you get a writer,” he raised his right eyebrow slightly with a faint frown. “Most lights don’t get that. There is no concise movement for them, thus it is nothing but mumbled chaos. Death and suffering are the only thing they get.”

“...Oh,” the Supreme One found it hard to react in any way.

“By the way, the one who created you, is still alive and doing just that,” his frown turned upside down. “You see, these people cannot control him, but Arosus made sure that his “story” gets told in this world. What happens down there, gets sent to the mind of a certain person and it gets written. Simple, right?”

The Supreme One used his newfound power and confirmed that for himself.

Down there, he could see it all.

He could see everything.

He could see the threads of creation and how everything was controlled from up here.

If he cut off the threads, everything could get worse.

But maybe, just in a few moments, he can create concepts or new threads that will make everything better.

However, he is not sure if he would want that.

“What the creators think here, it becomes reality down there, even if that does not get published. Every multiverse has one universe, which these people refer to as “canon” but then there is secondary “canon”, which includes rejected material. Then there are millions of other universes which is pure chaos where these odd ideas of these creators become real. And the non-creators, have no “canon” of any form, so what their creation gets is nothing but death and destruction.”

Aizen pointed downwards.

“Now that you have ascended, you can affect them all down there.”

“From the suggestion of your tone and words, I assume these… these “Gods” cannot affect one another’s creation?”

“It is the truth,” Aizen nodded as the energy construct in front of him vanished. “They can affect others' creations if they get a chance to officially “create” a part of it but otherwise, they can envision their version of that creation in their own Ultraverse.”

“Interesting...”

The Supreme One nodded his head as he digested what he was told.

As he was thinking about what happened, he remembered something odd he saw when they were coming up.

“When we were ascending, I saw these… chains? What are those?”

“Ah, that,” Aizen was quite surprised to see he had noticed the black chains of creation when ascending. Those black chains are almost impossible to see. “It’s quite complicated to explain...”

Aizen bit his lip as he thought about how to answer it.

“If I were to simplify it… Hmm,” he pursed his lips as he continued to think further.

For the first time, Supreme One found Aizen at a loss for words.

Was this concept so hard to explain? Or was it something above what Supreme One could comprehend?

“If it--”

“You see, there exists such things as stories in this world. It comes in the form of novels, visually moving images, and other formats. The people who view and read those said stories, they do for several reasons, but there is a group of them who actively seek out stories with… How do I put this… Interesting powers, perhaps?”

The Supreme One’s confusion skyrocketed.

“They seek out these stories, extract these characters and their feats of power and then… Well, they bicker about it tirelessly.”

“Huh?”

“Yes,” Aizen nodded in a confused manner. He simply did not understand this portion of these Gods. “They create odd scenarios where these “characters” from different stories come together and battle one another.”

“...”

“To keep the story short, the 「Chain of Scales」 is a terrible object certain Gods of this World uses to pull people from countless Ultraverses and have them battle each other mercilessly to death for their own enjoyment.”

The Supreme One sucked in a breath.

He could not believe how cruel these Gods could be.

“Every scenario they imagine happens to these “characters” and every argument brought up in a debate also happens but is reset. However, the characters remember them well. Then when they reach a conclusion, almost always, the other “character” is killed. Mercilessly.”

“Are...” the Supreme One swallowed his words and thought it over.

“These “characters” are healed, revived and then sent back to their rightful places afterwards, to their rightful families and friends, but… On the surface, they will be forced to pretend everything was fine, but deep down, they will always remember those cruel and merciless battles. Those scars will forever haunt them. That pain will forever linger deep within them, something that they can never forget or grow over.”

The Supreme One swallowed his saliva, unsure of how to react to what Aizen was telling him.

“People need human connections, they want to share their pain and joy with one another, and these people will want to share that, but cannot. The pain will eat them alive.”

“That’s so… cruel.”

The Supreme One, who also committed horrible crimes against his creation, found this inhumane, and Aizen found his comment rather hilarious.

However, he ignored that and changed the topic.

“Anyway, let's leave aside the boring stuff, do what you have come here for,” Aizen wept his arm across the air and created a portal directly to the main Ultraverse.

The Supreme One looked at his Ultraverse from a different angle.

Once, it looked so big, but now, it was smaller than an atom.

"So, get started right now. Watch over your diamond, predict what will happen and make changes there."

