「我以万物为砥石，试图砥砺我之意义；却不知万物是水，我消逝其中，正如水消逝在水中。」
—悲悼伶人莲祷，凝视虚空后写下的唱词
宇宙万物并无意义，人类在星神眼里亦不值一提。如果星神当真凌驾众生、高高在上，又怎会在乎凡人的爱恨苦乐？「自灭者」是不慎踏入「虚无」IX的阴影，因此失去存在意义的人群。
「虚无」的影子平等地遮蔽星空，自灭者可能在任何一个世界诞生。若将之称作「派系」，他们彼此之间过于缺乏社会性的联系；但若视之为「现象」，这群可怜人又都具有一种共性：他们的种种存在属性：躯体、认知、记忆…会在自灭的旅途中逐渐消亡。
这些现象往往难以用自然规律解释，混沌医师的手记如此形容：有些人的皮肤变得像是腐烂的枯木，布满伤痕和孔洞；有些人的内分泌系统开始错乱，不分快乐与痛苦，变得对一切麻木；有些人失去了记忆，有些人丧失了感官…他们仿佛被某种存在剥夺了生命的意义，只能在梦境和幻觉中不断看见自己的身影消失在一处地平线尽头的黑洞里。
但一些自灭者会萌生反抗的想法，他们加入「混沌医师」，誓在有限的时光中尽力医治他人的虚无，以换取自我的救赎；更有甚者以强烈的信念为支柱，试图从根源上断绝「虚无」的诅咒，通过杀死那位沉眠在深渊中的星神。
天才俱乐部#64「原始博士」曾在失踪前发问：倘若IX真的对宇宙视若无睹，「虚无」的命途何以存在至今？也许当自灭者茫然地行于星海，同时也是在将祂的阴影投向宇宙各地。而那寥寥少数能以自身存在承受「虚无」浸染的行者，他们的自灭之旅被拉得无限漫长，走出的道路也如同IX在世间的一道侧影。
Self-Annihilator — Nihility
"I aim to refine my significance by employing all as a whetstone, oblivious to how all beings are but water. I fade into them, like water dissolving into water."
— Lyrics of a song written by the Mourning Actor, Lotusprayer, after gazing into the void.
Everything in the universe is meaningless, and human beings are worthless in the eyes of Aeons. If Aeons are truly above all beings, why would THEY even care about the emotions of mortals? The Self-Annihilators are individuals who have inadvertently stepped into the shadow of IX the Nihility and from that moment have lost the meaning of their own existence.
The shadow of Nihility covers the stars equally, and Self-Annihilators may form in any world. If we call them phenomena, these poor souls do share one thing in common: Their various existential properties — such as corporeal body, mental cognition, and personal memories... will gradually fade away in their journey of self-annihilation.
These phenomena can hardly be explained by the laws of nature. As described in the handwritten notes of the Doctors of Chaos — Some Self-Annihilators have their skin turn into something like rotten wood, full of holes and scars. Some have their endocrine system disrupted, becoming unable to distinguish between pleasure and pain and turning numb to everything. Some lose their memories, others lose their senses... It is as if they have been deprived of the meaning of their lives by some entity, and can only keep watching in dreams and illusions as their own forms disappear into a black hole at the end of the horizon.
However, some Self-Annihilators would conceive the idea of fighting back. They join the Doctors of Chaos, vowing to do their best to cure others of Nihility in what little time they have left in exchange for their own redemption. Moreover, some of them rely on their strong convictions to try to break the curse of Nihility at its root — by slaying the Aeon that slumbers in the abyss.
Dr. Primitive, No. 64 of the Genius Society, once asked before his disappearance: If IX is truly unresponsive to the universe, how could the Path of Nihility exist to this day? Perhaps, as the Self-Annihilators aimlessly traverse the cosmos, they are also casting the shadow of the Aeon around the universe. As for the few who can single-handedly withstand the encroachment of Nihility on their existences, their journey of self-annihilation is drawn out to infinity, and the road they walk is like a shadow of IX cast in the world.
