CHAPTER 633: 633

Zarvok paused, tilting his head, his sharp gaze lingering on her. A faint, knowing smile crept onto his lips. "Indeed, you could find uses for them. And perhaps in your hands they may serve a purpose that even you have yet to uncover. But," his tone shifted, firm and steady, "their use will never surpass the strength I could bring to your world. Knowledge is one thing. Survival in the race of the cosmos is another. And only one of those will decide if your realm continues to exist."

Ikenga’s eyes lingered on Zarvok for a long moment before he finally looked to Keles. He could see the tension in her jaw, the faint tightening around her eyes. She did not like this, did not like the casual way Zarvok reduced souls to fuel, to seeds for war.

Yet Ikenga’s thoughts weighed differently. He isn’t wrong, he admitted silently. The race of worlds was not a place for purity or sentiment. It was a contest where only strength decided who remained and who vanished. Zarvok, for all his bluntness, spoke with the voice of reality.

Keles broke the silence first, her voice spoken inwards to Ikenga to avoid Zarvok hearing it. "To bind ourselves to people like him... the very idea unsettles me. Souls are not mere coin to be traded, Ikenga. To hand them over is to hand over pieces of what I am meant to shepherd." Her gaze dropped briefly, as though searching the unseen stream of spirits always lingering at the edge of her perception. "It feels like betrayal."

Ikenga nodded slowly, but his reply carried his own unshaken pragmatism. "And yet, if his words hold truth, then refusing may be a greater betrayal to our people, to our realm."

Keles’s lips parted, as if to argue, but she faltered. His reasoning was harsh, but it was not wrong.

He placed a steady hand on hers. "We do not have to decide now. But consider this, alliances are not built on trust, but on necessity. Zarvok needs us, as much as we may one day need him. That balance gives us leverage."

Keles looked back toward Zarvok, who was waiting in silence, confident in the seeds he had sown. She exhaled softly. "Leverage, yes. But it feels like playing with fire."

Ikenga’s gaze hardened, fixed on the abyss lord. "Then let us be the ones holding the torch."

Ikenga finally spoke, his voice calm but measured as he met Zarvok’s gaze. "We have much to consider from your words. Such a decision is not ours alone to make. It will require the voice of our siblings, their counsel, and their will together before we can arrive at an answer."

Zarvok regarded him for a long moment, then gave a slow nod. "Hearing your words brings me peace of mind," he said evenly. "So, in turn, let me make the picture clearer for you."

His posture straightened, "My aim with you is nothing extraordinary. I am not the first demon lord, nor am I the only one to rise. What I seek is the same thing all demon lords require, a channel for souls. And I can promise you this: it is not conquest alone that has filled their coffers."

He let the statement linger, watching Ikenga’s eyes flicker with silent calculations.

"Understand this," Zarvok continued, his voice low but steady, "alliances with demon lords are not a rarity. They are inevitabilities. Countless worlds have already chosen the same path you now stand upon, whether in desperation or pragmatism. What I offer you is not an aberration, it is the pattern that has shaped the very cosmos you are about to enter."

Ikenga’s brow furrowed, though he said nothing at first. He was piecing the puzzle together, weighing Zarvok’s claim against what little he and Keles knew of the greater cosmos. If alliances with demon lords were as common as Zarvok implied, then their world was already standing on the threshold of an order they had yet to fully grasp.

Keles, however, did not share his silence. Her voice was steady, but there was an edge to it. "You make it sound as if we have no choice. That every world must eventually bow to the abyss."

Zarvok’s smile sharpened, though not cruelly. "Not bow," he corrected. "Align. Choose wisely where to tie your rope before the flood sweeps through. Refuse, and another demon lord will offer the same bargain perhaps less generously, perhaps with chains instead of open hands."

Ikenga responded, his tone even but laced with iron. "And yet, it is still a choice. You offer power, yes. You offer survival, yes. But you also offer dependence. To ally with you is to bind our fate to yours. If you fall, we fall with you."

