No matter how in control Sloth was, he couldn't possibly be this immune despite being at 97%.
"One of the reasons the seven Cardinal Sins are tied together is that they are objectively equivalent when it comes to their consequences," Dorian started. "Of course, such things also depend on their host... the previous examples I talked about are all about people who let their Sins take over."
"A truly competent person would never allow anything aside from his own will to guide him." He added seriously.
Ashen just kept staring unblinking. His compatibility was something that had haunted him since he knew how harmful it could be.
And now he was dying to know the consequences, but this uncle of his kept dawdling and deflecting.
'Old people really can't stay on topic. As they always claimed... the brain retires before the body does...'
"...Anyway, back to your issue," Dorian shot him a mock glare, likely aware of his little thoughts from his expression. "Sloth's Achilles heel is giving up."
"...On what?" Ashen asked, question marks floating over his head.
"...Anything, basically." Dorian answered. "Giving up on anything once is like giving up on it forever for us, hosts of Sloth..."
Ashen's face turned grim at the implications.
Dorian went on to provide an example to drive the severity of the issue home, just in case.
"Let's take an example of a regular guy," he began. "This fella is a really passionate writer... he writes devotedly every day, but one day he makes a mistake and his readers latch onto it, giving him so much hate he gets traumatized and gives up completely on writing..."
"Uh-huh..." Ashen nodded along, hand on chin.
"Well, if this were a regular dude, he may or may not eventually go back to writing... maybe he will use another identity, overcome his trauma, or even learn to shrug off the hate..." He paused a beat. "...But what if this normal man wasn't so normal? What if he was a pathwalker of the Sin of Sloth...?"
Dorian didn't leave the question unanswered for long. "Well, once he gave up on writing, he would likely never think about it again..."
"If he were on his fourth step... acknowledging his past as a writer would be considered a miracle..."
He leaned back, gaze now facing the broken ceiling. "Above that... He will get so triggered upon the mention of writing, he will resemble a Wrath user more than a Sloth one."
Turning back his gaze toward the now gloomy Ashen, he spoke, his voice tinged with wistfulness. "Do you get it now? I'm talking about an average percentage here, which is 30%..."
'Then what about 97%...' Ashen thought bitterly, but let the question go unasked. He could probably imagine.
"...How broad are we talking here... what's the trigger..." He asked, hopeful that it wasn't as encompassing as he feared.
But Dorian's next words ruthlessly shattered his hope.
"I've said it before... It's giving up on anything and everything..." He said, pensive. "Whether it's hobbies, jobs, relationships, family, lovers... If you truly decide to give up on something from the bottom of your heart... it triggers."
"Even yourself isn't left out. If you give up on yourself, you'd either become an empty husk or..." He made a gesture, as if slicing across his throat.
"Shit..." Ashen finally snapped. "Fuck... fuck... FUCK!" He threw a broken chair's leg across the room, hoping to vent his rising frustrations, but it was futile.
"Damn it!"
Dorian silently let him vent. He knew how much aggravation a fact like this could provoke.
He had to live his life fearing that one day, if he gave up on anything, he would never have another chance to fix it.
If he fought with a friend and decided he would have nothing to do with him anymore, there would be no forgiveness left.
If he wanted to return to a dream or a promise that he had previously let go of due to ignorance, then he would have nothing to return to.
If he felt overwhelmed with guilt, plagued by self-doubt, and eventually gave up on reconciling with his family... then he would forever lose them. All of them.
He wouldn't remember his father's words. His sister's face would become that of a stranger... and even his mother...
This was just a drop in the ocean. There was a whole psychological graveyard of reasons a person gives up on things.
Fear of failure—the classic "better not to try than to fail" trap. Perfectionism: if it can't be perfect, why bother at all? Impatience, wanting quick results, then quitting when progress crawls.
Comparison. Burnout. External pressure. Self-doubt. Overthinking...
All of these had just become Ashen's worst enemies.
"Haah... haah." After spewing all the profanity he could think of, Ashen finally felt a bit better as he threw himself back on that poor plank.
"...Feeling better?" Dorian asked softly.
"Ah... fuck off, uncle, not now..." But Ashen snapped back, irritation still bubbling over.
"Well, looking at it from another angle, as long as you don't act like a fickle quitter, it's actually okay to ignore such a flaw!" Dorian tried cheering him up, but he was clearly bad at it. "You get to keep the benefits and ignore the demerits! Can it get any better than this...?"
Ashen just palmed his face with both hands, trying to ignore the chatter to no avail. "...Do you really think it would be that easy..."
"Uhh... not really...?" Dorian blinked, then gave him an embarrassed laugh.
"C'mon, cheer up, don't you wanna see the present I brought back with me? It's really cool, y'know?"
Now he was cheering him on as if he was still that fourteen-year-old kid.
Ashen was about to ignore it when he suddenly remembered that Dorian wasn't some next-door uncle. He was a Sin Lord, whatever that truly meant, though it was surely something great.
So a gift from him should be something equally great, right?
He slowly lifted his head, anticipation steadily overpowering gloominess. "...What is it?"
"Ohh, you're finally coming around! Hehe, still that same kid, easy to distract, even after all these years..."
Dorian smugly spoke, but Ashen didn't have enough mind to retort as his attention was stolen by the thing that suddenly appeared on Dorian's palms.
He called it a thing because he absolutely had no idea what it was. The spot just above Dorian's palms ceased to exist in his perception.
It was as if space itself was removed, but even that would leave something behind—a color, an attraction... anything... but not this.
The idea of existence in that tiny spot turned obsolete.
The sole thing he could sense, and the only reason he knew something was even there, was the humongous amount of mana he felt radiating from above that palm.
If he lost his concentration and let the mana phase out from his perception, he was sure he would ignore the thing completely and call Dorian a joker for giving air as a gift.
"Interesting... You can actually feel it?" Dorian gave him an intrigued smile.
"Am I not supposed to...? What's this thing, anyway? It's giving me the creeps." Ashen asked, slightly put out by the way his brain was constantly making him try to forget the existence of that thing.
"This, my dear nephew, is Whisp, the plant that longs to be seen... and I've brought it just for you."
He pointed at Ashen's golden pupils. "Isn't it about time you fixed that eye problem of yours...?"