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Chapter 361: Memories of War
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As soon as Siva entered the place, Cortana’s voice became lively.
[Boss, this place is like heaven to us.]
Siva became curious, ‘Why do you say so?’
[The Auricle Scan and the Absolute Domain is in total effect here.]
‘Feed me the information.’
The entire conversation happened in but a snap of a second and after a sharp stinging pain on his head, information was fed to his brain directly. It was like an eagle eye’s view from above or GTA-like third person open-world view of his entire surroundings, every bit of information on his immediate surroundings aside from the elevator shaft behind him were all visible to his mind.
Siva turned around him and looked at the closing panel doors of the elevator.
‘I see. So it seems that we are at the edge of this so called Hive and that there is something that’s stopping anything related to magic being hidden in this place.’
[That seems to be so. Based on your reactions, boss, anything that emits Mana is being restricted in this place and so there is no problem for all kinds of electronic gadgets to work here.]
‘Right. This is indeed a paradise for the BMA.’
Currently, the Black Master Armament is purely an Invention —an electronic weapon— in a general sense of its make.
NanoTech Weaponry, the game’s mainstream and commonly used weaponry, is the pinnacle of both world’s technology and aside from magic and half of the Demons’ [Plasma Field], it was impervious to EMP and all kinds of old electronically-affecting phenomena.
As such, for the BMA, an Invention that had used two and a half Mega-Crates of the heavy Black Ironwood Alloy, this place was like cake for it to slice through with simplicity and without effort.
—if he had to rampage here.
Perhaps only Gaspar’s White-Tech Armament, the one Siva saw he used back then in the warehouse, could be the ones that could match it in terms of destructive capability and defensive sturdiness.
But if Siva chose to drop his disguise here and use the [Killing Zone], he knew that even ten Gaspar wouldn’t be his match.
‘I really gotta upgrade you as fast as I can.’
[You really have to, boss.]
Siva and Cortana’s thought-conversation ended in but a moment after Higginson’s words.
“Sir Knight, I Welcome you to The Hive.”
“Yes. This place… I feel any Mana here.”
Higginson felt surprised by Siva’s sensitivity to the Mana in his surroundings. He felt that it was a waste of time to hide this secret so he opted to begin the tour immediately.
“This is an exactly 1km-wide circular structure that centers on the artifact we’ve have been tasked by The Teacher to protect for an indefinite time.”
“Artifact?” Siva’s curiosity was piqued. “Am I safe to assume that such artifact is not part of the items you are entitled to explain to me?”
“Just solely and purely by the authority of my title as the President of the Human Society, then yes, that is indeed not part of the items I can talk to you about. But by virtue of the power I also hold as the President of the Human Society, as well as the person who vowed that Heavenly Oath, I am obliged to at least impart to you a few information that I feel is the equivalent of the resources we’ve received in our earlier exchange.”
Such weirdly-toned and arranged words made Siva’s face twitch behind his faceless mask.
Just who talks like this in the modern era?
“I-I see your point. Well then, let’s not waste time and just proceed as fast as we can.”
“Very well.”
At this point, sisteen Real@D holographic figures also appeared around them and they all, just like Siva and Scion, floated like ghosts as their group made way to the left flank and down a wide set of stairs towards the office area. Some of them were the familiar faces of the Ambassadors while a few of them were probably senators and the other representatives of the Human Society.
The busy people —majority of which wearing lab coats— began noticing their group descending from the stairs.
Halfway through the stairs, another Real@D figure appeared and approached Higginson.
“Mr. President! This is not a good time.”
Higginson frowned and then asked, “What do you mean not a good time? Didn’t you get the memo for this tour?”
The professor was an old man on his 60’s with a round-rim eye-glass on his left eye. But although he was considered old, his body remained straight and not a speck of age could be seen on his posture. From the way he conversed with the President of the Human Society, it could be said that he held a very high rank.
Higginson faced Siva, “Allow me to introduce you first, Sir Knight. This is Professor Hojer, Head of our Research and Development Team. For the last 40 years, he’s been working on the artifact to study it and understand its mysticisms. His work’s results are the current technology for the latest Warship Building Techniques and as well as the public introduction of the materials and also Technologies for Anti-Monster and Anti-Demon City-wide Defense Technologies we use today.”
It was a bit of a long introduction but it precisely detailed the contributions of this person who was deemed to be an integral part of the Human Society in Terroa.
But looking at the bigger picture of things, Professor Hojer is, in fact, more important than Higginson who can always be replaced after another term.
“Ah!” Hojer exclaimed as he looked at Siva.
There was something in the way Hojer looked at Siva that made his skin cringe with something. It was like he was looking at a massive figure that loomed over his body, while he was like a pinned insect in a tray —ready to be bisected for study.
