“Alright. I’ll give you the shorter version because twenty years worth of history is too bothersome for me to talk about.”

I sat cross-legged on the ground. Mythria headed in front of me and did the same. Facing each other, I let her peer into the history of the World with my words as the medium. But before that,

“Let me just ask. Do I look like an ordinary person to you?”

Mythria didn’t move by much. Although for reasons unknown to me, she kept staring at me before giving me a reply.

“I don’t know. I don’t have any memories, so I’m not sure what people consider as ordinary. What I do know is that you are filled with a warm, gentle light. A light resembling a golden color, kind of like the sun.”

I was surprised at first because I didn’t expect her to be capable of seeing spiritual auras. Those are a tad bit different from mana, which most religions consider as a form of spiritual energy, but is in fact a physical form of a purer, more spiritual energy referred to as the Anima.

“You see, that golden light you’re seeing from me is an identifier. It allows you to know that I’m not just your ordinary guy. I am a far more powerful individual than any this World has seen. A Godlike entity.”

“God...? Are you the Lord Almighty?!”

I quickly corrected her, of course.

“No no no. The Lord Almighty is the Originator of everything, but there are also a lot of lower gods with lower levels of divinity. I am an artificial god. A god in a mortal body. In other words, I used to be human, but a higher entity made me into a god in order to support this World. But well, as you can see, I failed at my job… Well, anyways, let’s go back to the main topic.”

At last, I managed to push through and kickstart the story which took place about twenty-two years ago.

It was a time when both Science and Magic were at their peaks. Nations uselessly debated what’s superior; ultimately leading to a massive divide between those that supported one side over the other.

The Demon Race were natural-born magicians which meant that they would prefer magic over any alternatives. The dwarves, on the other hand, were natural engineers and mechanics, making their affinity for Science greater. Elves also advocated Magic as it is more nature-friendly than the alternative ( alas, they were mistaken ). Some of the more neutral races included the Humans, Beastkind, and the Dragonkin.

The Dragonkin didn’t care what was superior. To them, power is everything, and so, they didn’t discriminate between Science and Magic. If one of their kind achieved greater power via Magic, then so be it. If one were to achieve a higher level of power through Science, then good for them.

Beastkind were focused neither on the superiority of which faction, nor the convenience of wielding Magic and Science. They loved to move around, and for them, their bodies were their greatest weapons.

Then came the Humans which I also once belonged to some tens of thousands of years ago.

Humans were arguably the weakest of the Seven Races, and because of that, humanity’s thirst for knowledge, resources, and power was unrivaled. As a result of being the weakest, humans also achieved unparalleled flexibility and adaptability. It was often said that humans were born extremely weak because they had to sacrifice everything for limitless potential. What that meant was that humans, having started being weak, were capable of becoming stronger than anything else provided they put in the effort and time required to master their particular crafts. That saying was only half-true, but I am not going to correct it now as it is just a wasted effort.

Continuing, because of humanity’s thirst for knowledge, resources, and power, they were ever closer to turning corrupt and evil ( albeit for the sake of their own people ). Being competitive almost to the point of being prideful, they will almost immediately try to create something better whenever the other races present a new innovation. Whether it be magical or scientific innovation, humanity will not fail to research anything and everything.

Of course, the other races wouldn’t allow themselves to be trumped, and there would be a constant war not of violence, but that of innovation.

A scientific nation gave birth to what they called Mechs, which were kind of like huge metallic spiders equipped with things like guns, cannons, and vibrating blades that can cut through anything.

In response, a magical nation would then invent a barrier capable of mitigating the strength of the mechs. They would then develop an offensive magic substantially stronger than any scientific inventions, and will demonstrate it for the World to see.

This battle of innovation would eventually cause the World to be polluted. Massive industrialization led to air and water pollution, and at the same time, ate away at the resource reserves of the Planet.

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On the other hand, the quest for better and better magic led magical nations into developing ever-stronger offensive and defensive magic. The problem was that these magical nations focused solely on either destructive or defensive capability; completely ignoring casting efficiency and power draw. As a result, every time a massive scale magic were demonstrated for the World to see, a large amount of residual mana would escape into the air. From there, these residual mana would be inhaled by the plants, animals, and people. After circulating through their systems, they will then excrete it for the soil to absorb. These residual mana would then corrupt nature, and after some time, the miasma would grow enough for creatures to mutate into beings that know only destruction; devoid of their original qualities.

If the issue wasn’t addressed quickly enough, then nature’s bounties; the plants, trees, and flowers would start to die off one by one, thus, draining the World of its colors. Some of the plants and trees would also mutate to become deadly existences of murder for the unfortunate passerby.

Given enough time, the miasma would seep in deep enough into the Earth to break the delicate geothermal balance. This caused the occasional small earthquakes at first, gradually gaining in both number and strength as the underlying problem remained unresolved until one day, multiple volcanoes erupted to destroy a massive third of the World. Leaving a smoky abyss in place of lands and waters that used to exist there.

After that, the people continued to live their lives in the remaining habitable areas of the World. Two-thirds of the World remained alive, and that was enough reason not to give up.

