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WORLD-EATER (I)

The skies beyond the skies of Noterra repeatedly flashed in majestic, overbearing colors . Even though the entire planet was shrouded in a massive formation preventing it from being damaged, those ground-standing still felt the occasional shockwave reach them . Among those who intently stared at the empty sky without looking away was Aaria, looming perched on top of the balcony of her room, her clear eyes shimmering in worry . Standing by her side were young Cae, Eggor, and Primul, all three of whom also had rather pensive expressions .

Primul’s was the most complex one, however; as someone who used to stand on top of this world, the journey since his ’rebirth’ had truly shaken him . He had realized he was nothing but a little grain in the ever-throbbing gears of history, his name bound to be forgotten amidst the sea of those just like him .

Lino had offered to help him regain his previous strength well over a year ago, but Primul refused . The flame of his legend had long since waned – there was no reason to rekindle it . No, rather, he didn’t wish to rekindle it . In his bones he already knew he didn’t have long to live; he’d decided to dedicate the rest of his life to protecting this world that, once upon a time, he loathed . However little, he hoped to repent for the endless stream of sins he had committed in the past .

He didn’t trust himself still, however; he feared that, if he regained his prowess, he would become too attached to life, too ignorant of his past actions . Besides, his influence beyond the array would be minimal, even if he trained constantly . He sighed inwardly, looking away from the clear, blue sky . It was beautiful – all of it was . Be it the nature, or the human condition imposed upon it . Was there unity in the world? Hardly . Even now, while Lino, Hannah, Alison and the rest were bleeding tears of blood to defend the world, there were hundreds of wars ongoing on the surface .

Be it amongst the mortals, the minor and major Sects, individuals, Kingdoms, Empires... those partaking were none the wiser . Primul didn’t blame them, however . Their scopes of perception were limited, and their lives were finite; everyone tried to better their position in the world by however little they could . Those fighting to survive, or to ensure they had enough food to eat as to not starve, couldn’t care less about the larger-than-life stories . Their worries were right in front of them, rather than above them .

Primul could faintly understand the vanity of Lino’s desire to retire to the simple life . A long while ago, Lino shared with him that his greatest dream was to retire from everything, escape from it, and return to the life of simplehood . Work for a little while, sleep for a little while, enjoy life without all the chains binding him . However, he had long since accepted that was impossible . At best, he held it tightly to his heart as a distant dream, never letting himself get distracted .

How bitter did he seem at that moment, Primul pondered? The latter had even suggested to Lino to simply give up the power in return for protection; perhaps even Hannah didn’t know that those were his intentions until just recently . Lino was truly prepared to give up being the Agent, to give up the strength that allowed him to scale the cosmos fearlessly, in exchange for that life of simplicity . Even Primul, however, didn’t know what changed his mind .

"... they’ll be fine . " Cae consoled suddenly-shivering Aaria gently, patting her head . He had finally entered his growth sprout, and at last began to look like Eggor’s son; despite being stuck inside the libraries nearly all day long, every week, he still grew to be nearly two meters, with wide shoulders and even a tinge of muscles .

Aaria, on the other hand, had just begun entering teenagehood, first signs of maturity, besides rebellion, present both in her features and her countenance . Even still, however, whatever façade she put on when facing others, helplessness permeated her bones . Unlike her mother and father, both of whom could move the sky and the earth as they wished, yet still chose to put their lives on the line for everyone else, all she could do was silently watch over them .

Bitterness grew tight inside her heart; while the two of them never urged her to do anything, she could see the principle of expectation in virtually all other eyes, even those she considered close friends . Even if she continued doing nothing and freeloading until her death, she doubted anyone would say anything – but that was entirely due to who her parents were .

She was little over Level 100, barely a lamb in the land of Dragons . While definitely above average, she was hardly content; even Cae, who barely cultivated, was a little over Level 40 by now . Even with all the resources at her disposal, in the past three years that she had begun her training sincerely, she was unable to make any distinct progress . No matter how much she tried to reject it, the reality was clear – she had no talent . Perhaps that wouldn’t be all that bad since, as many had told her, neither did her father; if anything, he was even worse than her . But, he had something that she knew she didn’t – immovable will that could not be shaken . The sort of determination that enabled him to climb from that nothingness, from being a talentless nobody in the middle of nowhere to being the Emperor of the world .

