Chapter 173
Chapter 173
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Translator: Ryuma
Chapter: 173
Chapter Title: Root (3)
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‘Causality?’
The gods of the Pantheon generally hid their true names and went by divine names.
This was because those names fully embodied their divinity and the faith they represented.
As a result, most believers gravitated toward gods of combat that helped in daily life, or those of luck or professions tied to their work.
Gods with overly abstract or metaphysical divine names tended to lack popularity, or their very existence was scarcely known.
The God of Causality was a prime example.
Causality.
Cause and effect.
Simple enough on the surface, but from a philosophical standpoint, the divine name encapsulated the idea that every element composing the world was connected like threads.
Theo had heard the name at least once but had never actually seen one of their followers, and likewise, he’d never encountered anyone in his circles who openly declared themselves a devotee.
And yet, the very first message he saw after the filtering system shut down was from the God of Causality.
In that instant, a hypothesis pierced straight through Theo’s mind.
“Could it be that you’re the one who’s been sending me these messages all this time?”
The messages had always presented Theo with tasks and mentioned the rewards that followed.
As if the sender knew the future.
And they’d thrown in penalties for failure as well.
-Results of karma.
What could demonstrate cause and effect more clearly than that?
[The God of Causality explains that it’s too difficult to elaborate that far, wiggling their hips slightly. Their tail wags unconsciously.]
“…….”
Wasn’t that basically admitting it?
But… a tail?
[The God of Causality clears their throat lightly and urges you to hurry upward.]
Still, one thing nagged at him: the God of Causality acted as if they knew him intimately.
Was it simply because they handled messages similar to the system on the monitor?
Or was there something more…?
For now, Theo decided to heed the God of Causality’s guidance.
The White Tower ascent wasn’t over yet.
‘The White Tower delves into the soul’s past, into the unconscious, all the way to the root. So what could be even further back? Some distant past life I can’t remember?’
The 10th floor he arrived at was a cave.
[You have entered the 10th floor.]
[When humans first gain the capacity for cognition, the initial pain they feel is childbirth. Passing through the narrow birth canal is an arduous process that lingers long in the infant’s unconscious. Yet the joy of encountering the outside world’s light after traversing that tight, dark passage also remains etched in the unconscious.]
[The process of navigating a dark, damp, cramped cave closely mirrors passing through the birth canal. But to return to a time far earlier than you remember, you must retrace your steps through the cave.]
[Return through the cave to where you originally were. Do so, and you will gain the qualification to reach the <root> tied to your birth.]
The light that had illuminated Theo’s path vanished entirely.
Even infusing [Soul Vision] into his eyes yielded nothing.
All that remained were non-visual senses like hearing or smell.
He reached out, gauging the size of the passage he had to traverse.
‘Width barely enough for one skinny person. Height… I’ll have to crouch. About 1.7 meters. How far does it go?’
Theo expanded his mana outward as far as possible.
No end in sight.
It twisted and turned, connecting like a maze.
It looked like an ant hill.
“……This is insane.”
[The God of the Journey grows curious about how you’ll navigate it.]
[The God of Archery clicks their tongue, saying you could gauge distance with arrows, but no, you wield that pathetic sword.]
.
[The God of Destruction suggests smashing everything in your path as the solution.]
[The God of Harmony sneers that if you rampage like a brute, the cave will collapse and bury you alive.]
[The God of Destruction frowns, asking if you’re the one begging to be destroyed.]
[The God of Harmony scoffs, daring them to try it.]
[The two gods clash!]
[The God of the Journey presses their temple, annoyed by the noise.]
.
.
[The God of Causality clenches both fists and shouts a spirited cheer.]
.
These so-called gods seemed far noisier and more frivolous than he’d imagined—a lot more, in fact.
No, forget that—what was the point of blocking his vision while letting him see messages?
Irritated, Theo simply closed the message window.
[The God of Causality frantically pleads for you not to close i—!]
Snap!
“Finally, some peace.”
Theo slowly stepped toward the cave.
Fortunately, external perception was still possible, so his gait felt awkward but movement wasn’t an issue.
“I might wander a bit, but if I can keep going like this, no matter how long it is, it should be fine.”
But as the saying goes, words plant seeds—and trouble arrived right on cue.
[You have lost taste. You can no longer sense flavors from the outside world.]
Other senses began shutting down one by one.
[You have lost smell. You can no longer detect scents from the outside world.]
[You have lost hearing. You can no longer hear sounds from the outside world.]
From the moment smell and sound cut off, warning lights flashed in Theo’s mind.
‘This is dangerous!’
Losing pathways to perceive the outside world was fatal in such a cramped cave.
But,
[You have lost touch. You can no longer feel textures from the outside world.]
In the end, all five senses sealed shut.
Now Theo could rely only on mana-based external perception.
He moved excruciatingly slowly, like a blind man groping an elephant’s leg.
His head banged against the ceiling nonstop, blood trickling down; he tripped on rocks, his legs turning to a bloody mess in seconds.
Yet the cave showed no sign of ending.