This was about the time everyone decided to stop their War of Innovation, and instead work together to figure out a fix for what was happening. Unfortunately, there were very few clues for researchers to base on. Countless studies and experiments were done on both dead and live monsters ( the mutated animals ) and plants, but neither Science nor Magic could explain the mysterious phenomena that was gradually eating away at the World.

Time passed them by to no avail. At that point, everyone kept living their lives, but in the deepest depths of their hearts, they knew the end was coming. Not everything was hopeless around this part of history, however, as the disasters plaguing the World gave birth to Adventurers and Mercenaries. People who had a different sense of value, differing belief systems and philosophies would create what would be called The Guild, and they would have fun exploring the dangers that plague the World. These people would also become the highlight of history as we entered the Final Era; The era of Chaos Zones and Phantoms.

People would come to notice that certain parts of the World, sometimes as small as a few square meters of land, and sometimes as huge as a whole city, would appear black and white; as if the colors have literally been drained off them. Needless to say, it became obvious that people who got caught in the phenomenon as it was happening were seemingly robbed of their freedom. Specifically, anyone and anything who was in the perimeters of an area being devoured of its colors would seemingly halt; as if time had completely stopped for them. Trapped in the neverending nothingness, apparently immortalized as statues for everyone to witness.

Alarmed, nations and the guild would head towards researching the peculiarity that visited the World. Experiments led to the conclusion that anyone can freely enter and exit a Chaos Zone for as long as it was after the formation of the Zone. However, anything and anyone who got caught during the formation of a Chaos Zone would forever remain as they are; incapable of anything.

This discovery led to a surge of Adventurers exploring deep within these colorless territories, and not long after, they will have their first encounter with The Phantoms.

Creatures unlike anything anyone had ever seen, with colors closely related to the pitch-black darkness of the Abyss. Some of these Phantoms would appear like animals. Some would appear as if they were an amalgamation of multiple beasts combined together, with eyes and pupils of different shapes, and different frequencies of voices that could lead anyone into insanity at any moment. Others would be like walking trees with countless vines moving about in search of prey, while few would look similar to humans, also seemingly having retained a personality, and could somewhat understand human language. However, no reasoning could get the humanoid Phantoms into a truce.

The biggest threat arrived shortly after the discovery of humanoid Phantoms when a group claiming to be the Envoys of Sins arrived. They were utterly ruthless. Merciless even to an infant. Even though they could comprehend human language, their inner mental and emotional workings were more like weapons of mass destruction; having known only how to cause chaos, and nothing else.

Shortly after the arrival of the Sins, the Guardians of the World sent by the heavens to preserve the integrity of the Planet went rogue one by one. People just naturally assumed the Guardians lost their sanity, but in reality, they were fighting a fierce battle against the Sins, only to lose in the end.

And then, as if it all wasn’t enough…

…

…

I held my breath, and called it quits as I remembered the true identity of the adorable girl in front of me. Perhaps I didn’t have enough courage, but I just couldn’t bring myself to tell her that last part.

“So as you can see, I only observed everything from a safe distance. Not once have I helped.”

I gave Mythria a strained smile while awaiting her words. I expected her to be angry because that IS the right way to feel, but…

“It must have been painful for you… To see the World you were born to be gone… For things to slowly go from bad to worse and then to worst. You… must have held back a lot.”

Seeing her face be filled with sorrow and pity made me feel so disgusted. What was up with that response? What the hell is wrong with you? I glared at her with murderous eyes.

“Stop…”

“You must have your reas-”

“I SAID STOP! YOU DON’T HAVE TO PITY ME LIKE THAT. STOP IT BECAUSE IT PISSES ME OFF SO BAD I FEEL LIKE DESTROYING THE WORLD A SECOND TIME!”

I heaved heavily, my adrenaline going on a rampage. Anger was the only thing in my head. It felt like I could kill Mythria right then and there if she uttered one wrong word, but what happened next left me speechless.

“What’s wrong with telling the truth?! Sure, maybe I’m stupid, but even I know that you are suffering from the inside! Why can’t you tell?! Why do you have to keep lying to yourself?! ALL YOU’RE DOING IS ESCAPING YOUR REALITY!”

Little droplets of liquid streamed down her eyes. For whatever reason, she started crying. Was it because I yelled at her? No. That wasn’t it. It was something a lot deeper. Mysteriously enough, it calmed me down. She… wasn’t pitying me. Does that mean she really…

“If you truly didn’t care, you wouldn’t even give it a glance. You would let everything happen without ever taking a look. Without ever remembering, you’d forget about it as if it never even happened. But you remember… Clearly enough to explain it to me in detail. You must have loved the World so much… You must have cared for everything so much… It must have truly been painful… to stand by doing nothing…”

“UWAAAAHHHH!!!”

I was left dumbfounded. Meanwhile, Mythria dropped on her knees and cried her heart away.

At that point, I felt like I had gotten closer to her. It felt as if an old, forgotten feeling inside me was beginning to awaken. I didn’t know what it was at the time, but I was thankful to Mythria for being so understanding. For being so caring and forgiving. From the depths of my being, I thought she really is a real treasure.