136: Chapter 136 Time Corridor

In the instant the space collapsed, Lin Fan didn't even have time to make a defensive move.

The moment the shadow of the end detonated the Sower laboratory, the spatial structure inside the entire flagship shattered like a mirror struck by a giant hammer, cracking inch by inch. Countless pitch-black spatial rifts, like hideous wounds, spread crazily across his vision, tearing and swallowing all matter and energy they touched.

His body, constructed of dark matter, emitted a piercing scream on the verge of breaking within the extremely distorted turbulence of space-time. It was a tremor originating from the soul level; Lin Fan could clearly perceive every inch of his energy structure being forcibly dismantled, folded, reorganized, and then brutally kneaded into a torrent of light and shadow that had no visible end and no audible sound.

"Kate!"

He roared with all his remaining strength, his right hand lunging forward, but his fingertips brushed only against cold, ethereal particles of light. Those were the last traces of Kate's Light Orb Energy before it dissipated—gentle and fragile—only to be completely swallowed by the violent space-time turbulence in the next instant, leaving not even a hint of warmth behind.

His consciousness was stretched infinitely, then suddenly compressed.

One second ago, he could still see the pure white light bursting from the massive sound of origin container in the center of the Sower laboratory, and he could see Kate standing in the middle of that light, her eyes filled with despair and bewilderment. The next second, all light, sound, temperature, and perception were completely stripped away, and the world fell into absolute void and silence.

Time was no longer a linearly flowing river, but a mass of completely jumbled chaos.

Past, present, and future intertwined, overlapped, and collided. Countless fragmented images flashed crazily in the depths of Lin Fan's mind—the training grounds of the Interstellar Academy, the starport where he first met Kate, the battle to protect the Light Sphere Mother Star, every moment of fighting side-by-side with his companions, the despair of the entire starry sky being swallowed by darkness on the day the shadow of the end descended...

All memories were being tampered with, overwritten, and erased.

Lin Fan desperately held onto his final core of consciousness; he had only one single thought.

Find Kate.

No matter where he was thrown, no matter if the universe collapsed, no matter if the rules were reshaped, he had to find her.

This was an obsession etched into the depths of his soul, an existence more solid than Dark Matter Energy and more stubborn than the rules of space-time.

He didn't know how much time had passed—perhaps an instant, perhaps billions of years.

A violent sensation of suffocation suddenly seized his throat. Choking haze, smelling of scorched earth and gunpowder, poured frantically into his nasal passages, burning his respiratory tract and bringing a near-tearing pain.

Lin Fan snapped his eyes open.

His vision slowly transitioned from pitch black to a hazy, dusky yellow.

In his sight, there were no cold alloy ship plates, no flickering energy indicator lights, no suffocating black tentacles of the shadow of the end, and certainly no high-tech ruins left by the Sower Civilization.

There was only a vast, boundless expanse of ruins.

He lay stiffly on the extremely parched earth. His skin could clearly feel the residual heat and coarse particles of the surface—this was land that had cooled after experiencing extreme heat, hard and silent, devoid of any life. Even a breath of wind carried a heavy sense of oppression, making it hard to breathe.

Lin Fan propped himself up and slowly sat up.

Dark Matter Energy flowed sluggishly through his body like a river blocked by silt; every circulation brought intense discomfort. He could clearly perceive that this world exerted an extremely strong suppression on his power, as if the rules of this entire universe were completely different from the primary universe he came from—strange, cold, cruel, and... without light.

There was no ubiquitous, gentle, and stable glow of the Light Sphere Race, no energy trails left by interstellar fleet jumps, no pale halos emitted by planetary shields. Even the stars appeared dim and lusterless, as if covered by a thick layer of dust, emitting a deathly glimmer in the distant sky.

This was not the shadow of the end's flagship.

This was not the Light Sphere Mother Star.

This was certainly not the familiar primary universe they protected.

"Kate!"

Lin Fan suddenly snapped back to his senses, his heart tightening. He almost scrambled to his feet, his gaze frantically scanning the surrounding ruins, desperately searching for that familiar figure within his field of vision.

Charred broken walls and ruins stood tall; broken skyscrapers like the skeletons of dead giants were thrust diagonally beneath the hazy sky. The surfaces of the buildings were covered in bone-deep cracks and traces of melting from high temperatures, their metal frames twisted into bizarre shapes, silently recounting the catastrophe that had once occurred in the deathly quiet world.

