"Thank you."
After Bell spoke softly, she stepped past the attendant into the lavish villa.
Even at a glance, the place was enormous.
The building was Japanese in style, with a pool situated in the center of the interior courtyard—complete with ornamental fish swimming inside. In short, the entire design screamed luxury and made no attempt to be subtle.
But because it leaned so heavily into a traditional Japanese aesthetic, the surrounding walls were low, giving Bell the constant impression that an assassin could hop in at any moment.
'I really can't stand designs that offer no sense of security.'
Bell had little interest in such extravagant Japanese mansions. She preferred keeping her home in a space no one could infiltrate, ensuring permanent protection from intrusion.
After forming her own opinion of the villa, Bell stopped looking around and headed straight for the room she needed to visit.
The reception room.
"Swish!"
The sliding door opened, revealing a young black-haired girl seated inside, long straight hair flowing, clad in a splendid kimono.
After Bell entered the room, she closed the door and sat cross-legged before the girl.
"Pleased to meet you, Shiki Ryougi."
"To meet with me, you specifically used your future appearance? If I recall correctly, in this era, you should be thirteen, right?"
The girl across from her immediately lost her earlier elegance and sighed lightly.
"I wanted to maintain a better atmosphere. With people from two worlds watching, couldn't you at least try to keep up appearances?"
"Image…"
Bell sighed, running a hand through her hair with a helpless shake of her head.
"Appearance is a bit out of reach for me. This is how I normally look. You know how things are on my side… well, they're even worse than here. I only bother with appearances when I have to attend a ball.
"But you know me— I don't like going out, I don't like social gatherings, and I especially don't like balls."
Shiki Ryougi rolled her eyes.
"So you have absolutely no image whatsoever?"
After venting, Shiki Ryougi refocused her gaze on Bell.
"Self-awakened for only two years, and in just those two years you've reached this point. The beings she and I created… even if they dedicated their entire lives, they could never reach your level."
Reality delivered a cruel disparity even gods felt deeply.
That simple phrase—"could never achieve it even in a lifetime"—dismissed all divine effort, pushing everything they had into the realm of "meaningless."
"People from both worlds are listening right now. Are you sure this is something you should be saying?"
"And why not? Their beginning is also their end. No matter what they do, they can never break free from the trajectory set at the start. Their existence is defined by the purpose I gave them at birth. They never had the right to choose."
Bell tried to soften the phrasing, but Shiki Ryougi immediately overruled her. Her calm, even faintly amused tone delivered a brutally honest truth.
Then her gaze shifted back to Bell.
"There is an essential difference between them and you. The moment we created them, their limits were set. Perhaps reaching that limit requires effort, but their ceiling ends there."
"The materiality of the world?"
Though her words were harsh, Bell understood perfectly.
"Because you're so deeply bound to the world—you are a part of it—the gods you create can never surpass you no matter how they evolve.
"The limitations of the world and yourself impose structural limits on the divine system you created.
"My mother should be in the same situation as you."
Thinking of the girl before her, Bell immediately associated her with her own Mother. They likely shared the same sentiment. Yet one thing eluded Bell.
"Why did you suddenly decide to seek a breakthrough?"
It was a question Bell could never fully understand, one she had always wanted to ask.
"I find the world boring because we have no hope.
"We are inherently bound to the world. So although we can shape everything within it, we ourselves lack the possibility of 'growth.'
"Without Growth Potential, you lose the ability to change. A world without change looks no different at its beginning than at its end."
Their omniscience created a longing for the unknown.
They knew the heights of the unknown, and because they knew, their lack of growth left them utterly uninterested.
This is what people call giving up.
Not a willing surrender, but a surrender forced by the knowledge that they can never reach higher.
Thus, an unchanging world held zero interest for them.
This was how Shiki Ryougi once lived. As someone omniscient and omnipotent, she understood every shift in the world perfectly. If she already knew everything, what meaning was there to be found?
Thus, even after developing her own sense of self, her attitude toward the world hadn't changed.
Only when she sensed the existence of "hope"—that faint trace that 377 allowed her to reignite her curiosity and move forward—did she finally break free from her stagnant state. She even joined other worlds that sensed "hope," participating in cultivation and investment.
"So that's how you see it."
Lacking growth—no wonder she fell into apathy.
"Then… the world Artemis came from was destroyed…"
"Parallel worlds follow natural principles. They're branches off countless main timelines. When a branch loses nourishment, destruction is inevitable.
"And once a dead branch falls, it becomes nourishment for the others. This is simply how things work."
Though it sounded inhumane, this was how worlds operated.
Only those with value continued. Worlds without value eventually reached their end.
Shiki Ryougi smiled faintly at Bell.
"Unhappy?"
"No… just a slight sadness."
"If you dislike the sight of it, then it's your job to change it."
Bell took a deep breath. She felt as if she stood at the edge of a deep pit—but she also felt she had no choice but to step in.
"All right."