384: A Million Moves Ahead
Chapter 384: A Million Moves Ahead
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Eurynome Celestine found herself sighing as she sat down in the soft bed that occupied this room.
The room was gorgeous, exasperatingly so, as it was filled with things of the utmost quality. It was a pretty small room, but that was to be expected because it wasn't located in a house. It was inside a moving vehicle, a spacecraft.
She was being escorted to meet the highest ranking Abstracts of the CUBE. If she wished, she could blink out of this place and back to her home in a second, but she had to attend this. It was important.
"Madam,"
After sitting in the room for about a minute, a voice called.
"We are here."
Eurynome got up, instead of replying. She walked over to the door and pushed it open. It was supposed to open in the interior of the vehicle, but using her authority she opened it to face the space outside.
An endlessly expanding cosmos presented itself before her eyes, beautiful, filled with universes, and even multiverses visible in the far sky.
Eurynome didn't spare any of that a glance. Instead, she looked ahead, where a long table made out of primordial stone was positioned, with two tall chairs presented opposite one another.
Except both the chair and the table were gigantic. She was the size of a human woman right now, and compared to that, the table was as large as a nebula. It would have been eye-boggling for any mortals, more so since the legendary golden Buddha himself was occupying one of the chairs.
Eurynome took a gentle step forward. Her feet touched the dark matter that filled the 'empty' space, and her form expanded. One moment she was the size of a human, who was confronting Neji Hado earlier, and in the next millisecond she was a gigantic deity who could crush stars under her feet.
Gently, she moved the stone chair which felt a little heavy even for herself, due to how special it was, and took a seat.
Eurynome sat opposite the golden being whose body reflected the cosmos itself, as his three heads faced three directions.
Undebatable the strongest amongst the Class-1 Abstracts, the Buddha himself.
The term "Buddha" was a concept. The human who popularized it also existed, but first, it was a concept, and then he. This being was the personification of that concept, he was the living balance, the one who maintained.
They say reality will prevail as long as the Buddha stands unharmed. Even if the Prime destroys all of the Cube, it would achieve nothing if the Buddha remains, because the Cube would reincarnate.
It felt annoying to admit, but in theory, this statue-like being might pose a threat even for herself in a battle. His Tale was quite a peculiar one, after all.
Yet, Eurynome didn't show any respect to him. Putting her hands on the table, she looked into the Buddha's three eyes that faced her.
"You know, I thought this was going to be a meeting. Yet, all the others are just hiding behind your shade like rats. Kind of shameful, don't you agree?"
To lesser eyes, she and the Buddha were the only ones present here. However, she could feel a ton of other abstracts around this plane. They were hidden, not present in their physical forms, but they were observing this, ready to chime in the meeting if they wished.
"I would have expected a few of the Class-0s to be present here in person, too. Is this how you greet me?"
Eurynome sharply asked, crossing her arms and leaning back on the chair.
In reply, the extraordinary being whose golden form was translucent, whose face was like that of a mask, and whose eyes were as deep as the sky around, slowly smiled.
"As temperamental as ever."
The voice was ethereal, like the clash of galaxies. He sounded slightly more magical than herself since she wasn't in her truest form even now. She was still occupying a body, something that she didn't need.
"As for the others, they are observing. That much is enough, correct? If they need to say anything, or you want to say something to any of them in particular, they will reveal themselves."
"Then bring me Luck, I want to see her."
Eurynome demanded right away, making the Buddha gently shake his head, even as he continued to smile.
"That cannot be done. I reckon Death told you that that child is imprisoned. She is not even watching us."
"I am pretty sure you can make a slight exception for myself?"
"Not when you are here uninvited, no."
The Buddha's smile was everlasting as he stared at Eurynome's cold eyes.
"I must comment that it was not very smart of you. Even if it is the Gamer you are after, to come to the Cube like this, given our long history, is a bit problematic."
"Are you taking the Gamer's side?"
"I believe I have not said anything of that sort. The first Gamer was an issue even for us, but the second Gamer does not have to be treated the same way. It was your fault that your daughter died, you sent her after him. It is foolish to expand that mistake by coming after him all by yourself. We let that incident go, but you have done it again."