Still, Siva suppressed that feeling and extended a hand to shake Hojer’s.
“Professor Hojer.” The man said, “Pleasure to be of service, Sir Knight.”
“Likewise.” Siva didn’t reject the offered hand but when he was about to release his grip, he felt that Hojer’s hand was stuck on his own. “My hand…?”
Siva prompted.
“Ah, apologies… it’s just… I haven’t seen such an interesting specimen in ages.”
Siva’s felt the chill run on his spine and in anger he tried to crush the man’s hand. It failed. The Professor was nothing more but a Real@D Hologram and so it was limited to a certain degree of touch.
Unfortunately for Siva, he could only burry that last comment down his gut.
Higginson, knowing his real identity, felt the rush of crisis at Hojer’s unbridled obsession for the limits of Science and quickly stepped in.
“Gentlemen, please. And Professor Hojer, please control your urges.”
“Ah… AH! Apologies.” Hojer bowed respectfully, or at least he tried to, because even though he had lowered his body as much as possible, his gaze was still locked on Siva.
—or to be exact, to his body.
In fact, Siva even perceived a smile on the Professor’s lips that sent the same cold ‘chill’ on his spine.
—this guy’s obsession is dangerous.
[Boss, my apologies… I can’t scan him.]
‘I know. The Auricle Scan can only scan physical objects and since you’re without visual scanning capabilities, you can only hear the audio feedback but not see his real appearance.’
[But I still scanned your thoughts and as well as the man’s voice so based on that alone, I can tell that he can be categorized as a mad scientist.]
Siva felt alarmed. ‘Isn’t that dangerous?’
[For the Humans, sir. Yes. But to you… as long as he doesn’t have a ‘specimen’ that has the same physical capabilities or magical abilities on the level of Pistareen, then there shouldn’t be a thing to be worried about.]
‘Truthfully, that’s what’s making me concerned for these guys… what if Hojer suddenly loses his mind and stake it all? I’ve seen these kinds of plot in movies before. If those movies can make it, it is not impossibility that this world has them as well.’
—after all, this world is the culmination of all of the thoughts of the humans for the past 2000 years.
This book's true home is on another platform. Check it out there for the real experience.
Terroa was a product of Human Imagination. The humans who created this game are the product of those movies and stories in the past. There is a large possibility that a true ‘Mad Scientist’ can be inserted into the game’s story.
Hojer is indeed a bright candidate on that role.
‘He’s dangerous not only to the innocent Humans but to me as well.’
[…]
Was this just purely contradictory?
Should Cortana point it out or not?
Is he becoming a hypocrite?
Siva is trying to be as cruel and cold hearted as much as possible and yet, it was part of his very personality itself to be worried for these people.
Before he was dragged down of his normal life as a college student, he was a prodigy with talent and charisma that attracted a lot of people. He’d also been involved in the Green Earth Movement and was responsible for minimizing and even closing a few businesses that’re destroying Earth.
It may just be extra-curricular activities to him and was done out of whim, but it was still a fact that he became a part of it. Those activities still had a certain amount of influence to his personality.
His mindset right here might just be its result.
*****
“Professor.” Higginson tried to neutralize what he had perceived as wariness in the air around Siva and admonished, “Sir Knight is ours esteemed guest and he has an authority as big and as grand as one of the Main Heads of the representatives of The Alliance.”
Hojer was surprised and this time, he lowered his head and bowed with sincerity.
“Hojer apologizes for his disrespect, Sir Knight.”
“I am not here for you. I am here to see that so called Artifact and know of a few things.”
Remembering his earlier words, Higginson took the reins to ask, “Professor Hojer, what is it about this tour not being in an appropriate time?”
“Ah, about that, a few hours ago, the Artifact that has been dormant for decades seemed to have a unique reaction and emitted a kind of field barrier that forced back all of our researchers.
“You mean no one can approach it now?”
Hojer nodded dejectedly. It was his obsessions and had always been his sole and only eye-candy so being unable to approach his ‘wife’ is making him feel dejected.
From behind them, Siva felt somewhat… alerted.
—Does this mean I can’t see it?
Just as he was pondering over such things, Siva took a step forward and Hojer suddenly looked behind him with a jolt of surprise.
His face showed a rare look of wonder and ecstasy that he forgot that he was in the presence of Higginson and Siva.
“Fascinating!” he uttered in complete bliss.
“Professor, what is happening?”
Hojer looked at him, “Ah, apologies. It would be better if you’re going to see it.”
With that, Hojer moved his left hand and extended his fingers to show his palm to them. A panel window opened wide and showed the view of the place closest to a spherical globe of bluish Mana that was surrounded by modules and boxes of equipment that blinked lights from its devices.
