SANCTUM'S END (VI)

Madness.

Perhaps that was the aptest description of what transpired when the news of the creatures flying through s.p.a.ce was leaked. n.o.body was certain who did it, but it had to be someone from the group that surrounded Eldon when he discovered them to begin with.

The entire city -- nay, the entire world -- went mad, Eldon was certain. He'd immediately contacted Alana and ordered her to leave the school and go back to the apartment as quickly as possible.

He himself had planned on getting a Transport and going back quickly, but it turned out to be a pipe dream; not only could he not spot a single Transport, but the skies themselves also seemed to be ablaze with how many crashes had occurred in the s.p.a.ce of ten minutes.

Grunting, he didn't hesitate and broke out into a sprint. It would take him a long time, but at the very least he would get there. What to do when he got there, however? Hide? Yes, but where? He didn't know.

Rather, he didn't even know what were the intentions of those creatures, or whether they were even coming here. Though the A.I. predicted so, it was far from being flawless. Besides, even if they arrived, the military would deal with them, no? They had an entire defensive system set up throughout the nearby cl.u.s.ter -- everything from the concentrated blasts of radiation to singularity bombs. Just one of those was enough to level a whole planet to the ground; what could a few creatures possibly do against it?

Though those thoughts sprayed through his mind, something inside him told him he was deluding himself. He had to remind himself those creatures were flying through the open s.p.a.ce without any equipment -- flying faster than any of the s.h.i.+ps they had, so faster it was embarra.s.sing to even compare the two -- and they couldn't be gauged with their ordinary knowledge.

The alarms were blaring all throughout the city, Red Alerts singing aloud, the projectors dropped from the skies portraying the Spokesperson of the Union trying to orderly relay what people should do. Eldon suspected n.o.body quite cared since, as far as he could tell, not a single person he came across even bothered looking up.

They hadn't had a major war ever since the Galactic Uprising, which was well over two centuries ago. Complacency was a rather dangerous thing, and none of the ordinary people were quite ready for any sort of battle. Perhaps even the military wasn't, especially against the creatures that appeared entirely mythical in make.

After a long and grueling marathon, Eldon finally managed to make it back to the apartment complex that had half-emptied by now. He could still spot dozens of people racing about the ma.s.sive compound, however, despite several hours having pa.s.sed since the announcement.

Disregarding all of them, he shot up the eighteen flights of stairs in his record time and burst into the apartment. Alana cried out in surprise as she saw him, his clothes wet as though he'd just gone out for a swim, heaving madly, his head smoking.

"W-what's wrong with you?!!" she cried out worriedly. "Did--did you seriously run all the way here?!"

"are you okay?" he asked instead.

"I'm fine, I'm fine," she rushed him onto the bed; the moment his body felt the comforting envelopment of the mattress, he collapsed, unable to move a single muscle in his body. In retrospect, what he just did was absolutely insane; where did he even get the strength to do it? "You look like c.r.a.p, though..."

"...aah, ahhh," he was unable to answer her just yet, barely managing to breathe. His lungs felt as though they were ready to burst out of his body, seemingly falling apart at their seams. "Sorry...aahhh..."

"Ugh, shut up," she said, rolling her eyes and pulling up the screen in front of them; on it, he saw military being mobilized, both the planetary and the galactic ones.

"Though your call shocked me quite a bit, I only realized why you were like that when I came back home and checked the news. On my way over, it all seemed largely normal. Did your group discover them?" she asked worriedly.

"... y-yeah," Eldon replied, barely managing to sit up. "Did they show the picture?"

"Hm," Alana nodded. "They looked like the Winged Heralds from the old Holy Books..."

"They might as well be," Eldon shrugged. "How the h.e.l.l can they fly through the open s.p.a.ce without a s.h.i.+p?"

"... I guess it's similar to our Augmentation," Alana said, stroking her chin. "Just, obviously, countless grades better."

"... hmm," after a short thought, Eldon nodded -- that seemed like the most likely possibility. "The military is really going all out."

"I don't get why everyone got so panicked," Alana said. "Even if their Augmentations are powerful, can they really do anything against a Nanocannon? That thing can bore holes through the stars."

"... I think it's mostly just a chain reaction, and the surprise factor," Eldon replied. "This is the first time something like this happened, after all..."

