Once Hars has been brought to his room and everyone has left, Lacius looks at Hars’s wrinkled face and sighed, “I guess it’s already time to let go.”

  A moment ter, three blessed with healing power arrived and quickly used their ability on Hars.

  It took a long time before Hars’s breathing stabilized. Even so, the healers still kept on using their abilities until they’re exhausted.

  When Lacius saw the healers were already of no use, he asked them to leave the room and pulled a potion from his pocket.

  It’s the potion created by the old female doctor, which allows even someone on their deathbed to regain some energy.

  After helping Hars to drink it, Lacius silently waited and hoped for the potion to take effect.

  Seeing no response even after ten whole minutes, Lacius sighed and left the room.

  “Guard the door and immediately report to me once Hars woke up.” Lacius ordered the blessed guarding Hars’s room.

  After ordering the blessed, Lacius continued his daily activity as per usual. But this time, he focused even more on alchemy than before, in hope of discovering a potion that could increase someone’s lifespan.

  Lacius seems to have turned mad as he spent several sleepless nights doing experiments.

  He only stopped when a guard told him Hars had woken up from his coma.

  Quickly leaving his experiment, Lacius went to Hars’s room and saw a pale looking Hars ying on his bed.

  He didn’t say anything and simply fed Hars a health nurturing potion to help him regain his energy.

  When a trace of color returned to Hars’s pale faces, Lacius said while trying to keep his emotions in check, “Let’s continue our work. You don’t have much time left.”

  “Alright.” Hars stood up from his bed while slightly trembling.

  Lacius helped Hars to stand up from his bed before walking toward the pace that has been turned into a boratory.

  Entering Lacius’s private boratory, they started an alchemy experiment together while chatting with each other.

  Both talked about small things from their youth for a few days.

  With each passing day, Hars’s condition kept on worsening. Until finally, Hars can only watch Lacius busy doing his experiment while sitting and occasionally went into a daze.

  With his blurry sight, Hars watched Lacius who had also turned into an old man full of wrinkles yet still does his experiments with incredibly precise movement.

  Midway through Lacius’s experiment, Hars felt his eyes become incredibly hard to open and slept for eternity.

  Lacius who hasn’t realized Hars’s death continued to craft an experimental potion while maintaining his utmost focus.

  Once the experiment in front of him failed, Lacius turned his eyes toward Hars and saw him sleeping peacefully on a chair.

  Lacius somehow got a bad feeling and pced his finger in front of Hars’s nostril.

  When he failed to feel any air coming from it, Lacius pced his ears on Hars’s chest to listen to his heartbeat.

  After hearing nothing even after half a minute, Lacius quickly fed Hars some potions with a trembling hand.

  “Hars! Hars! Wake up!” While helping Hars to drink the potions, Lacius kept on calling his name.

  After chugging five bottles of potions into Hars, Lacius’s eyes turned bloodshot as he began to shake Hars’s body. “Wake up! I ordered you to wake up! RIGHT NOW!”

  Lacius continued to pull many precious potions and fed them to Hars while screaming, “Wake up! I ordered you to wake up! WAKE UP!”

  “Wake up! Wake up! Come on and wake up! Stop pying around with me!”

  At st, Lacius could only grab Hars’s shoulder and accepted reality as he sobbed while whispering, “Goodbye, my st friend.”

  After accepting the fact that Hars has died, many mixed and complicated feelings appeared in his heart. But they all culminated in a sentence that kept on echoing in his mind. ‘I must live!’

  While clenching his palm on Hars’s shoulder, Lacius continued as tears streamed down his cheeks. “My parents, you, uncle Yasu. I’ll make sure to remember all of you and make everyone exist for eternity! Even if it’s only as a memory.”

  ***

  Outside of Lacius’s private boratory room, some guards and alchemists heard Lacius’s scream and forcefully barged into his room.

  Those people initially expecting to see a failed experiment, or an intruder that’s attacking Lacius. But instead, all they see is Lacius who has been crying to the point of ignoring their existence.

  Everyone became flustered and confused upon watching Lacius cry like a child. They also felt their world view being damaged at the scene.

  Most people began to think, ‘Oh, even the god of alchemy would look unsightly while they cried.’

  Just as more and more disrespectful thoughts appeared on everyone’s mind while they watched Lacius’s crying.

  In the void outside the Crystal Cube world, an invisible force that came from deep within the universe silently passes through the world barrier guarding the Crystal Cube world.

  It entered the nothingness surrounding the Crystal Cube world and immediately arrived nearby.

  The moment it passed through the crystal cube that guarded the world, the invisible force turned into a blinding light that fell toward the pace where many alchemists gathered.

  As if having an eye, it quickly moved toward Lacius before stopping on his head.

  The surrounding people panicked before falling into chaos due to the sudden blinding light.

  “Ahh!! I am going to go blind! Stop the light!” Shouted an alchemist whose eyes had turned red from the light.

  A few more screams also followed suit.

  “Is this the power of a god?! Is this a punishment for our disrespectful thoughts?”

  Amidst their fear, everyone kept on staring at Lacius whose head had been enveloped by a blinding light.

  But the more they watched, the more they began to feel something strange.

  Instead of punishment like they expected, every alchemist who saw that glow felt their head become full of inspiration.

  Idea after idea kept on entering their brain, and several pusible alchemy experiments quickly came into their mind.

  Meanwhile, the blessed who also barged into the room and watched the scene from a distance could feel their head become full of inspiration on how to use their blessed power more effectively.

  Even the normal guards and servants who accidentally passed by and saw the glow felt their wisdom has increased.

