OP Absorption
Chapter 63: Revelation

Chapter 63: Revelation

The revelation hung heavy in the air. The purpose of the fight seemed to evaporate, replaced by a shared, albeit vastly different, position under the oppressive thumb of unseen forces.

Fin felt the Queen’s gaze on him, sharp and assessing. She had revealed truths that shattered his worldview, yet her own situation seemed just as constrained, albeit on a grander scale.

"So," he said, breaking the silence, his voice still flat, "this whole dungeon, the spiders, you... it’s all just a prison cell?"

"An oversimplification," she replied, tracing a pattern on the floor with the butt of Requiem’s shaft. "But essentially correct. A gilded cage, perhaps. Maintained by forces that find my existence inconvenient."

It made a sickening kind of sense.

Dungeons weren’t random anomalies. They were curated pockets of broken worlds, isolated dimensions stitched together. Farms. Prisons. Playgrounds for beings he couldn’t comprehend.

The monsters weren’t inherently evil. They were just... inmates. Forced combatants in a cosmic game, just like the Hunters scrambling for survival and mana stones on the other side of the veil.

Was it all just a game?

He had so many questions. A universe of them exploding behind his blank expression. Admins. Outer Gods. True Gods. Even fucking demons.

So little time.

This talk, this bizarre truce mid-battle, it was... interesting. But the fundamental equation hadn’t changed.

He needed to kill her.

There was no other way out. No reasoning with a warden of this scale, no appealing to higher authorities he didn’t even know existed moments ago. Kill the Queen and leave the dungeon. That was the path.

The only path.

---

Arachne watched them from her huddle against the wall. She couldn’t hear the words exchanged across the hall, the distance too great, the Queen’s voice too controlled now.

But she felt... peace. A strange, quiet calm settling over her terror.

The connection was back. The moment Fin’s eyes had snapped open, that invisible tether reformed. But it was different. Not the draining, parasitic pull he’d inflicted before, nor the forced bond she shared with her Queen.

This felt deeper. Integrated. Like hearing a faint echo of the cold, clear thoughts racing behind those disturbing cube pupils. She felt his sudden understanding, his renewed, icy resolve.

And strangely, it didn’t frighten her. Seeing the Queen, her all-powerful, terrifying goddess, paused, censored, conversing with this human as something almost... equal? It cracked the foundation of her world.

Maybe the Queen wasn’t absolute after all.

---

The shift was subtle, almost imperceptible, but the Queen felt it instantly. The brief flicker of shared understanding vanished from the human’s energy signature, replaced by the cold, sharp edge of returning bloodlust.

A flicker of disappointment, perhaps? Or was it resignation?

She met his gaze, a faint, knowing smile touching her lips. Requiem remained lowered, resting easily against the floor.

"Before we resume our... disagreement," she said, her voice soft again, almost conspiratorial, "perhaps one final piece of knowledge?"

She tapped her own chest lightly. "That Silver Core humming within you. A rarity, yes. But do you know why?"

Fin’s blank expression didn’t change, but a flicker of interest sparked deep within those cube pupils. The Silver Core. Juliana’s core. The foundation of his power before the Mana Cell’s chaotic infusion.

She leaned forward slightly. "They aren’t just conduits, human. They are fragments. Echoes of something far older, far more..."

Tremors began.

Low at first, a deep vibration in the stone beneath their feet. The silvery light of the throne room flickered erratically. Dust rained down from the unseen ceiling.

The Queen frowned, glancing upwards, annoyance flashing across her face. "Already? Impatient fools."

Reality fractured.

Not an explosion, but a glitch. Like the world itself was tearing along invisible seams. Straight lines of impossible non-color zigzagged across the air directly between them.

The air warped, shimmered.

And a man stepped out.

He wore a simple, impeccably tailored black suit. White shirt, black tie. Polished black shoes clicked silently on the obsidian floor as he emerged from the tear in reality, which sealed itself behind him instantly, leaving no trace.

He looked utterly mundane. Human. Mid-thirties, maybe, with neatly combed dark hair and nondescript features. He adjusted his tie slightly, his movements economical, precise.

But his eyes... they held no light. Cold, flat, utterly detached. They swept over the scene – the Queen, Requiem, Fin, the distant corpses, Arachne – with the bored indifference of an exterminator assessing an infestation.

He stopped, standing calmly in the center of the hall, ignoring the immense power radiating from both the Queen and Fin. He turned his gaze slowly towards the Queen.

"That’s quite enough exposition, Your Majesty," he stated, his voice calm, level, utterly devoid of deference or emotion. It carried an unnerving authority that made the Queen stiffen almost imperceptibly.

"You were tasked with containment, not education." His cold eyes flicked briefly towards Fin, lingering for a fraction of a second longer than necessary.

An Admin. Here. Now.

The game, it seemed, had just been interrupted by management.

"The acquisition of the Silver Core was... unexpected," he stated, his voice a monotone drone. "An anomaly permitted due to certain... probability fluctuations."

He sounded like he was discussing spreadsheet errors.

"Its nature, its purpose, its origins—these are matters tied intrinsically to your designated path." He addressed Fin directly, yet without looking at him for more than a blink. "It was your journey to unravel that meaning, not hers to hand it to you like cheap candy."

Fin remained silent, his mind, however, processed the statement with cold logic.

Wait.

The thought was sharp, clear amidst the swirling chaos of new knowledge.

’My journey? My path? If she was about to tell me, and I was here to hear it... isn’t he the one interfering now? Isn’t he blocking my path?’

He didn’t dare voice it. The power radiating from the admin felt different. Not raw energy like the Queen or the Mana Cell, but something colder. Deeper. The quiet hum of absolute control over the reality they stood in.

Challenging him felt like arguing with the concept of gravity itself.

---

The Queen, however, possessed no such restraint. Millennia of rule, of being the apex predator in her own domain, had ingrained an arrogance that even the appearance of an Admin couldn’t entirely suppress.

"His designated path?" she scoffed, gripping Requiem tighter, the bone scythe humming faintly in response to her agitation. "You dare lecture me about paths and purposes, little warden?"

Her voice rose, regaining its sharp, imperious edge. "I am a Queen! A being of power you merely manage! These dungeons, these rules—they are inconveniences, not absolute laws to creatures like myself!"

She took a step forward, radiating defiant power. "Perhaps you forget who you address? I devoured my predecessor! I hold dominion—"

The Admin raised a single hand, palm outward, in a casual ’stop’ gesture.

"Your designation is ’Contained Entity level 4’," he interrupted flatly, his voice unchanged. "Your importance is functional, not inherent. And your tone is exceeding operational parameters."

"How dare you—!" she snarled, raising Requiem slightly, fury finally overriding caution.

The Admin sighed. A faint, almost imperceptible sound of boredom.

He snapped his fingers.

Just a simple, clean snap.

The Queen froze mid-snarl.

Her eyes widened, not in pain, but in sudden, complete shock. A look of utter disbelief washed over her regal features.

Then she exploded.

Not in a messy splatter of gore. It was cleaner. More terrifying.

Her form simply ruptured outwards in a blinding flash of silver and grey energy, instantly disintegrating into constituent mana particles. Requiem, the bone scythe, clattered to the floor, suddenly inert, its deadly aura vanishing like smoke.

Silence slammed back into the throne room, absolute and deafening.

Where the Queen of Spiders had stood moments before, there was nothing. Not even dust.