Only God
Chapter 72 - 66 Why Has God Departed?

Chapter 72: Chapter 66 Why Has God Departed?

Dertulian was in prison.

He was the second son of the Prophet and also the brother of the King, so Dertulian was held in solitary confinement.

It was just dusk, and the surroundings were slowly becoming quiet.

Even though he had been confined in this stone cell these past days, Dertulian could still find out what was happening outside because people came daily to deliver food and have simple exchanges with him.

He knew that his brother Yarlessto had been seriously injured, and it was feared incurable.

Trapped in his cell, Dertulian could only pray each day for his brother.

Ever since Al passed away, the brothers’ past conflicts had been erased by time, and under Yarlessto’s extended hand of reconciliation, they finally learned to value each other.

Aside from the news of Yarlessto’s grave illness, Dertulian also learned of other matters.

This slave rebellion was unprecedented, not only in scale but also in its significant impact.

The phrase "God has left us" in the mouths of tens of thousands of slaves profoundly shook the entire Kingdom.

They said, God is gone, so innumerable sins have arisen in the world.

They said, God is gone, no one has seen God any longer, God has abandoned the people of Logos.

...

The Nobles originally thought the slaves were merely alarmists, but when tens of thousands of such alarmist messages combined, they were enough to topple the edifice of civilization.

The great King Yarlessto gravely ill and unresponsive, the army suffering heavy losses in the flames of the Giant Dragon, the statues of the Prophet collapsing on the battlefield...

If God were still on the mountain top, still looking after the people of Logos,

how could He allow such a catastrophe to befall the people of Logos?!

The panicked Nobles, taking advantage of King Yarlessto’s coma, incited the Priests of the Pattern Garden to ascend to the peak of the mountain.

Not a single person didn’t hope that the Priests would see the figure of God on the mountain top.

But...

God was not there.

No one could find a trace of Him.

God...

It seemed He had truly departed.

Fear and despair spread like a plague—one telling ten, ten a hundred.

Not just the rebellious slaves,

but every enslaved person in the entire Kingdom was shouting the same phrase:

God has left us!

Logos is filled with sins!

For you replaced God with statues, and love with slavery!

The cries and anger of the slaves filled the entire Kingdom, each person in Logos doubting whether God had truly departed, as Logos fell once again into panic and weeping.

Had God really departed?

Another profound crisis of reason swept through mightily!

The people of Logos could not understand if God really had departed, and if not, why would He tolerate so much sin; if He had left, when would He return?

If God never comes back...

What meaning would the people of Logos have?!

It was because of God’s existence that we were endowed with reason.

Now, with God gone, what becomes of the reason we were granted? Are we to return to being beasts?!

No one could provide an answer, not even the Priests who served God and sought the laws of the world.

The civilization of Logos fell into a second crisis of reason, one far greater than before—a multitude of Nobles, a multitude of common people, a multitude of slaves all started to take action, and rebellion and division arose everywhere in the Kingdom.

Logos was bleeding.

A glorious civilization, not yet past its infancy, was stepping into destruction.

The spirit of the people of Logos was being crushed bit by bit!

Those powerful Nobles united, waiting for King Yarlessto to awaken, once the King woke up, they were going to demand the execution of Dertulian, the leader of the uprising.

Countless people of Logos, those who were lost and without direction, also followed the Nobles’ clamoring to demand the execution of Dertulian.

As if executing this man would bring God back.

As if only through a bloody suppression could the entire Kingdom be reunited.

...

Dertulian heard all of this from the person who brought his meals.

To his own surprise, faced with the encroaching approach of death, his soul remained incredibly calm.

He knelt on a pile of straw, as night quickly fell completely.

Dertulian pressed his hands together, head slightly bowed.

He prayed to the departed God, questioning the departed God.

Asking a question he had asked many times.

"Lord, why have You departed?"

"Have You left because the morals of the people of Logos have degraded?"

