“F-Floating Continent? Ether? Can you please explain it to me?”
“Boy, you aren’t even worried about what happened to you…”
“Ahh…well, please tell me that first...”
“Very well! This, Dylan here will be the kindest soul for you!”
Dylan, after announcing that in a grandiose manner, he stands up from his chair and left the room while I was staring at him curiously.
Wait…
…
…
After for like, ten minutes, he returns carrying two bottles of liquor with him. I can tell by the smell of it from afar.
He put down a bottle in the tabletop beside and me and opens the one he is carrying in his right arm. He immediately guzzles on it with a few gulps.
“Ahhh!~ That hit the spot! I feel like my hangover from last night disappearing!”
“Umm…”
“Oh? Aren’t you going to drink?”
“I…I don’t drink this kind of stuff.”
“…”
“I never drink this kind of thing in my entire life…”
“Ga hahaha! I’m sorry! I just brought two liquors for another person out of habit! You see, everyone in this continent drinks! Day in, day out!”
“Isn’t that unhealthy?!”
“Not really! It depends on how you cultivate or brew a drink! We got the best technology in the world too!”
“Ahh…then, I would like some water…”
“Water?”
“Water…please…”
“…”
“…”
“For drinking…”
“Ga hahaha! I forgot that water is also something you drink and not only used for bathing!”
Wow…
I wonder if these people in this continent are all like this.
He stands up and left the room again leaving his booze behind…
…
…
Another ten minutes passed before he returns and now, he is holding a clear glass of water and hand it to me.
“Sorry about that, boy. We, lots here are fond of drinking booze every day like it’s already water for us. Anyway, what are we talking about?”
“How I ended up like this…”
“Yeah, yeah! I really don’t care about what happened to you but, what I only know is that I found you lying in a forest bathing on your own blood, mutilated and battered. Well… not really me but one of my stealth bots that I had sent below ground.”
“Stealth bots?!”
“Yeah! We Etherians do not wish to step on the below ground. We once tried to dominate the human lands after all.”
“Eh? What do you mean?”
“Ohoho! You want a long discussion, boy?”
“I don’t mind. I mean, I don’t have anything better to do after all.”
“Then let’s take a walk outside as we talk.”
“Ok.”
“…”
“…”
“…”
“…”
“What’s wrong boy? I told you that we can continue this talk outside.”
“I really don’t know if you are trying to be a savage here but, as you can see, I don’t have my legs anymore…”
“…”
“…”
“I’ll go get something.”
He left yet, again…
…
…
Another ten minutes passed when returns…
“Here boy, a wheelchair for the disable with fully functional steerable wheel and atomic booster equipped! It can also levitate for a while. It has missile and lasers too if you are in any trouble.”
“Is this normal to you guys?!”
“…”
“…”
“Boy, do you want the one with flight function and mountain blaster together with a flame thrower?”
“I’ll take that one…”
And so, my wonderful voyage starts with this overpowered wheelchair…
I follow Dylan out of the room. The levitate function is quite usable as I used it to go down stairs.
Dylan’s house…or rather he said, party cabin is full of weird electronics and technologies that even on earth still don’t have.
His cabin is fully functional with a voice system to do his biddings that it made me wonder how in the world did it take him ten minutes to get something in here.
…
As we exit the cabin, what brought to my sight is the full view of the city…
Wonderful
Is the only thing I can say.
It’s futuristic with tall buildings with weird things propelling at the top.
I can see everything because Dylan’s cabin is located uphill…or more likely… in a very high place!
Not really high, but you can see the whole city in plain view. There are also farmlands and lands where animals are being taken care of.
And what’s their leading product being produced? Booze of course…
…
We walk leisurely in the midst of all trees in a downward slope. There are snows falling lightly and the temperature is cold.
“So… what happened?”
“UH? Ah yeah, I found you with one of my stealth bots and brought you over here with one of my proudest inventions, oscillation teleporter.”
“Eh?”
“What, you don’t know what oscillation is? It’s basically a movement of back and forth motion over a central neural point, boy. It’s also…blah blah blah. I get it, you are not interested.”
“Yeah…please proceed.”
“Then I treated you.”
“…that’s all?”
“Yeah.”
“…”
“Do you expect any drama from me?”
“No, that would be weird.”
“Right! Ga hahaha! Anyway, about this floating continent.”
“Yes, I’d love to know about it.”
