Chapter 172
Fuuuuh!
'That gloom runs deep. As if Quil-Hasa's words reopened a fracture he had long kept frozen beneath his heavenly discipline.'
Fhhhh!
'He didn't cry, didn't falter, didn't show anything. But I could feel it. Something inside him was slowly collapsing.'
Hooooh!
'But what hurt more was the fact that he knew Quil-Hasa wasn't wrong.
He knew that his devotion might have been only half-correct—and that hit him harder than any punishment.'
From behind the thicket gilded by golden light, Theo's observation reached a new level of sharpness.
His knowledge of Aldraya's unshakable character—who always presented a flat surface like a frozen lake on a winter night—told him one thing.
Do not expect a dramatic outburst.
There would be no screams, no explosive sobs, no sudden changes in that monotone voice.
Yet Theo had learned that the body language of the Fallen Angel was a far more honest canvas than his voice.
What he witnessed now was a bowing of the head.
Not the respectful kind from before, but a deep, slow, burdened descent.
Aldraya turned his face away from the figure seated upon the high throne, lowering his gaze to the false heavenly ground beneath his feet.
His shoulders, usually straight like pillars holding up the sky, appeared slightly slumped forward.
It was not the posture of a weary warrior, but of something shrinking, curling beneath the weight of an undeniable realization.
With the intuition of a keen observer, Theo immediately interpreted these movements.
Behind the flatness of that unseen face, two storms were raging.
First, a gloom so deep—an existential sorrow burying itself.
That feeling may have come from the realization that his long journey—countless cycles of reincarnation and all the suffering he took as ascetic discipline—had been misunderstood from the very foundation.
Second, and more importantly, was a silent acceptance of the truth in Quil-Hasa's question.
Aldraya could not refute it.
The fact that he remained unchanged—that he still clung desperately to an extreme and blind definition of loyalty—was an undeniable truth now piercing him from within.
He was being confronted with a mirror that did not reflect him as a misunderstood tragic hero, but as a stubborn student who kept repeating the same mistakes, even after the Teacher had rewritten the universe's entire curriculum for him.
That bowed head was a wordless confession.
A sign that the last fortress within him—the belief that his path was the only correct way to love Quil-Hasa—had finally begun to crack.
The air around him felt different now.
No longer the tension between two wills, but the silence enveloping a soul undergoing the disintegration of its deepest convictions.
Theo wrote it down in his yellow book, knowing that this moment—quiet and tearless—might be the most tragic and honest turning point in this entire cosmic drama.
"From the beginning, I never ordered anyone—least of all you—to imprison yourself after receiving enlightenment.
Never did I write a command that required you to withdraw from life, close the doors of the world, or bury yourself in unnecessary silence.
If you did such things, be assured it was not from Me."
Fhhhh!
"And now allow Me to ask: were your actions truly born of your own belief, or was there something else orchestrating you into acting so recklessly?"
'Whatever the true intent, this was no ordinary reprimand.
He was questioning the source of all Aldraya's actions—not just loyalty, but something deeper.
As if He were digging to see whether Aldraya acted for Him, or for a feeling he had held too extremely and misguidedly.'
Suuuuh!
'If that were true, then those words would pierce deeper than any punishment.'
The illusory landscape seemed to hold its breath.
In the middle of that vast golden, lifeless expanse, Aldraya froze in a posture more heartbreaking than any cry.
His body—which for thousands of years had stood as a pillar of steadfastness—was now merely a shrinking silhouette.
His head hung low, as if his neck could no longer bear the weight of a crown of conviction that had turned out to be false.
His gaze was locked on the ground beneath him, avoiding contact with the source of light that had once been his only compass.
There was a boiling shame within his silence, a fire burning the remnants of his pride, making him feel lower than the dust drifting beneath the throne.
Before him, Quil-Hasa's presence was no longer just a figure.
He was a living question, an atmosphere pressing without sound.
The statement spoken without anger was sharper than any blade of judgment.
It was not merely a rejection of Aldraya's actions, but a total negation of the foundation of his entire existence.
Each word was a shovel digging an abyss beneath the Fallen Angel's feet, questioning every second of his unconditional devotion, every choice to lock himself in a quiet pavilion, every dogma about faith and betrayal he had crafted with such earnestness.
The question disturbed the deepest roots, suspecting that perhaps behind all those sacred acts and dedication lay a tragic foolishness, an execution of personal feelings mistaken for revelation.
From the depths of the illusion's foliage, Theo Vkytor's eyes captured every tremor of unspoken devastation.
He understood that what he was witnessing was no longer a trial between Creator and creation.
This was a dissection of a soul.
As Quil-Hasa questioned the purity of Aldraya's motivations, Theo saw not an accusation, but a bitter search for truth.
Were the movements of those entire cycles of reincarnation born from true loyalty, or from blind admiration and fascination that had turned into obsession?
The foolishness being implied was the possibility that the Supreme Angel had become a slave to his own narrative of love—a dogma he crafted for himself, then sacrificed everything for, believing it to be devotion.
And at the center of that silent storm, Aldraya could only stay still.
'Just as I thought from the beginning.
A rigid doctrine won't collapse by an attack from outside—it must fall from within, from its own foundation.'
Aldraya's posture remained frozen, a statue of mourning upon a stage of merciless light.
Both of his hands were now tightly clenched, the muscles in his forearms tense like steel wires on the verge of snapping.
The clenched fists were no longer signs of strength or anger, but the last attempt to keep himself from falling apart.
His bowed head gave an impression of total submission, yet from a certain angle—from behind the golden leaves where Theo hid—there was a tremor almost invisible.
Not a shake of the head, not a nod.
More like a microquake held back, a pulse of denial from a nervous system overwhelmed by a crushing reality.
The movement was so subtle, so faint, it resembled an illusion—a shadow caught by the eye more than a deliberate motion.
Yet for Theo, whose eyes were trained to read the most hidden body language, it was a sign.
A scream trapped within the bones, a final instinctual attempt to reject an undeniable truth.
In his yellow book, a neat sentence had already been written, capturing the essence of that silent shattering.
And now, Theo's brow furrowed, his eyes narrowing once more with deeper fixation.
To be continued…