Countless bottomless chasms split the ground, with the residual heat of dark red lava flowing slowly in their depths, emitting faint light and a pungent smell of sulfur. Dried riverbeds exposed cracked rocks; the rivers that once flowed with the source of life had long since dried up completely in the apocalypse, leaving only a desperate wasteland.

No life, no sound, no movement.

The entire world was terrifyingly quiet.

Just as Lin Fan's heart was about to jump out of his chest, his gaze suddenly froze on a tilted floor slab not far away.

A slender figure was curled up there, her white skirt covered in dust and charred stains, her long hair scattered messily on the ground. The golden mark on her brow, symbolizing the successor of the Light Sphere Race, was now so dim it was almost invisible, leaving only a faint, flickering trace, as if it would go out completely at any moment.

It was Kate.

"Kate!"

Lin Fan rushed over like a madman, the gravel beneath his feet splashing as he ran. Dark Matter Energy erupted uncontrollably, only to be forcibly suppressed the moment it touched this world, merely kicking up a faint cloud of dust. He reached Kate's side and squatted down without hesitation, carefully pulling her into his arms, his movements as gentle as if he were touching a fragile treasure.

The girl's body was cool and soft, her face pale to the point of being nearly transparent. Her long eyelashes trembled slightly, and a trace of pallor from the space-time traversal remained at the corners of her mouth. Her breathing was weak but steady; she had merely fallen into a brief coma and had not suffered any fatal injuries.

"Kate, wake up, look at me."

Lin Fan called her name in a low voice, his tone suppressed with unmistakable panic and lingering fear. He gently brushed the dust from her cheek with his fingertips, the coldness of the skin he touched making his heart ache.

He didn't dare imagine what would have happened if he hadn't been able to protect her consciousness in the space-time turbulence, if she had been thrown to some other corner of this universe, or if she had encountered unknown dangers here...

Lin Fan didn't dare think further.

He could clearly perceive that the Light Orb Energy within Kate's body was nearly exhausted. That was her innate power, a part of her life, yet now it was like an extinguished flame, with only weak embers pulsing slowly in her meridians.

The universal rules here were stripping her of her power.

"Mm..."

Kate groaned softly, her long eyelashes fluttering as she slowly opened her eyes.

What first entered her sight was a hazy gray sky and Lin Fan's face, filled with worry and urgency. Her pupils contracted slightly, a flash of bewilderment appearing first, followed quickly by immense fear and unease. She instinctively raised her hand, wanting to grab Lin Fan's sleeve, only to find her arm so weak she could barely lift it.

"Lin Fan..."

Kate's voice was hoarse and dry, carrying the weakness of just waking up. "Where... is this? Aren't we still in the shadow of the end's flagship? The laboratory... the laboratory exploded, the Sower ruins..."

Her words came to an abrupt halt.

Because she suddenly realized that the Light Orb Energy within her body—as natural as breathing, as connected as blood—had vanished.

Completely, without a trace.

She instinctively tried to circulate her power, wanting to summon even a faint glimmer of light, wanting to use Light Orb Energy to warm her cold body, wanting to sense the presence of her companions, wanting to confirm the safety of the Mother Star...

There was nothing.

No light, no warmth, no flow of energy, no resonance of the soul.

It was as if she had been a normal human girl without any power from the very beginning.

"My power..." Kate's pupils dilated suddenly, and the color drained completely from her face. She looked down at her hands in disbelief—those hands were slender and pale, but they could no longer bloom with any golden light. "My power is gone... Lin Fan, my Light Orb Energy has disappeared."

Lin Fan's heart sank heavily, down into a bottomless abyss.

He had noticed this long ago but hadn't dared to say it out loud. He was afraid of upsetting the already fragile Kate, afraid she wouldn't be able to accept this cruel fact. But now, Kate had sensed everything herself; there was no longer any need for concealment.

"This isn't our universe, Kate."

Lin Fan took a deep breath, forcing himself to calm down. He held Kate tightly in his arms, using his still-warm chest to shield her from the cold and despair of this world, his voice low and firm. "When the shadow of the end detonated the laboratory, it tampered with the space-time trajectory and forcibly threw us into a parallel universe."

"A parallel universe..." Kate murmured the words, her eyes hollow and vacant. "A universe... without light orbs."

