31 The Duty of the Tribulant One

'Now, how can I combine these five purple orbs?'

Before Kivas could put his thoughts into trying to get this red orb that he had been longing for, a foreign and unbelievable existence appeared inside his torch' illumination.

A flower the size of him emerged out of nowhere in front of him. In the middle where the nectar soul bloomed, there was a head of a black goat with yellow eyes with its pupils being a red slit. Kivas gazed at it looking dumbfounded, trying to determine whether he should be wary or perturbed.

"Curious creature of the misty black water," spoke the goat, although it was not in any language that Kivas could understand. "If you may halt your thoughts and spare some effort to converse, I have a rather meaningful task while we try to reach for an understanding."

'Did the goat just talk!???'

"As much as I want to read your mind, little curious creature, it could barely pass through as a decryptable wavelength if not for that torch of yours to amplify the resonance." The goat's head slightly tilted his head. "How about this, I'll try to speak all kinds of language that I know, we'll see if you react to any of it."

'I feel like you have given a specific instruction to me, But I just can't really make up what it is.'

"Fullsees, Caranar, Borhlhm, Tivris, Kazsuhk, Ccessi, Detakulm, Ampelirhya-"

It went on and on for a couple of minutes, Kivas wanted to get away and get on with his business but it seemed like there was a foreign force that was keeping him interested in the talking goat. Either that a spell was casted or the goat himself was too charismatic to be ignored, but Kivas couldn't take his gaze and attention from the numerous unknown words that the goat said no matter what.

"Amoearkrusbetalishi, Tevyatikashtika, Tourtour-beralushi," As the goat began to look bored, so did Kivas who couldn't really detach his attention from him. "Merhat, Anglo-saxon."

'Anglo-saxon?'

"Ah." The goat's eyes dilated with delightment. "Finally! anon yond both of us speaketh the same language, things shall receiveth fluid!"

"That's not Anglo-saxon, that is just Early Modern English." Kivas immediately corrected the goat's head, only a second later he realized that he had audibly spoken without the use of his mouth. "Wait, I can talk?"

"Truly, it seems like my wisdom is a little bit rusty, now that I've mistaken Early Modern English with Anglo-saxon." The goat's head nodded in amusement. "Be fear not, creature from the misty black water, I've only sought for a means for both of us to converse."

"H-how am I able to talk though!?" Kivas felt like he had an existential crisis. "How can I talk!!??"

"Ease, breathe! Be relaxed, my guest." The nonchalant yet convincing deep voice of the goat head seemed to calm Kivas immediately after the distress. After all, what could be more convincing than another old-head to an old-head. "I've established a telepathic link to your soul. Your torch is being used as a decoder for the traffic of our thoughts, hence why it simulated the experience of the capability of talking normally, and hearing it as if it was said through your vocal cord.

"For most low intelligence creatures, they won't really question the changes in this process. But seeing how you're self aware, not to mention, capable of a language that is buried under the length of decaying universe, it seemed like I'd met with a rather special guest this time around."

Kivas couldn't help his emotion. It was the first time for him to be able to talk to someone in a proper and pseudo-audible manner. If he had a pair of eyes instead of a searing-gluttony mouth, he would shed not a droplet of tears, but a whole waterfall straight from his eye socket.

"Uhm, are you alright there, little creature?"

"I'm fine." Kivas wiped his nonexistent tear, looking even more uplifted than usual. "As to answer what might be the question in your mind, yes, I'm actually not a creature from this world," he said, as he wondered why the talking goat's head referred to him as a little creature. "Although I can't really be sure of that myself."

Kivas then explained the rough context of his existence, such as the concept of reincarnation, and how he couldn't see, hear, nor sense anything outside of his torch. He didn't reveal his background nor any obscure information about him to the talking goat's head, mostly because he was still judging on whether he could trust him.

Not to mention, his experience and wisdom allowed him to read the personality of a human, not the head of a literal goat. To further support the fact, Kivas felt like the goat's head was not his real form. Looking back on how he was referred to as a little creature, his real body must be much bigger in scale.

"Not only that you've amused me, you have also brought me knowledge that I have never heard before!" The goat's head looked even more delighted. "Ehem, pardon my exuberant excitement. Also, it's no wonder that you didn't hear my calls back then."

"I apologize if I looked rude that way." Kivas slightly bowed.

"No, not at all! Before we talk more about things and wonders. My name is none other than Samsong. Many gaze and speech at my time refers to me as the Tribulant One, the storms of many, and the bearer of one. I lived inside this realm for thousands if not millions of years. It might be the same as you, knowing that we know the language that can be comprehended by us two."

"Mine is Kivas." Kivas followed the rhythm, and the common sense to introduce yourself when the other initiated. "Kivas Chariot and nothing else. I can see that your true form is vast, that even the smartest turns pales. We might not be of the same race, but I can feel like we're kindred, nothing more and nothing less."

"Hahahahahah! I like your jazz, my brother."

"So do you, brother!"

Unknowingly, both of them bonded deeply within a small timespan.

"You might have already guessed, but the mist that leads you here is controlled by none other than me."

"And I assume that you might have some issues that you alone can't resolve."

"Precisely, brother." The flower turns around, facing his former behind. "Right there, is my true body."

Kivas might not be able to see it, but the true form of Samsong was far bigger than the size of the image in his head. There, it was a humanoid entity laying on his side like a Buddha. Onyx black skin of steel, coated by leather and fur of primordial beasts. Samsong possessed three heads, each of them were that of a goat. The immense scale and the intimidating presence was enough to turn the smallest and mindless bug to run in fear. When seen by something with a quasi-human intelligence, their heartbeats or bodily system would slow itself down, with their instinct trying their best to tell the brain to gold nothing but fear.

"Now that you make me conscious of it, I feel the sharp and determined gaze coming from the sky over there." Kivas felt a chill spine. "Though, pardon me if I said this. You're not truly alone in this realm, are you, brother?"

The gazes that Kivas felt from right above him.

"You're precise in your hunch, brother." The flower then began to face the sky. "I'm not alone here. In fact, this realm is crowded to the point of overpopulation."

Kivas began to look up as well, even though he couldn't see anything beyond his range of perception.

Right in the middle of the pinkish sky, there was a rectangular hole as if the sky itself was fake and nothing but the ceiling of this realm. Inside that rectangular hole, was a humanoid entity coated in darkness as its gaze latched to both Kivas and Samsong.

The head that the entity revealed by peeking from above was third the size of the whole rectangular hole.

The rectangular hole in that sky was three times bigger than the biggest continent on earth.

And there was more than one entity in one hole, peeking through the ignorant land below them.

In fact, there was more than one hole in the sky.

With Kivas trying his best to expand his instinct beyond the darkness, he began to feel disgustingly disturbed.

"I feel… thousands of sinister gazes…"

"Those are the Primal Standings, a world-destroying monster who sought nothing but the destruction of others except themselves." Samsong's tone shifted deeper. "Back then, I captured each and every one of them, put all of them into this closed realm that I made my friend create for me, and trapped them all within.

"I fought all of them for more than millenia, until one after another tried to run away from my position. They constructed a fake sky while I was distracted by the group that they sent, and lived inside of it, creating a civilization as they copulated and expanded their numbers. But no matter how their kin progressed, they couldn't beat me, so all they could do was gaze from the fake sky.

"My sole role right now is to keep them at bay, keeping them away from harming and tearing the world apart."