The rivers trembled.
Nero felt the disturbance ripple through his consciousness, a sensation like standing at the edge of an Abyss's precipice while the ground shifted beneath his feet. The two streams of energy flowing through the depths of his being had existed separately until this moment, running parallel like oil and water refusing to mix. One was dark, thick and heavy with corruption, the essence of Yang, his natural state. It was the monster within. The Abominable form he suppressed with constant effort...
The other was light, thin and precise, the essence of Yin; the human facade he maintained.
The information the Oracle had dumped into his mind was fragmentary, presented in images and sensations rather than mere words.
Unlike what he had initially assumed, the absorption was not consumption. There was the critical difference.
