Achilles's eyes opened wide.
He felt a boundless and vast Authority that felt fundamentally different from everything he currently wielded!
Not the Void's absolute negation. Not the Regulations he'd claimed through force. Not even the Existential Authority of Fables that let him perceive narrative structures underlying events.
This was something else entirely…an Authority that resonated with principles of growth, adaptation, propagation, continuation.
The fundamental drive that made existence persist rather than collapsing into entropy, that encouraged complexity rather than dissolution, that declared consciousness and life were meaningful rather than mere accidents of existence!
The Way of Life, manifested as barrier that would only permit passage to those whose existence harmonized with its principles.
And Achilles, standing before it with carefully constructed identity and genuine curiosity warring behind purple-gold eyes...
