Childhood Friend of the Zenith Novel MTL - Chapter 1010

Chapter 1010

A profound quiet settled over the surroundings.

The surface of the lake shivered with a soft, undulating motion.

The smell of fresh vegetation grazed my nostrils.

A temperate glow, gentle enough to be confused with daylight, permeated the area, paired with a mysterious wind that persistently stirred the strands of my hair.

There was nothing especially unusual about it.

In fact, everything felt overwhelmingly common.

Even the bark of the tree under my palm—indistinguishable from any ordinary tree—seemed completely unremarkable.

But within all this familiarity, the existence of the astonishing person standing opposite me made me scowl.

‘What is happening?’

What was I actually witnessing?

Thud.

My body seemed to have ceased operating. My blood moved heavily, the current of power within me growing lethargic.

The source of that feeling—was her.

Our gazes met.

Eyes of violet-red, reminiscent of the aurora lights that blaze through the night heavens.

A fall of snow-white hair streamed over her shoulders, merging with the fairness of her complexion.

And that tender tone she had used a moment before to address me.

Gradually, my mind assembled each feature, and my paralyzed form started to react.

‘How…?’

How could she be present here?

Did she track me?

It was conceivable. A being such as the Lord was beyond comprehension—if she possessed methods to materialize like this, it wouldn’t shock me.

However—

‘A moment ago…’

More than the doubt, a different part of what she had said resonated much more profoundly inside me.

«My son.»

The phrase she had uttered…

I could not possibly misunderstand what it signified.

«…Mother?»

Hesitantly, I voiced the name I had ached to speak.

And she smiled.

Then, lifting a pale, slender hand, she moved it toward my face.

Her motion was deliberate—painfully slow—yet I found myself unable to refuse her.

At last, her fingers made contact with my cheek.

It was then—

«Ah…»

The instant I registered my mother’s touch, I understood.

There was no feeling.

Not in terms of heat or cold—

I could perceive nothing at all.

Which indicated—

‘A remnant? An echo?’

The figure before me was not truly living.

And still, I was aware that my mother lived on in another place.

So to label this a simple remnant felt… inaccurate.

‘Is this also the effect of an illusion or some enchantment?’

This was not just a trick of the mind. It had to be one or the other.

As this realization took hold, a wave of disappointment washed through me.

Because the woman facing me was not real.

And then—

«I am sorry.»

The apparition of my mother expressed regret.

«You appear deeply disappointed.»
«…Mother.»
«Yet this was the sole method available.»

Her demeanor altered as she spoke.

A mournful smile.

It gripped my heart.

I could hardly recall her features clearly anymore.

But that particular look—

That one, I would always recognize.

It was the identical expression she had worn when she abandoned me.

The final memory she had given me.

«I will not request your comprehension… However, if you are encountering me in this manner, it signifies that every other alternative was exhausted.»
«…What is occurring?»

What was going on?

Why was this illusion of my mother here?

Unable to grasp it, I asked the question.

And my mother answered.

«This was the only path for me to communicate with you.»
«…Communicate with me?»
«Indeed. And, it is also because you made contact with the Divine Tree.»

She indicated the tree at my back—the Divine Tree.

«And additionally… it implies that child fulfilled her role.»
«…That child?»
«The one who has been guarding you in my place.»
«…Are you speaking of… Shin Noya?»
«Correct.»

«……»

Hearing that, I was briefly lost for words.

To refer to Noya as a child…

In terms of appearance, my mother could be mistaken for a youthful girl—or even a grandchild.

And yet, she called Noya a child?

«I am thankful. It appears she has performed admirably.»
«No…»

There were innumerable remarks I wished to make.

But this was not the moment.

Because there were much more pressing questions I needed to pose.

«Was it you… who drew me into the Abyss?»

My mother stayed silent for a beat, simply watching me.

She compressed her lips, as if weighing her response—

Then she spoke.

«Yes.»

She affirmed it.

«If you are present here, then it signifies… I was the one who summoned you.»

So it was confirmed.

I had already been told something similar.

But I required verification from her.

I had entered the Abyss because my mother had called me.

