Silence fell abruptly, dense like a fog.
At Bakuzan's question, Morlük slowly lowered his head, the same calm smile stretching his lips. His eyes closed, as if savoring the tension that had just filled the room.
— That's a very good question… he murmured, in a voice that seemed to resonate in the very air itself.
Then he reopened his eyes.
Their golden gleam turned not toward Bakuzan, but toward Salomi.
He raised a finger, his gesture imbued with an almost solemn slowness:
— If I am here… it is for her.
A shiver ran through the room.
Salomi stepped back, unsettled, while Sakolomi frowned.
— For me? she repeated, her voice trembling.
Morlük nodded serenely.
— Yes. I observed your confrontation against my fragment, Isissis. You knew you could not defeat him… but you stood your ground. You kept hitting, breathing, rising.
He smiled, closing his eyes for a moment.
— And that, few beings would have done.
His tone was peaceful, but his aura grew heavier, so vast that it made the ground beneath their feet vibrate.
— Fear nothing, he added calmly. I do not come to claim vengeance for this fight.
His eyelids reopened slowly, and his pupils suddenly seemed to contain reflections of galaxies.
— I have come to offer him a role… that of being my Apostle.
The words echoed in the air like a silent thunderclap.
Everyone froze.
— What?! exclaimed Salomi.
— Salomi?! repeated Sakolomi, stunned. — The Apostle… of Morlük himself?
Bakuzan, for his part, remained motionless. His gaze alternated between Morlük and his sister, trying to grasp the deep meaning of this invitation.
Morlük raised his hand, calming the palpable tension with an invisible gesture:
— Do not worry. I impose nothing upon her. I simply love her light, her instinct… this way of refusing the destiny traced for her. Even facing a god, she keeps her gaze high. And I like that.
His tone changed subtly, becoming graver, older:
— As for you, Bakuzan… I know you have absorbed Isissis. You surely expected me to speak to you about it.
He smiled slightly.
— It is not a problem. As long as he exists within you, he maintains his order — and through you, he still watches over the Second Zone.
He tilted his head slightly, his gaze shining with a strange compassion.
— And besides… if he wanted to escape, he would have done so already. During your fight with Sakolomi, you were drained, vulnerable… yet he remained.
He paused, his words falling like a revelation.
— It is that part of him… feels good inside you.
Bakuzan felt his heart tighten. He no longer knew whether to feel relieved or frightened.
Morlük turned again toward Salomi, and suddenly his aura softened, becoming almost luminous.
— So, my little one… do you want to be my Apostle?
His voice was almost paternal in its gentleness, but each word carried the weight of destiny.
— If you accept, I will grant you the power needed to endure any fight. A strength beyond fear, pain… and even death.
Salomi stood frozen, hands over her mouth.
Her heart beat so loudly she thought she could hear it in her head.
To become the Apostle of Morlük, the living union of Creation and Destruction…
It was more than an honor: it was a miracle.
And also… a terror.
Salomi hesitated, her voice trembling: "Are you sure… really sure?" She lowered her eyes, as if the simple idea burned her lips. "In fact… it seems too easy. Aren't you hiding a plan behind all this?"
Morlük burst into a deep laugh, resonating like an echo. "Your caution is justified, my little one," he said, tilting his head slightly. "But do not worry. To be honest… I have never offered anyone to become my apostle. I almost never leave my zone. But you… I have this strange and irresistible desire: to reflect myself through you, to see you embody a fragment of my ego. That is what I desire… now."
Salomi took a deep breath, her hands trembling: "And… what about your governance then?"
Morlük frowned, his gaze growing distant. "I do not govern. My fragments take care of everything. I am more a silent witness than anything else. I do not intervene in their affairs… nor in those of the lower zones."
Salomi remained silent, her gaze shifting between her brothers. Sakolomi gave her a reassuring, almost imperceptible smile, as if to say: You can do it, it's not dangerous. But Bakuzan remained silent, lost in thought.
He closed his eyes and let his consciousness drift, immediately sensing the presence of Isissis 1, standing, accompanied by Validus.
Bakuzan stared into the void and asked, in a low but firm voice: "Is it possible to trust Morlük? You are a part of him… you must know him. So tell me, what can you say about him?"
A cruel laugh, scattered into a hundred voices, echoed in his mind. "And what makes you think I'd tell you, huh?" growled Isissis. "Nothing. Absolutely nothing. Especially not with that guy…"
Bakuzan remained silent, weighing every word that might cross this fragment's mind. Isissis made a brusque hand gesture: "You'd better kindly leave…"
Validus, visibly irritated, intervened: "Why such hostility to everyone? It's unbearable!"
Isissis replied without hesitation, his tone sharp: "Shut up, you. Mind your own business!"
Silence fell again. Bakuzan, eyes fixed on Isissis, whispered: "You are disappointed… because Morlük said that even if you transcend, you remain a part of him?"
Isissis slowly turned his head, eyes sparkling with a mixture of irony and defiance: "What goes through your mind, huh?"