"... I know they will . " Aaria replied, at last, glancing at Cae and meeting his gaze . "They wouldn’t dare leave me all by myself . " She shrugged, quickly replacing her worried look with the haughty one she began employing around a year ago . She felt unworthy of being friends with countless legendary figures that flocked around her, doing their best to help her with whatever problem she had . Unworthy of their kindness, the only thing she could do was slowly drive them away .

**

Though vacuum of space had the property of swallowing up all sounds, its membranes were being repeatedly sheered by the pure brutality and scale of the battle . Time and again, continuous drums of the explosions bellowed out into the nothingness, only swallowed up a good few miles away . The battlefield was an absolute hellhole; even Hannah couldn’t quite make heads or tails of what was going on . Halfway through, she began spotting figures that were fighting them just a moment ago switch about and fight alongside them .

Naturally, neither her nor those by her side shared an inkling of joy, but rather confusion and doubt; what if it was a scheme, after all, designed to make them drop their guard? Rather than joining those people, they kept a good deal of distance away . Yet, those people continued fighting, even killing several dozen, entirely ignoring Hannah’s and others’ movements .

Reaped by confusion and lacking the knowledge as to what to do, Hannah remained pensive until she saw Alison appear just by her side, a strange man standing next to her . Hannah quickly recognized him – it was the man that had engaged Alison when she went out to help Lucky . Wait... don’t tell me...?

"So..." Alison smiled helplessly, already realizing what Hannah was thinking .

"Him too?" Hannah quizzed .

"Hm..." Alison nodded, sighing . Hannah turned toward the man who inspected her with a pensive expression . Jonttar was the most worried about the woman now floating in front of him . Though weaker than the Agents, she would easily be able to rank among the top experts on the General Board of the Union . For a small world to nurture someone to such a degree... even Jonttar had no clue as to how they did it .

"I’d really like an explanation . " Hannah turned toward the strange man and asked, frowning .

"Ah—don’t misunderstand; it’s actually not that odd," Jonttar quickly said, fearful of garnering ire of the woman in front of him . "If anything, I should expect a few hundred more to turn over by the end of this . "

"... huh?"

"Truth be told," Jonttar took a deep breath, preparing himself for a lengthy explanation . It appeared that, even if the Agent of Destruction knew anything, he hadn’t said much about the state of the cosmos, most-likely as to not dispirit them . "Hardly a few of us who came here wanted to . If anything, you could see this as a sort of blackmail . "

"..." Hannah listened carefully, wishing to see the big picture .

"Most of us here, save for the Agents fighting that maniac," the man added with a shudder . "Climbed up just like you, I imagine . Fighting, winning, losing, bleeding . Are you aware of what Ashening is?"

"... yes . " Hannah nodded, her expression turning dark for a moment . How could she not? After Reli recounted everything to her, she longed for nothing more than to thrust herself out to find those who commenced such onslaught and give them the taste of their own medicine .

"I’d wager that at least 90% of here are the product of it," Jonttar said with a hardened expression . "While some, naturally, had long since stopped caring about the destruction of their homeworld, most of us haven’t . However, the binds of the Creator are too large, the reach and army too overbearing . All we could do, all this while, was sit in silence and endure . While the Ashening is explained as an event designed to foster geniuses and talents, in reality, it is nothing more but one of the ways to curb any potential opposition, to root it out before it could even grow . The sort of resentment that builds up after watching your homeworld crumble isn’t something that can easily be discarded by many of us . Do you understand now?"

"... so you chose to latch on the opportunity presented by Lino?" Hannah seemed to have picked up on everything .

"Lino?" Jonttar quizzed, surprised by a strange name .

"That maniac . " Hannah added with a faint smile .