"But you just said…"

"Indeed. Stories happen there seconds earlier before the author here even thinks about it. But that doesn't apply to you. As long as you have your memories, you can intercept them and make changes to your Ultraverse. But… don't expect it to always work. If he realises it, this world is toast."

And so, the Supreme One began working on his task at once.

He could see every level of that existence, except for Earth where there was nothing but a black hole.

“That must be him...”

A thought occurred to him; what if he erases this being from existence? What if this black dot was removed once and for all?

He would have his diamond all to himself and ultimately, the entire omniverse will become his.

All he had to do was "unwrite" him out of existence.

So!

"Pfft," Aizen burst into uncontrollable laughter.

The Supreme One looked at him in a confused manner.

"You… You didn't… ha… try to… haha… do that… right?"

"I am afraid I don't know what you are talking about."

Aizen continued to laugh for a minute, which started to irritate the Supreme One, but he tried his best to keep it down.

"Oh, this is good stuff," he had laughed so hard that he was holding his stomach. He raised his right hand and wiped away the tears from his eyes. "I missed this. It's always fun to watch."

"..."

Aizen sucked in a long breath then exhaled loudly.

"Once upon a time, God made himself powerless and asked the Dragon to nuke him from existence - every level possible. And so, the Dragon did. He erases him… but for a mere moment. A fleeting moment that passed faster than the blinking eye."

The Supreme One did not reply in any way. He continued to put on his false confused face.

"He cannot die. He has done everything to kill him. He has tried trillions of methods, and nothing worked. Including what you were trying to do just now."

"Whatever do you mean?"

"Come on, don't lie to me."

The Supreme One ignored Aizen and focused on his task at hand.

He began to analyse everyone and everything in the diamond he had created and started to predict everyone’s movement.

He could clearly see a man with unimaginable speed with a sword that can destroy the one true God. However, he can also see how this blur is hidden from the view of certain people.

So, he used his new power to write a different ending for the blur, essentially removing him completely from the "plot".

The blur was erased completely, not existing anymore in any form or shape. And neither did the devilish sword he had clutched onto.

“Heh,” Aizen laughed in a condescending manner.

“...Huh?” the Supreme One raised his eyebrows in a confused yet surprised manner.

“He nullified your changes. You cannot change anything down there.”

His tone gradually grew colder and colder.

“You cannot affect God’s territory. You are an ant, and he is an elephant.”

The Supreme One cluttered his teeth in anger as he looked at Aizen in the eyes.

He had not realised that he could feel the same emotions as the lowly races he had created.

“What I am trying to say is♪,” Aizen walked around the Supreme One with a gleeful smile. In an almost singing tone, he continued. “Whatever you do, it’s useless♪.”

Aizen strolled around the Supreme One while humming a tune to himself.

He stood in front of the Supreme One and smiled thinly.

“You wanted to be omnipotent, right?”

The Supreme One did not reply.

“WELL. HERE. IT. IS.”

Aizen spread his arms widely and shouted angrily in his face.

“THIS. IS. THE. OMNIPOTENCE. YOU. ALWAYS. SOUGHT.”

He was right, this is what the Supreme One always wanted.

This was his idea of omnipotence.

This was everyone’s idea of omnipotence.

"The omnipotence you always wanted; it is right here. Right now, you are one of the few billion "omnipotent" people here. You are not special."

Aizen's eyes turned red ever so slightly in anger.

His veins popped angrily.

The Supreme One could not understand why he was angry.

What could anger him so much?

Did Aizen hate people like him?

Was Aizen angry because he did something this stupid?

Or was there something else?

"You are all nothing but ants before the true God."

The Supreme One wanted to question, what angered him so much?

But suddenly, something happened.

He felt intense pain in his head, the first in so long. Or perhaps ever.

And the next instant, his vision started to become blurry.

"What…"

"It has begun, has it not?" the angry Aizen continued to speak in a cold tone.

But a hint of satisfaction could be felt in it.

"This is the "omnipotence" you always desired. Now watch as your memories and bodies fade away, only to reincarnate as a child who remembers nothing and knows nothing and cannot do an-y-th-i-ng. From hundred to zero, quite a feat, if I say so myself."

Aizen placed his hand on the Supreme One's head and shook it slightly.

He wanted the full attention of this Creator.

Aizen wanted this Creator to focus just on him and not the pain.

"You will live a life of a human and die as one without making a change to your creation. Your will is so weak you cannot even sustain yourself in this world for a moment before fading away."

The pain in the head of the Supreme One intensified, causing him to let out an audible groan.

