Side Chapter 48: The threat closing in on Origin

An existential threat was closing in on the world of Origin.

Zuruwarn, the G.o.d of s.p.a.ce and Creation, and Ricklent, the Genie of Time and Magic, were on the borders of the world of Lambda, checking for movements in the other worlds just in case.

If humanity becomes extinct, the G.o.d of Origin will fade from existence not long afterwards. If that happens, even if the planet itself remains, it will be no different from the world itself ceasing to exist, said Zuruwarn.

The G.o.d of Origin is a being that was created by the devotion and fears of the entirety of humanity. Thus, it is not capable of creating new intelligent life like we are. If humanity perishes, the G.o.d of Origin will have no choice but to perish with them, said Ricklent.

Well, it is not so easy for us to create intelligent life, either.

Like Earth, Origin was a world whose s.p.a.ce behaved similarly to Lambdas and whose time flowed at roughly the same pace. However, from time to time, anomalies would cause periods of time to pa.s.s by very quickly, between several months to a year. Such an anomaly had occurred very recently, but that did not guarantee that another one would not occur again soon.

Ordinarily, such anomalies would not cause any problems and were not even worth taking notice of, but in this situation, Ricklent and Zuruwarn couldnt afford to overlook the events that were currently taking place in Origin.

That is true, but please do not interrupt me, Ricklent said. More importantly, the threat that puts Origins existence at risk Do you think Rodcorte will make a move?

It is possible that he has not even noticed the danger. Though it is also likely that he has noticed but does not intend to make a move, said Zuruwarn.

The threat on Origin was the research on death-attribute magic being carried out by the Avalon Rikudou Hijiri.

If the research was successful In other words, if it were to produce the most terrible results, all life would be extinguished on the continent that Rikudou Hijiri was conducting the research on. And if the humans of Origin were unable to contain it, all life on an entire hemisphere would be extinguished.

It would affect all life, not just humans. And it wouldnt just be birds, beasts, fish, and plants. Every single microbe, fungus, and bacteria in the air, in the water, and underground would be annihilated.

After the death of Pluto of the Eighth Guidance, her death-attribute Mana had exploded out of control inside the Department of Defense building of the Federal States. If Rikudous research were to continue, this incident would be repeated, but this time on the scale of an entire continent, or possibly even an entire hemisphere.

Humanity would not become extinct immediately, but it was questionable as to whether they could survive such an incident. After all, not only would half of the human population perish, but vast swathes of the planets lands and seas would become dead zones with no life in them.

It was unclear as to whether Rodcorte was aware of this possible scenario. Even if he was, it was possible that he merely thought of it as an opportunity, as the incident would cause many of the Bravers to perish as well, and he would be able to use them as p.a.w.ns against Vandalieu.

We do not know how valuable he considers Origin to be. Even if an uncontrolled explosion of Death-attribute Mana were to extinguish half of all life in the world, souls will not be destroyed. As long as they are not destroyed, his circle of transmigration system may be completely unaffected. And because the G.o.d of Origin has allied itself with Vandalieu, it is possible that he considers the destruction of that world to be a desirable outcome, Zuruwarn speculated.

He was unaware that Rodcorte had previously attempted to sever the connection between his circle of transmigration system and Lambda, at the cost of cutting off both Earth and Origin as well. If he knew this, he would have felt certain that this speculation was correct.

And in truth, Origin had become a matter of secondary importance to Rodcorte, and he did not care what happened to it as long as he could achieve the goal that was his highest priority the erasure of Vandalieu from existence. Origin was insignificant compared to that.

Once Vandalieu was erased and the Demon Empire of Vidal was destroyed, he would no longer be a G.o.d of the world of Lambda. If Origin continued to exist after that, then he would consider himself a little lucky, and if it was destroyed, then he would simply shrug and say, Oh well.

Of course, it is possible that he simply believes that the other reincarnated individuals can stop the impending disaster, Zuruwarn added.

Amemiya Hiroto. The G.o.d of Origin apparently intends to lend him its strength as well, so I hope he can do something about it and it would be best if he could survive and live out the rest of his years until he pa.s.ses away at an age that is far beyond his life expectancy, said Ricklent.

