Ke-style law enforcement officers

Chapter 428 The True Personality in a Fictional World
"Have you ever thought about why they call you a sinner?"

Raven suddenly asked Milo this question.

Milo shook his head.

He had only heard this title from people in the church.

From the time of Grazie to the time when Yog Sothoth's projection attempted to descend, it seems that even within the Church itself, it became unclear how to define the nature of Milo.

They believed that Milo's hands were stained with indelible divine blood, but it seems that he never used the term "sinner" as frequently again after that.

Whether things have improved or they no longer dare to continue calling it that, Milo has no way of knowing.

The raven asked very strange questions.

Milo knew that the presence of the raven in the Abyss Illusion meant that this person held a very important place in his subjective consciousness.

The questions Raven asked were, in essence, questions Milo was asking himself.

However, the current situation does not seem to allow him to remain immersed in this way of thinking.

As the thick clouds in the sky gradually dispersed, Milo saw some strange things.

That thing stole the moonlight and the stars...

...

There was no moonlight in the long night.

The scene in the sky became incredibly dark.

Milo could only vaguely make out some outlines with his naked eye. They were incredibly huge, so huge that they seemed to exceed the boundaries of the sky. The "huge" here does not just refer to their visual size, but rather to their existence as if they came from a higher dimension.

Those things moving in the sky have no emotions, no consciousness, and seem to have no subjective thoughts; they are just a mass of operating order and rules.

Everything under the sky is so small in comparison to it, so small that it can be ignored.

……

Suddenly, Milo sensed that the clouds in the sky, which should have been blown away and faded away, had changed. They condensed into some huge human or beast-like outlines, and even evolved into eyeball-like structures that were brighter than the stars but dimmer than the moonlight.

A loud noise seemed to be brewing within the rolling clouds, but it was completely different from the conventional concept of thunder.

Milo suspected that something extremely terrifying was happening in the sky, beyond the reach of the naked eye.

But he had no way of knowing what had happened.

What is foreseeable is a disaster that is about to befall this place.

……

The raven beside him watched Milo.

Seeing that Milo had not left for a long time, he spoke again:

"It seems there are no longer any people you care about in that city."

Milo waved his hand: "Stop playing dumb. Everything here is an illusion, a product of the conflict between my subjective consciousness and the complex knowledge that exists objectively."

His gaze remained fixed on the outline of the life form that had stolen the stars and the moon overhead, attempting to glean some crucial clues from it.

However, Raven's next words surprised Milo, or rather, left him stunned and chilled.

He said this:

"As you say, everything right now is indeed an illusion, but do you really think I'm included in that so-called 'everything'?"

Milo got goosebumps all over.

He subconsciously took a step back.

From the very beginning, he regarded the raven in front of him as a familiar face, like Emma or Enid, a product of his subconscious imagination.

Because it is obvious that Raven cannot return to the Church and put on the robes of the Golden Law again, and the Contract Organization cannot allow him to appear unharmed in the Prayer Square.

So even knowing the danger posed by the raven, Milo remained completely unguarded, because he knew this person was not a raven.

……

But right now, the raven is conveying this message to him—the one standing in front of you is the raven.

Although this could not be verified, it still made Milo feel uneasy.

Just as something incomprehensible and fake appears in the real world, real people appear in a fake world—both are worthy of fear.

...

Despite Milo's wary gaze, Raven remained remarkably calm. He crossed his arms, his clear eyes gleaming with profound wisdom, and slowly looked at Milo, no longer paying attention to the dramatic changes in the sky.

“Any soul that considers itself intelligent enough will inevitably lose itself after a sufficiently long journey. You are not the only one who questions this system of knowledge, and you certainly will not be the last, Milo Valrocan.”

"Perhaps I should call you by your real name, but unfortunately my vision is not broad enough and I cannot see your name clearly."

The raven watched Milo calmly.

