Chapter 384: The Merging of the Worlds, and the Golden Thorn.
Chapter 384: The Merging of the Worlds, and the Golden Thorn.
I had conveyed the matter about the change that would happen to the world three days from now to everyone I could. Borrowing the strength of the country leaders of both worlds, the guild master Rerishia-san, and the [Black Cat]’s Silhouette-san, I had them warn the populace not to approach dangerous areas three days from now.
Kami-sama did say there wouldn’t be any large changes, but just to be safe. In Brunhild, too, I’ve marked the dungeon islands as off-limits on that day.
I’ll be putting a lot of burden on the arch-spirits and the spirits directly under them. They’ll be suppressing earthquakes, erasing tsunamis, calming volcanoes, and dealing with other such natural disasters to prevent them from happening. It’s something we can do only because we know it would happen in advance.
Normally, the spirits have nothing to do with earthquakes or volcano eruptions. Those are natural phenomenon, which happen spontaneously by themselves. Even so, this time alone I’ll have to ask the spirits to lend me their strengths regarding this issue. The spirits themselves also wouldn’t want to see the world destroyed at this rate.
I’ve done everything I could; all that’s left is praying to god.
—And morning comes, three days later.
I woke up before the alarm on my smartphone could rang.
Honestly speaking, I hardly slept. Since 12am at midnight could also count within the “three days later” time period. It can’t be helped since not even Kami-sama could know the exact timing, but still, it’s pretty frustrating.
“Morning, everyone.”
“Good morning… Are you okay? Touya-san.”
Yumina looked at my face with a worried look. I’m fine, it’s just a lack of sleep.
I’ve already talked about this with everyone else, and in the end, we’re not doing anything special today; we’re just going to spend it normally.
Having said that, I suppose everyone still feels worried; after breakfast, everyone gathered in the living room. They spent time doing things like reading books or playing trumps.
I sat down on the sofa and was reading news sites on my smartphone as well; a thought came to me that it would’ve been convenient if we had an emergency broadcast application which would relay information real-time when incidents like this happen.
When I called up the professor in Babylon and consulted her about that, she answered that it’s plenty possible if we borrow the power of contracted spirits to do that.
It’s too late right now, but after this, let’s make one and distribute it around. Things like a tsunami warning or a fire warning would be really helpful.
As I cut the call and switched the display to go back to the news site I was reading, “that” came.
For just an instant, the ground shook intensely with a *don!*. After that, small shakings of around magnitude 1 to 2 continued.
“So it’s here…”
“To, Touya…”
Suu came clinging onto me in her unease. It’ll be alright. The spirits should be repressing them right now.
“Touya-san, the sky…!”
Linze, who was at the balcony, raised her voice. When we got out onto the balcony—with Suu still clinging onto me—we saw a dark sky, even though it’s morning right now. Thick clouds hung all around us, projecting a dark shadow almost as if it was midnight.
“Wha, what is that!? That shining thing there…!?”
“Beautiful-degozaru na… However, it also feels somewhat unnatural-degozaru…”
At the area in the sky Luu was pointing to, a curtain of light was drawn over the clouds. Yae, next to her, also had her eyes wide open at the sight.
“The sky splitted…?”
“No, that’s an aurora. I don’t know about this world in particular, but they’re a type of natural phenomena.”
“The polar lights, huh. I’ve heard that you can see it sometimes in the Great Sea of Trees. It’s the first time I’ve seen it despite my long age, though.”
As I replied to the uneasy-looking Hilda, Leen made a supplementary explanation. On Earth, it was something you can see in cold places, but I guess it’s different here.
During the time when we were focusing on the sky, the ground continued to shake. It’s to a degree so weak that nothing in the room fell down from it, though.
The sky changed color randomly, sometimes red, sometimes green, sometimes violet; however, it disappeared eventually. We retreated from the balcony due to the rain that started falling at the same time the light show disappeared.
The rain had no force. It was a light drizzle. However, it was not ordinary.
“Rain… of light…?”
Just like Sakura said, the rain that dropped down from the sky shined in the seven colors of the rainbow. They glittered brightly, and disappeared upon bursting open on the ground.
Unbelievably, this rain doesn’t form puddles. Every drop disappeared into the ground as if being absorbed by a sponge. When I tried extending a hand out to touch them, there was the sensation of raindrops hitting my hand, but my hand remained dry.
I tried putting a cup out on the balcony, and sure enough, nothing gathered inside. Just what is this rain?
