Chapter 799: 799

He had been living in a private hell of paranoia and insecurity. While his sister and Ezinne knew of his burden, they could only offer sympathy; they could not truly experience the skin-crawling sensation of being watched by an invisible predator.

Hearing the other leaders voice these same fears acted as a release valve for Nwadiebube’s pent-up anxiety. He didn’t hesitate. Stepping into the center of the communication circle, he shared his own harrowing encounters with Osita.

He was careful with the details, keeping some secrets close to his chest but his message was clear. Their fears were not theoretical. They were historical fact.

He described how Osita could bypass any physical ward. He confirmed that a Sixth Tier being doesn’t need to be in the room to know what is happening inside it. He spoke all of this with the raw honesty of a man who had lost the luxury of privacy.

Nwadiebube’s testimony had a visceral, immediate effect. Because the world already viewed Osita as a rogue threat, hearing a respected leader confirm his near-spectral capabilities turned their caution into sheer terror.

The atmosphere of the summit shifted instantly. These powerful men and women, who commanded armies and ruled continents, suddenly looked diminished. Like Nwadiebube, they began casting furtive glances over their shoulders, their eyes darting to dark corners and empty seats.

The "brilliant move" of waiting for others to take the first step into the Sixth Tier now felt like a trap. If they didn’t ascend, they were blind, if they did, they were doomed.

The summit, which had begun with a frantic search for order, soon hit a wall of cold, hard reality. As the leaders began to draft the Law of the Ascended, a paralyzing dilemma emerged, a law is only as strong as the hand that enforces it.

They realized they were drafting a decree for a class of beings they had no physical way to restrain. They were like children drawing lines in the sand to stop the tide.

A chilling realization swept through the communication circle. Most of these monarchs were not seekers themselves, their understanding of the Sixth Tier came second-hand from subjects, generals, or family members who had studied the Oracle’s method.

This created a double-edged sword that cut deep into their sense of security. Even if their own loved ones or loyalists reached the Sixth Tier, the power dynamic of the kingdom would flip. A king cannot command a god, even if that god is his own son.

Their political power was built on traditional armies and economic wealth, assets that meant nothing to someone standing in an unseen dimension.

The leaders eventually arrived at the only logical, yet terrifying, solution to the "peeping" problem. To counter an invisible threat, they needed an invisible shield.

The only way to detect a Sixth Tier intruder was to have a "Loyal" Sixth Tier powerhouse stationed permanently within the palace to monitor the unseen dimension.

The realization hit the assembly like a physical blow, turning the collective fear of the "outside" into a cold, internal dread. While the "Watcher Doctrine" seemed like a logical defense against an invisible enemy, it carried a lethal flaw. To employ a Sixth Tier guardian was to invite an eternal, unblinking eye into their most private thoughts and deeds.

The peeping would no longer be a threat from a distant rival like Osita, it would be the constant, silent observation of their own subordinates. The very people they had raised to protect them would become their literal overminds.

In that moment of shared silence, the traditional definition of "leadership" in the world of Nana crumbled. The leaders looked at one another through the communication array and saw the same terrifying truth, the era of the mortal king was over.

What use was a ruler who sat on a golden throne but remained blind to the "real" world happening in the unseen dimension around them?

A leader who cannot perceive the movements of their own court is not a leader; they are a puppet. If they could not see the Sixth Tier, they could not govern it.

The grand gathering, which was supposed to be the foundation of a new global law, disintegrated almost as quickly as it had formed. The "Law of the Ascended" was forgotten, replaced by a desperate, individual scramble for survival.

The leaders didn’t end the meeting with handshakes or treaties, they severed the connections abruptly, retreating into their own palaces with a singular, frantic mission.

To lead was no longer about lineage, wealth, or diplomatic tact. To lead was to ascend. They realized that they were in a race against their own shadows. Every second they spent debating laws was a second their subjects spent mastering the Oracle’s alphabetical method.

They were no longer just worried about being watched, they were worried about being replaced. The leaders who had once feared the "Oracle’s Touch" now realized it was their only hope. If they did not use that basic, broken-down method to reach the Sixth Tier themselves, they would become relics of a bypassed age, ghosts in their own kingdoms, ruled by those who could finally see.

The human leaders were not alone in their existential dread. In far borders from the huamns, the Godlings were grappling with a crisis of their own, though for them, the fear was not of being watched, but of being defied and destroying all that has been built.

For centuries, the Godlings had ruled through a mixture of divine lineage and absolute oversight. But recently, that grip had begun to slip. Their subjects had seemed to realize a liberating, dangerous truth, their leaders words only held weight as long as they were within their leaders sight. Once a Godling stepped into the shadows or crossed a distant border, the "mandate" evaporates.

This newfound sense of anonymity had birthed a wave of uncontrollable behavior as seen with what happened with Xerosis and her court.

Acting without regard for the collective reputation of their race. Engaging in power plays that threatened to destabilize the delicate balance between the different Godling factions.

Treating the orders of their elders as mere suggestions rather than laws. This hasn’t occured so often and much that it was a problem but they were not going to wait for it to become a problem.

The leadership understood that if this was the state of affairs now, the birth of Sixth Tier beings would turn this seemingly small insubordination into an absolute catastrophe.

A Sixth Tier Godling would not just be hard to control, they would be impossible to catch or take down.

Amidst this burgeoning anarchy, a flicker of hope remained. Zephyr, one of the most forward-thinking of the Godling leaders, already engineered a potential solution from the book left by his father. He had begun quietly briefing other leaders on a method to tether these rising powers.

However, the time for diplomacy and official summits had not yet arrived. The Godlings reached the same cold conclusion as the humans, "Ascension was the only shield".

The Godling leaders postponed any formal meetings to address the coming change of their kin. Their focus narrowed to a single, desperate objective.

The ruling elite had to be the first to produce Sixth Tier figures from their own inner circles.

They believed that only from a position of absolute parity could they negotiate. Only when the leaders themselves stood within that unseen dimension could they safely implement Zephyr’s solution. To seek a "legal" fix while they were still trapped in the Fifth Tier was to invite a coup.

In the world of Nana, from the human palaces to the Godling spires, every ruler was now hunched over the Oracle’s alphabetical method, racing to become the very thing they feared before someone else did it first.

Ikenga and the other origin gods watched all of this take place, Ikenga found it amusing at the humans’ irrational fear at being watched without their knowing.

By now, every existence in the world of Nana should know about the origin gods and their meaning to this world, this includes their everwatchful gaze in this world.

Somehow that seemed to have been accepted by everyone, it was like no one cared that the origin gods or other gods’ gaze was steadily on them.

From their vantage point beyond the mundane, Ikenga and the other Origin Gods watched the frantic scurrying of the mortal and godling leaders with a mixture of detachment and irony. To Ikenga, there was something deeply amusing, almost absurd about this sudden, collective panic over being watched.

By now, every sentient being in the world of Nana understood the nature of the Origin Gods. They were the foundation of existence, the architects of the world, and their gaze was, by definition, omnipresent. Whether a king sat on his throne or a beggar slept in the dirt, the eyes of the gods were never truly closed.

Yet, strangely, this eternal surveillance had been folded into the background of daily life. It was an accepted reality, like the air or the gravity of Nana. No one lost sleep over the fact that an Origin God might be watching them eat, sleep, or plot.