Pausing slightly, Ouroboros added another condition:
"There is one more condition: when my Lord reclaims the authority of 'Sun,' you will not actively intervene."
"Deal." Leyton nodded gently, neither surprised by nor caring about this condition.
Amon snorted with a nasal sound, shaking His head silently at Ouroboros as if to say: You could have exchanged it for a condition more beneficial to yourself.
With a touch of gentleness within His indifferent silver eyes, Ouroboros shook His head at Amon without speaking. It seemed that aside from the "True Creator," He would only reveal a hint of emotion when facing this son of the Creator.
"In my view, zealots are no different from a lunatic." Amon shrugged, lamenting.
As His voice fell, He extended His right hand forward and made a tugging and dragging motion toward Ouroboros.
Under the intervention of high-level destiny power, His act of stealing the characteristic from Ouroboros's body succeeded in an instant.
Mercury-colored fluorescence continuously separated out, flying into Amon's hand to construct one interconnected wheel after another. Around each wheel were different markers, linking with one another to form even more wheels—just like a door overlapping with countless doors, layered and dense, beyond counting.
These wheels looked as though they merged together with countless illusory rivers, evolving into a blurry, insufficiently real, slowly rotating translucent three-dimensional ring.
Around the ring were various symbolic signs, seemingly representing different futures.
"I performed a certain amount of stealing and adjustment upon the big snake's divine and human selves, concentrating the crazed divinity into this characteristic."
Before Amon could finish His words, that "Snake of Fate" characteristic held in His hand flew out uncontrollably. He happened to space out for a split second, forgetting to stop it and letting this characteristic fuse into the transparent, illusory key in Leyton's hand.
The transparent, illusory key disintegrated instantly, turning into stream after stream of mercury-colored light that quietly flowed into the void, returning to that long river representing destiny and merging into the destiny of the entire world itself.
At this moment, a mercury-colored die appeared in the eyes of all living creatures in this world, moving as their gazes moved and rotating as their thoughts changed, seemingly symbolizing the success probability of them doing different things.
All of their actions became uncontrolled, looking as though they had become a game of rolling dice.
Even Angels could not resist this kind of change.
.....
At the absolute easternmost side of the Forsaken Land of the Gods, Bernadette, who was patrolling along the barrier formed by the rolling expansion of endless gray fog, suddenly came to a stop. Sensing something, she looked toward the northwest direction, and then her vision fell back onto the barrier solidified from gray fog.
As her gaze shifted, that mercury-colored die continuously rolled out various values.
The intuition of a "Clairvoyant" let her learn the meaning of these values at the first available moment: the probability of different places of the gray fog barrier being broken through.
Formulating a guess, she tilted her head to look toward Mr. Door off to the side, saying: "Wheel of Fortune?"
The latter shook His head gently and said:
"Perhaps, it has already surpassed 'Wheel of Fortune.' "
"Whether an 'Astrologer' or a 'Clairvoyant,' if a change occurs to the 'Snake of Fate,' we should more or less be capable of perceiving some of it."
.....
In the Southern Continent, Leonard—who had already met up with the teams dispatched by the various major churches and was currently discussing cooperation proposals and the division of responsible areas—suddenly froze on the spot.
A mercury-colored die materialized in his field of view for no rhyme or reason. No matter who he looked at, this die would rotate. Such a distinct anomaly, yet his spiritual intuition oddly failed to provide a single speck of feedback.
Pallez's slightly elderly voice echoed by his ear at the right time:
"Some changes have occurred at the high levels of the 'Destiny' pathway. that die you see is a certain manifestation."
"What's the situation?"
Leonard tilted his head slightly, voicing a low question. A delay appeared in his words and movements; he only truly spoke the words out after the die in his field of view rolled out a certain point value.
The other surrounding church members fell into the identical predicament. For a brief moment, unexpectedly no one answered his words, with only Pallez's voice echoing by his ear:
"Simply put, a great existence has data-fied the entire world, aside from the true gods."
"This kind of influence won't last too long. Don't worry, ignore it."
After explaining simply to Leonard, Pallez sank back into silence once more.
As a "Trojan Horse of Destiny," He was highly interested in this kind of high-level destiny change, intending to take advantage of the time this effect could still persist to conduct a proper study.
.....
In Backlund, a certain chubby infant lying in a stroller suddenly pouted toward the eastern direction, letting out a loud cry:
"That was clearly my Die of Probability! A bastard who even takes advantage of a newborn infant."
Crying and crying, the infant's voice suddenly ceased. Before him, one after another complex mercury-colored symbol seeped out from the void consecutively, linking with one another to form a tangible, transparent wheel that fell into his chubby little hand.
"Hmph, trying to dismiss me just by sharing a sliver of authority?"
While speaking, the small infant moved extremely rapidly to press the transparent wheel onto his own forearm. The tangible wheel rapidly transformed into a silver-white mark, imprinting into the flesh.