She finally understood why everything here was so strange, so hopeless.

The light orb was the anchor of order, the Guardian of civilization, the light of hope that spanned the stars. In a universe where light orbs were never born, there was no unified order, no peace across planets, no power to combat interstellar disasters. All civilizations could only crush, fight, and destroy each other on their narrow planets, eventually heading toward self-destruction.

And the Earth here had clearly finished this desperate journey.

"I can't sense any energy fluctuations, I can't sense the Mother Star, I can't sense Little Kate, Franklin, AKai..." Kate's voice carried an uncontrollable tremor, and tears welled up in her eyes, sliding down her pale cheeks and hitting Lin Fan's hand, cold as ice. "Will they... will they also..."

"They won't." Lin Fan immediately interrupted her, his tone decisive and without a hint of hesitation. "They are in the primary universe. The shadow of the end's targets were us, were you—it won't easily move against them. What we need to do now is not panic, but find a way back."

He had to stay calm.

In this desperate, strange universe, he was Kate's only reliance. If even he broke down, then the two of them would truly have no possibility of returning.

Leaning in Lin Fan's arms, feeling his steady heartbeat and warm embrace, Kate's panicked thoughts settled slightly. She knew Lin Fan was right; panic and crying wouldn't solve any problems. They had to survive, and they had to find a way back to the primary universe.

"Let's leave here first and see if there are any clues nearby." Lin Fan helped Kate slowly stand up, carefully guarding her. "The shadow of the end wouldn't throw us here for no reason. This must be its trap, and also the 'rules' it left for us."

Supporting each other, the two walked slowly through the deathly ruins.

The road beneath their feet was long since broken beyond repair, sharp gravel cutting through their soles and stinging their feet, but neither of them noticed. They walked past fractured streets, collapsed buildings, and desolate squares. Everything in sight was destruction and silence.

There were no vehicles, no pedestrians, no traces of life inside the buildings—they couldn't even find a single corpse or an intact object.

Everything had been cleansed by extreme power, so clean it was hair-raising.

There were no remains of interstellar war here, no traces of alien invasion, only the mess left after human civilization's self-destruction.

Without the restraint and protection of the light orb, the greed, violence, and selfishness in human nature were infinitely magnified. The struggles between nation and nation, race and race, civilization and civilization never ceased, finally burning out the entire planet's vitality in a world-destroying war.

Looking at this dead Earth before her, Kate felt as if her heart was being gripped hard by a cold hand, making it painful to breathe.

She thought of the Earth in the primary universe.

There were bustling cities, laughing crowds, young boys and girls of the Interstellar Academy training hard to protect civilization, and the light of the light orb enveloping the entire planet—peaceful, harmonious, and full of hope.

But here, there was only despair.

"Is this... a world without light orbs?" Kate whispered, her vision blurred by tears. "If we hadn't awakened our power back then, if the Mother Star hadn't given birth to the light orb, if the shadow of the end had descended early... would our universe have become like this too?"

Lin Fan remained silent and did not answer.

He couldn't answer.

The truth was too cruel, so cruel he didn't have the heart to say it and shatter the last hope in Kate's heart.

If there were no light orb, if there were no Kate, if there weren't this group of Guardians resisting with all their might, the primary universe's end would not have been a bit better than here.

The shadow of the end was never a destroyer without cause; it was a cleaning tool created by the Sower Civilization, a blade used to clear away 'failed experiments.' And the Light Sphere Race and Kate were precisely the Sower Civilization's most 'failed' yet most successful accidents.

The two moved forward in silence, the only sounds in the air being their slight footsteps and breathing, which seemed exceptionally out of place in this deathly world.

After walking for an unknown amount of time, Kate's stamina gradually failed, her face becoming even paler. Lin Fan stopped immediately, supporting her as she leaned against a relatively intact section of a broken wall to rest.

"Rest for a while." Lin Fan took out his last remaining energy supply and carefully fed it to Kate. "Replenish some energy; we can't fall here."

Kate obediently drank the supply, and a faint energy slowly flowed into her limbs, allowing her to recover some strength. She looked up, her gaze inadvertently sweeping across a patch of ruins not far ahead, and her eyes suddenly narrowed.

"Lin Fan, look over there."

Kate pointed her finger at an object half-buried in the soil in the center of the ruins.

