About Interludes:

Though these may not seem like interludes at all, you're just gonna have to accept this and move on. Sorry.

Except for this first set of interludes(This one, [Interlude 1] and up till [Interlude 11-Epilogue]), the Interludes are the stories of what were supposed to originally happen if Rea and the MC didn't do what they are doing right now.

When you compile a set of them together, they will form an entirely different story.

Yes, they're stand-alone side stories.

Not that this is important right now. We're still far from those chapters.... sadly. But this is my plan and I'll stick to it.

Now then, here's the first one:

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Prologue Alpha - The Origin

Mankind had finally reached a certain point in the field of science.

And with the help of science, they had achieved peace for themselves.

They turned Earth into a place that every human in the world longed for, and they renamed the place into Heaven.

There were no more wars, no more death, no more sadness, no more envy and everyone is equal and united. Everyone in the world was happy. They sang songs all day, danced gracefully, no longer needed to eat, played together happily and so on...

They could even revive the dead, but decided against it.

Doing so would cause the peace that they had worked so hard for to achieve to come crumbling down like a house made of cards.

Yet, they have decided to make every human in the world immortal.

Is it due to their fear of death? Curiosity of what will happen in the future? No. It is to ensure that the future generation would not be led astray into the wrong path. To prevent humans from causing catastrophes in the far future.

It seemed as if there was nothing to fear anymore.

So they stopped developing technology, researching and gaining new knowledge.

That is until they realized that peace never lasts forever...

Unsurprisingly, a problem presented itself with the passage of time.

The universe got overpopulated with humans due to absolute absence of death.

But this resulted in forced evolution and the start of- no, the halt of all kinds of human reproduction functions which made every single human in the world incapable of producing an offspring anymore. Not by either the natural way or the scientific way. No one knew how it happened. They cannot explain it scientifically either. It seemed as if the limit of humans that are allowed to exist in the universe has already been reached. It's like a natural universal law. They are baffled by it but decided to ignore it due to them being freed from the problems like the universe being too tight for humans.

But most of them ignored this one crucial fact that will lead to their demise in the future. The fact that something non-scientific such as a universal law of the limit of humans allowed to exist has been applied to them. No, the fact that a universal law separate from science exists.

Had they realized it earlier, they would have been able to take action and evaded an irreversible disaster.

Time passed by and thousands of years later, humanity grew tired of seeing the same faces over and over again. Boredom hit everyone like a strange plague, from oldest to youngest, no one was an exception from it.

Even when disaster is about to hit the Earth, the place they dubbed "Heaven", or any other planet, they could easily deal with it.

A storm is coming? Control the weather.

Predicted an incoming disastrous earth quake? Stop it by manipulating the planet itself.

Asteroids colliding with a planet? Blast it away no matter how big or how small.

Alien invasion? The border of the universe has been reached by humans and it was confirmed that they are the only civilization in this universe.

Black hole? It just inconveniences them so they just throw in a single "anti-black hole bomb" that neutralizes any black hole.

And so on and so forth...

Their civilization's level of technology had already reached that far before they stopped trying to advance it even further, believing that there is no more need for further improvement.

Not until that one time in a certain planet that was once called Earth.

In a place where it's common for many people to gather.

Inside a public park in the center of a certain city in a certain country.

Something happened.

Something unbelievable.

Something unscientific.

Something... supernatural.

Not a single person present in that place expected to witness something so scientifically impossible.

A human sized crack opened up in an empty space. From inside the crack came out shining white light, making it hard to see what was inside.

Every single person present in that place stared at the cracked space.

From within the cracked space, something came out. No, not something. It was a strange dark haired man.

The man wore an overly large pure green robe that was dragged along the ground as he walked. The robe covered his entire body so no one could see what was inside it. The robe is also only slightly darker than the bright grass around the park.

Strangely, not a single person in that place could recognize him. Each and every single human in the universe could recognize each other by face as they already have seen each other multiple times in their seemingly unending life. But no one could recognize this strangely dressed smirking man who was looking all over the place.

The man chewed something with his mouth. No, he was trying to speak.

"Come... want... to..."

No one understood what he was saying. He was too far away for anyone to hear what he just said accurately.

Had they just known what it is that he said, that one unlucky person who approached him would have avoided death.

Yes. Death.

In a universe where it was currently impossible for a human to die, no one expected what happened next.

What the man had said was actually "Come closer, those who want to die..."

Yet, due to being unable to understand, a woman tried to approach the man.

What the woman wanted to was simple. All she tried to do was to greet the man in the friendliest way possible. But when she got inside the reach of the man...

The strange man unclenched his already clenched fist inside his large robe.

She felt a wet finger touch her forehead. The man touched her in the forehead with his index finger. The wetness must have been from his palm's sweat.

Not understanding what the action meant, she just stayed standing there while feeling strange.

Until...

Her head withered away like it suddenly began to age rapidly and, and, and...

And then, her head exploded.

It popped like a balloon.

The body that remained, having lost its head, did what it had to do. It fell down with a thud like a puppet with its strings suddenly cut.

