"Your fated destiny?" said Kui. He chewed off another chunk of white serpent flesh and mulled over his thoughts as he chewed, his bestial teeth making quick work of the meat. He glanced at the Collector with an expressionless side eye before his pupils raised a little, zoning in on the glowing white shard atop its head. "There is your destiny right there."
"Elaborate further. Vagaries make only for inefficiencies and defeats the purpose of evolving the capacity for vocalized communication," stated the Collector.
"My apologies. I was simply being dramatic," said Kui. He put down the serpent tail he was eating. "The World is dying, her life blood drained by the plague of the gods. Once, at the beginning of convergence history, the world brought forth seven champions, seven titans, to cleanse her body of the invading gods.
She invested her life and soul to these champions, splitting a vast amount of her essence into twenty-one shards among them.
But when these titans were defeated, the gods took the shards for their own, fueling the Tethers that keep all realms converged.
Yet the true purpose of these shards has always remained the same – to bind to worthy hosts capable of defeating the gods and restoring the world. That you possess a shard now is simply proof that you are chosen by the World-will to bring forth the End."
"Is this 'World-will' analogous to the entity known as the 'White Voice'?" said the Collector.
"World-will, White Voice, Earth Mother, the Snow Root, all of these are her names, and all refer to her," said Kui.
"And you are some emissary of this White Voice?" queried the Collector. "You are capable of hearing her voice and interpreting it?"
"I have only managed to hear faint whispers, once," said Kui. "But no, I cannot truly speak for her, nor do I truly hear her. I merely understand that there are three shards beyond this mountain range, in the land of the Rift, and I do not let any unworthy of bearing them cross.
That is the purpose of my trial."
"Yet you had already seen the shard upon me," stated the Collector. "There was no necessity in enforcing such a trial upon me."
"Ah, but it is because you possess the shard that you must be tested," said Kui. "For in combat, I may see into the hearts of those who I clash with. And it is all the more important that I know a shard bearer is one of strong intent to bring forth the End of all things.
In that regard, you are remarkably well suited. Much like Valtr."
"Then it must be that you have also enforced this 'trial' upon the white maned draconid specimen," stated the Collector.
"I have. We battled beyond the Rift and like you, drew to an even match. Though I will warn you that your unnatural talent for the martial arts may have allowed you near my level, but it will not serve you as well against Valtr," said Kui. "As you are now, you are no true match for Valtr."
"I have analyzed this specimen known as 'Valtr'" stated the Collector. "And determined that unless he is concealing a vast amount of power, that this current form is enough to yield a sizable challenge to him."
"Indeed, it initially will be. But you will come to know what I mean when you face him again. And you inevitably shall, for neither of you will accept that there will be two champions to bring forth the End." Kui watched his mangled arm, and the Collector also observed that he was slowly regenerating.
The primal energy dense atmosphere was sending out white particulates into his body, reforming his destroyed body bit by bit, though full recovery would still take approximately eighteen hours.
"It is curious that as a tinkering specimen, you possess such high levels of primal energy reserved to creatures of the wild," said the Collector. "Further more curious that even as a tinkerer, you would desire the end of your 'gods' and, subsequently, the ends of countless of your species."
"Like I have said, I am no longer of the Common Body," said Kui. "Officially, I am designated as a monster. I have no place among the Common Realms anymore. I only see beyond, to the good of this world as a whole, and I know that the gods must be stopped."
"And what details have you analyzed that allow you to reach this conclusion?" said the Collector.
Kui looked up. They were above cloud level, but the tips of the Rift mountains projected thick fog that created an impenetrable layer of white above. "Everything the gods have created cannot be sustained.
Before the Convergence, the realms were not nearly as linked as they were now, and this created balance.
There is only so much of the World-will's presence she can project to nourish and protect all the realms.
When the gods forcibly connected the realms by stealing her power, they knew not then, but they doomed not only themselves, but all realms. They continue to create Tethers from the world shards they have taken, forcibly linking the realms so that they may have more land to rule for themselves.
But this has taken a toll.
Without the World-will's presence properly nourishing the realms, the plague of Undeath grew, and continues to grow. So long as the gods continue to steal the World-will's essence, Undeath will keep growing, and the world will crumble into rot before long.
And Undeath is merely a symptom. A prelude of the greater darkness to come."
Kui's eyes narrowed as he seemed to be seeing beyond the fog wall above, to the stars and void of space.
"Again, elaborate further without wasting time on inefficient gestures," said the Collector.
"My apologies," said Kui as he looked back down to the Collector. "It is a habit of mine when I speak of this subject, though I have not with another soul in many years.
There is a darkness out there, beyond this world, in the darkness of infinity, that awaits and lurks. I know…little of its true nature, for I have only glimpsed the slightest feeling of it, the faintest of its cold whispers.
But I call it the Devourer, for from it, I could sense only a bottomless hunger that perceived everything, every living entity, anything that radiated the warmth of life and existence, as prey.
The World-will and her essence envelops this world and its realms, hiding it from the Devourer, but as she fades, so too will her protection.
That is why the End must happen, and it must happen soon. Before the gods drain the World-will fully, they must be eliminated, and balance must be restored."
The Collector clicked its mandibles and began to formulate the hypothesis that it was entirely possible that this fighter specimen had somehow foreseen the arrival of the Collector and the Collective. Were that the case, then it was entirely possible that the 'gods' had been prepared for the Collective, and yet, also uncertain.
The 'high king' of the gods seemed to understand that a foretold end was coming, but he had felt surprise in that it came in the form of the Collector. It was unclear what this surprise indicated. It could mean that the Collector was not expected at that time or that the Collector was not the 'Devourer' among many more possibilitis.
In addition, this fighter specimen linked this 'Devourer' to the presence of Undeath which neither the Collector nor the Collective possessed no true ties to.
"How is it that you have come upon this information?" stated the Collector. "And if it is so that the 'gods' know of this entity, then how have they not enacted countermeasures against it?"
"The highest level of martial arts is not the pursuit of strength, but in the pursuit of the state of being that is known as the Void," said Kui.
"The Void affinity?" said the Collector.
"Related, yes," said Kui. "The Void affinity is one that encompasses the temporal and spatial flow of existence. Yet to control time and space itself is impossible for a fragile mortal.
Hence, the Void affinity is one that is supremely rare, and even in the case it does manifest, those that bear it can never utilize it, for to tap into the powers that shape the fabric of reality itself sunder their mind and destroy their bodies from within.
Martial arts, or at least those passed down in Xia, are meant to create a state of oneness. Oneness with the self. Oneness with nature. And, finally, Onenness with the Void, with the fundamental bases of existence itself.
No martial artist in existence has ever truly reached the Void, for to do so would likely subsume them into a higher existence where their physical bodies have no true anchor in any single point in space and time. For to become one with the Void is to cast away all that the self is.
All unnecessary emotions are pared away until there is nothing but absolute calm. All attachments are cut. All desires extinguished. When the self becomes nothing, then the self becomes everything. The self ascends past the chains of the physical body and mind, its needs and wants, and reaches beyond, far beyond, into the infinite vastness of space and time itself."
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