Jonas felt his soul being sucked into the vesicle. At that moment, a point of light burst from his chest—roughly below his field of vision. Jonas wasn't sure if he still had a physical form, but a substantial radiance surged from the place he usually called his chest. It was a bronze wheel, held aloft by a platinum-gold man and thrown violently, shattering the worm before him. The god within the vesicle let out a shrill howl before being crushed by the wheel's imprint, his majestic posture utterly destroyed.
Jonas's vision blurred, and he found himself carving stone on a pillar in a temple with a hammer and chisel. Suddenly, the tall, pointed stone pillar in the temple vibrated violently, releasing a shockwave that shattered the later-added hollowed-out dome. The laborers also regained consciousness, collapsing weakly to the ground one after another.
Only then did the boy realize his strength was too weak; he couldn't even resist the opponent's illusions, filling him with intense shame for a moment.
However, there was no need for him to think this way. Miraak had already deeply integrated with Apocrypha, effectively stealing a portion of Hermaeus's authority. He was already a second-tier Et'Ada. For an ordinary person to defeat him without the assistance of Hermaeus Mora was absolutely impossible.
Furthermore, Miraak's thousands of years of bitter cultivation were no small matter. He had comprehended a path that ran contrary to CHIM: anti-CHIM, the path of Inverse CHIM.
According to the '36 Lessons of Vivec,' the earliest recorded researcher of the path of anti-CHIM was Dagoth Ur. This Dunmer, known as the eternal nightmare beneath the ash and the main antagonist of 'the elder scrolls III: Morrowind,' misappropriated the Divine Power of the Heart of Lorkhan, attempting to spread the seeds of anti-CHIM through the Blight. Even the three gods of the Tribunal were pushed to their wits' end by his relentless pressure.
If CHIM is about attaining enlightenment and Dao, analyzing the world's truth step by step, cultivating the cause through the effect, transcending all manifestations, and pointing directly to the Amaranth in a gentle and elegant manner, then anti-CHIM is about attaining Dao by spreading one's will to dye the world and devouring the Amaranth—it is malicious and greedy.
Miraak had absorbed countless secret knowledge within Apocrypha and had long known the world was but a dream. He even used Mora's authority to resist Zero-Sum. He did not choose to comprehend CHIM, perhaps due to insufficient potential. Regardless, he used the ancient All-Maker Stones of Solstheim to expand his mind, enslaving those who touched the stones, swallowing their wills and souls bit by bit, and merging their dreams into his own.
Anti-CHIM is such a hair-raising path.
It was perfectly normal for Jonas to be defeated. The illusion he fell into was Miraak's dreamscape, and it was true and unerring. For anyone touching the All-Maker Stone, what they saw was both the true appearance of the world and a falsehood. Once Miraak achieved a milestone, this environment would become reality within a certain spatial-temporal region, and he himself would gain power great enough to devour Hermaeus Mora and become the new Daedric Prince of Knowledge—replacing Mora as the personified Incarnation of Apocrypha.
Miraak being defeated by the Wheel-Imprint Fist was actually quite simple. This was because the path walked by the War God Simon was also anti-CHIM. The difference was that he used the power of the Pure Land, shaping the Pure Land into his own CHIM Fist Intent, truly forged according to the mold of the elder scrolls World Wheel, on the same level as the Buddha's Son's 'Palm of the Small Thousand Worlds.'
With one punch, anything not of the first tier must die. It was only because the War God Simon was still too weak to bear his own Fist Intent that he actively held back at the last moment, passing the Legacy of the Fist Intent to Jonas. Otherwise, the Dragon Chrysalis of Saarthal would have ruptured directly, and the Dragon Break would have spread uncontrollably across all time and space.
Jonas was unaware of this; he only felt fortunate for his narrow escape from death.
Many of Miraak's cultists, wearing bone-yellow starfish-like masks, ran out of the temple. They let out shrill howls and gathered in a circle under the hazy night, bowing in worship to the All-Maker Stone. Then, under the boy's shocked gaze, they drew daggers, sliced open their chests, reached in to pull out their internal organs, and poured warm blood onto the stone.
A layer of cyan light glowed faintly. Jonas stared at the All-Maker Stone with full vigilance.
A misty humanoid figure appeared in the Void Realm. He wore an octopus-like dark gold multi-legged mask and elaborate leather robes. He was tall in stature. Strangely, though he was standing now, he seemed smaller than when Jonas had seen him sitting on the throne.
As the cultists offered their warm blood, they gradually turned into gray stone. Miraak spoke in a strange tone—the questioning lilt at the end went up, yet his words were entirely declarative.
"Dragonborn, you walk a path of bondage, so much like me. You too feel that fate of dragon-slaying—the killing, the enslaving, the desire to destroy. Dragons are a race born evil. Among countless false kings, a true leader competes to emerge. I once desperately craved Alduin's mercy, but after all, man is not Dragon."
Jonas frowned. The opponent was using spiritual transmission, which could bypass language barriers to express everything he wanted to say thoroughly and freely to the listener. But Miraak's current state was very strange. It should be said he wasn't even a spirit; he was merely a creation of faith—an armored phantom named Miraak left behind under the Wheel-Imprint Fist, mere dross.
Miraak continued his narration, "We are puppets bound by fate, the Incarnation of the Dragon and the Serpent. So what? We can neither decide our birth nor our lives. We will not live for ourselves for even a second. We are kingslayers, tools."
Jonas didn't speak, only expressing his disgust for Miraak.
"Look at you, so successfully brainwashed that you can't stop for a moment. A pathetic creature ravaged by a sense of mission. You don't live as happily as a Mudcrab or a Netchling. Ask yourself: if wisdom brings only pain, would you choose to give it up?"
"I would not."
"That's right. Neither would I."
Miraak's figure slowly dissipated.
Jonas took a few slow breaths. The night wind blew, carrying a strong scent of blood, and he felt a slight chill in his body. It turned out that sweat had soaked through his outer garment at some unknown point.
One enemy dealt with, the boy told himself. He had to keep it up, or if he died once, he'd have to face Miraak all over again, and he had no confidence at all in dealing with this terrifying enemy.
Next was killing Alduin, but he didn't have the elder scrolls, so he couldn't learn Dragon Break. What should he do?
"What a pity..." A slow, sluggish, eerie voice sounded behind Jonas. The boy turned around and saw a mass of ice-blue vortex. This despairing color was like the reflection of a cliff cave where skeletons were buried, struggling against the gray sunset on the horizon. The newcomer was the Wretched Abyss, an avatar of our Daedric Prince of Knowledge.
"Who are you?"
"I am Hermaeus Mora, Mortal. The one thou hast just slain was my servant."
"Then... I'm sorry?" Jonas felt a headache. He had been a bewildered spectator the whole time and wasn't even clear on how that old rogue Miraak had died. From the tone of this vortex ball, it seemed intent on pinning this murder on him.
"One less person means one must be added. He is dead; thou shalt replace him. Go to the depths of this temple; there lies my secret hoard. In that place, read the holy scripture, and I shall grant thee a supreme miracle."
Jonas thought for a moment. "Can I refuse?"
"The toil of a single lifetime, or eternal torment after death? It depends on how thou choosest." The Wretched Abyss spoke so slowly it could drive one mad. After finishing the threat, it didn't wait for Jonas to bargain and vanished immediately.
The boy scratched his head. It was too painful. Helpless, he could only walk toward the temple entrance.
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