Chapter 1281: Epilogue

As the destruction of a world draws near, a woman watched with tears in her eyes. She learned the truth. The truth of her identity, the truth of their realm and the truth of the experiment that stretched across Eons.

Seeing her treasured ones perish in the gulf of infinity, insanity washed over her mind as she cried out with blood shot eyes.

“I’m sorry…” Shiro apologized as she watched the destruction of the world with her future clone.

Before she could curse Shiro, she too disappeared amidst the destruction.

How many cycles has this been? Shiro had lost count.

‘Is this how Anima felt? Constantly killing those that looked like you, lived the same life as you, met the same people as you…’ Shiro thought to herself as she could feel herself become numb with each passing day. But she had to continue. Even if she wanted a break, she had to continue the experiment.

Watching the final spark of this cycle collapse into itself, Shiro reached out with her hand yet the destruction didn’t damage her at all.

She had long stopped existing as a mortal being. She was a Universal Law, the foundation of the universe. One that continued to exist until the perfect cycle is discovered.

Biting her lip, Shiro pulled back her hand as her body was forced to move. She was forced to create the next cycle, start the next experiment.

Returning to the conceptual realm, she sat upon the throne once more with chains weighing down her every move.

However, there was something strange. One of the cycles seemed to be diverging off the standard pattern as it warranted her attention.

The state of the realm was teetering on the verge of destruction yet it was strangely peaceful as though it could implode at any given moment.

With the Laws compelling her to investigate further, she closed her eyes and split a part of her consciousness to the world similar to what she had done many times before.

“Did it work?”

“Don’t look at me, I’m not the one who made this bloody thing.”

“Stop arguing alright? God I swear even after travelling for this long you two still bicker like little children.”

“You’re not really helping, Madi. Just help me secure the aura to the doll already.”

“Fine, this better work. I don’t know how many more times we can do this before exhausting this doll. Plus why don’t you ask Lyrica or Nan Tian to help with this one? I’ve already done it before.”

“You have the most mana capacity out of all of us thanks to you being a demon god. Now focus up already before the aura leaves.”

“Fine~ If you say so.”

Hearing all of these family voices, a burst of emotion flooded Shiro’s heart as she didn’t dare to dream. She didn’t dare to hope that this was true. Countless years she had spent in the conceptual realm trying to finish the experiments so that she could go back to her own world. But it was already destroyed. She could not stop herself from destroying her own world.

Opening her eyes slowly, she could see the familiar faces of her friends as tears welled up in her eyes.

“See? I told you it would work.” Lyrica smiled as she couldn’t hold back her tears anymore and hugged Shiro. She looked older than she did before and had a new hairstyle while the others had different outfits as well.

“You’re the one who was most anxious.” Madison laughed as she too broke down with tears in her eyes.

“I told you, it doesn’t matter if you’re in a far off realm. I will fulfill my promise to you.” Nan Tian chuckled as he kneeled down next to Shiro.

“How?” Shiro asked, as emotions flooded her heart. She couldn’t believe she could see her friends again after all this time.

“I got some help from an old fan of yours. It wasn’t the intended purpose but I made it work.” Nan Tian smiled, handing a small note to her.

[Sup! I heard you were going for balance so I left a little something for you towards the North. I don’t know if it will work exactly as I expect but I hope my pal does what I ask and sends the information to you regardless. If you do hatch it, you’ll get this letter. If you don’t… well you won’t be reading this. I can’t use the system since I’m about to be reset for how much sh*t I caused for you. Well that’s fine. The egg is a gateway between the two worlds. You can use it to reach the world of Creation. It’ll serve as a bridge for a short period of time so their creatures may spill out towards your side but I’m sure you can deal with it. It’ll hopefully cultivate into a seed of creation and destruction and help you achieve balance. This is the last time you’ll hear from me so this is goodbye I suppose. Keep on fighting! And please, if I’m an asshole if you see me again, don’t take it as an invitation to pierce me!]

[- Your biggest fan, Admin 4]

Reading this, Shiro bit her lip and forced a laugh as she remembered how much Admin 4 had helped her throughout her journey.

“Since you already reached balance, we couldn’t exactly use it. I had an idea during our last talk and used your nanotech to fuse the two together and simulated your journey to create a vessel. I assumed you couldn’t come back so we wanted a way to anchor you down without splitting your soul and here we are. Sorry for being late.” Nan Tian smiled as one glance at the codes that created this vessel told Shiro everything she needed to know.

How long they took to create this vessel and how much they had to do.

“Since it’s a success, I’ve already told everyone back home to start the party. Asharia’s gone through some pretty major changes in the years you were gone. It can even go through cycles now.”

“Don’t you dare go off without saying goodbye this time! Do you know how much Lyrica cried because of you last time???” Madison pouted as Shiro wiped her tears and nodded her head.

“Alright.”

She was finally back home where she belonged.