Eternal Emerald Dragon

Chapter 1538 - 1537 - Last Meeting

Darkness. Lind knew only darkness but he was not simply asleep or dreaming. He felt like he was growing back to his peak when the world went completely dark.

It was as if something was trying to happen but it was struggling.

Eventually, a flickering flame in a familiar hearth appeared. The dark stones were well fitted together and the dark wooden mantle held many artifacts but he frowned as the rest of the study slowly appeared around him.

Previously, it had all felt far more real than anything else, yet now it felt as fragile as glass.

The once fine furniture was showing signs of near depletion of Qi. The carpets were little better than rags and he saw the shattered window looking out on the ruins of the once brightly lit city in the mountains.

Even that vista felt like it was fading. What was going on with the future?

"I was so slow back then too but you need not fear the future." A faint voice made Lind whip around only to freeze.

He saw himself with emerald and white hair and wrinkled visage but the massive wound was what stopped him cold. It was a festering black thing that did not seem to be healing at all!

It was unlike normal Fiend Qi yet he had no idea what it even was. He dared not even probe it!

"Wise, very wise. The Great Bast–" Blood flew from his older self's mouth. It was not red but black! One of his eyes was not working either! How did a Divine Realm end up like that?

"No time, never enough time but maybe now, there is hope." The working eye narrowed at him before the older man sat up slowly. It cost him but in that movement, many older injuries were revealed to Lind's trained eyes.

How was that possible? Healing was far more advanced than anything he had ever seen and if it could not restore a cultivator, it would eventually heal in time with his draconic vitality!

A sneer crossed his older face.

"You put too much faith in what you understand. Divine injuries almost never heal without dedicated effort. Still, I came farther than I hoped. Each time we met, the future shifted just a bit. A strange feeling." His words made Lind nearly leap forward.

"You used me?!" His anger was met with laughter!

"Use?! We are the same person, or at least we were." Confusion filled Lind but his older self then summoned a portrait. It was carved into some kind of jade stone unlike anything he had ever seen before.

He could not even try to scratch it but he noticed several figures were fainter than the others.

They were also very familiar people!

His wives were in the etching but so were Fey and others he knew as some of his children. There were unfamiliar faces but they were dark and seeing Cyntilla's was dark told him something on 2 fronts.

The darkened figures were dead. Over half his family!

Yet, if it was a kind of soul slate, then why was Cyntilla on it all unless she had been alive when it was made.

"You noticed? Our paths diverged at last! I won the gamble!" A massive emerald scaled arm slammed his older self, shattering the chair he was on.

"CYNTILLA IS DEAD! HOW DARE YOU SMILE!" For a brief moment, Lind forgot what he was talking to but shock spread on his face. His older self felt so frail! Like he was an old man on the verge of death!

The smile never left him as he slowly picked himself up. The destroyed furniture did not repair itself and he noticed the weavings were essentially dead. What had happened in that room to cause such degradation?

"He he he, I was such an emotion–" The old version froze then as if Lind's words took time to register. "Dead, how is she dead? Ethry was nearly crippled but that was the worst of it."

Lind sighed as some things came together. He had an idea of when things changed between them.

"I have completed my nodes and you did not. I have gone farther than you did and created a new path. This timeline is ending then?" HIs older version looked at him coldly before sighing.

"Idiot, time travel is not what is happening here. If I brought you to the present, the Heavens would wipe us both out, but I am letting you touch my mind. We are, essentially, the same person. It is a loophole very few can pull off but it has dangers. I actually wanted it to happen." His old self then stumbled to land heavily on a couch.

He seemed to look at the engraving with deep sorrow.

"He won. The Great Bastard is about to ascend to the next major realm." Shock flooded Lind. A realm beyond the Divine Realm?! He had never even heard of such a thing!

As if realizing he had not meant to speak aloud, the older Lind waved his hand off of more questions.

"I can't do this much longer and it is the last time finally. You are wrong, it was not the nodes, I did them too, but you broke the bindings of fate. I am still ensnared by the damned things. I used them to become a Divine Realm too." Lind frowned at that. It was not that he did not understand the theory but it made his claim of not changing the future irritating.

As if reading his immediate thoughts, his older version sighed before saying dreaded words.

"Terminator vs Back to the Future." Lind immediately wished for death! Not that merciless conversation again! George had forced him to take a 4 day weekend to actually show him the math!

He had been tricked by the promise of meeting a girl but George completely forgot it or never meant to do it in the first place!

Four hellish days explaining why the 2 most popular franchises' time travel concepts were horribly wrong!

"If you bring up that accursed blue box, I will personally choke you to death!" His older self actually shivered. Compared to the other 2, that franchise had been a near constant exaltation from George!

He had worshipped that show and had nearly had a breakdown when they did the mother of all retcons. Lind thought George was actually going to burn down the office!

"My point is you are using fictional rules when Time is not nearly as simple as that. Time Dao is limitless in many ways. The one I use between us is not much more than this: I interfere at points when you can choose a different path from mine but you always made the same damned choices at first! I thought I had failed!" Lind saw his older self sigh but then the room shook.

A chagrined look crossed the wrinkled face before he sighed.

"Long story short, I worried it could not be changed. I met my future self but he was different. He was all alone and I endeavored to treasure my bonds more but still lost them at the end. The Great Bastard is just too strong." A haggard look crossed his face then.

Lind felt it. It was like a vortex was tying the man down. He held up his pale hand and faint threads only a few could see appeared.

"I misunderstood what fate was. I misunderstood what that Bastard had done. I can't tell you as you are not capable of surviving it, but just know that any system can be abused. Just like I am doing now!" A crazy grin spread on his face again.

Lind contemplated it once more. The difference between them was he had severed fate's strings to him. He forged his own path but then why did his older self say he had not changed the future?

As if he was a dull child, his older self looked at him pityingly.

"Look, just forget about cause and effect. What is happening here is part of what is happening to you but even if you have a different end, this time still happened. I can't escape my fate. This world is doomed." Lind then thought of a possibility that made his head hurt.

"Quantum mechanics?" His older self smiled normally at that.

"I forced a branch to try again. There is still a chance to stop the Great Bastard but he will prevent any further attempts after this. You are the last chance. You have to stop him!" Lind was more confused.

He could not save the current future but he could save his own and others? Which was it?

A vicious cough racked his older self and Lind saw it then, he was dying. As it got worse, the shaking returned.

"You made this entire place?" His older self shook his head.

"Not that easy in the Divine Lands. You need to ascend soon! In less than a thousand years or your timeline will be wiped out otherwise. It will seem impossible but we have done the impossible before! The Great Bastard is so sure of his victory because his future self has helped him too." That revelation made Lind snap upright.

"Then why–?" His older self then shimmered before he barely stabilized.

"Listen to me! We are out of time! He is a self-important ass but he is not stupid! He knew of you before you were born! He just could not touch us in the mortal realms! Further, we have been doing this for so long it has mired him in struggles to counter us! I do not know how many timelines have been consumed but he is done after this. There are no more chances!" Lind then felt something pull on his soul.

He was going back but he had one more question.

"Can you save an Immortal who died and was reborn?!" His older self looked at him with pity.

"You can, but the price is the Bastard wins. Karma will lock you in place and it is all over. I do not know why Cyntilla died but know it was not in vain! It is a difference that could mean victory for all! Do not try to act like a false God! Stop that Bastard forever!" Lind only half understood but he grasped the part that mattered to him.

Cyntilla was truly gone. The price to bring her back would only result in what he saw now. A crumbling city and his own death. Lind had to take the next step!