Both of them wished Amemiya Hiroto the best of fortune in his upcoming battles.

More importantly, Zuruwarn, are there any movements from the G.o.ds of other worlds? If Rodcorte were to request their aid, and they agreed to provide it I would pity them, said Ricklent.

He was worried that Rodcorte might have asked for help from the G.o.ds of other worlds under the rule of his circle of transmigration system that he might have coerced them with the threat of stopping reincarnation from taking place in their world if they didnt help him erase Vandalieu.

I think youre overthinking things. Doing such a thing would be too much of a double-edged sword, said Zuruwarn as he stared deep into s.p.a.ce, pouring a black liquid into his cup.

Ricklents concern was that Rodcorte would make this threat to the G.o.ds of the other worlds, which would be effective against all G.o.ds that desired the continued existence of their worlds, and these G.o.ds would have no choice but to obey him.

But if Rodcorte did threaten the G.o.ds of other worlds this way, many of them would begin to distrust Rodcorte and view him as a threat. From their perspective, there was no guarantee that these threats would only happen just this once. It was possible that Rodcorte would continue to make unreasonable demands of them in the future, holding his powers of reincarnation over their heads.

Zuruwarn suspected that they would then construct their own circle of transmigration systems. Guduranis and Vida had been able to create their own imitations of Rodcortes system. There was no reason why the G.o.ds of other worlds couldnt do the same.

If this happened, Rodcorte would lose his monopoly over reincarnation across multiple worlds, which served as his source of power. Zuruwarn found it hard to believe that Rodcorte would risk such a thing.

It was not that he believed in Rodcortes wisdom; he merely believed that Rodcorte would not be bold enough to make such a decision.

And even if G.o.ds from other worlds were to come and attack our world they would be exhausted within minutes, even if we and Vandalieu did nothing, Zuruwarn added. After all, they would be descending on a world with completely different laws of physics.

In general, a G.o.d descending upon a world would require vast quant.i.ties of energy. Descending upon Lambda, which had different laws of physics from other worlds, would require even greater amounts of energy. And if a G.o.d who originated from a different world were to do so in this world without any prior preparations If they were to cross the boundary between worlds without a large population of their own wors.h.i.+ppers, they would experience pain equivalent to one of their limbs being torn to shreds.

If they came to this world in such a state, even if Zuruwarn and the others did nothing at all, they would use up all of their power and fall into a slumber within minutes. If they possessed physical bodies, like demiG.o.ds, then they would simply die.

The only concern was an invasion by G.o.ds of other worlds that were different from ordinary demiG.o.ds and G.o.ds like Zuruwarn, like the one carried out by Guduranis and the evil G.o.ds that served him, but it was difficult to imagine that Rodcorte had negotiated with such G.o.ds to allow him to rule over the reincarnation in their worlds, so that concern was unlikely to become a reality.

I am aware of that, said Ricklent. Over a hundred thousand years ago, we were only able to visit

Earth

and discover the champions because the Mana that filled

Earth

was similar enough to the Mana that fills ours, because of your efforts, and because we were able to focus the use of our power on maintaining our existences there.

At that time, the G.o.ds of Lambda had already negotiated with the G.o.d of

Earth

, and that was a large contributing factor, but the world of

Earth

had an environment that had been tolerable to the G.o.ds of Lambda, at least for a reasonable period of time. In addition to that, Zuruwarn had connected the two worlds through a hole in s.p.a.ce, allowing them to move between the worlds without cutting themselves off from Lambda. And most importantly, their objective had been to select humans to summon them to their own world as champions, rather than invade. Thus, this task had not required such tremendous amounts of power.

The bestowing of power to the champions had been done during the instant it had taken to travel from

Earth

to Lambda, carried out in the single moment in which they were unrestricted by the laws of physics in either world.

Ricklent, do you mean to suggest that the G.o.ds of other worlds may be capable of doing the same as us? Zuruwarn asked.

No. I do not know how much of a difference there is between Lambda and other worlds, but it would certainly be impossible for them to come here with the objective of fighting us unless you are asking whether they would be capable of drinking Cola from a cup, said Ricklent, looking pointedly at Zuruwarns three idle heads.

