Chapter 823 — Three Stages
Blade of Dawn · Page 1 of 4
Hedy, Kamael, and the others received their work assignments for the near term and soon left the study. The vast room fell quiet, until only Gao Yang remained seated behind the desk, with Verodai/Ophelia standing before it.
Amber was present as well, of course, though since she had long since dissolved into the air, she could be left out of the count.
Gao Yang glanced up at Verodai, who held the platinum scepter, and gave a calm nod. "Regarding this 'Upper Narrator,' there are a few questions we might discuss. Have a seat."
Verodai nodded and settled into a high-backed chair beside the desk, speaking softly as she did. "Your operation this time has provided us with a valuable reference example—this should be the first time we have ever come into such direct, such close contact with a deity, and a deity in a rational state at that."
Gao Yang said gravely, "Strictly speaking, there are still differences between Him and the gods of the real world. We cannot yet be certain whether the Upper Narrator gestated within the sandbox world is sufficiently 'complete,' and He has undergone the complex processes of madness, death, and division—it is hard to say what changes may have occurred to Him along the way."
"But as a reference, He is sufficient," Verodai said. "At the very least, we can analyze from Him many of the 'traits' peculiar to deities."
"Such as... the purity of divinity, and its responsiveness to mortal currents of thought," Gao Yang said slowly. "The Upper Narrator is composed of two parts, divinity and humanity. The human part appears radical, chaotic, emotionally charged, and insufficiently rational, yet at the same time more clever and cunning; the divine part is far simpler. I could sense that He holds an unconditional protection and regard for His people, and that He will act to satisfy the collective currents of His believers—moreover, in a certain sense, His human part also acts to satisfy the believers' currents of thought, only by different means."
As he spoke, Gao Yang's brows gradually knit. "This confirms a conjecture I held earlier: all deities, regardless of whether they ultimately turn mad and harmful, act in their early stages out of a purpose of protecting mortals..."
"The Defiers have never denied that possibility; we even believe that right up to the final moment of madness, a deity will retain, in certain respects, the instinct to protect mortals," Verodai said evenly. "There is abundant evidence of the shelter the gods have given the mortal world. In humanity's primitive era, the existence of the gods even allowed the fragile mortals of that time to survive countless catastrophes. The madness and degeneration of the gods is a gradual process—and after this operation against the 'Upper Narrator,' I am all the more certain of it."
As she spoke, Verodai lowered her head slightly, resting her fingertips lightly against her chin, as though pondering, as though marshaling her words. "We may regard the 'Upper Narrator' as a deity of an earlier stage—in the early period of His birth, the relatively pure currents of thought endowed Him with a purer divinity. This is the stage closest to the gods' 'essence.' The gods of the real world, by contrast, stand at a later stage. According to our observation records from those years, the gods of the real world have already entered a highly chaotic and bigoted state, and this condition will clearly only continue to worsen..."
"We might divide the gods into several stages on this basis," Gao Yang said, musing. "The deities first born from mortal currents of thought are pure individuals produced by relatively intense psychic projections. They usually arise from a comparatively singular emotion or desire—fear of death, reverence for nature, and so on. These are the 'primordial gods,' and the Upper Narrator stands at this stage.