Chapter 961 — "The Gods"

"I thought I heard some commotion outside," Gaoyang set down his cup and looked toward the far end of the hall with a slight frown. There was an open balcony there, but perhaps because of the angle, he could not see much of the scenery from where he sat.

"Pay it no mind," the god seated across from him said indifferently. "Merely a bit of wind."

"Very well, wind. The winds around Talonde are always strong," Gaoyang glanced at the "god" and shook his head with indifference. Then his expression turned grave again, returning to the topic that had startled him so badly he nearly lost his grip on his cup. "The Gods... So you mean, as long as 'defiance' fails, the gods will inevitably merge into one and become the 'Gods'? How exactly does this process occur? Is there some principle behind it?"

"You really do love to dig into principles," the Dragon God laughed and shook Her head. "Unfortunately, I cannot give you an answer..."

Gaoyang fixed his eyes on Her: "Is it that you don't know, or that you cannot say?"

"Neither know nor say," the Dragon God said. "Though I am the result of the 'Gods' merging, I do not know how it all happened, and I believe the truth underlying this process lies beyond the 'limits' of our communication—even between you and me, there is some knowledge that cannot be easily exchanged."

"Very well, I understand," Gaoyang nodded with a touch of regret, then looked thoughtfully toward the hall's entrance, toward where Hragor was theoretically waiting. "Then what about the matter of Hragor? You know... I once saw a dragon in human form at the center of the Eternal Storm, and I believe that was Hragor. On this point, could you satisfy my curiosity?"

The Dragon God fell silent.

Just when Gaoyang thought the question too sensitive and that She would not answer, he suddenly heard Her voice ring out: "Since you saw it, you should be able to tell—he once stood at the center of that battlefield, leading the dragons to rise in defiance against the gods who had lost control... Ironic, is it not? Now he is the highest-ranking priest in Talonde, serving Talonde's one and only, supreme god."

Gaoyang's brow furrowed once more. He looked at the Dragon God, his voice low: "So this is some kind of 'punishment'? A chastisement handed down by the gods? Or... simply their 'perverse amusement'?"

The Dragon God shook her head. "Neither. It is a transaction."

"A transaction?"

"Mortals choose to submit; the gods end the judgment," the Dragon God said candidly. "This transaction requires a 'symbol', and Hragor is that symbol."

"Is that all?"

"That is all."

"Very well. I understand." Gaoyang nodded, signaling that the topic could be laid to rest.

"Perhaps we should turn to lighter matters," the Dragon God said with a sudden smile, her tone shifting as though she were discussing the weather or some everyday trifle. "You and your companions have been touring Tarronde for three days now—I trust you have seen a great deal. I would like to hear your impressions."

"My impressions of Tarronde?" Gaoyang raised an eyebrow. "You want the truth?"

"If I wished, I could hear countless ornate and honeyed lies—I want the truth, the heartfelt assessment of you, an 'outlander wanderer'."

Gaoyang looked into her eyes, and in those eyes, perfect beyond mortal measure, he saw a calm and a void.

"Deformed," he said. "Prosperous yet sickly, advanced yet decayed. Beneath the noisy, glittering surface there is no vitality at all."

The Dragon God nodded. "A pungent and direct assessment."

"That is the fact I saw," Gaoyang said. "How many years has Tarronde been stagnant? Hundreds of thousands? A million? Perhaps only stagnation of such duration can explain everything I saw. At first glance, I saw its prosperity and advancement—frankly, it startled me. I almost took it for the advanced society that exists only in fantasy—but as I looked deeper within, more and more dark and desolate things revealed themselves before me...

"Tarronde is already dead—dead within a technological framework developed to its limit, dead within a social structure rigid as stone, dead within this... sanctuary you call the 'Eternal Cradle'. Frankly, when I looked upon Tarronde I even felt as though I were gazing at ruins—ruins running themselves on automatic."

At the last, Gaoyang could not suppress a sigh: "This country is called the Nation of Dragons, yet the dragon race seems to have become the most superfluous thing in it—whether the citizens of lower Tarronde or the so-called upper citizens, all have in truth been decoupled from the advance of civilization. That is the fact I saw."

After much hesitation, he at last did not voice the words in his heart: "the ultimate stage of capitalism".

After all, though Tarronde's condition resembled that stage as he knew it, he knew the two were fundamentally different—what had brought Tarronde to its present state were causes far more complex.

One of those causes was, at this very moment, sitting before him.

This time the Dragon God fell silent for a long while—so long that Gaoyang began to worry she might smash a cup as a signal for five hundred axemen to rush in. But at last she spoke, and after a sigh, her expression turned as though a burden had lifted: "To render such an assessment, you have indeed looked with great care."

"Which is precisely why I am now all the more curious—" Gaoyang said aloud. "What exactly is the chain between gods and mortals? How does it take effect, and how does it hold mortals and gods alike in bondage? Where does its power manifest? And if we wish to break free of it... where must we begin, if we are to be 'correct'?"