  Just by watching that glow for a short time, everyone has greatly benefited.

  It’s unknown who started it first, but the surrounding people began to kneel toward Lacius in worship while keeping their eyes on the glow coming from him.

  Even if their eyes have turned bloodshot, they are unwilling to close their eyes and stop the inspiration from coming.

  From outside the room, more and more people barged in after seeing the meteor-like light that fell toward the pace.

  Every time they entered Lacius’s room, their eyes were quickly locked on Lacius and they quickly joined the kneeling crowds.

  With how intense the look on everyone’s face as they gred at Lacius, It seems like everyone wished to etch the crying figure deep inside their memory.

  ***

  In the Divine Space.

  Cedric, who has created some tissue to blow his nose and wipe the tears that fell down his eyes upon watching Hars die, quickly stood up from his chair when he saw the blinding light coming from the sky of the Crystal Cube world.

  When he saw that blinding light. The familiar feeling he got when he decided to intervene in Lacius’s search for eternal life appeared.

  But this time, instead of a feeling of loss, what he felt is an entirely different feeling that’s hard to describe.

  If he must describe it, then the feeling he sensed is akin to completion or a sense of achievement. These sudden feelings coupled with the light coming out of Lacius made him confused.

  Luckily, the System saw his confusion and expined.

  [Congratutions! A creature in your world has successfully pulled the attention of the universe’s operation rules and has entered Universal Enlightenment state.]

  Cedric has many questions to ask. But, he decided to start with the most basic question. “What is this universal enlightenment state?”

  [It’s a state where the universe allows a creature to get in contact with its peripheral operation rules, and … bh bh bh… That’s why it’s important.]

  The System replied with quite a lot of unknown jargon that he knew nothing of. So, Cedric kinda lost it amidst the expnation and asked the System once more. “Expin it in simple terms. Like how you would expin to a monkey.”

  [Alright!]

  [Ooh! Ooh! Aak! *Screech* Oook! Aaak! Aak! Aaakkk! Ooh Oook! Ookk! *Screech*...]

  “Stop!” Cedric heard the monkey screams the System released and tried to calm down. Still, he felt some of his veins bulging from repressing his anger. “Expin it in a short, simple, and concise way.”

  [Universal Enlightenment state is good. Once done with it, Lacius should get some skill or knowledge. It’s also rare, and most of the world didn’t experience it even once from their conception to their demise.]

  That’s a bit too short for his liking, but Cedric is tired of arguing with the System for now. “What does Lacius entering the universal enlightenment state have anything to do with the weird feeling I got?”

  [According to the System’s analysis, that feeling of loss you got from intervening should be a warning from the universe’s rules. Basically, as you’ve intervened, the gains Lacius will get from this Universe Enlightenment state will be lower than if you hadn’t intervened.]

  [Now that you got a feeling of completion, it should be how the universe tells you that it has done what it wanted to do. Which is to grant Lacius the Universal Enlightenment state.]

  Then, Cedric got to his second question, “Why Lacius?”

  [Dunno. The universe is just that flippant. But the System guessed it should have something to do with Lacius’s will to seek eternal life.]

  “Ohhh…“ Cedric nodded at the expnation.

  After processing the System’s answer, Cedric became suspicious. “Why don’t you know about it? When we first met, you introduced yourself as the will of the universe! There is no way the universe’s will didn’t understand how the universe works, right?”

  [...]

  [Using company as a metaphor, you can think of the System as someone in a different department from the part that’s sending the Universal Enlightenment state. We are basically under the same company, but the System is in the sales and marketing division while the operation rules managing Universal Enlightenment state are in the human resources department. We occasionally met with each other and exchanged information, but that’s about it.]

  [Anyway, it’s recommended for you to spend some GP and bribe the Universal Enlightenment state to increase the gain Lacius got. It should make up for the loss you caused by intervening on Lacius’s journey to search for eternal life. Also, do it quick before Lacius exited his universal enlightenment state.]

  Cedric could see the System’s urging. So, he didn’t choose to retort the System’s word.

  Instead, he asked another serious question, “How do I send GP to Lacius?”

  [Send some GP to your world just like when you tried to generate mana there. But this time don’t convert it to mana and just send those GP to the light floating on Lacius’s head.]

  He followed the System’s guidance and checked Lacius’s current location before pausing. “How much GP should I send to him?”

  [Sending 1 GP every three seconds until his universal enlightenment state ran out of time should be enough. On average, the Universal Enlightenment state usually sts for around five minutes. Now that you already spend close to two minutes chatting with the System, you will only need to spend approximately 60GP.]

  [Remember to focus and only send the GP toward the light floating on Lacius’s face to affect his Universal Enlightenment state. Don’t accidentally use it to create things or affect the world with your will, otherwise you will affect the world’s bance.]

  Cedric nodded at the System’s reminder and quickly got into work.

  He focused his attention on Lacius, before following the System’s guide to send his GP to the light floating on Lacius’s face.

  As he is extremely focused, Cedric forgot to count the amount of GP he has spent.

  While he is spending his GP like a flowing water, a warning from the System appeared.

  [Warning! Due to excessive intervention within a short time span, the bance and stability of your world has been affected.]

  [Please stop sending GP to your world in this instant.]

  Cedric read the System’s notification while mechanically sending his GP.

  When he realized what the System was talking about, he quickly stopped sending his GP to Lacius and retrieved his mental power. But the System has sent another message.

  [Warning! Your world’s stability has reached a dangerous point. As the stability has reached below certain point, some failure in the world’s operation might happen. Please try not to intervene while the world tried to heal itself.]