Chapter 1170: Diverging Choices

"I’ve already informed my father of a request to see the rest of the tower and he’s already given his green light for it." Damien smiled while walking behind Alice.

Hearing this, she couldn’t help but raise her eyebrow.

She never mentioned anything about wanting to see the tower so how did he know?

Yet when he simply pointed at his eyes, Alice realised it must’ve been a similar situation to Monika.

Someone who could peer into the workings of the cogs.

Which then brings up a different kind of question.

"How can you see the Cogs?"

"I don’t." Damien shook his head without a single ounce of expectation. As if he already knew what she was going to say, when she was going to say it and the exact moment he could start his response.

"What I see is more akin to... flash of certain scenery. Sometimes they come with vivid imagery..." He smiled.

’Like the scene of you destroying Extalia.’ A single passing thought he didn’t verbalise.

"Sometimes it manifests as a ’strong feeling’. A hunch too certain to be dismissed as my own instincts. It’s hard to explain but when I feel that hunch, I know it’s something that’s likely to come true. Even if it may not seem like it."

Closing his eyes, Damien recalled the first time he ’felt’ this feeling.

He was just a child at the time, on an excursion to one of the cities with his father.

They needed to inspect a potential gateway at the time. With it being relatively safe, his father figured he might was well bring young Damien to the location.

To broaden his horizons and understand the world.

But after they arrived, Damien had a bad feeling.

A sense of despair and death. When he came face to face with a woman running a stall, the first thing out of his mouth horrified those around him.

"Miss... are you going to be struck by a pillar and die?"

Of course, the King apologised and reprimanded Damien at the time and the young boy didn’t know why he said what he said.

The King seemed confused as well. Despite them having the same eyes, the King never had such feelings.

So in two days when the gateway suddenly destabilised and chaos erupted, Damien understood the source of those feelings.

The sight of a woman crushed under a pillar, gurgling for blood as several wooden beams ripped her organs apart.

The horrified look on her face as she watched the young boy stare at her wordlessly until she died.

Incidents like this kept happening. There was no pattern in when it would appear.

Simply that this feeling would randomly strike and when it does, changing the outcome was near impossible.

The odds of coming true 99.9% of the time as compared to a 0.1% chance of success.

Though naturally, the odds weren’t that high in terms of success. It was simply an idea of how unlikely it was to change the outcome.

He tried to drag people away, to keep them under a Lord’s protection. But when he does, freak accidents would always happen, causing the death he prophesised in that moment.

Another Lord might suddenly go berserk.

A prisoner giving up on his life.

Spatial ruptures destabilising, beasts that just so happened to be in the area.

Whatever he felt, the outcome was all but guaranteed...

With a certain exception.

Alice being one of them.

He saw her at one point. From afar.

Before she was hidden away.

In that moment, he sensed her death. A gruesome one surrounded by teeth and flesh. One where she cried out for help but no one did.

And yet here she was. Of course, it could also simply be a case where the original prophecy was fulfilled but the one involved is still alive.

Alyss and Alice are two different beings occupying the same body.

Even so, she still overturned the prophecy.

She went beyond the ending that he saw for her.

So now that he saw Extalia in flames, he could only hope that Alice could repeat the miracle once more.

That it wasn’t just a fluke.

"And this feeling told you I wanted to see the tower?" Alice creased her brows.

At first it might’ve been a coincidence but now...

She couldn’t help but notice the Cogs getting more and more involved.

That as they approach the potential ’end’ where Nyer finally achieves his goal, the Cogs give up on ’hiding’ their involvement.

Taking a deep breath, Alice exhaled.

She was starting to see pieces of the full picture.

Why Monika must hide herself.

With the end being near, the Cogs will be more insistent on ensuring that nothing goes wrong in their perfect vision.

When a series of actions with a high likelihood of occurring link up, their final scenario comes to light.

And...

’It mustn’t be a good one if Monika is trying to mess with things.’

Alice didn’t trust Yvael.

Far from it.