Eurynome was calm as she stayed silent. She waited for the Buddha to speak again, but the being did not. She was the one forced to break the silence.
"Right, and what if I continue to come after him? I need his head, but unfortunately someone annoying happened to stop me. If you grant me his head right now, this little game will stop, and this matter will be resolved. To begin with, he is from the Prime anyway, so you'll just be returning him to me."
"Truly, if you continue to come after him, on your own, you will force us to retaliate. The Prime possesses a few things we need, what if a few of us go fetch those?"
It was the head on the Buddha's left side that had spoken. The right face continued.
"And no, we cannot hand him over. If we could, we would have done so already, right after your husband and daughter tried and failed to kill him. We may be tolerating, but we are not weaklings."
Lastly, the front face whose smile was still ever present, gave a nod and spoke.
"As you heard, handing over the Gamer is out of the question, certainly."
"Oh, right, of course."
Eurynome clicked her tongue, wearing a smile. She knew that would be the answer. Even if the Buddha had other plans before, Contessa Fate must have convinced him of this decision. That woman was with the First Gamer just like the Director, so she will not allow the Second Gamer to be taken away, as that would cause problems for the Director's plan.
Obviously, they wouldn't give up that boy so easily.
"What do you suggest I do then, Buddha? How must my husband and I quench our revenge on that boy?"
"To suggest you is out of my capabilities. Beyond that, it's relatively stupid to ask the Buddha about how to obtain revenge. In reality, the only thing I can suggest to you, or anybody, is to sit down and breathe air. You may try that out, it helps one calm their nerves."
In short, he was saying she should sit the fuck down and forget this ever happened.
'What a group of stupid bastards.'
Eurynome felt irritated at the three faces. In particular, she hated the left face, that one was always the most annoying.
The front face spoke, seeing her silence.
"You are indeed important, Lady Celestine. We cannot harm you, because your husband will behead us if we do. Nobody wants to see another Great War, I am sure you agree, so we all have reached a decision to let this matter off. For this once. We will escort you out, and you will not come after the Gamer anymore."
"You are trying hard to keep him safe."
"We are not."
Eurynome stood up from her chair, her red hair moving to the side as she tilted her head and looked at the golden statue.
"I suppose you have a point. All right, be it. I shall not mess with him… personally. But it would be a pity if some random criminal from the Prime slipped into the Cube, and happened to meet the Gamer out of back luck, don't you agree?"
"...."
The Buddha listened to her implications with that annoying smile ever present. Then, he nodded.
"Accidents are beyond the control of even us, so of course it would be a pity."
Eurynome smiled at that. This exchange implied that the Abstracts won't hold it against her, or the Prime, if some random gods from there came after Neji here. The same went for a scenario where mercenaries from this Cube would go after the Gamer, perhaps lured by the greed of consuming his system, or perhaps being hired by someone.
Nobody could be sure, correct?
"Thank you for treating me so kindly," said Eurynome, for once not hating the Buddha. "Now, if I may. I think I will get busy out there soon, so I must leave right away."
The Buddha too stood up, and the cosmos shook as he did.
"Must we escort you?"
"No need, thank you."
She gave the Buddha one last look, which he returned with his everlasting smile, and then she blinked out an existence.
Eurynome destroyed the fabric of reality and created a wormhole, leaping from this spot and appearing in the Prime, right outside [Nowhere].
"Well, that was annoying. But not useless. I hurt him a lot, and he lost a lot. Now that I know what type of person and fighter he is, the next invasion will perfectly counter his pathetic existence."
To be fair, she didn't need to go after him at all. She just needed to hire people to deal with him. Even if he somehow survived, he would lose his powers and loved ones too, enough that it would break him slowly from the inside out.
In this long game, Eurynome Celestine saw the checkmate right from this moment.
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[0] Sad, we were close but didn't reach the 200 stones. How about 400 this time? It's closer than last challenge. Alright then, if we reach 400 in the next 24h, you get an extra chapter posted tomorrow!
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