Bakuzan lowered his eyes, his voice full of regret: "I'm really sorry… for not being able to help you surpass him. So that you can assert yourself, fully…"
Validus, silent until then, also nodded, as a sign of concession.
Isissis stared at both of them, then burst into a shrill and contemptuous laugh: "No, but you mortals… Even becoming great mythical beings, you never change! Always thinking you can… help a god like me?"
Bakuzan clenched his fists, a shiver running down his spine. "Maybe I still have mortal limits as you think… but one thing is certain. It is not out of simple principle that you show hostility. It is not because you embody what you are that you try to surpass your whole… Morlük."
Isissis suddenly widened his eyes, as if struck by Bakuzan's words.
A crack appeared in his mask of arrogance.
Bakuzan, gently: "You know… I don't mind helping you if—"
"Enough."
The tone dropped, sharp but trembling.
The cut was brutal, almost painful.
Validus and Bakuzan exchanged a troubled glance.
Isissis remained motionless, his head bowed, his face tense with an unusual expression — almost melancholic.
His voice, when he resumed, was no more than a vibrant whisper within consciousness:
"You have already helped me much more than you think…"
Bakuzan frowned: "I… am not sure I understand."
Then Isissis slowly raised his head, his gaze fixing on an invisible point in Bakuzan's mental void.
A strange gravity reflected there.
"Morlük," he finally said, "as the Threshold of the Second Zone, is not a simple entity like other meta-conceptual gods. He is a total structure… An architecture of being."
He lowered his eyes, thoughtful.
"When he created Shylty and me, he divided his essence to interact with the lower planes.
But we, fragments, by becoming individualized, developed our own consciousness.
And that is… where the paradox was born."
He closed his eyes, and his voice became almost trembling:
"To survive, I must believe I am separate from Morlük."
Bakuzan and Validus froze, stunned.
Bakuzan: "What do you mean… to survive?"
Isissis reopened his eyes, a sad gleam burning within.
"Because if I accepted fully the truth — that I am only a part of him — then I would dissolve.
I would cease to exist as a distinct consciousness.
I would merge once again into his matrix… and I would die."
The silence that followed was glacial.
Validus lowered his gaze, feeling the weight of these words crush him.
Even Bakuzan, accustomed to probing the mysteries of existence, felt a shiver run through his soul.
Isissis's hatred toward Morlük…
It was not rebellion.
It was a vital reflex — an ontological preservation mechanism.
A way of saying: I am.
Isissis did not hate Morlük because he despised him.
He hated him because he loved him too much.
Because loving Morlük… would mean returning to him.
And returning to him… was disappearing.
An impossible love, sealed in the cosmic logic of their existence itself.
And Morlük, it seemed, knew this.
That is why he did not fight it: he respected this hatred, for it proved that Isissis possessed his own will.
Isissis resumed, in an even graver tone:
"Yes, he, Shylty and I… Morlük is our father.
But his very principle says that I was born from him, and that I exist only in him."
He raised his gaze, voice tight:
"Yet… I am me. I want to be me.
I want to exist without him… because I admire him too much to bear it."
These words resonated like the confession of a dying star.
Then, slowly, Isissis turned his gaze toward Bakuzan.
"Where you saved me," he said, "is in our fusion.
Our mingled essences freed me from part of my destiny.
I am no longer merely a fragment of Morlük: I am also an essence of Bakuzan.
And as long as this part exists in me… I can recognize myself through you, rather than lose myself in him."
A slight smile — bitter but sincere — brushed his lips.
"Thanks to you, I still exist… no longer as a fragment, but as a being."
And in the silence of the shared consciousness, one might have sworn to feel, for the first time, in Isissis, something that resembled… peace.
After hearing Isissis's words, a slight smile appeared on Bakuzan's face.
"Listen, Isissis…" he said with unexpected gentleness. "You can be whatever you want living with me. No need to fear returning to Morlük… it's over."
Isissis looked up at him, a sincere smile forming on his features. Validus, beside him, also smirked, proud to perceive this subtle but profound change in the atmosphere.
Isissis, voice imbued with rare warmth, added:
"And you… you can tell your little one to trust Morlük. She has absolutely nothing to fear with him, believe me."
Bakuzan nodded, grateful:
"Thank you, Isissis…"
He left Isissis's consciousness and turned his gaze to Salomi, a benevolent smile lighting his face.
Salomi, feeling the silent approval of her elder brothers, relaxed and met Morlük's eyes. The god watched her, patient and impassive, but his imposing aura already commanded respect.
"So… have you made your choice, little one?" asked Morlük with a calm but authority-filled voice.
Salomi took a deep breath, her heart racing wildly, then nodded resolutely:
"I accept to become your apostle."
She bowed deeply, marking a reverence full of respect and humility. "We may link now…" she murmured, her tone solemn but filled with determination.
A sacred silence settled for a moment, as if the universe itself held its breath, witness to this alliance between a human of exceptional courage and the entity embodying creation and destruction simultaneously.