Only one of Zuruwarns four heads was partic.i.p.ating in this serious conversation with Ricklent; the other three were drinking Cola.

Ricklent himself had three separate bodies; the rather un-G.o.dlike thought of having a light snack using two of them went through his mind.

I meant that I pity the G.o.ds of other worlds if they yielded to Rodcortes threat, only to use up all of their power and fall into a slumber within minutes, never to awaken again, Ricklent said.

The people of Lambda would have no knowledge of G.o.ds that came here from another world. Thus, there was no hope of these G.o.ds ever recovering from their damage through people wors.h.i.+ping them. They would never be able to recover unless they returned to the world they came from, where their wors.h.i.+ppers were.

That is indeed very pitiful, but we cannot do anything other than pray that Rodcorte will not make such threats to the G.o.ds of other worlds. And currently, there do not seem to be any signs of him doing that, said Zuruwarn.

You are right, but let us stay vigilant for a while longer, just in case. If we are able to sense the signs of other G.o.ds coming before they arrive, we can pa.s.s on a warning, said Ricklent.

There was also a scenario where there was another world with s.p.a.ce-attribute G.o.ds and heroes whose strength rivaled that of people like Schneider, Randolf, and Heinz, and the G.o.ds sent these heroes to Lambda. But Ricklent and Zuruwarn didnt even consider this scenario.

If there were G.o.ds that possessed such power and initiative, invading Rodcortes Divine Realm rather than Lambda and wresting control over the circle of transmigration system from him or stealing the information necessary to conduct their worlds reincarnation on their own would be a less risky venture for a greater return. And such capable G.o.ds would surely realize that.

But once Rodcorte learns that he is unable to escape his own destruction or catastrophic damage that would cause him to fall into a slumber, there is no guarantee that he will not threaten other G.o.ds What is going on? Ricklent wondered.

We will just have to keep a steady eye on the situation, I suppose? We cannot ask Rodcorte in person, so we have no choice but to keep peeping and watching. There is no way to make certain of anything, said Zuruwarn.

Meanwhile, the Avalon Rikudou Hijiri, the man who was considered to be a greater threat to Origins existence than an all-out war between large nations, was feeling frustration and suspicion at the lack of progress in his plans and his research.

So, it seems that Metamorph will no longer be of any use, he said.

That is correct, said the Shaman Moriya. She is terribly deranged and unable to maintain a disguise. She is only stable when she is sleeping under the effects of sedatives. We tried brainwas.h.i.+ng her again, but neither magic nor drugs have had any effect.

Rikudou sighed. He had been using the brainwashed Metamorph s.h.i.+houin Mari to act as his body double in order to ensure his own safety and to buy time for his research into death-attribute magic to progress.

But when Metamorph attended the party to celebrate Meis third birthday at the Amemiya residence in Rikudous place, she had suddenly become deranged, and it was now impossible to control her.

Since then, Rikudou had been forced to personally make his own public appearances in the media. This took up much of his time.

This would not be a problem if Rikudou had a capable person he could depend on to make progress on the death-attribute magic research, but

It would have been best to leave a few death-attribute magic researchers alive, Moriya said.

Capable

researchers, to be more precise, said Rikudou.

Many researchers of death-attribute magic had been killed by Pluto and the other members of the Eighth Guidance. The ones whom they hadnt found, who had been secretly employed by the Federal States, had been killed at the Department of Defense building through the plan of none other than Rikudou Hijiri himself.

Rikudou had killed these researchers instead of kidnapping or hiring them himself in order to gain a monopoly on the research. Rikudou himself was a capable researcher, and Metamorph had provided a convenient body double that provided him with enough time to both make public appearances while remaining hidden behind the scenes. Thus, he had felt no need to take in researchers from the outside.

But the top-secret research facility that Rikudou and Moriya were in now had other researchers as well. However, many of them were just lab workers who operated the research equipment; they were effectively little more than simple laborers.

His collaborators had sent him personnel as well, and while they proved to be capable a.s.sistants for Rikudou, he couldnt depend on them to lead the research.