Hojer was also in that ‘view’, as small as a thumb, facing a wall that had an active call in it.
When Hojer looked back, the ‘Hojer’ in the panel window also looked back at the large globe of Mana.
“What is happening?!” Higginson also felt alerted by this. “What is that spherical globe? Where is the Artifact?” his voice became panicky.
Hojer replied, “The Artifact is still here. But that globe used to be a transparent barrier —the same barrier I just told you about. But just now, it had expanded twice in size and even materialized into this tangible gelatinous membrane of Mana. Truly fascinating, if you ask me!”
While they were shouting and being alerted in that manner, attracting the attention of the people in the busy workplace, Siva’s eyes were locked in that globe of Mana as [memories] surged in his mind in batches of images —visions that told him that this wasn’t his first time encountering such a phenomenon.
*****
There was him accompanied by a humanoid alien with a floating fiery crown on its head wearing a set of greenish-golden clothes with hovering runes and symbols… talking to him using a very ancient set of language about the globe of Mana.
“We found this a few hundred years ago—”
SWOOOSH!!
The words weren’t even finished when the vision of this scene switched with an imaginary sound of a gale and there he was again, Siva, in front of another ‘Artifact’ that emitted the same tangible barrier or Mana… inside a cave.
Before, they were in a majestic palace, now, they were inside a cave.
The only difference is that he was accompanied by a different person in this vision.
It was a little girl with fox ears and wagging bushy tail, wearing a loose robe and carrying a Wizard Staff twice her height, clinging his sleeve like a lost child. No. In fact, this little one wasn’t a girl but a woman.
It was just her racial characteristic to be this small.
The ‘small’ and cute-looking fox woman pointed a delicate finger towards the direction of the Artifact and eagerly pulled him.
“I found this a few days ago…”
SWOOSH!!!
Again, the scenery changed and just like being in a wormhole of flashing images, Siva was brought to another vision.
This time, he was deep in an ocean, surrounded by Sea Kings of massive sizes, emitting their full blast of hungry intents.
In the seabed, there was a bright light. Siva was on top of his golden cloud, sitting cross-legged as his eyes stared fixedly on that Artifact the deeper he goes.
The closer he got, the brighter was the reaction of the barrier of Mana.
SWOOSH!!!
The scene changed again and he was in outer space, still seated atop his golden piece of cloud that trailed off as he moved along in this dark canvas of stars.
In the distance, a war of Immortals is taking place around a large piece of rock that barely passed as an island. No. It was actually a comet.
Siva’s eyes stared at that comet because in it was the Artifact… emitting bright lights whenever one of the Immortals got closed to it.
Siva then murmured in that vision…
“This is the sixth…”
SWOOSH!!!
For the fifth time, the scene changed again. He is now in front of a large monster that emitted a very savage amount of Mana.
The monster was tens of kilometers in size. A bit of semblance to an armadillo; its body was made up of golden metallic rocks and having four arms and a pair of humanoid legs.
It roared angrily at Siva, its left eye shining with a familiar blue light.
They were in a planet of perpetual darkness; ice and pointy rocks shaped by strong winds filled the entire scene.
Siva looked at its eye and sighed, “The Eight…”
SWOOSH!!!
In this next scene, he was passing through a city broken down by war and when he turned his gaze towards the palace in the distance, his vision was directed towards the throne where a skull-faced emperor in dark majestic robes that emitted faces of souls it had devoured was seated, holding his golden staff that had the ‘Artifact’ embedded on it.
Despite the distance between them, that undead emperor raised its head and their gazes met: its dark empty sockets for eyes had a red fiery orb.
“That’s the Seventh…” Siva murmured and then faced up front, not bothering to look at the undead emperor again.
SWOOSH!!!
In this last scene…
Siva was different. He was angry. He was roaring to the skies full of enemies. Blood of different kinds and colors filled the entire battlefield. There are also the corpses piled up in the distance and around him.
The enemies weren’t just Immortals. There were also Gods and strong Mortals amongst them.
But then in the distance, there were the Devils; in a formation, they were a force conducting a large invasive war.
At the prow of that formation, was a sinister face that wore a confident smile.
The Siva in this vision roared, “Lucifer!”
Behind the observing Siva was the ninth Artifact that emitted a bright bluish barrier of Mana.
When Siva turned his gaze on that direction, he almost choked and forgot to breathe. Because at the side of that ‘Artifact’ was a familiar face.
‘Mom?’
His heart skipped a beat.
No.
That’s Terra!
—It’s not my mom but her twin entity.