In a world where a gun, if it even existed, or a meteorite crashing into your body, or coming into contact with a black hole could not make you feel pain, let alone harm you, that woman died all too easily in the hands of the strange man.

To the eyes of everyone there, something strange and foreign happened. No one here is old enough to come in contact with malice when it still existed.

It was a concept that they did not have a chance to come in contact with the moment they were born.

What happened next came naturally due to the nature of humans, or more likely due to the nature of living beings.

Those who were around watching felt an emotion that they had long since forgotten for the first time in a while. This familiar but surprisingly distant sensation. The feeling of fear.

Someone screamed. They did not know who screamed first but they knew someone did. The scream brought them to their senses.

Once they realized what happened, they began to panic and run around trying to escape from the man.

Strangely, What the man did as a reaction to the panic he had caused was just a loud long laugh and then he along with the crack. It was as if his intention was just to cause a panic to enjoy himself.

On that day, humanity was once again reminded of the feeling of fear after a long time.

Due to the incident, Humanity once again decided to improve their technology and sharpen their self defense skills in preparation for a possible next attack. They had grieved for the loss of one human but most of them used it as an inspiration for finding out what happened to the fullest detail. Part of their motive was for curiosity, and part of it was for anger and revenge towards the man who killed the unsuspecting victim.

Thanks to their already broad knowledge, it was only days later that they finally reached an answer that no one expected at all.

He had come from an alternate universe.

Traces of the dimensional crack where the man had come from had let them to that conclusion.

Yet, before they tackle that problem, they still have another one small problem.

Their current population is reduced by one. They are one human fewer.

It means it was now possible to create another human child.

This possibility brings with it a different kind of disaster that will change or take the lives everyone.

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Prologue Beta - A Glimpse into the future

-----Epilogue---------------------

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------then------he--------over-----

-----------never--------want---------------

---lied----------killed---------------finish--

------start-----------fast-------too-------

-realized--------and--------------------sometime-

---and he ran as fast as he can, hoping that his friends are at that place still waiting for him to come back from that place undesirable place.

He finally reached the entrance. He lives here. His friends live here. His foster parents live here. They all live here.

He was standing in front of the entrance of a small white house in the middle his hometown. The place served as the base of operations of him and his friends, but it's also the place that they call home. It has two floors, one with the living room and the kitchen, and one containing a hallway that has two doors that lead to different rooms. One room is for sleeping and the other room is for Bathroom and Hygiene. Some of his friends sleep in the hallway or the living room due to lack of space.

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Remembering all the experiences he had from his childhood up to this point in time, he prepared to open the door. He remember about surviving a large scale disaster and being thrown into this place as a child. He remember about this only one other child that he met in that place before being coming here all on his own. He remember that he couldn't remember anything about his real parents' faces. He remembered all those hardships he went through when he was all alone, about how he met the owner of this house and helped him, about how mysterious coincidences keep happening resulting in favorable outcomes, and about all those people he met. Though he could barely remember any details about his past, he knows that none of it were good memories. No, wrong.

He pushed the door open and went inside.

He also remember about the teachings of his parents. Even though he could barely remember them, he knows they those parents thought him well as a child about all kinds of moral teachings and kindness.

But those teachings are kind of wasted now as he had become something that would surely displease his real parents.

He looked around the house.

He was not proud of what he had become, but he is still happy that he had met all these different people who helped him reach this point in life.

He was happy that he at least showed kindness, if not to humans, then to the world and that he had made it a better place.

Finally, he found all his comrades in one spot in the kitchen...

He remember all the faces of his friends when they we're still children. They've grown up together and shared sorrows and happiness together. When one of them is in trouble, the others will quickly come to rescue.

Now, all of those young faces are already adults. He was the only one who looked young enough to be out of place in the group. His body stopped aging before reaching twenty, he didn't know why but that's how it is. Though that's not important now.

Rather, what's more important is what he is seeing right now right in front of his eyes.

All of his friends, now adults.

Each and every one of them.

Dead.

Blood was scattered everywhere. It looked like a mess. A slaughter fest.

He could not believe what he is seeing. All of his friends, dead.

It was like he was in a horror movie. No, he probably was in one right now.

One of them even had his head twisted and torn off like a doll with a dagger stuck inside both eye sockets. One was impaled to the ceiling with daggers. One had her wrists cut off and stabbed with a dagger in the face and is now lying on the floor. One sat on the chair as if taking a nap silently, but upon close look, it was only his impaled body stuck to the wall with a single dagger in his chest and was only being help up in sitting position by the chair. One only had an unrecognizable skinless unmoving but uninjured body lying on a pool of blood while still gripping on a dagger in his or her right hand.

He did not know where all those daggers had come from.

He was shocked. He had already found 5 brutally murdered bodies of his friends.

He passed by them and went to the second floor.

There, he found four bodies.

Two young girls he know are lying down in a pool of blood on the floor together while impaled together by a single dagger, if it still can be called that, long enough to get stuck in both of their throats. One was an old woman, his foster mother, also lying on the floor positioned a bit farther from the two girls and she was held in place to the floor by a dagger at the back of her neck. And the final body, with hands trying to to reach out to the old woman, her husband's body was also impaled to the floor by multiple daggers on his back and he was just positioned a feet away from the old woman's body.