"This was all for naught. Your fate has been sealed, Supremer."

The Supreme One willed himself to keep his eyes from getting blurry, but he found it hard.

He thought his eyes would close any moment.

He felt his consciousness fading away into non-existence.

In the midst of the pain, he saw the backs of the angels as they flew so far away from him.

The man who once stood at the top now stood alone, losing control over everything he had created.

Now that he had emotions like a human, the images of his four children popped into the back of his mind.

Because of him, they suffered for billions of years.

Because of him, they couldn't live a good and worthy life.

Because of him, they couldn't be happy.

Because of him, nothing good ever happened to them.

Lucifer…

If he had helped his first child, what kind of world would they have created?

If he had not wronged him, Lucifer would have stood by his side till the end.

Michael...

Had he not wronged his second child, he would have not wronged him in return.

Had he not wronged his second child, Michael would have never thrown the Supreme One off the Celestial hierarchy.

Esme…

If he hadn't killed her, she would have stood by his side until the end of time, just like Lucifer.

If he hadn't hurt her, he would have not lost so much control over his diamond.

Azazel…

If he had helped his fourth child, he could have grown more powerful than he thought.

If he had helped his fourth son, that child would have had a happier and fulfilling life.

I am sorry.

In the end, what he felt was one emotion.

Regret.

Everyone wants power, but once they get the power they want, they feel one emotion: regret.

They can do anything they want, they achieve all their goals, leaving nothing but emptiness.

So, they seek out death like a drunk man who cannot think.

But…

They cannot die easily.

So, they go on a quest, to gain even more power.

They want to grow more powerful so they either get noticed by a higher entity to end them or they find a power to do it themselves.

But they ultimately make it worse for themselves.

They become so powerful, they question, what was it all for?

Why did they waste all this time?

Why did they even want to grow so powerful in the first place?

"Any last words, Supremer?"

The Supreme One wanted to know many things, but he also had a deep desire. In fact, he had two.

The first was, he wanted Aizen to save him.

But instead of asking for mercy, the Supreme One forced out a simple question.

"Who are you?" with all his might, the Supreme One wanted to know one last thing in the end.

Aizen removed his hand from Supreme One's head and smiled.

The Supreme One was in too much pain to notice what kind of smile it was.

"I am the only one, who is not a God, who can traverse between the lower worlds and higher, the only one who can traverse between the stories and reality, I am the shaman who will lead the souls to the afterlife… I am the child of a God and the Empress of the Cosmos. I am a memory long forgotten to them."

The Supreme One heard his simple answer, it should have been sufficient, but he couldn't shake off his words.

Aizen sensed the question in the Supreme One's mind, so he decided to give him one last answer as a pity.

"Actually…" he smiled thinly and changed his mind.

He did not want to give him the answer.

After all, it was better for him to die with lingering desires and questions.

"Heh," Aizen had the last laugh. "The pain must be getting worse, Huh?"

The Supreme One couldn't answer, but Aizen knew.

"You ascended from a world which was fiction into reality, of course, you should have expected drawbacks. After all, you are not him."

Oh, how he hated that human.

Why was he always at the centre?

What did he do to deserve all that glory?

Why couldn't it be just about anyone else?

"Now then…"

He watched as the Supreme One slowly lost his memory to the pain and his vision blackened.

"Without your memories, you cannot control the Ultraverse you had created. Unless you become a writer, your new Ultraverse will be nothing but mumbled chaos."

The Supreme One fell back onto the ground as his consciousness slipped away.

"Goodbye."

And so, the Supreme One ceased existing.

Two weeks later, he will be reborn in an extremely hot and poor continent of this world.

He will live his life in misery, with no education, money, influence, or power.

By the age of thirty, he will drown himself in the ocean to end his suffering.

And at the last moment of his final death, he will remember the former glory he once held.

He will remember everything.

He will remember sitting atop his throne and drinking wine.

He will remember his beautiful angelic soldiers kneeling before him.

He will remember it all but just then, just at that moment, it will all slip away once again, and he will die, having achieved nothing in his miserable short life.

But that's in the far future.

In the present, Aizen stretched his arms as he let out a faint groan.

"Ahh, I wish they had a little more time to be miserable…"

His words slowly trailed off as his eyes laid upon this white, red, and light brown aurora.

He could see the remnants of God.

So, he looked at the beauty of this off aurora.

And on his face, a faint sad smile appeared.

"Hm."