Elizabeth Kingsley doesn’t have a twin sister but because of the things that happened in Terroa, the Terra Program gained sentience because of her and the two of them shared the same sets of memories with different personalities.
At the end of the day, Terra diverted and became a real living consciousness that fell in love and get to see the ‘real world’ outside the Cage. She even had a child which he now called his brother!
Technically and emotionally though, Terra… is still his mother… his ‘foster’ mother that sacrificed her life to protect “Rex Kingsley” 56 years ago in the current time.
Alas, Siva wasn’t aware of the above statement and so he viewed Terra and Elizabeth Kingsley as both his mothers and as a single person —one is an avatar and one is the soul.
“Mom!” he tried to call out but this ‘Elizabeth’ is the Terra who was on her Physical Goddess Form and was just about to discard it.
The war around him broke out and Siva could only watch as the Gods and Immortals on his side was converted into Darkness and became part of the corrupted army of Gods and Immortals.
It was this scene that Janus showed Scion back in the Cellar Dungeons. And now, Siva was looking at it… a recollection of his forgotten [memories].
Siva was strong and was in the core of the Army of Darkness, fighting Lucifer.
It was savagely bloody war that corpses and blood could be piled up to form a small planet.
On the enemies’ side, there was the monster with the shining left eye and even the Emperor of the Undead leading a legion of Specters as one of Lucifer’s Generals.
There were the faces of a few familiar Gods that Siva seem to recognize and recall the names like Donar, Apollo, Hecate, Leviathan, Ramus, Atlas, and a few more…
All of them were Terra’s protectors and they were fighting the war with all their might.
Stars could be seen dimming their radiances as lights of spells and magic, the Godly might of all these entities shaking the very fabric of space.
Eventually Siva defeated —no— deleted Lucifer but the Army still had its Devil Generals and they led an assault towards Terra.
Ultimately, half of the few surviving members of the Gods and Immortals, led by the newly arrived Janus in his Mortal Form, established the Cage and Terra abandoned her Goddess Essence.
The scene where Siva turned his head and saw the millions of Gods and Immortals burning their essences to destroy Terra’s shell was imprinted on his vision.
On his perception, they had become corrupted and so he felt despaired but more than that, he felt immense hatred.
“TRAITOOOOOOOOOORS!!!”
A heaven shattering cry of agony and hatred erupted from deep within his soul and [Siva] abandoned all rationality as he rushed towards the planet he was trying to protect.
The observing Siva saw it all and he too was affected by the despair and agony of seeing your mother be betrayed like that.
And yet, despite that, he also saw the underlying events and understood something.
Unlike the raging [Siva] whose mind was eaten by rage and despair, he saw the ‘reason’ why those Gods and Immortals did what they did.
*****
Back in the townhouse, Rex, who was lying on the bed, suddenly opened his eyes and jolted to sitting upright on the bed.
He hugged his left knee and used his right hand to grip his face.
“So that’s what happened…”
Tears were flowing in his eyes. He finally knew the truth. But alas, the one true [entity] that should have been made aware of this truth was taken away from him by The Father.
He hugged himself as he lay back to the bed.
He sobbed and covered himself with blanket. For some reason, he suddenly missed his mom; that caring and kind mom; and he wailed and cried as loud as he could since there wasn’t anyone who could hear him scream his heart out in this house.
*****
GASP!
Siva staggered a step back and this attracted the two men of prominent standing in front of him.
“Sir Knight, are you alright?”
He was still disoriented. The stinging pain of this batch of [memories] was greater than the last and the duration of what he could remember from the visions was also greater.
Siva held his head as he oriented himself back to his physical self.
‘Cortana…’
On his vision, Cortana was also holding her head and a pained look was also on her expression. It was a rare sight. No. This was a shocking sight.
Siva wasn’t even aware that this is one of those few times that Cortana was showing emotions such as ‘pain’ and ‘discomfort’. A normal AI should not even be capable of it —if Cortana was normal.
[Boss, for some reason, I was able to see what you had just seen and remembered it.]
‘Remembered?’
[It’s like… I’ve seen that war before. In my logs archive, it was registered as an existing memory but the encoding in that archive far exceeded my own capabilities to crack.]
Siva felt like panting when he heard it.
‘Isn’t this just full of shittery?’
He was enraged. Didn’t he swear that he would not let anyone control his life again? What is this?
‘Tell me Cortana, is there a date stamp on it?’
[Yes! Yes there is!]
Siva already had the feeling and this ‘thought’ was of course perceived by Cotana.
[You’re right boss. This date stamp, it’s registered four years ago!]
‘It’s connected to that accident.’
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Siva is getting close to the truth!!
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Next Chapter: The tour take a turn.
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