And if that was true, only one question remained.

«…Why did you summon me here?»

Why had she brought me to this place?

And beyond that—

«Am I… truly destined to become a catastrophe?»

«……»

Exactly as Shin Noya had claimed—

Not Cheonma.

Not any other.

But me.

Was I the genuine calamity fated to obliterate Zhongyuan?

At my words, my mother’s eyes opened a little wider.

Then—

Her face grew even more pained than previously.

«…You have deduced that much. How regrettable.»

«……»

Those words…

Were more crushing than silence.

My hands balled into fists of their own accord.

«So it is true? I truly am a disaster?»

Her reply suggested that I was the entity meant to annihilate all existence in Zhongyuan and begin anew.

I had anticipated this.

Following my discussion with Noya, I had recognized the likelihood.

But—

«…Why?»

Even so, I could not completely embrace it.

«Why me?»

I was unaware of what look I wore.

But I sensed it must have been distorted by fury.

«…Why, of all people, is it me? Do you have any conception of the life I have endured?»

I had been reunited with my mother, even if only an echo.

But instead of happiness, the feelings I had repressed for so long burst forth.

«Damn it—! I…! Do you know everything I have suffered?!»

It had been under a decade since my return.

A brief period, relative to my previous existence.

But the actions I had taken in that time were numerous.

Initially, I had only desired a marginally improved life.

I had believed, if I could exist in peace—free from the catastrophes of my past—that would suffice.

That was my original aim.

Yet as time advanced, I understood that to safeguard those I valued—

I would need to confront Cheonma personally.

To that end, I committed many acts.

My physique had long since corroded and grown blunt, too damaged for lofty principles or righteousness.

I cast aside ethics, discarded uncertainty.

I stained my hands with blood I should never have spilled.

I did not pursue glory or recognition—I employed them as instruments.

Every action was for the road ahead.

For those who had lived and died on my behalf.

For them, I withstood all to reach this point.

And now—

«And now you claim that I am the disaster?»

I was intended to destroy those very people?

«Why…? Why me? If nothing else—»

If nothing else—

«It should not be me.»

«……»

«That is utterly senseless.»

I recalled the slaughter Cheonma had wrought in my former life.

The atmosphere in Zhongyuan had been thick with the odor of blood.

An era where only cries and hopelessness remained.

Fires consumed everything to ashes.

A mother’s howl for her dead child.

A man clutching his wife beneath the wreckage of their home, his body dissolving into cinders.

The moon dimmed, and the stars plummeted.

The day when innumerable heroes, who might have brightened the world, died—while the corrupt and the debased ascended.

Blood flowed so abundantly that it saturated the skies and swamped the land, transforming the world into a red ocean.

If asked to define hell, I would indicate that very vision without doubt.

«Why am I the disaster?»

Cheonma, the architect of all this, is not the disaster, but I am?

No matter how deeply I pondered, it eluded my understanding.

«…What have I committed…?»

To claim I had done nothing would be false, pure arrogance. But measured against Cheonma’s deeds in my past life, the lives I had taken were a mere droplet in a vast sea.

And yet, in answer to my furious words—

«…I apologize.»

It was a brief apology.

A terribly brief one.

«Ha…»

A empty exhalation left me. I emitted a quiet, bitter laugh.

«I desired to see you so intensely… I never imagined it would be under these circumstances.»

How greatly had I yearned for her?

And yet, how equally had I wished to forget her?

To me, my mother was a perpetual thirst.

Like a vessel leaking from a hole in its base, eternally vacant, regardless of how much was poured in.

I had lived in desperation, craving to fill that emptiness—

Only to finally encounter her again, and be told this.

«…This is fucking hell.»

I barely suppressed the oath climbing up my throat.

«Then. The reason you summoned me here—was it to transform me into a disaster?»

I could detect the rage in my own tone. But there was no retreating now.

She had stated my soul had been warped—
That this deformation had prevented my destiny as a disaster from fully awakening.

That consuming the divine fruit had returned me to my true form.

And the issue was—

«That divine fruit… that was your arrangement, correct?»
«Yes.»

