The Record of Unusual Creatures

The world had been destroyed before.

Yet, only a few knew of it.

“For many commoners, the ‘world’ itself is stable and eternal,” Constance’s voice was calm yet distant, as she described the shocking truth in a very simple manner. “Day giving way to night, the cycles of the seasons, the growth of life, the cycle of life and death, for many in their short and limited life, these will happen and repeat as it should, naturally. To them, the concept of ‘the world had been destroyed before’ was not only a foreign, it is outright outlandish, they could not and would not understand this matter. If you force it upon them to recognize the fact, it will only lead to nothing but fear. So, aside from the heritors, no one would bring up this truth.”

She did not take notice of Charlemagne and Awenna’s expression and continued on, “Our small world had been destroyed before, and not just once, it is not those ‘little events’ like world war leading to the fall of a kingdom, or the extinction of a race, it is as literal as it gets, the entire world had totally come apart and disintegrated.

“In a very very long time ago, so ancient that even the heritors are not able to ascertain what the beginning was, a powerful and terrifying power had taken hold of this world. We do not know its origins, or why it was so intent to destroy everything, but we know that our first ancestors called them ‘The Annihilation’, and it is as the name states, leading to the world being annihilated.”

“Do you know, the universe is very big, bigger beyond your imaginations. It was not just limited… to a planet. Before the Annihilation, planets like L’Haronne were countless, they were all called planets, and there were stars larger than planets, and celestial bodies even larger than the stars floating in the universe. Our ancestors called it the galaxy.

“And the Annihilation caused the extinction of the first galaxy, using a method beyond the understanding of mortals, and tore the galaxy into shreds.”

“That was the first era.”

Princess Constance stopped for a moment, and Awenna could not help but ask, “So are we survivors of that event?”

Constance smiled, and there was a distinct chill to her smile, “There’s no such fairy tale ending. There were practically no survivors from the first era.”

“A true apocalypse would not be so ‘gentle’. It’s not like wars between men, where you may survive if you dig a big enough cavern, or erect a strong enough fort. But when the entire universe collapse, even the stars will be snuffed out in an instance, and there is nothing in the world for you to hide and survive. In the first era, our ancient ancestors were very powerful, and they could even cross the vastness of space in an instant, and they could create or extinguish stars of all size, and they could even add or remove dimensional structures to create a personal fief floating by the border of the universe. And even when our ancestors were that powerful, they could not reverse the tide when the Annihilation came. The universe of the first era was torn asunder and even the glorious civilization was destroyed in the process, and nothing survived.

“But the real nightmare only came after that.”

Constance took a deep breath as she was about to say something that sent chills down her spine.

Charlemagne was impatient to know more, “What happened after that?”

“After the first era was destroyed, our world was recreated.” Constance said slowly, “A new era was born upon the ruins of the first era, as life bloomed again, so did the Annihilation returned.”

Charlemagne and Awenna exchanged glances, and Hao Ren could not help but do to the same to Vivian as well. “Seems like things were different than what we first thought.”

Awenna’s face turned pale. “How many times had this happened since?”

“I don’t know.” Constance shook her head, “Far too many times, and even the eternal spirit could not withstand such attrition. We only know that the universe was destroyed more than once, before being recreated from the wastes of the previous age, and every time the process was about the same. After the recreation, the world will grow and prosper normally, even bringing some a false sense of true peace, but the Annihilation will definitely appear after that, and push the entire universe into the abyss of destruction.”

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“And every time the Annihilation comes, there will be a war called the ‘Turn of the Eras’. This war is unavoidable, as the one starting the war is not us, but the Annihilation. It will corrupt the world’s strongest warriors, and unleash all sorts of monsters from the nightmare, and these monsters feast upon worlds and will destroy everything. In order to survive, and to leave a shred of hope at the Turn of the Eras, we will fight to the last.”

“But, regardless of how strong the resistance is, the Annihilation will destroy everything. The war will turn more and more brutal, as monsters will appear more and more until the order of the worlds were broken, until every life was consumed in their madness only then things will die down.”