It was a broken stone tablet made of hard material. Even after experiencing the apocalyptic catastrophe, it had not been completely pulverized; its surface was merely covered in cracks and scratches. Most of the tablet was buried under the charred soil, with only a small section of the body exposed.

Lin Fan's gaze immediately shifted there, his heart stirred.

In a vast expanse of completely destroyed ruins, a section of a stone tablet that remained intact seemed exceptionally conspicuous.

This was definitely not ordinary construction debris; it had to contain a clue.

"Let's go, let's take a look."

Supporting Kate, Lin Fan walked step by step toward that stone tablet.

Upon drawing closer, he realized that this fragment of the stone tablet was far larger than it appeared. The body of the tablet was square and upright, engraved with neat and clear characters. However, due to the erosion of time and the destruction of the disaster, most of the writing had become blurred and illegible, leaving only the top line still clearly discernible.

Lin Fan squatted down and reached out, gently brushing away the dust and rubble from the tablet's surface.

As his fingertips touched the cold, hard surface, a line of text slowly revealed itself before his eyes.

Seven characters, neat and solemn, carried a weight of time and a sense of destiny that struck both of them like a bolt of lightning.

【Causality must be a closed loop.】

Causality must be a closed loop.

Seven simple characters, yet they contained a suffocating truth and law.

Kate's body jolted, her face instantly turning as pale as paper. She staggered back a step, her eyes filled with shock and fear as she murmured, "Causality... closed loop... what does this mean? The shadow of the end threw us here just to tell us this?"

Lin Fan stared intently at those seven characters, his heart racing as countless thoughts flashed through his mind.

Causality.

They had touched the taboos of the Sower Civilization, peered into the truth of the sound of origin, tampered with the causal line of the light orb's birth, and disrupted the original laws of the universe.

Closed loop.

The disrupted causality must be repaired; the twisted timeline must be restored to its proper place.

The shadow of the end wasn't exiling them; it was punishing them, forcing their hand.

Using a completely destroyed parallel universe, it declared to them:

Your actions have broken the balance of the universe. If you want to return to the main universe and stop the destruction of the shadow of the end, you must close the loop of the twisted causality.

"It's forcing us to make a choice," Lin Fan's voice was low and cold, carrying a bone-chilling frost. "It threw us into this desperate universe without light orbs to tell us that causality is irreversible and laws cannot be broken. We must follow its rules to fix everything."

"But how do we do that?" Kate's voice carried a hint of despair. "We don't even understand the rules here, and even our power is suppressed. How do we repair causality? How do we close the loop? How do we get back to the main universe?"

Lin Fan did not answer.

His gaze was fixed immovably on a pile of rubble behind the stone tablet.

There, in the shadow of the broken tablet, half-buried in charred rubble and dust, lay a slender, long-weathered hand bone.

That hand bone was small and delicate. Even after enduring years of erosion and disaster, it still maintained a stiff and stubborn posture—clenched in a tight fist, as if at the final moment of life, it was desperately guarding something important, refusing to let go.

Lin Fan's breathing suddenly stopped.

An indescribable panic and sharp pain flooded his entire body like a tsunami, leaving him stiff and unable to move, making even breathing exceptionally difficult.

He had an extremely ominous premonition.

A premonition that made his very soul tremble.

Lin Fan walked over slowly, step by step, each one feeling like he was treading on the edge of a blade—heavy and painful. He squatted down and reached out with a trembling hand, carefully brushing away the rubble, dust, and withered vines covering it.

As the dust was swept away, a complete, long-lifeless set of remains slowly revealed itself.

The small figure was curled up in the shadow of the stone tablet, like a wounded young animal—quiet and desperate.

She was wearing a white dress of a simple design. A trace of a long-cooled, almost unrecognizable pale gold mark remained on the hem—the only mark left after the Light Orb Energy had burned out.

Lin Fan knew this dress down to his very bones.

It was Kate's favorite dress, a gift he had personally given her during a festival at the Interstellar Academy.

And the remains before him, whether in stature, bone structure, or that faint lingering aura of a light orb, all pointed to a fact that made him collapse.

This was the Kate of this universe.

The Kate who had ultimately met her death in this parallel universe where there were no light orbs, no hope, and no Guardians.

She hadn't awakened the power of the light orb, hadn't met Lin Fan, hadn't met comrades to fight alongside, and hadn't been protected by everyone.

