'So, in three years a human light years away from us would acquire the Devourer system and would hide in the shadows for the next hundred and sixty years before he makes his presence known as the Abomination of Great Devourer,' Nero said, as he slowly ate spoonfuls of meat stew.
'Yes, but if you are worried about eliminating him, I have ways of locating him in less than a decade,' Draven said and added, 'And with how strict the conditions to acquiring the devourer system are, It would be a near impossible for someone else to acquire it, at least not in the following few centuries,'
'It is near impossible for a Mortal human to kill a Void Ascendent Rank individual all by himself, without any outside help, and then eat their heart and survive,' Nero said, reminding himself of the insane condition of acquiring the devourer system.
'There is also the possibility that killing him once could also kill the system since no one after that tragedy was able to awaken the devourer system with the same method, but as you said it is a big maybe since Architect rarely die with their host,'
'So, Killing him early might not be his end,' Nero thought, reconsidering his options once more.
It had been four hours since Nero was presented with the choice between the four systems, each capable of making him one of the strongest and transforming his life.
He made many decisions only to second-guess and reconsider each one. Draven played a big role in his confusion, as if, like a little demon, every time he thought he was satisfied with his choice, the old man would share new information that forced him to reconsider.
The Guardian of Knowledge was a woman driven by an insatiable thirst for understanding, a researcher who delved into every conceivable field.
She was willing to commit the most heinous acts, performing unspeakable experiments that would make even the most ruthless criminals, those who destroyed entire worlds without a second thought, seem virtuous.
To her, knowledge was priceless, and no cost was too great to obtain it, no boundary too sacred to cross.
But she was not genuinely evil if one looked deeper. In her own twisted way, she could be generous and forgiving, offering wisdom and insight to those who sought it. However, her actions always served a singular purpose, the relentless pursuit of knowledge.
No matter how kind she appeared, her driving ambition overshadowed all else, so if Nero wished to choose her, he better be ready to work with her.
The Watcher of Time was an anomaly himself, as at one moment he could be an innocent child and another a knight with unmatched ambition, or even a frail old man full of wisdom or a ruthless tyrant whose cruelty knew no bounds.
Yet, behind all these shifting forms and personas, his true nature was that of an emotionless being, detached, cold, and ever-calculating, driven by a singular purpose to observe and understand the working of Time.
Draven also warned Nero that since he had time travelled in some form, he would not be surprised if the Architect of Time decided to pull some tricks on them to extract his secrets to further his understanding of Time.
The Traveller seemed the most sensible as the Architect of Space he was equally as powerful as the other and did not have any overly bizarre personality traits, except he was very lazy, sleeping for years in between the realms.
The last choice was the Devourer system, its Architect unknown. Its power and the ruin it could bring were very clear, and whether or not he and his old self could fight against the architect's influence was unknown.
Nero considered his options once more as he slowly ate his meal, and once he was done, he left to explore the city, not making any hasty decision based on a momentary wave of emotions.
Nero also questions Draven's motives, as he cannot help but feel that his old self was pushing him to pick the Devourer system. But if he wanted that, then why would he go to such lengths when he could just keep him in the dark and make him pick the system anyway?
All things aside, Nero felt that his best option was the Devourer system because he would not only prevent the person who acquired it in the other timeline from getting it, but also if they could not control it, he could simply kill it by dying.
His reasoning for seriously considering it was not just because he wished to save the galaxy from suffering a tragedy but because both Architects of Knowledge and Time seemed very difficult to deal with, and between Space and Devourer, the latter made much more sense.
Nero also leaned more toward the Devourer system based on what Draven discovered about the system holder in his timeline. He stayed in the public eye for nearly thirteen years before vanishing inside an old ruin and being considered dead.
The little they found from his memories showed that even after sixty years, the man had some semblance of consciousness, and it was not until the eighty-year mark that he became nothing more than a withered husk, ever hungry to devour, being controlled by an equally evil and cunning presence.
Nero also did not have much of a choice, seeing if he did not comply, his older self would kill him, and if he survived long enough, then he would probably die at the hands of that True King.
So, if he was going to walk the path of doom, he might as well take the one that offered the best chance of survival.
Nero aimlessly roamed the city for the next few hours before returning to his hotel and taking a few hour's nap. The entire time, he had no more discussions with Draven.
When he woke up, night had already settled in. Sitting upright on his bed, he reviewed all his options one final time and reached the same decision he had hours ago, and now content with it, he spoke his mind.
"I will choose the Devourer System, but if we can not resist its influence, I will kill myself before things go out of hand," Nero said, and he did not need to wait long for a reply.
"Kid, I will kill myself a thousand times before becoming a puppet of someone," Draven replied, and with that, the duo reached a decision on what system they wanted.
"I will not kill innocent people for their powers," Nero said, and after a long pause, Draven answered, 'It's your choice,'
"So what next?" Nero asked, instantly feeling a tug on his conciseness as Draven's voice sounded in his mind. "It's time we pay that old coat a visit and empty his treasury," Draven said as he stood up and began to remove his cloaths.
He quickly changed into the new set of cloaths, wearing his mask and the dark cloak before leaving the room through the window, sliding down the wall from two stories above into the dark ally with fluid ease.
The streets were empty, mostly cloaked in darkness, with the only source of light being the light poles positioned every few streets, but this quickly changed once they reached the inner area of the city, as every house had one or more light crystals to cover its immediate vicinity.
There were also guards who kept watch over specific areas, but to Draven, it all posed no hindrance, and within minutes he reached the stone walls of the core area, the centre of the city, and house to all the truly wealthy of this small city, including the city governor.
The core area had a three-meter-high stone wall with two-foot-tall sharp iron spikes covering every inch. Four guard towers covered all four sides, and city guards patrolled the area on foot to ensure everything was fine.
It was not normal to have such security in the lowest-grade city, but since the city exported agricultural goods and was located near the border, such security was needed to deal with bandits.
Nero watched as Draven found the perfect spot away from the sight of a watch tower, placed his ear on the wall as if he could hear the other side, and moments later, began to clip the nearly flat wall like a spider, taking hold of the two pokes to flip his body to the other side, landing on the ground with ease, barely making any noise even as he landed.
Draven moved from one shadow to another, stopping at just the perfect place to avoid the guards, his footsteps as silent as a cat, and just when Nero thought that he messed up as he heard the footsteps of a guard, he jumped and caught hold of a house wall, watching with calm as the guard passed right beneath him.
Once the guard left, he landed and began to move toward the largest mention in the distance. He reached its fortified boundary within minutes, and after a quick look around, he climbed the wall and entered the mansion's grounds.