.....
The Gargas Archipelago, the "City of White" Nas.
With the help of The Magician Fors, Audrey easily arrived here via "Spirit World Traversal," preparing to look for that Angel mentioned by Leyton to obtain a "Dream Weaver" characteristic.
She and Fors, along with the two women and a dog, walked quietly upon the streets here. The pedestrians coming and going in the surroundings all spontaneously ignored them, yet when they were about to bump into them, they would inexplicably yield a space.
Looking at the multi-layered depictions, decorations, and sculptures related to giant dragons appearing in the surroundings, Fors spoke with some hesitation:
"A custom of giant dragon worship seems to have appeared here. That one we are looking for wouldn't be a giant dragon, right?"
"Highly possible..."
The words Audrey had yet to finish suddenly became stuck. A mercury-colored die that could not be shaken off appeared inside her field of view.
The golden retriever big dog following by her feet suddenly voiced out:
"Audrey, a die has been following me all along. It's so strange, it even rotates on its own."
Before Audrey could speak, an elderly and genial voice abruptly echoed deep within their minds:
"No need to worry. This should be a change brought by a certain high-level existence of the 'Destiny' pathway taking a step further. It won't last too long."
"As long as you do not move around recklessly and do not interact with the surrounding people and items, your own destiny will not receive an influence."
Audrey silenced for a brief moment. Neither her spiritual intuition nor her sensitivity as a "Spectator" toward emotions and words perceived any malice or implied malicious tendencies from the other party.
A certain thought flashed across her mind. Directing her voice with some surprise yet also a lack of surprise, she inquired:
"Are you precisely that Angel of the 'Spectator' pathway mentioned by Mr. 'Mr. Tower'?"
The genial voice echoing within the mental world spoke once more:
"If you have come to request the 'Dream Weaver' characteristic, then that is me."
.....
In the Forsaken Land of the Gods, at the place where the sanctuary of the True Creator was situated, a vast expanse of silver-white materialized out of thin air. No beginning could be seen, nor could an end be seen, looking like the materialization of that long river representing destiny. It linked with all matters and items, crossing the long and distant past and extending toward an blurry, infinite future.
Within the silver-white long river, one after another complex mercury-colored symbol emerged consecutively, connecting to form a giant, illusory, scaleless serpent with deep-red, cold eyes, its head and tail meeting.
The figure of the giant serpent emerged and rapidly collapsed anew, turning into stream after stream of silver-white light that dropped toward the mountain peak below, converging and reorganizing into the figure of a small boy around seven or eight years old beside Leyton.
As the light restrained, his appearance was completely reflected into the eyes of Leyton, Amon, and Ouroboros:
Silver hair and silver eyes, with soft facial features, yet wearing a stiff face in a posture of I am very serious. He had a thin build, looking somewhat malnourished.
Meeting Leyton's curious gaze, he tilted his head up slightly and said:
"This is the appearance most suitable for my current mentality. I count as a born mythical creature, and a reboot of destiny also counts as a type of growth for me. I can take advantage of this to accumulate what you call humanity, letting myself throw off the influence of instinct."
"If it weren't for this kind of specialty, I would currently be no different from those fellows bricked into the wall by you, being heavily influenced by my own symbols and instincts and situated in a half-crazy state at any moment."
Leyton nodded gently, then turned his head to glance at that giant crucifix erected there as if eternally, speaking calmly:
"I have an agreement with the 'River of Eternal Darkness' and will not intervene in the struggle between it and 'Evernight.' Before the remaining Sefirot break through the blockade, I will reinforce the barrier in the Astral World."
Finishing his words, Leyton waved his hand toward the "Key of Light" who had transformed into the appearance of a seven-or-eight-year-old child:
"Let's go."
The "Key of Light" did not refuse. Behaving just like this child exterior, he asked with quite some excitement and curiosity:
"Where are we going?"
"To look for my rabbit. It has been left to graze for quite a long time; if I don't go look for it, it's going to turn into a wild rabbit."
While speaking, pieces of brilliant starlight emerged around them, constructing an "Astral World passage." Through the connection with the Astral World, they directly exchanged their current location, arriving in the Southern Continent in the blink of an eye.
After Leyton and the "Key of Light" left, Amon looked at the expressionless Ouroboros who had sat back in His original spot, laughing:
"Big snake, that child looks quite similar to your appearance after you reboot. If I broadcast the news to the outside world that He is your illegitimate child, there will certainly be quite a few people who believe it."
"Cough! Cough~"
Before Amon could finish His words, He was suddenly choked by the air, coughing continuously and coughing harder and harder. He attempted to use the methods of deception and theft to resolve the problem upon His body, yet all failed because of being too unlucky.
Within the air, individual creatures so minuscule that they were invisible to the naked eye welled out consecutively, and then they suddenly turned into Amon.