For Yvael, nothing was too far. No sacrifice too great.

Just look at her daughter and son.

But Monika wasn’t the same.

Though she may be a fragment of Yvael, she didn’t follow her path. Just like herself.

Yvael had tampered with her creation to some degree. Or else it wouldn’t explain how much of Yvael’s knowledge had been implanted within herself.

But neither of them, herself and Monika, followed Yvael’s path out of free will.

It was more so being forced down a path of no retreat. Despite that, they’ve been leaving small marks against the walls. Slowly but surely carving their way out.

Shaking her head, Alice had Damien walk faster as he led them towards the ’base’ of the Tower.

Despite being called the base, it was actually located further up than the main hall and the Royal bedrooms.

It felt as though the tower itself had been split into three portions. Everything they’ve explored belonged to the first third while the rest had been off limits.

"The door to the rest of the Tower used to be closed. My ancestors were never really given any instructions on what must be done for the Tower. Only that we must protect it. Nothing more, nothing less." Damien explained as they ascended a set of stairs.

"We even had specialised Lords try to peer through the door or even the walls but nothing worked. It’s as if Abyssal energy or any form of energy would dissipate upon coming into contact with the walls.

"We gave up after a while but not long ago, the door actually opened by itself." Damien’s expression turned serious as they arrived at the floor where the door was located.

It was a simple hall without any fancy decorations. Just white walls and pillars.

But on the other side, a set of giant doors were slightly ajar.

The moment she fully entered the floor, Alice felt a chill down her spine.

Rather than float, she dropped down and walked on both feet.

She didn’t need to as she was a projection right now. However...

". . ." Alice narrowed her eyes.

Floating felt too dangerous. It felt as though she was fully exposed to danger from all sides.

At least by keeping her feet on the ground, she could position herself accordingly.

"You’ll get used to this feeling after a while. I was like that at the start too but nothing happened." Damien chuckled but Alice didn’t drop her guard.

Something was definitely happening. Especially because two specific individuals stepped onto this floor.

The two people most involved with the Cogs in this room.

Herself and Alyss.

One was the product of Nyer’s experiment.

The other was the vessel that could hold it.

*Krrrr

When the full group stepped onto the floor, the door started to move as Damien’s pupils constricted. He had just said nothing would happen and yet the gap was growing wider by the second.

Once the doors were fully open, the group was exposed to what was hidden within the first room.

Though it might not be exact carvings...

Alice understood what it was trying to depict.

Tightening her jaw, she clenched her fists and took a step forward.

The death of a mechanical monstrosity. A woman who had been flayed and combined with twisted machinery.

Then came the birth of something unnatural. A creature that should not be...

A woman surrounded by spider lilies...

A raven in the Abyss...

These carvings were scattered around the walls.

Without knowing the exact context, it was hard to figure out their meaning.

But Alice and Alyss knew.

All of these were connection to one another.

That being everything Alice had experienced upon breaking out of the prison.

"Think these things were carved before or after?" Alyss frowned, walking next to Alice.

"Before. Though the carvings might seem fresh, the ’age’ of the energy imbued into it is far too old... However." Alice exhaled.

"They’re also ’fresh’ in the sense that these aren’t predictions. They’re the possibilities that remain."

These were the only carvings they ’saw’ with their bare eyes.

But if one was to look deeper, to the veil of energy surrounding the walls, one would be able to see the traces of other carvings.

Possibilities that had been erased when a choice was made.

For the first one...

One such possibility was Alice choosing to spare Lilia instead of killing her. The carving depicted a monstrous woman hiding behind a small figure. A life of scavenging and hiding despite Alice’s protection.

She who couldn’t easily reveal herself to others...

But after that time of hardship, she eventually gains a new body with Alice’s help. Though it may not be entirely flesh, Lilia was reborn into a mechanical body not unlike Griselda or Suyin’s puppets.

A flash of regret washed over Alice’s eyes.

This room revealed the consequences or rather, the results of the choices she didn’t make.