His face showed no emotional fluctuations whatsoever, nor did it reveal even the slightest hint of hostility towards Milo; all that remained was the bewilderment of someone deep in thought.

"This is indeed a false world, an abyss. Only life forms that have reached a higher order can touch these illusory things, or rather, create all of this illusion. But we cannot make hasty conclusions, can we? The deeper we go into contact with that supreme order, the more humble we should be. Can you really pat your chest and tell me that the world you exist in is real?"

Milo frowned, staring warily at the raven before him. "I don't like talking to riddles."

However, the raven simply shook its head slightly.

"There is a saying that the world we live in, no, it should be said that all the order and rules in this entire universe, as well as the life forms and matter under the rules, are a dream after the most primordial supreme will fell into slumber, and we are just parasites in its dream. We are all just ferrymen in the dream."

“Back in my hometown, you’d be called a nihilist,” Milo said, shaking his head.

He was now completely unable to tell whether the raven in front of him was a figment of his imagination or something that actually existed.

Because the views and knowledge he expressed gradually exceeded the scope of the knowledge system that Milo had previously received.

According to Milo's logic, everything here originates from his subjective consciousness, so it should be based on the thinking that already exists within his existing consciousness system, and there is no reason to transcend it.

……

“You have the heart of a scholar, because your eyes are filled with doubt, doubt about everything, but it is precisely this doubt that becomes your self-imposed constraint.” Raven stared at Milo.

"Perhaps if you had appeared earlier, the world wouldn't have ended up in this state. But if you had never appeared, none of these changes would have happened either. Hmm... it seems that no matter what I do, I can't change the course of time. This seems to be another paradox."

Some of Raven's words didn't sound like they were directed at Milo at all, but rather like a form of self-deprecation and reflection.

For a moment, Milo felt that this guy was not a figment of imagination, but an independent life form or personality with the ability to think for himself.

But the raven's thoughts never stopped.

He murmured:

"But if you truly have the heart of a scholar, you shouldn't be in a hurry to escape the illusion of the abyss. There are also truths worth exploring here, isn't that right? Which do you think is more difficult: seeking truth in the real world or seeking truth in the false world?"

“I just want to live in the world that I believe is real,” Milo replied firmly.

"Let me ask you again, why are you so certain that the world you originally lived in was real? Isn't that a bit too subjective? And have you ever thought about how to define that distant world where you first existed? Perhaps you'll say that if both are real, then there can be two real worlds, so why can't this one be real?" Raven asked several questions in a row.

But Milo didn't want to answer any of them.

Instead, he retorted:

"Either you are the embodiment of some will in this abyss that wants to bewitch me into complete madness, or you are indeed a raven, but you have gone mad."

For the first time ever, the raven let out a hearty laugh: "Hahaha, perhaps that's true."

He straightened the sleeves of his robe and said to Milo, "Then you can just think of me as some kind of will incarnation in the Abyss Illusion, trying to keep you here forever. That's fine. I like this state of game and dialectics."

Then, he glanced back at the direction of the church clock tower and added casually:

"It's a great pity that there isn't enough time for us to continue our conversation. Your will is strong enough that this place will soon collapse and be annihilated, but we will have many more opportunities to meet again, whether in what you consider the real world or in this abyss."

"Remember, the abyss will always exist. As long as the soul that harbors doubts does not perish, it will never be broken. It belongs only to people like us."

"Looking forward to meeting you again, Valrocan."

"Oh, by the way, you might not know my real name."

“Remember my name, Tutis Clau.”

"Because I may be the only soul you encounter in the second half of your journey that will not change."

"Goodbye."

……

A roaring sound and dust began to sweep in from beneath the church.

Before Milo could even blink, the raven's figure had already disappeared into the billowing dust.

While his thoughts were still immersed in that moment of bewilderment, the world had already begun to collapse.

Next, Milo witnessed the apocalypse as he perceived it.

(End of this chapter)