No, at this point, he wasn’t even sure if he was on the right path.
‘What? I swear I came through here just now? Wait, no? The ceiling position feels different…!’
An agonizing stretch of time with no end in sight.
Using the Chronograph here was pointless.
It offered no aid to movement.
The cave was too vast; slowing time for contemplation didn’t help much.
Another issue was perception range.
Expand mana too wide, and fine details blurred; narrow it too much, and he lost his bearings.
Repeating expansions and contractions led to confusion in the ant-hill map he’d mapped in his head.
‘Just a bit… let’s push forward faster. Better to keep momentum going.’
Impatience crept over Theo.
[Obsession] wrapped around him, demanding haste.
[Persecutory delusion] piled on, whispering of unknown new constraints.
Then came [Confusion], [Mental Impulses], [Cognitive Dissonance], [Neurosis]; when things didn’t go well, [Depression], [Anxiety Disorder], and [Panic Symptoms] as the world closed in.
And then,
[Mana usage restricted for unknown reasons. All external perception severed.]
When even his last resort failed,
The anxieties tormenting him exploded, overwhelming his mental world.
For a moment, he felt utterly abandoned by the world.
In a situation where front, back, left, right, up, down blurred together, how was he supposed to find the way?
No, was he even truly existing to begin with?
‘Maybe I’m already dead? Buried here after failing the White Tower… Penalty for failure is death… Feels like when I died before….’
Theo’s consciousness shrank endlessly.
The darkness filling the cave seemed to swallow his very being.
He wondered if it would devour his soul, dismantling him piece by piece.
-A world without distinction between self and other.
In such a place, clinging to consciousness was nothing but futile delusion, mere scraps.
No matter how strong his will, it yielded no results—so what use was will…?
[The boundary with the world fades.]
[Consciousness fades.]
[Cause dismantles. Effect naturally detaches. The chain of causality no longer applies to you.]
[The quest is failing.]
.
.
[The God of Causality shouts for you to get up quick—]
[The God of Destruction clicks their tongue, disappointed that someone they’d looked forward to amounted to this—]
[The God of Harmony feels regret…]
[The God of the Journey declares your journey at an end…]
.
Theo’s consciousness dwindled to a single point.
The darkness finally devoured his entire existence, ushering in a time of nothingness.
….
[Madness erupts.]
At that moment, one element within Theo that hadn’t vanished awoke.
The sword orb.
The lingering thought that brought infinite inspiration—and an obsession with swords and swordsmanship—stirred, shaking his mental world.
In truth, as Gishar had glimpsed, Theo had been showing flickers of madness.
That remaining ember hadn’t died; it blazed to life like a wildfire.
At the same time, the madness within him ballooned uncontrollably, repelling the darkness.
It wasn’t enough to restore his mental world—it expanded infinitely.
The madness brimmed with tangled emotions.
The urge to break out.
The yearning to grow stronger.
The thirst for the throne.
These aligned somewhat with the obsessions of the orb’s original owner in life, making their fusion with Theo’s consciousness a natural outcome.
Thump-thump-thump-thump—
The pulsing grew into a violent explosion.
Boom-boom-boom-boom-boom…!
[The God of Causality gapes, slack-jawed, staring blankly at the phenomenon unfolding around you. Drool drips freely.]
Like the universe exploding from a singular point.
Theo’s consciousness expanded with the blast of madness, shoving aside the outside world and growing infinitely.
‘The mission for this floor—I misunderstood it from the start. There was no destination in this ant hill.’
Theo directed the ‘gaze’ of his consciousness not downward, but upward.
This was a tower.
Shouldn’t he look up, not down?
‘Even if my existence seals shut from the outside world, don’t forget… No, the real message was to direct it upward….’
Now using the sword orb’s madness as fuel, Theo instead burned fiercely through the White Tower.
‘Pushing consciousness outward, beyond self-other distinctions—that was the solution.’
His conscious world didn’t just repel the darkness; it merged with it.
All senses returned.
He reawakened to the ‘self.’
[Mana usage restored.]
[All senses restored.]
[You have entered the 11th floor.]
Theo had somehow passed the cave and reached a new floor.
‘Not yet.’
His conscious expansion didn’t stop there. The 11th was merely a waypoint.
‘To the top.’
[You have entered the 12th floor.]
[You have entered the 13th floor.]
‘And….’
[You have conquered up to the 13th floor and reached the rooftop.]
‘Beyond that.’
The tower’s pinnacle was the rooftop, not the 13th floor. But higher still? Only one place.
-The Pantheon.
Theo’s consciousness pierced the White Tower, tore through the sky, passed the planet, and reached the cosmic realm beyond.
It was enlightenment. Nirvana.
The mental state where self-other vanished, where I became the world and the world became I.
[The God of Causality hurriedly adds that what should’ve ended at ascending the 11th floor has escalated due to madness as fuel and secrets of your past life—]
The furiously scrolling messages shattered against a colossal iron gate that appeared.
Boom…!
An iron gate engraved with fragments of countless gods tangled together.
Theo clenched his fist before it.