Soul of Searing Steel

“Evil God.”

Yana Milo, Avian Legend of the Glorious Era said bluntly and firmly. She stood up, flapping her wings to move around the meeting room, thinking as she softly said, “There is no question that it was a great purge that the Evil Gods conducted against civilization—we deduced that Evil Gods were already destroying other civilizations even before the Glorious Era, or the birth of every civilization in the Void and galaxies would not be logical.”

“So why are there no such ancient ruins in the Lost Galaxy—our homeworld?”

La Motte the Sword Saint muttered to himself, but soon thought of the reason with the information Joshua had summed up before. “—Right. The Lost Galaxy is the youngest galaxy, the last one created by the Initial Flame, and we humans are the first civilization to face an Evil God purge! That is precisely why we are the last to fall into limbo, and not decelerate and pause like other galaxies early on!”

That was the most logical deduction which explains everything. Joshua did not question it, and simply nodded while searching his thoughts.

It was not surprising that ancient, powerful civilizations were wiped out by the Evil Gods. The Eldars awakening was merely as a civilization born from the ashes, and not actually a rare thing. If the Starfall Era had not reclaimed the Unified Archives and the Multiverse Sacrificial Grounds, they would probably be alike with the Eldars in that respect.

Still, leaving aside the Eldars who did not discover those ancient ruins… how did those champions who had the power to spy on the expedition fleet and Mycroft—the latter from across galaxies, champions as powerful as himself, Pope Igor or even the Seven Gods… how did they not discover the remains of those pioneers?

Their conditions are far superior than the newly established Mycroft civilization, and they should have uncovered those unusual ruins, learning from them and guessing about the facts… Did those ancient civilizations of the Multiverse suspect the truth behind the Multiverse like them early on as well?

To put it in other words, Joshua was considering whether the other civilizations of the had unraveled the facts of why they Multiverse was stuck in limbo like them, and became aware of that powerful existence that controlled the Evil God.

He wanted to knows how those civilizations and champions were reacting to that truth.

It was not a question which can be solved just by thinking about it.

Therefore, the reconnaissance continued.

***

Scout ship 001, the Void vessel Priest and the others were sailing in.

A drone landed on a burning magma planet that was filled with thick carbon dioxide and reaches temperatures of 218 degrees Celsius. A planet where the thinnest acid clouds were ten kilometers long, it was unsuitable for any lifeforms—if the Elite Party were not Gold-tiers, they would have all died the first second they appeared on the planet’s surface.

“The prime world of system three-nine-nine-five-eight… confirmed to be a greenhouse lava world, with perpetually boiling seas that fills the realm in burning steam. Only the strongest bacterium form survives.”

Mage, who was wearing an enchanted armor activated his Spirit Terminal to study various aspects of the world, but his team’s objective was not that place. After Rider launched the flying car, the five members of the Elite Party darted for a massive crater nearby.

It was more than a hundred and fifty meters long, and instead of calling it a crater, it was more appropriate to call it an unnatural scar on the planet so profoundly deep that it reaches into the planet’s core. Even as Mage and Clergy captured images with their Spirit Terminal in the flying car, they could clearly make out that the massive circular crater was flowing with golden-red magma even from outer space.

“A powerful strike pierces the planet’s crust and mantle, causing burning heat to emanate from inside and a tight, unnatural atmosphere that captures the heat. The blow of hot energy from the unknown source must have intended to detonate the planet’s core so that it explodes entirely, but it was stopped halfway to present its current half-baked appearance.”

While Mage and Priest captured pictures, Alchemist verified the data with a creased brow before saying loudly later, “That’s right, this is the homeworld of the worm civilization. The data that team zero-zero-eight found on system one-four-six-three-four checks out with this world, this is their fallen homeworld!”

The worms of star system 14634 had crashed a living live-support vessel into the prime world. Most of the crew had died in that incident, but the vessel itself did not, and with its genetical programming it had restored its own form, altered the ecosystem and gradually converting the world itself. Then, it also reproduced the worm civilization through its gene vaults, but since the local primates were not actually suitable hosts for the worms, no intelligent life was created to reactivated the worm’s ships.

Therefore, the Nature’s Magister altered it and submitted the data from the archives inside. With the coordinates to the former homeworld of the worms, Priest found it successfully under Joshua’s instructions.

It was a planet once attacked by a planetary or arcane weapon but survived.

“Remains of the worms’ civilization is everywhere on star system three-nine-nine-five-eight. We found broken continental fragments and planets that were broken on the inside—but it’s evident that they were once a prosperous and advanced Void civilization with living warships. They had resisted against their unknown enemy with all their might and prevented them from occupying their planet at the very end, only for their foes to completely destroy it with a planet devastator from outer place and be reduced to dust in the Void.”

“Bizarre.”

Rider mumbled at that part of the recording. “Why stop an assault halfway? Could the worms had reinforcements to repel their enemies?”

“It’s likely.”