Zarvok’s expression did not waver. "Just as if I stand, you stand taller than you could alone." He leaned backward slightly, his voice carrying a weight that pressed down on the chamber. "That is the gamble of all alliances. Survival is never free."

Keles looked at Ikenga, her unease still present, but she did not speak again. Ikenga gave her hand a brief squeeze, then turned back to Zarvok. "As I said, we will not decide here. But know this: if we choose to walk this path with you, it will not be as supplicants. We will not kneel. It will be as equals, or not at all."

For the first time, Zarvok’s smile shifted into something that almost resembled amusement. "Then perhaps there is hope for this alliance after all."

"Now," Ikenga said, his voice carrying the weight of old bargains, "where is our original pact with the abyss? We have played our part. I believe it is time the abyss walks its own path." His eyes fixed on Zarvok with quiet authority.

Zarvok’s lips curved into a knowing smile. "The abyss has already placed your goal before you. I merely stayed its hand until now, so that we might have this discussion... and time together."

With a snap of his fingers, the air before them warped, folding in on itself like glass under pressure. From that distortion appeared an orb hard, diamond-like, shaped as a perfect teardrop. Within it, multitudes of shifting lights swirled endlessly, as though entire skies had been trapped inside.

The moment Ikenga and Keles’s gaze fell upon it, their divine instincts surged forth. Precognition. A vision struck them both, hazy and fragmented, like a reflection in rippling water. Neither could grasp its full truth, yet its weight was undeniable, it was a glimpse of what was to come, and it was enough.

They turned to each other, faint smiles tugging at their lips. The silence between them spoke louder than words: whatever future lay ahead, the abyss had indeed delivered.

Ikenga raised his hand, and with a thought, wood scented of cedar and resin formed, shaping itself into a box of solemn beauty. As the orb descended, it fell neatly into his palm, and he guided it into the vessel. With a quiet click, he closed the lid, sealing its light within.

Keles’s gaze lingered on Zarvok, cool and unyielding. "Now," she said, her voice like tempered steel, "for the price you owe us personally."

Zarvok’s smile never wavered. With another snap of his fingers, the chamber shifted. Around them appeared the entirety of what had been taken from the goblin world treasures, artifacts, relics, even living beings, all diminished in size to fit within the space. Among them, even the "Mother" sat in miniature, her presence still unsettling despite its reduced form.

Ikenga released Keles’s hand, her attention immediately pulled elsewhere. She felt a tug, not her own desire, but that of the unborn child within her, resonating with one of the treasures scattered before them. Keles walked with deliberate steps toward the object.

It was a tower.

Shrunken though it was, its presence radiated with a quiet gravity. The sight of it stirred her memory, the image of the emperor, their past discussion, his words that had clung to her mind like a shadow. She reached out, and as her palm touched its surface, her hand dissolved into a swirling aperture of darkness. The tower vanished, consumed whole as it was drawn into her, claimed as her own.

Ikenga, meanwhile, did not move toward the treasures of wealth or power. His thoughts were elsewhere, on something their world lacked, something it would continue to lack unless he seized it now. His expression hardened as the word formed clearly in his mind: Technology.

"I need all their acquired knowledge on the technological system," Ikenga said, his voice firm as his eyes locked onto Zarvok.

Without hesitation, Zarvok snapped his fingers. An orb, faintly metallic in its sheen, descended into Ikenga’s palm, pulsing with threads of light, an archive of centuries of thought and invention compressed into a single vessel.

"What is your last request?" Zarvok asked, his tone steady, though curiosity flickered behind his smile.

Keles turned her gaze toward Ikenga, then back to Zarvok. "We need all their knowledge concerning the workings of the Sixth Stage."

Zarvok inclined his head, as though he had expected this. Another orb materialized in the air, drifting gently into Keles’s waiting hand. Its glow was heavier, darker, filled with the weight of power and understanding that could shape the fate of race to acquire god like beings.