“It is like a cycle, a continuous cycle of destruction and rebirth, it is as if the end of the world was already upon us, and yet it never felt like it had ended. We had fought and fought, and the ones that could complete the Turn and be reborn in the next era are naturally the strongest, fearless and stubborn of humans, and yet in the next era, the strong would be the host of the Annihilation, and the saviors will become the annihilators, and will be defeated by new resistance forces, and this is the Turn of the Eras.

“And the other effect of the Turn of the Eras is that the world is constantly under attrition.”

“As we are ‘defective objects’ recreated from the ruins and wreckage of the universe, and with every recreation, something will be lost, and in a general sense, it means that the world’s level will be reduced, and our civilization level will fall as well.”

“Remember why I emphasized the ‘heritors’ and ‘eternal spirits? These refer to the spirits that could complete the Turn of the Eras, and survive the recreation. While the worlds will be destroyed, and flesh and bones will perish, but some spirit remnants will survive, bringing the memories into the next era. And protecting this sort of passed down hope is the heritors’ biggest drive to resist every apocalypse. But this would all be sapped away, alongside the world.”

In the first War of the Turn of the Eras, we had fought in the endless battlefield of time and space, and after that we were destroyed alongside the stars, and a few eras later, we were only fighting in a galaxy, and further ahead, we are fighting in the shadows of a planet, using combat satellites to fight against the monsters from the stars, and a few more Turns later, we had finally retreated to the planet’s surface, and our weapons were reduced to spears and swords, and our battlefield were strictly stuck on the surface of the planet.”

“And there will be a day, where the Turn of the Era will commence with in a city, then a town, then on a piece of rock, and perhaps man will be fighting with the last of the monsters with their bare fists, nails, and teeth. If they had all fallen there, that is probably the true salvation.”

Constance’s story came to an end.

Hao Ren knew that Constance was not telling everything, and it was not because the Princess wanted to hide something, rather she really did not know all of the truth.

This was because the memories left behind by the heritors are diminishing, as the ancient civilization was withering alongside the universe, and the Umbral Realm, where it was once a vast sea of stars were now nothing but chaos and a planet called L’Haronne. So what did the heritors who had survived through so many Turns of the Eras until today would have left?

It was possible that Constance herself did not fully understand what she had just said, and heritors like her had probably forgotten what the stars had looked like, and could no longer remember the times where they surfed through the stars. They only remembered the wars and the fragmented words that they did not even understand themselves.

As for Charlemagne and Awenna, they only looked up after a long silence, Charlemagne pointed to the floating scepter, “That scepter had been in the care of the Izzoean royal family, so does that mean we too are…”

“Heritors, yes, but heritors which had been severed.” Constance nodded. “And until today I did not know that you were still keeping this ‘relic’, and wanted to figure out a way myself to look for the scepter. You father, His Majesty the King had probably been awakened by the effect of the Turn of the Eras, and a memory appeared from the deepest part of his soul, and therefore he had sent you here, but you two… clearly had no memories of the past.”

Charlemagne gave a self-deprecating smile. “And that means, we do not have the right to participate in the Turn of the Era and have no right to be part of the people to continue onto the next era, right? If what you say is not just an outlandish horror story.”

“Everyone has the right to participate in the Turn of the Era because it is a war that all life must face.” Constance looked at Charlemagne. “But you are indeed unable to continue on…your ancient memories had been totally wiped out, and your spirit is no longer eternal, and even if you partake in the Turn of the Era with me and emerge victorious, you will not remember me… when the new era comes.”

Charlemagne opened his mouth as if he wanted to say something, but Awenna spoke first, “This is a blessing.”

“Yes, an incredible blessing,” Constance looked at the Izzoean princess, “You do not have to keep facing the truth, and that is the biggest blessing of them all.”

After digesting that large amount of information, Hao Ren sighed, “Aih… so your history… is actually going backward.”

He finally understood those echos from different civilization levels, different time lines and world lines were all about.

This was not the case of many destroyed worlds being piled upon one another and not a mish-mash of civilization ruins. There was only one universe since the beginning of time to its destruction, but it was destroyed more than once.

“Backwards? That’s a rather apt way to describe it.” Constance raised an eyebrow, “But why did you say ‘your history’?”

“Nothing.” Hao Ren quickly shifted the attention away from the tiny slip of the tongue. “As for the Turn of the Eras, I have a few questions.”