On this desperate wasteland, she was just an ordinary girl, a poor soul struggling alone in the apocalypse before finally dying.

She hadn't even been able to wait for the hope of civilization, for the arrival of light.

Looking at the long-weathered remains before him, at that small, curled-up body, Lin Fan felt his heart being gripped, crushed, and mangled by an invisible hand. Intense pain erupted from the depths of his soul, sweeping through his entire body.

He had seen countless deaths.

He had seen comrades sacrifice themselves on the battlefield, seen planets explode under the attack of the shadow of the end, seen civilizations perish in the darkness, and seen countless lives vanish in despair.

But never had there been a moment like this that made him feel so broken, so helpless, and so utterly miserable.

This Kate was another version of her.

The one who should have been protected, cherished, and embraced.

But here, she had died alone in the ruins, without even a complete body left behind—only a clenched hand bone telling of her final obsession.

Lin Fan's finger gently touched that slender hand bone.

The bone was already weathered and fragile, crumbling into fine powder at a touch, just like her short and desperate life—shattering completely with the slightest contact.

Trembling, he used every ounce of strength he had to keep from letting out a broken roar.

He carefully and gently pried open those tightly clenched finger bones.

A small chip, covered in scratches and wear, lay quietly in the center of the finger bones, amidst the dust.

The chip was small and inconspicuous, yet it had been guarded with the final strength of the Kate of this universe's life.

Lin Fan reached out with a trembling hand, gently picking up the chip and cradling it in his palm.

The surface of the chip was covered with the marks of time, yet it could still function normally. Almost instinctively, Lin Fan injected Dark Matter Energy into it. The chip instantly lit up with a faint blue light, and a short holographic image and recording slowly projected into the air.

The image was blurry and shaky, with terrible quality, clearly recorded under extremely difficult circumstances.

In the image was a young girl.

She had the exact same face as Kate, the same eyes, and the same hair color, but her gaze lacked the gentleness and determination of the main universe's Kate, holding only the deep fear and despair that matched this universe.

She was wearing tattered clothes, hiding in a corner of the ruins, clutching the chip tightly in her hand as she spoke softly to the camera.

Her voice was weak yet exceptionally clear, traveling through billions of years of time and space to reach the ears of Lin Fan and Kate.

【I don't know... if anyone will see this recording.】

【I also don't know if light really exists.】

【The adults say that light is just a legend, a fantasy born of despair. In this world, light will never arrive.】

【But I don't believe them.】

【I always feel that in a place far, far away, in a universe we cannot see, there must be light.】

【There must be a group of people guarding hope.】

【There must be someone waiting for me.】

The girl's voice trembled slightly, and tears fell from her eyes, yet she still stubbornly lifted her head to look at the gray sky.

【If one day, light really appears...】

【If someone from another world sees this recording...】

【Please, you must not give up.】

【Don't give up hope, don't give up on each other, don't give up on the light.】

【Always remember, the meaning of light's existence is to protect.】

【And you must live on.】

【You must... see the world with light for me.】

The image came to an abrupt end.

The blue light went out, and the chip returned to silence.

The air fell into a dead silence.

Kate was already in tears. She covered her mouth, desperately suppressing the sobs in her throat, but the tears fell like broken beads, soaking the front of her dress.

She looked at that young, desperate version of herself in the image, watching her hide alone in the ruins, watching her use the last of her life to protect an insignificant chip, and watching her hold the purest, most humble expectation for the "light."

That was another version of her.

A version of her that hadn't been saved.

A version of her that had died alone in the darkness.

In the main universe, she was protected by Lin Fan with all his might, cherished by her comrades, and seen as hope by the Light Sphere Mother Star. She had light, she had love, and she had a future.

But here, she didn't even have the chance to live.

"Why..." Kate let out a suppressed, painful whimper. "Why... did she have to go through this... Why could I survive, but she couldn't..."

Lin Fan knelt on the ground.

The hard, sharp rubble dug deep into his knees, piercing his skin and bringing intense pain, but he was completely oblivious to it.

He gripped the chip in his palm tightly, his knuckles turning white from the force. His shoulders shook uncontrollably as suppressed sobs escaped from deep in his throat, no longer able to be contained.

Tears fell uncontrollably onto the charred earth, splashing into fine dust.