The wise among the Nobles all say, God’s departure is because the morals of the people of Logos have declined, people no longer sticking to their duties, Nobles no longer being Nobles, slaves no longer being slaves, the original order has been destroyed.

They also believe it is because sins abound across the land, that’s why God has left.

And only by restoring the original order will God return.

Dertulian closed his eyes tightly, emptying his spirit.

He knew better than anyone that God had departed.

For this reason,

he prayed more willingly than anyone.

"Lord, have you departed from us out of disappointment?"

Not only did Dertulian hope for an answer.

All the lost and wandering Logosians longed for an answer.

People wished for God to tell them what direction they should take.

But God had left...

No one could provide an answer.

At that moment, a heavy rain began to fall outside; it came suddenly, as if the Kingdom itself were weeping.

Listening to the rain, Dertulian continued his prayers.

Morality had decayed, and so God had departed.

It sounded so reasonable.

And yet, and yet...

"Lord, the Logosians are your children."

"Do you wish to see children taming other children, some becoming Nobles while others turn into slaves? Do you wish to witness this kind of moral division?"

Dertulian asked, his voice even, but echoing long in his cell.

His prayers, his questions, were not just for God to hear but also for himself.

Dertulian pondered in his prayers.

Only through God could one see oneself clearly, know what one truly thought.

The Nobles wanted to execute him because he had precipitated moral decay, the old morality had collapsed, therefore God had left, and calamity ensued.

Yet...

Did God love us because of morality?

Wouldn’t that mean if morality changed, God’s love would change too?

The rain outside grew heavier, blanketing the entire Kingdom in sorrow.

The raindrops outside the cell formed densely packed beads, strings, curtains, and the sound of them striking the ground was so irritating, yet Dertulian never minded it.

After a long period of contemplation, Dertulian found no answer.

Suddenly, he remembered his father once said: When all that can be done has been done, all we have left is our faith in God.

Thus, Dertulian bowed his head lower and clasped his hands tighter.

"God,

look at all that we’ve endured,

can you embrace us?

Embrace the suffering of this world, embrace our despair."

Dertulian maintained his patience and faith, praying quietly over and over in the dark cell.

The Nobles said: Because morality had decayed, that’s why God left.

Such rhetoric seemed so rational, coherent with morality.

Though Dertulian did not agree in his heart, he could not understand, what actually caused God to depart.

"No, it’s not because of morality that God departed."

Dertulian muttered to himself.

If God departed because of morality...

"Is God a God of morality and not a God of people?

Does God love our morality rather than us ourselves?"

Dertulian questioned himself, then answered his own question:

"When we were still Ape-men, there was no morality in this world."

So what was it that made God leave?

Dertulian knelt in the noise of the rain, praying, seeking.

In search of an answer,

he couldn’t help but recall the records in the historical texts.

A great flood came upon the last days, threatening nearly all Logosians with death, the flood set to destroy everything.

Not long after, flames erupted from the edge of the world and spread across the sky, causing the Unihorns to emerge. They were assigned a mission by God, to part the waters.

In the sea of fire, the flood was extinguished, no longer to ravage the Logosians.

God saved the entire world because of love for us.

Concerning God, the history simply recorded this much.

Dertulian clenched his hands and gently lifted his head, as if catching something.

The historical texts compiled by King Yarlessto recorded only the salvation of God and not his departure.

Yet now, God had indeed gone.

Dertulian’s eyes snapped open; he had caught something.

Rain fell within the Kingdom, and Dertulian’s tears also fell to the ground.

Even though King Yarlessto endeavored to conceal God’s departure, King Yarlessto was one who had seen God, the history texts would never leave out God’s salvation.

Dertulian found the answer to God’s departure.

"Because of love for us, God left."

Dertulian’s tears mixed with the sound of rain, and he understood love.

He knew,

the Logosians were God’s children.

And so, Dertulian murmured:

"And because we love, we must find where God resides."

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