Although often given a hard time as a Crow’s Mouth, Rider’s deduction was correct and everyone in the Elite Party agreed. Priest, who was transmitting reports in real time to Joshua back in headquarters nodded grimly. “The life-support vessel in world one-four-six-three-four must have escaped in that period… the problem is which civilization fought that unknown enemy and repelled them? Were they destroyed as well, or had fled to another galaxy?”

Priest and the others would not raise the suggestion that the civilization in question triumphed, given that only the Eldars lived in the Galaxy of Beginnings.

There was no reason they would not remain in their homeworld.

“Huh. Who cares if they exist? There’s certainly not much to say if they didn’t—but if they do, they must be wandering other galaxies, and perhaps come across us one day.

Rider accelerated the flying car, bringing the spellcaster trio to continue studying the massive crater left by a planet devastator to obtain precious data.

However, because they were busy and there was nothing actually wrong with what Rider said, everyone else did not react or have him silenced.

***

Starfall Year 845, the ninth of February—a month after the wide-range ruins reconnaissance, seven days after the Elite Party headed for the prime world of system 39958.

Once again, Joshua received news that gave him a migraine.

“There’s been some time since there was word from Priest and the others… don’t tell me they went missing again.”

In the conference room within the Void base on Zeta Ram, Joshua sighed deeply as he watched Lisa the Drakonid hurry to him with a solemn face, prepared to give a report. “Why do they always have so many problems—never have I been so wild in my youth.”

…I’m sorry, what?

The Nature’s Magister had been seated on another side of the conference table, talking to Joshua about having a Void Reserve and continue after Lisa gave her report. However, her eyes bulged at once at Joshua’s words and she leveled a weird gaze at the warrior. Then, searching her memory, Galanoud confirmed that there was no existence wilder than Joshua—aside from the great reformations and upheaval, he was also the first to suggest building the entire Combined Fleet.

You, pointing fingers at others? Are Radcliffes not self-conscious at all!?

“No, master. Priest and the others are not missing… they had great findings, in fact.”

Meanwhile, seemingly not noticing the weird atmosphere, the Drakonid girl simply handed the reports to Joshua and summarized, “Due to unexpected circumstances, Priest’s party had been pulled into the ‘devastator crater’ in world three-nine-nine-five-eight. However, inside the magma layer, they managed to find a metal ship of unusual form that is completely different from the worms’ vessel.”

“They intend to study the inside of the craft, but were taken by surprise—the ship still has power, seemingly having absorbed magma energies and convert it for its own use… which is why they were locked inside for days and just got out. Fortunately, they also obtained partial data from the ship’s archives.”

“Oh?”

Learning that the Elite Party was neither missing, captured or encountering some powerful otherworld creature, Joshua breathed a sigh of relief for his student and his teammates. Still, given the importance of the last part, he asked interestedly, “So what did they get?”

But I don’t have clearance.

Lisa said nothing, scratching her head as if troubled. She passed the documents in her hand respectfully to Joshua, who did not open it, but felt the traces of ink and encrypted spiritual mark on the documents to directly read the contents.

“…A civilization formally allied to the worms, another parasitic lifeform that resembles ants in appearance. They are not born with natural forms, but use natural runes to directly latch onto a host’s soul and mind through contact… interesting. A magical parasite, what a novel lifeform—it seems that this civilization repelled the Evil God that attacked the worms, buying time for their life-support vessel to escape.

Although they ended up destroyed, it appears that there had at least been a ray of hope then.

When he finished, Joshua could not help but be in awe of the vastness and diversity of the Multiverse. Although there was no lack of wormlike parasites back on the Mycroft continent, there was never such a civilization of magical parasites.

“When directly translated, the worms are called the Caretakers of Flesh, right? Quite direct. As for the other civilization… Caretakers of Knowledge? Interesting. No wonder they are allied—a clear division of labor, even sounding a little ominous… Wait.”

Joshua blinked, sensing that something was not right. “There’s a problem.”

He remembered that the Great Khan had told him about several apocalyptic civilizations that were infamous across the Multiverse, species far less likeable than the Starherders themselves.

And now, Joshua repeated the name of those civilizations.

“Caretakers of Flesh, Caretakers of Knowledge… Know…”

“The Knowers?”

***

The dark Void.

A massive fleet was gathering like ants and advancing in silence.

If there had been no native civilizations that had reached into the Void around them, they would find that the sun and stars were rather warped and dark this day when they look up. The boundless galaxy would appear to be unusually separated by a mysterious shadow, and while the stars flickered, dazzling specks would appear among the starlight, smaller than planets but bright individually.

Those were the lights from a massive fleet’s tail exhaust flames.

And that was not all.

On the other side of the dimensions, many places of the Multiverse were shining with extraordinarily bright dots, departing from the infinite stars…Psionic, arcane, ether—each radiance was different, but shared the common aspect that they were all very powerful and did not conceal their own intention at all.

The vast ranks of the fleet were gathering from every direction of the Multiverse.

Their objective was there, the place where that arrogant declaration was made to the Multiverse. They would head there, and ask the visitors from a lost, faraway place one question.

And hence obtain an ‘answer’.