"You're no better..."

"Sorry, ha ha," he chuckled awkwardly. "I just... got a bad premonition when I first looked at the picture of them. It was like... I don't know... like my instinct screaming at me. That those things... aren't as simple as they seem..."

"... what? You think they can go up against our military?" Alana asked with an incredulous expression.

"I don't know..." he sighed. "It's better to be cautious, however..."

"My worries proved right soon after," Ataxia said to Lino whose eyes were peeled on the angelic-looking figures on the still image. "In less than ten days, Adur would cease to exist, as well as all but fourteen members of our species."

"Fourteen?" Lino quizzed. "With other Writs, you, Alana, and I imagine Biyung, isn't that nine? Where did the other five come from?"

"... Ashtar was one of them," Ataxia replied with a sigh. "As was Asmodei. And Alladin. The other two, you've never met. One of them heralded the t.i.tan Race into existence with my help, the second died on our way to Noterra..."

"... who were they?" Lino asked, pointing at the still image. "They look eerily a lot like the Archangels."

"--when the Edifice asked me what kind of an army I wanted, I instinctively thought back at them, which is how Archangels came to be," Ataxia replied. "As for who they are... I have no idea, to be honest. My speculation is that they are simply members of many other galactic species inhabiting the cosmos. They, after all, gave very little explanation during their ransacking of my home."

"... to be honest," Lino said, chuckling bitterly. "All of this... is so far outside my scope... it's embarra.s.sing. For a long while now I've been concocting various theories of your origins, but, by G.o.ds... I could have never thought up this s.h.i.+t."

"It isn't surprising," Ataxia said. "You had nothing to go on."

"--other Writs, then... aren't your natural enemies?" Lino asked.

"On the contrary," Ataxia replied. "They... are my friends. Or, at least, they used to be."

"That's... hard to believe."

"They intentionally wiped their memories before they reached Noterra," Ataxia explained as Lino listened, his entire worldview shaken beyond belief. "It was a gamble. In a way, we wall knew those things -- or at least someone like them -- might come back in the future. With the help of the Edifice, we turned from creatures into concepts -- however, the requirement was that we gather enough Chaos to rebuild it. Chaos is, surprisingly, easy enough to generate; each time there's a discord to the natural order, a small bit appears. And, bit by bit, we collected them. That was why I made Primes -- since they made the perfect vessels for Chaos.

"However, to be effective at it, we decided to segregate into camps; I on one side, and the rest on another. For this to work, they've given up majority of their functions over to me, and thus... the story of Noterra began."

"... holy h.e.l.l..." Lino mumbled, sucking in a cold breath.

"Now, perhaps, you can see why I was so ambiguous with you..."

"Aye..." Lino nodded, still trying to process everything Ataxia told him. "Then, the First Scripture...?"

"A small pod of the s.p.a.ces.h.i.+p we arrived in, the one I carried Alana with to Noterra," Ataxia replied. "It holds as many records as we could salvage of Adur, as a way of preserving the memory of the entire system of worlds that have vanished from all cosmic annals."

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"... is there a way to restore the Writs' memories?" Lino asked.

"Yes," Ataxia replied. "Though, I imagine, a few of them have already begun remembering certain things -- especially Astrum and Nirvana. Lino," he said in a strangely serious voice, forcing Lino to look at him squarely. "Ella... will not return as a friend."

"... how do you know?" Lino asked.

"I just... do," Ataxia replied. "And, most importantly, she won't return alone. Seeing as you've now become a fully-fledged Agent of Destruction, you are effectively at her level of strength, if not even stronger. She will bring either other Agents, or armies under them."

"..."

"There is only one way to ensure the survival."

"I won't abandon Noterra, Ataxia." Lino said firmly, frowning.

"... do you think I could ask of you to do that?" Ataxia sighed painfully, glancing down at the frozen, distant memory. "No, we won't abandon it. Rather, we'll turn it into our starting point."

"Hm?"

"Rebuild the Edifice," Ataxia explained. "And unite the world. Prepare them for a war the likes of which none of them can even imagine. The one where battles like yours and Asthar's are as common as weed. Otherwise... the same thing will happen to Noterra, the same thing that happened to my home."