Even so, if the research was progressing smoothly, there wouldnt have been any problems. Even with less time, Rikudou could simply continue with his plan to kidnap Amemiya Mei in order to acquire death-attribute Mana and rule the world.

Preparations for this plan had already been completed years ago, with the cooperative relations.h.i.+ps necessary both public and behind the scenes already established. If he wanted to execute this plan, he could do so at a moments notice.

Making moves to keep the Bravers deceived had become more difficult, as the Druid Joseph and several of the Bravers close to him had become suspicious of Rikudou. But this would not be a fatal problem. Amemiya Hiroto had been puzzled by the deranged behavior of Rikudous body double, but it seemed that he hadnt come to any firm conclusions.

But if Rikudou were to execute his plan to kidnap Amemiya Mei while his crucial research had yet to make progress, and he somehow failed to acquire death-attribute Mana, then it would all be over for him.

Rikudous collaborators would all turn their backs on him, and he and his allies would be branded traitors and defeated by Amemiya Hiroto.

Rikudou was one of the worlds most distinguished mages and had superhuman physical abilities. Many of the other reincarnated individuals, including the Shaman Moriya Kousuke, were his allies, but none of them would be able to withstand the attacks of Amemiya Hiroto, who possessed cheat-like abilities such as Ignore Defense.

Death-attribute Mana was absolutely necessary to defeat Amemiya.

And there was also one enemy whose ident.i.ty was a mystery.

We still dont know the ident.i.ty of the thing lurking in the Amemiyas house No, the thing that has possessed Amemiya Mei. Given the behavior of Hiroto and Narumi, it doesnt seem that its in contact with them, but its possible that its in contact with Joseph, said Rikudou.

Then the one who caused Metamorph to? said Moriya.

Theres no other explanation, Rikudou said. Just what kind of magic No, what kind of abilities does it use? Or could it be that there are some other reincarnated individuals other than the Undead that were unaware of?

There were sensors in the Amemiya residence that detected all forms of Mana, including death-attribute Mana. And yet, even they had been unable to detect this unknown enemy even at the moment when the brainwas.h.i.+ng of Metamorph was disrupted, causing her to become deranged.

This was impossible to understand for Rikudou, who believed that the unknown enemy Banda, was a surviving member of the Eighth Guidance, one of their fanatical wors.h.i.+ppers, or perhaps a spy sent by some other foe.

It was surely impossible for this enemy to remain invisible and cause Metamorph to become deranged without casting a single spell without emitting any form of Mana. Not without some kind of cheat-like ability like the ones possessed by the reincarnated individuals. Cheat-like abilities consumed Mana when used, but they did not cause Mana to be radiated, so they couldnt be detected by sensors.

The truth was that Banda was in an invisible state by default, and the reason the brainwas.h.i.+ng of Metamorph had been disrupted was because he had previously appeared to her in a dream. The incident had been triggered by Meis words, and Banda hadnt used any Mana at all.

I believe it is a being that has been created through someones abilities, but has possessed Amemiya Mei. Given that its a being that is powerful enough to destroy one of my artificial spirits in an instant, but remains completely hidden, theres no other possibility, said Moriya.

And he was, in fact, correct. However, he could never have guessed that this someone was the one known by the codename Undead, the reincarnated individual who no longer existed in this world.

So, a reincarnated individual after all. Someone has taken notice of my plans, gained Joseph and others as allies, and is now protecting Amemiya Mei. But why are they keeping it a secret from Amemiya Hiroto and Narumi? Rikudou wondered. We have too little information. Its impossible for us to narrow the possibilities down at this stage.

There were still many surviving reincarnated individuals. And it was possible for reincarnated individuals to further develop the abilities that had been granted them by the G.o.d of reincarnation. It wasnt too strange to think that one of them had done so and come up with a way to use their abilities in a way that Rikudou wasnt aware of.

Thus, Rikudou gave up on trying to identify this someone for now. Given that they were protecting Mei, it was unavoidable that they would interfere with his plans. But the reason Rikudou gave up on identifying them was because he believed that they represented less of an interference than Amemiya Hiroto.