“It’s possibly a matter that contains magic power. Something like the ether liquid… It could be that the magic power in the atmosphere is falling down all at once.”
Leen looked at the rain with interest. I guess this won’t develop into floods, but is this okay… Well, it’ll be a rain of blessing for lands that have no magic power in them and have been abandoned by the spirits…
“Ah, the sky’s clearing up!”
“Yeah, it is… Wait, eh?”
I looked upwards when I heard Elze’s voice. True, the rain was beginning to let up, and the rays of the sun began to peek through.
The thing is, though, I could see two suns behind the partition of the clouds. What’s more, a part of them are overlapping with each other.
Everyone stood in silence as they looked at the shocking sight. Eventually, the two suns combined into one, and released a burst of strong light.
An almost explosive flash assaulted our eyes. When we opened our eyes again timidly, all that was there was the same sun as usual.
Before we noticed, the earthquakes have stopped too. Is it, over?
“Open the world map. Display it in the air.”
“Understood. Displaying.”
With a *vron* sound, the world map appeared in front of us. That was not the same world map we were used to seeing, but an entirely new one.
Roughly describing, the Reverse World continent is at the left, and the Surface World continent is at the right. However, there are some parts that are different from before.
“Eashen and Egret… The island countries are pretty far out from where they were. In the Reverse World too.”
“Panashes Kingdom and Refreese Imperium has a land connection now. Will it be alright?”
When I turned my eyes towards the location Yumina pointed out, indeed, the front part of Panashes Kingdom was touching the land of Refreese Imperium.
The territory overlap is not that wide, so I don’t think they’ll fight over it, but I’m worried about the people who used to live there.
I immediately sent this map data to Babylon, and also called the professor to update everyone’s terminal with the new information. I don’t think everyone else’s mass-production model smartphone can display the new world map just like that.
The professor, who picked up the call, also seemed to have anticipated that.
“How are the observations?”
“No problems so far. No tsunamis or fissures, and no signs of volcano eruptions too. If I have to say it, the atmosphere is a bit unstable, but it’s well within permissible margins.”
Seems like the spirits are working hard. I should probably prepare something as thanks for them on another date.
For now, I put the new world map as photo attachment and sent group mails to everyone else in order to get that information out.
For the sake of precaution, I also called the Refreese emperor.
“It does seem to be true that we’re connected, but the other side is a single island country, so things should work out fine. According to the Strain queen, the Panashes king is of a mild disposition. It’s fine, I’ll make sure to handle this well.”
In terms of understanding of the current situation, Refreese is in the advantage. They shouldn’t be forced to take a bad deal in talks.
Rather than that, I’m more concerned about Kyriela Kingdom, the country that is currently neighboring both Refreese and Belfast, separated only by a patch of sea.
I don’t know anything about that country right now, after all. Well, if I ask around in Strain or Garudio, it should come up easily.
As if aiming at the timing when I felt relieved after confirming the current situation, suddenly, a large *gakyannn* sound of glass breaking came from high up in the sky.
“! What!?”
“Touya-san! That!”
Yumina pointed a finger at the sky.
Something that looked like a shooting star was falling from the eastern sky. When I immediately activated [Divine Eyes] and then [Long Sense], the figure of that thing was clearly reflected in my eyes.
A poisoned barb. That was what I thought it was. A dull gold-colored thorn needle with lots of twisted-looking barbs growing on it flew off into the sky.
That sinister-looking thorn was clad in a muddy divinity.
“Search! Where will that object just now fall at!?”
“Analyzing… Analyzed. Displaying.”
A pin fell down on the map displayed. Regulus, huh! Damn it!
It’s to the northeast of the imperial capital Gallaria, near a plains area. I don’t know if it’s fortunate, but there are no large towns or cities nearby.
Even so, we cannot feel relieved. That was, without a doubt, something that came from the evil god. It fell into this world after piercing through the world barrier. There’s no way we can leave it alone.
“I’ll be back!”
Since it’s close, I can move there immediately using [Teleport]. Since I don’t know what may happen, I’m going by myself. If there are no problems, I can just connect that place to here via a [Gate].
When I used [Teleport] and transferred myself to the target location inside Regulus, I saw a huge crater on the ground.
At the center of the crater, there was the figure of the twisted thorn, piercing through the ground.
Its size is around thirty meters. And that’s without counting the portion that’s buried in the ground.
