Morning settled over the Heavenly Order Sect, but peace never truly returned.
Disciples resumed their training, elders repaired damaged formations, and patrols moved along every mountain path with greater vigilance than before. To those who had never left the sect, life seemed to be returning to normal.
To those who had fought...
Nothing felt normal anymore.
Zarek stood at the edge of the Cliff of Reflection, watching clouds drift beneath the towering peaks. His breathing remained steady, yet his thoughts never left the battle against the Absolute Entity.
The contradiction.
The fracture.
The Law Fragment.
Every answer had only created more questions.
For several minutes, silence accompanied him.
Then, for the first time since returning to the sect, the familiar voice spoke.
It was calm.
Ancient.
Neither male nor female.
"You seek an explanation."
Zarek did not turn.
"You already know."
A faint chuckle echoed in his consciousness.
"You mistake knowledge for understanding."
The words lingered.
"You know what happened."
"But you do not understand why."
Zarek closed his eyes.
"Then explain."
The voice became silent again.
Long enough for the wind to carry fallen leaves across the cliff.
Finally, it answered.
"No."
His brow furrowed.
"No?"
"If I answer every question, your understanding will become mine instead of yours."
Silence returned.
"The path of a Devourer is not inherited."
"It is discovered."
Zarek remained quiet.
He had expected guidance.
Instead...
The System had refused him.
Oddly enough—
He wasn't disappointed.
He understood.
A borrowed answer would never become his own.
"You told me to build another cultivation path."
"I did."
"I don't know how."
"You know where to begin."
"I don't."
Another pause followed.
Then the System asked a question instead.
"What did the Absolute Entity possess that every cultivator lacks?"
Zarek answered almost immediately.
"A Law."
"Wrong."
His eyes narrowed.
"It possessed no spiritual energy."
"Still wrong."
Silence.
Then the voice spoke once more.
"It possessed certainty."
The words struck deeper than any attack.
"It never questioned what it was."
"It simply existed according to its own nature."
Zarek slowly looked toward the rising sun.
"...Then my cultivation has always depended on external strength."
"Exactly."
"You devoured power."
"You devoured bloodlines."
"You devoured techniques."
"You devoured concepts."
"But you have never created one."
The realization settled heavily in his heart.
Everything he possessed...
Had once belonged to someone else.
"So the second path..."
"...cannot be devoured."
"It must be created."
For the first time, satisfaction entered the System's voice.
"Now you understand."
Far below the cliff, a bell echoed across the sect.
One strike.
Then another.
Finally...
A third.
Emergency summons.
A disciple rushed toward the cliff, breathing heavily before kneeling.
"Senior Brother Zarek!"
"The Sect Master requests your presence immediately!"
Moments later...
The Grand Hall had filled with every core elder.
Their expressions were grim.
At the center of the hall floated a jade communication talisman, its light flickering violently.
The Sect Master looked toward everyone present.
"It came from the Azure Sky Sect."
He waved his sleeve.
The talisman's light expanded into an image.
Everyone fell silent.
An entire mountain...
Gone.
Not destroyed.
Not burned.
Simply...
Missing.
Where a flourishing sect had once stood, there was only an endless plain of smooth stone, as though the mountain had never existed.
No ruins.
No bodies.
No traces of battle.
Only absence.
An elder whispered,
"...Impossible..."
The messenger's trembling voice continued through the projection.
"We arrived after receiving their distress signal."
"There were no survivors."
"We found only one sentence carved into the ground."
The image shifted.
Ancient characters appeared across the stone.
"The First Judgment has begun."
The hall became deathly silent.
The First Elder slowly turned toward Zarek.
"They've moved."
Zarek stared at the message without speaking.
Something about those words...
Felt familiar.
Not because he had seen them before.
But because they carried the same certainty as the Absolute Entity.
They were not a threat.
They were...
A declaration.
The ancient voice returned.
Quietly.
"You wished to know who watched the battlefield."
Zarek remained still.
"They have answered."
"Who are they?"
For several heartbeats...
The System said nothing.
Then it spoke with a gravity Zarek had never heard before.
"They are not your enemies."
A pause.
"They are your predecessors."
Zarek's eyes narrowed.
"...Explain."
The System fell silent.
After a long moment, it replied with the same calm certainty as before.
"No."
Another pause.
"You are not ready to hear the answer."
For the first time...
Zarek almost smiled.
The System hadn't refused because it couldn't answer.
It refused because some truths had to be earned.
He accepted that.
Then he turned toward the Sect Master.
"When do we leave?"
The elders looked at him in surprise.
The Sect Master studied him for several moments before answering.
"At dawn tomorrow."
Zarek nodded once.
Then he walked out of the Grand Hall.
Behind him, the System whispered one final sentence.
"Do not seek to become stronger on this journey."
"Seek to discover what strength truly is."
For the first time since obtaining the Primordial Devour System...
Zarek felt that he wasn't walking toward another battle.
He was walking toward the truth.