Adam stood silently for a moment, processing the Echo’s words. Though he still felt the unfairness of it all, a part of him understood the cruel necessity behind the system. He exhaled slowly and asked another question.

"I understand... at least somewhat. But why was the Loom of Fate built here, in the Wasteland? Is there a special reason for choosing this place?"

The Echo of the Divine began to glow brighter, as if preparing to answer in detail. However, its light suddenly flickered unsteadily. The voice that followed sounded more urgent, laced with haste.

"There is indeed a reason, one deeply tied to—" 𝙛𝒓𝓮𝙚𝔀𝒆𝒃𝓷𝒐𝓿𝙚𝓵.𝙘𝒐𝒎

The light pulsed sharply, cutting itself off. A wave of invisible pressure swept through the chamber.

"...Time grows short. I cannot explain everything now. If you seek the full truth behind the Loom of Fate and why it was anchored in the Wasteland, you must find the answers within the World Tree. It holds the memories of this world’s creation."

The Echo’s radiance softened as it focused directly on Adam.

"As for the girl named Ignis... I will loosen the chains that bind her and open a path for you to reach her. She has fallen into the deepest darkness, so the journey will not be easy. But the chance is yours to take."

Adam’s shoulders tensed, his crimson eyes flashing with frustration as the Echo’s words settled over him. He took a half-step forward, voice rising in protest.

"Hey... I still have so many questions! About so many things... You can’t just leave like this!"

The Echo of the Divine flickered sharply, its radiant form pulsing with visible strain. The gentle voice inside his mind carried a new edge of urgency.

"Your time here is running out as well, Adam. This domain was never meant to be inhabited by a living soul. It is a realm for the judged and the departed. If you remain too long, even your living spirit may become entangled in its laws. You must go now, save the girl before the window closes."

Adam’s fists clenched at his sides. He opened his mouth to argue, questions still burning on his tongue, but the weight of the warning sank in. With a heavy, reluctant breath, he forced himself to swallow the rest of his words.

The Echo sensed his decision. Its light flared brightly one last time.

A low hum filled the chamber. Silver threads of energy spiraled outward from the Echo, weaving together into a shimmering portal of swirling darkness and faint starlight. The gateway pulsed with cold, ancient power, leading downward into what felt like the very heart of the abyss.

"Go," the Echo commanded softly, yet with unyielding firmness. "Step through the portal. It will carry you to the deepest layer of the eternal darkness... where Ignis waits. Save her."

Adam drew in a deep breath, his crimson eyes locked on the swirling portal. With one last glance at the glowing Echo, he stepped forward and leaped into the vortex.

As his body crossed the threshold, the Echo’s voice rang softly in his mind one final time, warm and sincere:

"May you be granted safety, Adam. May the light find you even in the deepest dark."

The portal swallowed him whole.

A rush of freezing wind and endless void pulled him downward, faster and faster, into the deepest layer of the eternal darkness. The silver threads of light faded behind him, replaced by absolute black. Adam felt weightless, then heavy, tumbling through layers of nothingness.

Whispers began to rise around him, faint at first, then growing louder, slithering into his ears like icy smoke.

"Give up..."

"You don’t belong here..."

"Death claims all who enter..."

The voices of the damned and the forgotten clawed at his mind, cold and hungry, trying to drag his resolve into the abyss. They echoed with every heartbeat, promising pain, regret, and eternal silence.

But Adam clenched his jaw and ignored them. He shut the whispers out, focusing only on one name.

Ignis.

Adam pushed deeper into the crushing void, the whispers of the damned still clawing at the edges of his mind. He kept them locked out, focusing only on the faint pull toward Ignis. Suddenly, his Trisense flared to life, a sharp, instinctive warning rippling across his scales and through his draconic senses.

’Something is ahead.’

He slowed, crimson eyes narrowing into the endless black. A bone-deep chill washed over him, far colder than the freezing winds of the abyss. It wasn’t just absence of heat, it was something ancient, hollow, and wrong. Yet Adam refused to turn back. Jaw set, he pressed forward.

Gathering mana into his palm, he channeled a controlled burst of Prismatic energy. A brilliant rainbow beam lanced forward, cutting through the darkness like a blade of living light. The glow spread, revealing the silhouette of something massive looming directly in his path.

Adam’s breath caught.

It was a skull.

A serpent skull so enormous it dwarfed even his massive Ouroboros Progenitor form. The bone structure alone stretched wider than a castle gate, fangs longer than Adam’s entire body, eye sockets deep enough to swallow a house. Cracked and ancient, it lay half-buried in the black void, its empty sockets staring into nothingness. Frost-like crystals of pure darkness clung to the bone, radiating that unnatural cold.

Before Adam could even process the sight, the System’s mechanical voice rang clearly inside his head, calm and emotionless.

[Notification: You have discovered the remains of the World Tree Serpent — deceased.]

[This entity once served as the physical anchor and guardian of the World Tree. Its death occurred eons ago during the First Weaving of Fate.]

Adam stared at the colossal skull, crimson eyes wide with shock. The sheer scale of it made his own Ouroboros form feel small and insignificant. The cold radiating from the bones seeped into his scales, yet he couldn’t look away.

’This... was the World Tree Serpent?’

The Echo had told him to seek answers from the World Tree. Now its ancient guardian lay dead before him, deep inside the eternal darkness.

The whispers around him seemed to grow louder for a moment, almost mocking, before fading again.