Chapter 42: The Weight of BeingThe mental realm was dying, and it was taking Ethan’s sanity with it.The sky—if the chaotic, shifting canvas of the parasite’s mind could be called that—was peeling away in long, gray strips. Each strip was a memory, a failed timeline, a possibility that had once been a universe, now reduced to nothingness as the "Certainty" encroached. It didn't burn. It didn't explode. It simply ceased to have ever been.Ethan stood in the center of the wreckage, his boots sinking into a floor that was rapidly turning into static. Opposite him, the Ancient Parasite was unravelling. Its sleek, predatory form, once a projection of absolute authority, was now a jagged mess of dark energy and exposed, pulsating raw nerves. It was laughing, but the sound was thin, like paper tearing."You don't get it," the creature rasped, its form flickering. "You’re looking at the end of the script, Ethan. And you—you’re the ink spill that ruined the page."Ethan didn't answer. He c
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