Lord of Cosmos

Chapter 204 204: The Monaliza

Noor realized his ploy had failed. The provocation simply hadn't been enough to unhinge the General. Curling into a tight ball, he braced himself against the brunt of Hugo's vicious kicks.

The crunch of scrambling boots broke through the haze. Franks soldiers were scaling the hill, frantically searching for their commander. Hugo turned on them, his voice cracking like a whip.

"Stay out of this," he barked. "Get back to the battle against those primitives. I'll join you in a few minutes."

The soldiers snapped crisp salutes and descended back into the raging fray. Down below, the Franks' casualties were mounting rapidly; they were floundering without General Hugo there to shield them.

Noor seized the momentary distraction to finalize his plan. When Hugo looked back down, he found the boy still curled up, feigning agonizing pain. As the General drew his leg back for another brutal kick, Noor lunged. He grabbed Hugo's ankle, slapped a sticky bomb onto the armor, and instantly conjured a solid dome over his own body.

The bomb detonated. The force spun Hugo around, sending him crashing into the dirt. The hardened crystal around his leg shattered, leaving the flesh beneath charred and blackened by the flames. He let out a roar of pure agony.

Snatching his brush, Hugo plunged it into the green paint and slathered it over his mangled leg. The wounds rapidly knit themselves back together. He rose, seething with rage, and marched toward the small dome where Noor hid. Mixing red and white to create pink, Hugo swept his brush across the barrier. The surface immediately began to hiss and corrode, eaten away by a highly potent acid.

He narrowed his eyes, waiting for the boy to emerge.

"Come out of your hole, little rat," Hugo snarled. "I'll make certain, once I return with your head, that we sever all ties with the Enix. We will declare you a banned faction. We bled for your ideology for so long, sacrificed millions of soldiers—and this is how you repay us? This is exactly why Darleon the Third never trusted your ideals. He saw the sheer magnitude of devastation that Darleon the Conqueror's wars brought upon our planet. He saw our enemies multiply, closing in on every front. He saw the economic crisis that crippled us—a crisis we haven't suffered since the abhorrent era of the monks."

The dome was on the verge of melting completely when dozens of sharp, spear-like objects violently erupted from within it, nearly skewering the General. He leaped backward, narrowly avoiding the lethal barrage.

"You have a remarkable ability, boy," Hugo sneered, dusting himself off. "But you lack any taste in art. I suppose these cheap parlor tricks are the absolute limits of your imagination."

Suddenly, the sharp structures elongated. They expanded in width and volume, shooting upward into the sky and branching out in every direction. Hugo watched with growing apprehension as the structures stretched across the heavens, entirely blotting out the sun. Without warning, they plunged downward, caging him in from all sides. He bolted, desperate to escape, but the massive pillars slammed into the earth, sealing off every possible exit.

Hugo found himself standing in pitch darkness. Suddenly, ornate lamps flickered to life overhead, bathing the space in a warm, golden glow. He instantly summoned a blue shield around himself and advanced cautiously.

He took in his surroundings—a room adorned with exquisite, breathtaking decorations. Tiny mosaic cubes were meticulously set into smooth tiles, embellishing the floors and walls with an intricate array of vibrant colors. Written across the walls were words in a language Hugo didn't understand, yet the intertwining, fluid symmetry of the letters possessed a strange, captivating beauty.

Hugo couldn't fathom what Noor was attempting, but it was undoubtedly a trap. Spotting a doorway ahead, he stepped through with measured caution, only to find himself in a second room, even more opulent than the first.

His eyes landed on Noor. The boy sat slumped back in a plush, luxurious armchair. Blood trickled freely down his body, his face deathly pale. Behind him stood a magnificent stained-glass window, a vibrant kaleidoscope of color reminiscent of the Nasir al-Mulk Mosque in Shiraz. More stained glass flanked him to the right and left, depicting majestic elephants and camels. Rays of sunlight filtered through the colored glass, washing over Noor and framing him like a painted masterpiece that embodied pure suffering.

Hugo's gaze swept the room. Recreations of Earth's most famous masterpieces hung upon the walls: Da Vinci's Mona Lisa and The Last Supper; Van Gogh's The Starry Night; Picasso's Guernica; Vermeer's Girl with a Pearl Earring; and Munch's The Scream. Arrayed around them were flawless sculptures of Greek, Roman, and Pharaonic origin.

Hugo studied the gallery for a long moment.

"What exactly are you trying to prove here?" he finally asked, his voice echoing in the grand room. "Have you accepted death, and chosen to build yourself a tomb decorated with bizarre arts?"

Noor let out a weak, breathy laugh. His gaze remained fixed on the ceiling, admiring a three-dimensional fresco modeled after the works of the Italian painter Andrea Pozzo.

Without moving an inch, without even looking at Hugo, Noor spoke.

"This is art through the ages on my planet. It evolved... varied, from one civilization to the next."

Hugo raised an eyebrow, his tone dripping with incredulity. "From civilization to civilization? Just how many did you manage to cram onto a single planet?"

Noor answered with a weary sigh. "Hundreds of them. We differed from one another. We waged wars over the most trivial things. But that fierce competition between cultures birthed countless creators with rare, fertile imaginations. There was an inherent advantage to our differences; it served art throughout the ages."

He gestured weakly toward the entrance. "That strange, magnificent calligraphy you saw before entering here is Arabic script. It stems from my mother tongue. And those mosaic cubes are an art form used by that civilization to construct the most resplendent palaces—structures that stood for thousands of years without the observer ever tiring of their beauty."

With a mere thought, Noor materialized a small, highly detailed model of the Alhambra Palace, setting it on a side table next to his plush chair.

"This palace survived for centuries," Noor continued softly, "and it was a rare day indeed when a single stone fell from it. As for the stained glass, it was an art form embraced by multiple civilizations. I always marveled at it, wondering how one could craft a painting on glass. A vibrant mosaic of colors and shapes made from a material so difficult to mold. But nothing is too difficult for those blessed with fertile imaginations—artists who filled every era with joy, striving to leave behind something immortal. As for the paintings to your left and right... these are works that sold for millions. They were immortalized in history for their exquisite precision."

Hugo approached the Mona Lisa. He stared at it intently, gently hovering his fingertips near the canvas.

"That is the Mona Lisa," Noor said. "Da Vinci, the man who painted it, used to dissect corpses just to understand human physiology. He was able to capture the very essence of human features in this breathtakingly lifelike portrait."

Noor watched Hugo tilt his head slightly to the right, then to the left. A soft chuckle escaped the boy's lips.

"You feel as though she's watching you, no matter where you stand," Noor said. "Am I right?"