Before continuing his jolly mood of speaking, he made a long pause for a moment and sighs deeply as he seems to recall many things.
The tale has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
“Is it painful?”
“Yeah…”
“I’m sorry…”
“You don’t have to apologize because I forgot to bring my booze.”
“Eh?”
“Ha?”
“N-nothing…well, would you please tell me now?”
“We tried to dominate the human continent once but got our asses kick by the continental destroyer!”
“Uh-huh…”
“That woman is so powerful that she lifts our whole land into the sky. She then prepares a powerful magic that would surely destroy the whole land. Fortunately, we used everything at our disposal to make a holographic illusion to trick her and the world that our land crumbles and became part of the sea.”
“Why do you looks so happy?!”
“Why you ask? I am not even mad, not anyone in our side is! We are just being a good sport after all! We started something, if it goes wrong and it gets back to us, it’s our fault too!”
“Somehow, that’s a really admirable belief. But…what are ethers? You look like a human too.”
“What are our differences? First of all, we etherians are not of this dimension. We evacuated our old timeline to travel dimension and we came across this world thousands of years ago.”
“Wow…”
“Following that, we became greedy and wanted more resources to fund our research! So we initiated a war against the humans and we lost. That’s all there is to it.”
“But…”
“We ethers are completely different. A human has blood vessels and nerves throughout their bodies. The nervous system, cardiovascular system, lymph nodes and much more. We, the ethers, also have all of this. The differences between humans and etherians are humans are capable of using and being proficient in magic as we cannot. They can also have soul weapons. We, however, the etherians, from a foreign dimension, developed a new system in our body to adapt in this world.”
“Eh?!”
“It’s called Flow Circuit.”
“Flow circuit? What does it mean?”
“We can detect any form of energy by simply touching. We sense it with this circuit that in our body. We can also detect energies from inanimate objects and non-living objects. Combined with our proficiency in inventing, we can also utilize this energy with indirect way too to make our technology grows further.”
“I see… so… why attack the human continent then?”
“Our attack two hundred years ago, pursuing more resource is because we want the spirits that produce a strong static energy. I am planning to use those spirit as my new concept for my spirit tech.”
“…”
“Also, our flow circuit acts like a leaf.”
“Leaf?
“We perpetually absorb corrupted and malignant energy around us and release new and purified energy through breathing. It’s not much of a help, but it’s useful as we still consume bad elements from the mana deposit of this world.”
“It doesn’t have any side effect?”
“Nay, more like it feels like we have eaten something in a really small amount, that’s all.”
“That’s good! It would be really bad if it has a negative impact.”
“Haha! Well, that’s all for now.”
“Thank you. By the way… about my body…”
“Yeah… I want to tell you bluntly but… you are not going to live for another year, boy.”
“What do you mean by that?!”
It’s not much of a shock for me, though. I just thought that being alive today is already a blessing for me.
“You lost a soul weapon right?”
“Yeah…”
“Only a fragment of your soul remains. It would only last a year until it goes out…”
“I am thankful for your bluntness on these issues, but I would appreciate if you don’t start picking berries…”
Yeah…
I feel like the mood is serious because my life is on the verge of disappearing and he just nonchalantly picks up berries from trees and ground.
“Sorry about that, boy. Anyway, you die in a year. Want to live the rest of your life happily here?”
“Of course not! I have many things to do. Is there any way for me to be able to fight again?”
“Hmm…I’d say if you can just recover you soul weapon from the arcana user, then you would definitely regain your lost count of life. But the limbs that were amputated are the real problem.”
Wait…what did he just said?!
“Dylan… what did you just said?”
“Hmm? Recovering your lost soul weapon would bring you lost count of life back.”
“No, that’s not it.”
“Hmm? What is it, boy?
I definitely didn’t mishear it.
He actually said it.
“Dylan, how did you even know that an arcana magician did this to me?”
“!”
“Dylan, I think you are actually more than meets the eye. Who are you?”
“…”
“…”
“Haa… It seems you really are a sharp one, boy. I did give away myself at this point. I can’t reason my way out of this now that you noticed it immediately…”
“…”
He sighs as he lament at his mistake but nevertheless, returns to his jolly and grinning mood. He walks forward with many steps and then faced me.
“Let me introduce myself again, boy.”
“…”
“I am Dylan. I have told you earlier of what I am in this land but I have another identity. In the order of Arcana of Sins, I am the current Arcana of Sloth.”