Pursuing Yarang, ingesting the divine fruit—

All of it was engineered by my mother.

«…And distorting my soul initially? Was that you as well?»
«Yes.»

I did not inquire how.

That was not what I needed to learn at this instant.

«Why?»

«You exerted such effort to suppress it… So why bring me here only to reverse it?»

If arriving in the Abyss was no accident or twist of fate, then this, too, must be her intention.

What did she truly want from me?

Surely—

«You wish for me to become the disaster—»
«No.»

She interrupted before I could complete the thought.

A different reply than earlier.

«…Certainly not.»
«Then—»
«Fate…»

Before I could continue, she spoke over me again.

«Fate resembles a road that cannot be bent or halted. It is a path you must keep treading, because to stop is not an option.»
«…What does that mean?»
«The will of the world has saturated you… It was an inevitability, unalterable by any means.»

Crack.

She stretched out and skimmed her fingers over the Divine Tree.

Unlike my own touch, which yielded nothing, her contact with the wood created a sound.

«Thus I resolved—if I could not halt it, if I could not warp it… then I would conceal it.»
«Conceal it…?»
«Indeed. If there was no method to alter it, then I would shroud it from the world’s sight.»
«Shroud it from the world’s sight…?»

What in the world did that signify?

As I frowned, struggling to decipher her meaning—

«Zhongyuan is an irregularity.»

She continued speaking.

«The instant it survived an insurmountable catastrophe, that became the issue.»

She was alluding to Cheonma’s initial rampage—

«It rendered the impossible, possible. That attracted the world’s notice… And shortly after, it detected an error. Because to surmount an absolute—»

Her eyes locked with mine.

«—necessitates that someone accomplished what must never be done.»

Something that should never have occurred.

And someone who caused it to occur.

In my thoughts, I recollected Mua, once titled the master of Zhongyuan, and Yeon Ilcheon, the one who had come back from death.

«Thus, the world acted to rectify its error. It would not permit the same mistake to recur.»
«…Which is why you were dispatched to Zhongyuan.»

The world would not repeat its failures.

It debilitated the defenders of Zhongyuan, guaranteeing they could not oppose another disaster.

Then, it dispatched a new calamity.

That calamity was supposed to be my mother—

«And yet, it did not succeed.»

She had not ascended as the ruler of Zhongyuan.

She had not arrived as a disaster.

And with that failure, the world devised another scheme.

That scheme was—

Me.

All I had uncovered so far pointed to that end.

Why me?

If it was me, how precisely would I become a disaster?

I did not want to comprehend.

I rejected comprehension.

But reality disregarded my refusal.

Regardless of how nightmarish this was, it remained truth.

I gritted my teeth, ready to speak—

«…You are mistaken.»

My mother contradicted me.

«The world did not fail.»
«…What?»

It did not fail?

«What do you mean by that?»
«My son, from the onset… The world never planned for me to be Zhongyuan’s disaster.»
«…But you arrived.»
«Yes, I did. However… I was not sent as a disaster.»

What was she saying?

«The world had no intention of assigning such a purpose to a master who had already forfeited their own world. It simply lacked any alternative—because I was the only one capable of moving between worlds for a time.»

That was what Noya had revealed.

That because two Lords coexisted in the Abyss, specific things became feasible.

But—

«…Was that not exactly why you could arrive as a disaster?»

If my mother had come to Zhongyuan as a disaster—

And if she had failed—

Then was I not just her substitute?

That was what all evidence implied.

«I did not enter Zhongyuan as a disaster. No… Not as a Lord, but instead—»

She halted herself.

Her eyes found mine, her typically calm face contorting.

Faint creases formed on her forehead, emotions spilling over.

That expression—

The sentiments behind it were grief.

And remorse.

The moment she made that face, I knew.

I knew that whatever she was going to say—

It would not be something I wished to hear.

And then—

«…It is more precise to say that I came to birth a disaster.»

She said it.

And for a long time, I was speechless.

I could not utter a word.

Because what she had just revealed—

Meant that from the very start—

My entire existence had been part of the world’s design.