When he had activated Serpent's Wisdom, Ashar remembered only that he had plunged himself into an everlasting darkness. He had been in this place before, he realised, in a desert at the edge of consciousness where there was only the wind, and where, if you stepped forward, you would be blown away into that which no one understood. Only Ashar stood in the desert, and he did not feel as if he possessed any identifying features. He existed outside of time, and the knowledge of this made him strangely calm.
Instead of moving forward, Ashar sat down in the sand of darkness and focused on his breath. He relaxed every part of his body, drawing his awareness inward to a faint light that glowed within him. From here, he could sense every single point of energy he possessed. Ever since the battle with the spider in the cave, Ashar had focused on these points with everything he had. So long as they glowed, his will could rise to meet whatever task lay before him.
And yet, something was missing.
"I know you're there, Bethryl," he said.
He could feel her standing behind him. There were times when he wanted to turn her away for her own sake, but it was perhaps the first time in his life that he had felt comfort in the presence of another human being.
Now he understood: he was in the Higher Realm, and the two of them were together again, as they had been before.
"Do you remember the words you said?" Bethryl asked.
"You said that although every instinct told you to run from me and forget I existed, you were glad that you were here with me. And I felt the same way."
"Yes," he said quietly. "I remember."
"I wonder if there could be a way for us to leave all of this behind," she continued. "It's tiring, walking through a story when you already know the ending."
Ashar looked down into the sand.
When had he become this way? When had he begun speaking of saving people? When had he become the kind of person who would sit here and speak of life?
Had he been deceiving himself all this time?
"Bethryl, why are you so interested in me?" he asked.
"I don't understand."
"You can see my future, can't you? That's why you're drawn to me. So what is it? What do you see?"
"I won't tell you that," she said. "I will protect you if I can, but I won't tell you."
"Then there is hardly a point in us travelling together."
"That isn't true," she said. "I am beginning to see everything, past and future, but there is something else I cannot see. A hidden truth. It is one of the many mysteries I encounter when I enter this place. And I know that the answer lies in our meeting."
"You have the same Eye that I do. You can see more than I can. So you must see who I really am."
"You are not a bad person."
"Then you are truly misguided. What you see is an idea of me, not who I am."
"I was born this way."
"Ashar, you know that isn't true."
He turned sharply—
—and she was gone.
"I suppose it is time," said a familiar voice from afar. "Time that we speak again."
"Who is that?"
"Now that you possess Serpent's Wisdom, it is only a matter of time before you become what I intended you to be. What I did not expect is that you would still be holding back, even now."
"We've met before, haven't we?"
"Yes. You were a frightened fool who did not understand the world. And now? An angry fool who understands nothing."
A figure approached through the shifting wind.
"Was it you who created those rituals to bring me here?" Ashar asked.
The figure drew closer, a shadow forming into shape.
"Was it you who spread the Eye of Sophia to the Shadow Clan so that it would reach me?"
At last, the figure emerged: an old man in a straw hat and robes. The Old Man of the Noctis Mountains.
"I told you we would meet again, Ashar of the Noctis Mountains," he said.
"What are you doing here?"
"It is time for you to understand. You have travelled for three weeks. You have grown stronger. But what have you truly achieved?"
"I am travelling to the Golden City."
"And what will you do when you arrive? Look at your journey. All you have done is lose. What do you believe will happen there?"
"I will destroy it," Ashar said. "I will begin the revolution of the Realms. I will set into motion the day when the people are so broken they will burn the world down themselves."
"You don't believe a single word of that."
Ashar said nothing.
"You intend to go there, let the Lords kill you, and die as a self-satisfied martyr. Your heart is not with your mission. It is elsewhere, on a quiet beach, beside that girl. You have not yet made your choice. That must change."
"What choice?"
The world shifted. The desert vanished, replaced by a dying wasteland strewn with bones and ash.
"What if you fail? What if you are wrong? What if you lose her forever, the only one who ever saw you as human?"
The wind howled through the remains of something long destroyed.
"You are not the hero of this story, Ashar. The hero was a man named Shenric. He is dead. And you killed him. Your path is different. Are you afraid of it?"
"I walk the path set by Sophia, not you."
"And what do you truly know of Sophia?"
The old man stepped closer.
"Do you know it was not Axios who created this world, but the child of Sophia?"
"Yes."
"Do you know that when she saw what her child had made, she wept, and sent out her Eye so that others might awaken and break free?"
"Yes."
"And do you know that a part of her wished for her child's destruction, and sent that part into the world as well?"
Ashar fell silent.
"Stop holding back,. It was always meant to be this way. You will be hated. You will be alone. But you will find what you seek."
His eyes lowered. Tears formed, not of grief, but of resignation.
"Yes," he said. "I understand now."
The Old Man turned and vanished into the wasteland.
Behind Ashar, Bethryl appeared once more.
"I came to tell you," she said softly, "that Raizo is looking for you. I think he knows where you are."
Ashar walked away from her.
"Where are you going?"
"I won't have these conversations anymore," he said. "It is time for me to walk the path I was given."
He gathered his Axiom energy. He felt each of his seven points. Once, when he focused on his breath, he could feel a gentle light within him, spreading through his body.
Now, that light was gone.
Each point was filled instead with darkness, dense, destructive, absolute. A howling rage awakened within him.
When Ashar returned to the material world, he lay upon the sand beside Maereth and Issen.
He opened his eyes.
They burned red.