A tide.
It represented forces that were supposedly unstoppable: fate, causality, destiny, divine will, history, natural law, or the overwhelming momentum of an event.
The destruction of the Pride Domain was a tide that could not be stopped. So was the death of the Pride Army and the Nine-Tailed Fox Tribe.
But when Ashen was set against that tide, he managed to push through it long enough to survive, and even drag the Queen of Foxes along with him.
To break the tide was not merely to resist it, but to interrupt its direction and force reality onto another course.
When he reached the human camps alive, despite the tide pushing against him at every turn… when the humans stationed at that border witnessed his miracle…
He was recognized as a Tidebreaker.
He reaffirmed his status as a Tidebreaker once again when he lifted the rock that was supposed to be impossible to move, breaking his limits again and again before the tide of its inevitable weight finally caught up to him.
That was when a mere title sublimated into an Icon that shone above him, proudly displaying its splendor upon reality and announcing to the world who its host was.
When he saved the Consort who was supposed to die in the eyes of all, even to abstract concepts such as fate and time, the Tidebreaker title seemed to become lacking for such a feat.
That was when it evolved into a Paradoxite.
Such was the reward of someone who achieved something worthy of being called a paradoxical accomplishment.
Yet here he was, once again, affirming it to all by killing a God as a mortal through the simple violence of his fists and a transcendent will to kill.
If that wasn't a paradox of the highest order, then nothing else would have satisfied the Icon currently hanging above him.
But this fact only fueled the remaining Outer Gods' desire to kill him at all costs.
They had recognized that this doing belonged to the current Third Step human ant, not the other monster he kept hidden within, the one that had nothing to do with mortality.
Ashen was feeling it in real time: how the Icon was actively feeding off of his intent and shaping itself to accommodate it. And even as he saw every Outer God rushing toward him, he did not move.
Because he knew someone else would reach him before them all… this mysterious Goddess.
The moment she did, she caught him by the wrist.
"Can we run now?"
The emotionless, slightly curious tone she used to ask him the question gave him the illusion that she would have simply obeyed if he had shaken his head and asked her to keep fighting instead.
But he knew that staying even a moment longer in this place would be akin to offering his neck on a silver platter.
He was truly exhausted beyond measure right now. He had no more mana or vitality stored inside the Hourvault, while his own circuits were screaming from the abuse he had inflicted upon them over the past year and a half.
His mind was as frayed as his circuits, if not more so, and even his immortal army had vanished after the mana he had been supplying them with was cut off.
The moment he nodded slightly, the Goddess did not waste any time.
One moment, Ashen was standing on the scorched crater. The next, he found himself in the air.
BOOOOM—!
He heard the distant sound of explosions, and when he looked down, he saw the place where he had previously stood completely erased.
Floating there were the three remaining Gods: Reshaping, Mandate, and their parasitic leader, Sovereignty.
Ashen couldn't believe that their numbers had dropped by half. From the initial six, only three remained, and he distantly wondered if they could simply finish them off now, once and for all.
But when he looked at the demi-humans, he saw that half of them were already dead, with the other half not far from joining them.
Then, he remembered just how many hardships he had to go through to kill the first three and simply shook his head, mocking himself for his wishful thinking.
'Let's survive for now… It won't be too late to finish them off once I reach the First Step.'
Of course, how could they let their prey leave just like that?
The three monstrosities were prepared to chase him until the end of the earth if they had to.
Ashen, who was being carried by the petite girl, watched them give chase and wondered how his savior planned to deal with this.
As if noticing his silent worry, she gently shook her head.
"Don't worry. Now that he is here, running away won't be a problem."
"He?"
The Goddess did not answer, merely continuing to fly away without caring about the three presences rapidly catching up to her.
And she did not need to.
Because Ashen soon understood what she was talking about.
It started with a rumbling that shook the earth, like the sound of an apocalyptic earthquake.
"Hrrrmmm."
The moon's light shone on his face, making him abruptly lift his head to witness a tall pillar parting the clouds.
The pillar was a bit strange in shape. It was slightly bent, and aside from its azure color, its bottom was colored black.
"Mrrrhh."
Soon, another pillar followed beside it, pushing another magnificent hole through the cloudy sky.
Right after, everyone, from Outer Gods and Narkals to demihumans, abruptly stopped as a crushing pressure descended upon them.
Ashen quickly realized that this pressure was simply caused by the concentration of mana in the atmosphere rising so high that it had begun producing a physical phenomenon.
His face paled as he saw a mountain part what little remained of the clouds above the two pillars.
The mountain's size was so cataclysmic, so absurd, that his mind blanked for a moment.
But his reaction wasn't solely due to the sheer size of it all…
"T-that's…"
Eyes.
Horns.
Hooves.
Bit by bit, the thing's features started becoming clearer, and despite its size, Ashen was finally able to recognize what it was.
The pillars were merely the legs of the creature, and it was a…
"A… goat?"
It was a giant goat walking through the sky.
It was so big that Ashen was sure ten Ashbastions wouldn't suffice to match its size. In fact, he could vaguely see a city so humongous that it eclipsed the largest cities of Seravelle resting upon its back.
"A… ah… ah…"
He wanted to scream, react, or do anything. But he was overcome by a deep sense of despair. He even forgot that this was supposedly the Goddess's reinforcements.
"Do not worry. You will not be harmed."
He only snapped out of it when he heard her voice.
"What is that…?"
"Hammon, the Sky-Ram. One of Seravelle's three World Enders. He has a grudge against the Outer Gods, so he agreed to a temporary alliance." The Goddess did not stop flying away even as she explained, "He will buy us enough time to leave unharmed."
"I… see."
Ashen could only watch as they kept creating more and more space between themselves and the battlefield until he could no longer see anything aside from the World Ender's back.
Even after traveling what seemed like hundreds of kilometers, he could still see a dot representing that humongous creature.
They only stopped when even that dot was no longer visible.
◉◉◉
.
.
.
[Hammon, The Sky-Ram]
[Ashen Hart, still in a trance after giving False Mercy a thorough beating]
[Parasitic Sovereignty]