The scenes he saw were all too cruel for him.

There was a creaking noise coming from below, but he ignored it.

He had killed many people before, but not in such gruesome ways. He also didn't kill without good reason.

Footsteps could be heard directly behind him, but he chose to believe that it was just his imagination.

He had considered the possibility of all this being some kind revenge from one of his target's families, but that was impossible as he covered his tracks quite well. They shouldn't even be able to know who he was.

But there was now an even bigger problem for him to worry about after discovering all the bodies.

The dead bodies... They were one too many.

Yes, he counted nine bodies but he only knew of eight who should be in this house.

And then he remembered.

He remembered.

Among all those dead bodies, there was only one which was not stabbed or damaged by a dagger in any way.

He could feel a presence behind him.

As he slowly looked back...

When he turned around to see who it was, he was suddenly unable to move. It's appearance was terrifying but fear was not the reason he could move. He held his breath upon seeing it but shock was also not the reason he couldn't move. His body simply felt really heavy and could not obey him. It couldn't move as if it was made of stone. He was just merely paralyzed while still standing. He couldn't even bend his knees or move his eyeballs whether he wanted to or not. Not even another person could probably move even his fingers right now.

Petrified. That word alone could describe his situation. It was unnatural. His body felt like stone yet it wasn't.

With all his will, he tried to move his body but couldn't. All he could do there right now was wait for his inevitable demise.

As he heard metallic footsteps coming from the front, he focused on the approaching face of the owner of those footsteps one last time.

He saw a skinless face inches away from his own, and he felt a small impact and a bit of stinging pain above his head.

And then... his thoughts stop there.

.........

.....

...

.

"AaaaaaaaaaAAaaaaaaaaaaAhhh!"

He screamed as he woke up.

"--What happened!?"

His mother came rushing into his room and asked.

The young child who screamed after waking up looked around and calmed down when he saw that he was in his bedroom.

"I... had a bad dream. It was scary."

Satisfied with the answer, the mother gave a sigh.

"Don't worry, all of it was just a dream. Don't be scared, all right? I'll go now, I need to wait for daddy to come home."

"But mom!"

The mother left the room without turning off the lights out of concern for her son and yet she shut the door despite the protests of the scared child.

She then went back to the living room and turned on the television.

"Phew... and here I thought it was something serious."

While watching television, she waited for her husband.

Her husband was working at a research company. The Miracle Industries. He was a scientist. He was also one of the oldest humans in the universe. They had met each other after that incident in the park eight years ago that everyone remembers.

"---loving memory of Sherry Rheison. The scientists and researchers has combined their efforts with the government and offered help to---"

The reported said something about the death anniversary of that one woman who died in the park eight years ago.

She remembered. She was also there the moment it happened.

In fact, the woman who died was her closest friend. Her best friend. Sherry Rheison.

She tried to recall the events that happened on that regrettable day.

Them strolling together in the park and then suddenly a man appeared, Sherry who was desperate for a companion in life tried to get friendly with him, then the man killed her unreasonably.

Every time she remembers it, tears start coming down on her cheeks.

"Why are you crying, mom?"

Then she heard the voice of the child, the human who filled her friend's gap in the universe.

March Kleist.

"Nothing, March. Go to sleep. Or do you want to wait for daddy with me?"

The young boy approached his mother, Christina Kleist, and watched the television together with her.

Few minutes later, the father Mark Kleist finally arived home.

...Somewhere inside the deepest floors and laboratory of Miracle Industries.

A child was sitting idly inside a transparent cage. To be precise, the child was a young girl.

That child who should not have existed at all is sitting there. A miracle, some might say.

There was a strange rule in this world that supposedly made it so that only one human child that can possibly exist currently. But that rule was miraculously broken just by the existence of this girl.

The girl's eyes were blank, always staring into nothingness. Nobody knows what she is thinking.

Is she hungry? Is she sad? Is she happy? Lonely? Scared? Tired? Excited? Surprised? No one knows.

The researchers around her cage were monitoring each and every single movement she makes.

At times they make the girl go outside the cage to teach her things that a normal human should be taught, and after that she gets to return inside the cage.

This process has repeatedly carried on from the moment of her creation.

Yes. Creation.

She was artificially created. 100% artificial. An artificial human.

A true miracle.

It could be said that her parents are these scientists. But that also would not be accurate.

Eight years old. The age of the girl.

Her age is also the hint to her origins. Eight years ago, when a certain incident happened.

She was created from the DNA of the man who killed Sherry Rheison and the DNA of Sherry herself. How they managed to get the man's DNA is only possible thanks to his sweaty finger at the time of contact with Sherry's skin. They detected a bit of his sweat and used it as a DNA sample.

Strictly speaking, she is the child of the Sherry and the mysterious man.

And so, they continued to study her in hopes on getting clue on the man's mysterious origins and ability.

Her days would go on like this until she is studied fully by the scientists and she gets old enough to go outside by herself.