This young man who stood tall and had never retreated a single step before the shadow of the end, this Guardian who had protected the entire starry sky and countless civilizations, had completely broken down at this moment.

He wasn't crying for a set of remains or a chip.

He was crying for the Kate he couldn't protect, for the girl who died alone in the dark, for the poor person he loved most who hadn't even seen the "light."

"I'm sorry..."

Lin Fan murmured in a low, raspy, broken voice, filled with endless self-reproach and pain. "I'm sorry... I came too late... I couldn't find you... I couldn't protect you..."

If he could have been a little earlier, if he could have been a little stronger, if he could have crossed time and space to come here...

Would she not have died?

Would she also have been able to see the light, have hope, and live a good life?

But there were no ifs.

The causality of this universe was already set.

No light orbs, no Guardians—only destruction and despair.

"Causality must be a closed loop..." Kate murmured through her tears. "The shadow of the end wants us to see our own failure, our own despair, and to see that if we don't work hard, the future will become like this... right?"

Lin Fan did not answer.

He just knelt before the small remains, not standing up for a long time.

Amidst this atmosphere of extreme despair, a faint and regular sound of mechanical operation suddenly came from the shadows of the ruins.

Click—

Click—

The sound of metal joints rubbing against rubble was exceptionally clear in the dead silence.

This was the sound of a living, intelligent object moving!

In this long-destroyed universe, there was actually something alive!

Lin Fan jerked his head up, instantly pulling back all his breakdown and pain. His eyes became sharp as blades, and Dark Matter Energy instantly surged within his body as he entered the highest state of alert.

He pulled Kate behind him, his body tense like a beast ready to pounce, staring intently in the direction of the sound.

Kate also instantly stopped her tears, leaning closely behind Lin Fan, her heart filled with vigilance and unease.

In this desperate parallel universe, any unknown presence could be a fatal danger.

The footsteps drew closer and closer.

A tall figure slowly walked out from the dark shadows of the ruins.

It was a half-human, half-mechanical figure.

One half of the body still retained a human form, with skin that was aged and wrinkled. The other half was completely replaced by cold metal, shimmering with a ghostly metallic luster. Complex mechanical conduits and an energy core operated slowly in the chest area. One eye was a weathered human eye, while the other was a cold, red-glowing optical lens.

He wore a tattered long trench coat and walked with slow, steady steps, each one making a crisp sound on the rubble.

His gaze calmly swept over the kneeling Lin Fan, over Kate protected behind him, and finally landed on the small remains in the shadow of the stone tablet.

There was no surprise, no sadness, and no fear.

Only a calm and weathered look that had crossed long years and seen through life, death, and destruction.

The moment they saw that face, Lin Fan and Kate's pupils shrank simultaneously, their faces showing expressions of unbelievable shock.

They were incredibly familiar with that face.

It was the companion who always puffed on an e-cigarette, was obsessed with mechanical modification, and seemed cynical yet always stepped up at critical moments—

Franklin.

But he wasn't the Franklin they knew.

This Franklin was aged, mechanical, and weathered by life. Long ago, over the course of many years, he had completed a Mechanical Ascension, discarding most of his human body to become a half-human, half-mechanical being.

He was the Franklin of this parallel universe.

The only person to have survived on this desperate wasteland.

The parallel universe Franklin stopped a few meters away from them. His optical lens flickered slightly, and a cold electronic voice interlaced with a raspy human voice slowly spoke.

"You don't need to be so desperate."

"Guardians from the main universe, and the last successor of the Light Sphere Race."

"Your being trapped here is not a victory for the shadow of the end, but a necessity of causality."

He slowly raised his mechanically modified right hand, his metal fingers pointing toward the sky—toward this long-dead universe with no light and no hope. His voice was calm yet carried an unquestionable firmness.

"You want to return to your universe."

"You want to fix the timeline tampered with by the shadow of the end."

"You want to close the loop of the twisted causality."

"There is only one way."

Franklin's gaze fell on Kate, on the dim light orb mark on her forehead. Word by word, he spoke clearly into their ears.

"Reenact—the Light Orb Birth Event."

As his voice fell, the entire ruin fell into a dead silence.

The wind began to blow at some unknown point, swirling the hazy dust across the sky, stirring up a storm of destiny regarding causality, sacrifice, and the end of the universe within the silent world.