"Ah, the Agent? Yes," Jonttar nodded, immediately deifying the name ’Lino’ in his mind . "To be completely forthcoming, I don’t think many of us hung onto a lot of hope when we came here . You may not realize it, but the scope of the Creator’s strength is beyond measure . Those three Agents currently fighting are just a drop in the bucket . The sole reason more weren’t dispatched is because fires of rebellion are constantly burning throughout thousands of the universes . Whether accidental or intentional, the timing you guys chose is practically perfect . Even with all that, however, at the very least I still held doubts . Just the Agent alone wouldn’t have been enough . What convinced me, and I imagine others, was the general strength of you guys . Whatever methods you used, though still below the bell-curve of the rest, for a world only scheduled for Ashening much later into the future to produce over twenty powerhouses... is virtually unheard of . And then there’s you . "

"Me?" Hannah asked, a frown returning to her face .

"Haven’t you noticed it?" Jonttar asked with a faint smile . "You’re by far the strongest individual out of all of us here . In truth, a few of us could probably best you – but that would entirely be because of the items and arts we possess . In terms of raw strength, none of us are a match for you . "

"Who says I don’t have any odd arts and items?" Hannah asked with a queer smile .

"I’m sure you do," Jonttar chuckled . "All the items you’re wearing had already left the planetary confines and could be considered decent . But, look at this," Jonttar took out a small sphere, no larger than a pebble, letting it float above his palm . "Inspect it . " He urged Hannah; the latter focused on the sphere as, rather than a window as she was usually accustomed to, the sphere’s information trickled directly into her mind, scaring her shitless .

"What the fuck?!"

"He he," Jonttar chuckled at her reaction, feeling somewhat proud . "Though I spent an arm and a leg to acquire it, it’s quite grandstanding, no?"

"... no shit . " Hannah sucked in a cold breath; the small sphere only had a single property, its tier labeled as ’Grand Tier-3 Divinity’ . Though Lino had informed her slightly about the tiers, she still didn’t really know what it meant . What she did know, however, was the sole property of the sphere – it was a condensed version of a behemoth-like star . Should Jonttar activate it, it would swallow up the entire stellar system within a breath and kill everything and everyone within it . Perhaps only Lino, Ella and the other two might stand a chance of escaping .

"I don’t want to discourage you; as I said, for a world yet to encounter Ashening to produce the quality of items that you’re sporting... it’s quite frankly impossible . I’m a bit, uh, interested... if you’d care to divulge just how?"

"... that maniac made them . " Hannah shrugged . "You’ll have to ask him when he gets out . "

"... eh? He’s a smith?" Jonttar’s mind blanked for a moment .

"He keeps calling himself smith first and a fighter second," Hannah said, sighing . "I’ve no clue as to why, though..."

"..." Jonttar took a few seconds to rebound from his shock . "Wait—you’re certain he will be the one coming out?"

"—of course," Hannah grinned for a moment . "The sole reason he’s even humoring them is that one of the Agents is quite important to him . "

"... just how strong is he?"

"I don’t know," Hannah shrugged . "He’d told me that, in some cosmic terms or whatever, he’s a World-eater . Can you imagine the level of ego? That bastard..."

Though Hannah continued chattering away, Jonttar didn’t hear anything she said past the ’World-eater’ . His entire body froze as he glanced around the battlefield . Like a maniac, he began relaying the information to anyone he even remotely knew or cared about, including the friend he made recently, the human called Alan .

Alan suddenly paused as he pushed battered and bruised Xia away, a single sentence trickling into his mind . He recognized Jonttar’s voice immediately, wondering what he wanted; he had already spotted that the Vampire had switched sides, which was why he found it so strange that he contacted him . Eh...w-what...? Just like Jonttar’s, Alan’s mind blanked upon the mention of ’World-eater’ .

Without a second thought, he immediately burned through his most treasured talisman that ignored the distance completely, and even the universes themselves, conveying but a single message to his family: Pack up as many things as you can; leave immediately . You have 5 hours to come to my location . We’re turning .