Chapter 2190: Gojo, Yog, and Lucy’s Plan
Back at Gojo’s royal castle, inside Gojo’s office, light only slipped in tiny threads through the closed shutters, and the void dragon himself was sitting on his chair, dealing with a pile of papers in the middle of the pure darkness. Only his blue eyes could be seen, and the barefoot Yog sat on the desk in front of him, going after the papers with him.
In the next second, Lucy appeared standing on the desk as well, and she threw a sharp glare down toward Yog. "I’m back." Moby, who appeared in the corner of the room, looked around in the darkness, confused at the sudden sharp spike in divine magic, and only noticed Yog a fraction of a second later.
"Divine Yog..." She gasped, and Lucy glared at her with a nasty smile. "Moby, go and get the maids to prepare the bath for me. I have some private business to deal with here. You’re dismissed for now."
Moby gulped as she bowed and left the room, thinking about what Merlin said about Lucy. That little girl clearly wasn’t normal, and Moby could only hope that whatever she was planning wouldn’t cause a disaster. Usually, she would be comforted to know that another goddess is there to keep an eye on Lucy and Gojo, but sadly, Yog is the last creature the gods and the angels trust.
Inside the room, Lucy sat facing Yog, looked at her for a second, and then shifted her gaze toward Gojo. "How is everything going?"
Yog frowned and started biting on her toenails with a frustrated face. "Not as smoothly as I’d wanted it to be... Arad is just too unpredictable; he is ruining every plan. At this rate, he will end up walking into the gate." She threw a sharp glare at the papers. "And we can’t even hide the gate. In all possible futures and threads of fate, he always ends up finding it."
Gojo finally spoke. "It is the fates, as long as they still hold power over destiny; what we do won’t matter that much..." He growled, "Can’t we just kill or replace them?" He then rubbed his temples. "No... what they are doing isn’t wrong; what we are doing is the problem. If Arad doesn’t go through the gate and leave existence for good, his own power would crush it. He has to leave..."
Lucy crossed her arms. "It is simple: the universe is already a dead corpse, and he can’t resurrect in it. Just imagine trying to revive someone but using their zombified corpse; that, of course, won’t ever work." She then quickly grabbed Yog’s foot and pulled it down. "And stop biting on your toenails; bite your nails if you want."
"I’m thinking..." Yog growled. "The Gate is beneath the dimensions of space, on the lowest thread. It is the link between what we know as reality and what is essentially the void AO was born in, Ginnungagap, and it is also where his entire laboratory and library are..."
Poking her nose, Lucy sighed, "If you, Yog-Sothoth, the bearer of forbidden knowledge, cannot figure it out, then why are we two even trying?" Yog immediately kicked her in the face. "You’re one to talk, squid. We agreed to work together, so you’ll help."
Lucy shrugged, "As you say... but..." She immediately kicked Yog back in the face. "Gojo is the master, so don’t go ordering me around." As the two started fighting on Gojo’s desk, they started kicking all of the papers away, and he was slowly getting mad at them. When they got on his nerves, he grabbed them by the heads and smacked their faces together. "Both of you, sit down."
Lucy rubbed her nose, and Yog cried as she had cracked a tooth. "AW! That hurts!" She glared at Gojo for a second before sitting back down and pulling all the papers to the desk with magic.
"Arad created this entire universe, and now it is his already dead corpse..." Gojo looked at them. "But he cannot die; he is above Death itself. That is why a better way of describing his current situation is to say he is sleeping, in a coma."
Gojo opened his hands. "And that is the main problem... the universe, his body, is dead, yet he isn’t. He cannot resurrect into this universe. To fully wake up, he would need to create an entirely new body, a whole universe." He looked at Yog. "And that’s why he would eventually end up going back to Ginnungagap; he needs that place to create a new body for himself."
Lucy interrupted him, "And that is where we hit the first problem. Right away after waking up, AO won’t have the energy to defend against the abomination, stay awake, and build a new body at the same time." She lifted one finger. "So, he will either recycle the entire universe and kill everyone in it, or force himself to create enough power to build a new universe, which would drive him mad."
Yog scratched the back of her head. "AO’s power is infinite, but there is a limit to how fast he can comprehend things. In the past, it took him six days to create the universe, and he had rest for the seventh day... but that was when time was unstable." She smiled. "The problem isn’t AO; it is Arad’s ego. Even though they are the same, having Arad go through that to create a new universe is like asking someone to go through a highly traumatic experience. They are still the same person, but highly different before and after it."
Gojo nodded. "That is why it is my job to consume all of Madness before he experiences that." Gojo sighed as he looked at the countless papers in front of him. "And it is my job to make sure he doesn’t get all of his knowledge in one go. It is easier for his mind if he takes his time to learn." She then giggled. "But I bet he thinks I’m the most annoying pest in existence."
Lucy looked at them with a grin. "And it is my job to make sure you two don’t get consumed by your own hunger for power." She reached down and looked at the several papers Gojo was reading. "Time reversal and timeline knowledge harvested from beyond the gate... did the fates find out about this?"
Yog sighed. "They did... even the orcs’ invasion wasn’t enough of a distraction. They were right there looking for my tiny ass." Yog sighed. "I almost got beaten up by them."
Lucy looked a bit angry, but quickly shook her head. "So... I’ve gone through all of that pain for nothing? We could’ve just acted without letting the orcs in..." She threw a glance at Gojo, and he shook his head. "No, they were necessary. Death and Arad almost clashed thanks to that, and if not for that, Yog wouldn’t have managed to slip and bring the data we need."
The rift the orc tried to open wouldn’t have opened if he hadn’t let them open it. Normally, Violet’s will would have blocked their attempts with ease, but for a while now, Yog and Gojo were preparing for this, and he was the one to open the rift on this side.
Lucy gave the papers a closer look. "Those aren’t just timeline data points and coordinates, but eldritch art as well..."
Gojo pulled his dimension sword that Mira reforged. "How to separate the Dragon from the Human... When the time comes, I’ll split myself in half. One will protect the future, and one will maintain the past."
Knock! Knock! "Lady Lucy, the bath is ready." Moby called, and Lucy jumped down from the table. "I’m going to wash up; want to join?"
"Nope." Gojo replied, and Yog jumped down. "I’ll keep you company. Relaxing in hot water would help me think clearly."