“Just what is…”
As I tried to approach the thorn, the ground near it started changing color like water stains spreading on a wet towel.
The poisonous-looking dull gold-colored darkness was corrupting the ground.
“The earth is rotting away…”
“You are…”
Suddenly, earth began rising up in one location and formed the figure of a woman before long. It’s the spirit of earth. As I didn’t summon her, she made a substitute body using rocks and dirt. Her real body is probably still back in the Spirit Realm.
“That object is releasing a poison which rots away the earth. At this rate, the surrounding area would all rot away, and the earth here will be lost from this world.”
“Lost? You mean they disappear?”
“Yes. They do not dissolve. They vanish, into nothingness…”
So it’s not like it’s melting down to become something like magma, but completely disappearing, huh. They’ve sent me another troublesome thing…
“My king. That.”
The spirit of earth pointed towards the giant poison thorn, which began to produce *pakin pakin* sounds before releasing variants out from itself. Man, those things sure appear however they want.
All the variants born from the thorn were lower-class. The ant-like lower-classes turned their bladed appendages towards us and came thrusting.
I took out a crystal hammer larger than myself from [Storage], applied [Gravity] to it to double its weight, and swung it down at the lower-class variants.
The variants, which were crushed with their cores altogether by the hammer, released black smoke and dissolved into a sludgy liquid before disappearing.
While I was doing that, the same kind of variants were continuously being born from the poison thorn. I kept swinging the hammer and crushing the variants, but at this rate it’ll never end.
First, I’ll have to do something about that poison thorn.
While crushing the variants that were being born, I made a full swing towards the poison thorn using the hammer that had its weight increased.
An impact like hitting a heavy bronze bell was transmitted to my hand from the hammer.
Cracks began to form on the poison thorn with a *pikiki* sound, and it began to fall. The cracked fragments of the thorn fell down all around it.
The weird darkness that was eroding the ground seemed to have stopped as well.
“Man, changing its methods every time… What is this, harassment?”
The pieces of the thorn began melting into a sludge. Up to that point, it was the same as the other variants, and I thought it would be disappearing after producing some black smoke this time as well.
However, the liquid-like substance that it melted down to somehow turned into a powdered form, and carried by the wind, began drifting around the area. The golden powder filled the surroundings with a yellow color.
“What is this?”
“Gu, uu, u, aa!?”
Suddenly, the spirit of earth began writhing in pain, and fell to her knees on the ground before falling over. What!?
I ran towards the fallen spirit of earth and crouched down before calling out.
“Oi! Are you alright!?”
“My apologies… My king, please escape. This is…!”
Leaving those words, the rocks and dirt that formed the body of the spirit of earth crumbled down, back to their original forms.
“Just what is…”
The moment I tried to stand up, an intense dizziness assaulted me, and I fell to my knees in a similar manner as the spirit of earth did earlier.
What? What, is this!?
I can’t put strength in my body. I tried to stand up, but not even one second passed before I fell down on my sides again. It’s hard to breathe. I can feel cold sweat on my body, and my eyes are becoming dizzy as well.
“Ku… Could it be, that this powder…”
While glaring at the powder that’s still hanging around this place like a mist, I struggled to somehow make my body stand up.
Anymore would be bad. I have to escape from here somehow.
“[Tele, port] …”
The transfer magic isn’t activating. Impossible. I tried again, but once again, it failed to activate.
I can’t refine any magic power in my body. Is this because of that mist as well?
When I tried my last resort and drew on my divinity to turn into my god form, an intense pain and dizziness incomparable to before assaulted me, and I vomited on the spot.
“Uguoee!”
I rolled on the ground to avoid the thing I vomited out. When I looked up at the sky after rolling myself into a upwards-facing position, “that” was reflected in my clouded eyes.
“You’re, kidding, right…?”
Judging from the angle of the sun, it’s from the west. Innumerable meteors were falling down from that direction, clad in golden light. Don’t tell me, every one of them are the same thorn as this one!?
My nausea reared its head again as I looked at the ominous meteor shower.
I tried to somehow move myself out of this mist in my hazy consciousness, but it’s not working at all.
This is seriously bad. It’s becoming hard to even keep my eyes open…
“Ku…!”
“King-sama!”
A girl with light red-colored hair entered my hazy sight. Sakura…? I see, by [Teleport]…
While looking at the figure of Sakura running towards me with the corner of my eyes, I lost consciousness.
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