The more pressing problem is the research, Rikudou said. Why is death-attribute Mana not being produced?

He looked down at the vast quant.i.ties of data that showed the results of the experiments that had been conducted thus far. But all the results were the same: Failure.

At the top-secret research laboratory of the military nation that had held the Undead, research had been carried out under the hypothesis that an affinity for the death attribute was possessed by a human who did not possess an affinity for any other attribute.

Human samples had been gathered from people all over the world who possessed no affinity for any of the magical attributes, but this had failed. Every one of those samples had been so lacking in any affinity for an attribute that it was no exaggeration to say that they had no affinity at all but in reality, there was a little though it was about one percent of an ordinary persons.

The researchers of the top-secret laboratory had then tried to artificially create humans with no affinity for any attribute. But this had also failed. To begin with, it had been impossible for them to create a human being out of nothing with the technology used at the time, and although cloning technology used to create copies of existing humans was able to suppress affinities for the attributes, it had been unable to reduce it to nothing.

And as their final resort, they had used clones of the Undead, his offspring that they artificially created, and even his relatives, including the parents who had sold him. But all of it was for nought.

To begin with, even with Origins current modern technology, n.o.body had discovered what determined a persons affinities for the attributes.

After that, the work of the researchers at the top-secret laboratory had veered off course. It was around then that they conducted experiments on the people who would later become the Eighth Guidance.

But Rikudou knew what it was that decided which attributes a person had affinities for.

In this world, the attributes a person has affinities for is determined by the soul. No matter how much research is carried out into DNA and genetics, its useless, said Rikudou. But there are examples of an acquired affinity for the death attribute, though imperfect, like those of the Eighth Guidance. This gave me a clue. Those people met some of the requirements.

Yes, you have explained it to me before, Rikudou-san. You said that in order to gain the power of the death attribute, one must die. The Eighth Guidance became able to use death-attribute magic because their affinities for the attributes were erased, and then they died, though their deaths were incomplete, said Moriya.

Isis, who was in a state of brain death; Valkyrie, whose heart did not beat; Pluto, whose growth had been stopped; Berserk, who lost most of his body; Shade, who lost his entire body Each member of the Eighth Guidance had been only partially alive and partially dead, to varying degrees.

When the death-attribute Mana of the Undead was granted to them in that state, an affinity for the death attribute had taken root within them.

Thats right, said Rikudou. Thats why I thought that if someone lost their affinities for the attributes and then their bodies died a complete death, they would acquire perfect death-attribute Mana.

Of course, even if a person were to gain Mana in such a state, they would be a mere corpse. Even if they moved, they would be Undead. Success was impossible unless their hearts and lungs were restarted to bring them back to life after the Mana had become established in their body.

But something is missing, Rikudou continued. The technology used to remove affinities for the attributes was already perfected by that top-secret laboratory. We have perfected a technology to capture a soul that has left the body and return it, to ensure that the subjects die a complete death rather than a temporary one, and we have perfected a technology that makes it possible to resuscitate the subjects after that. However this only produced inferior copies of the Eighth Guidance, imperfect failures, or somewhat unusual Undead.

Rikudou Hijiri had developed a technology that could store souls, something that had been impossible for the humans of this world.

If he were to publicly announce this technology and make use of it in the medical field, it would cause great advances to be made in this worlds medical technology and healing magic.

It would even be possible to create a society in which n.o.body died of any causes other than accidents, murder, suicide, or old age. It would be praised as the greatest invention of the century, and Rikudou Hijiris name would be engraved deep in the worlds history books.

But that would not be enough for Rikudou Hijiris wishes to come true. To him, it was nothing more than a technology that was necessary for him to achieve his ambitions.

The doc.u.ments he was looking at detailed several experiments in which the samples acquired an imperfect form of death-attribute magic. One sample with an ability caused the decay of anything they touched, another with the ability to directly sap water from their target and more, including some who had acquired the same abilities as the members of the Eighth Guidance.

Why were the samples only able to use imperfect forms of death-attribute magic, Rikudou wondered.

Could it be because us reincarnated individuals are different from the people of this world? Metamorph is no longer of any use as a body double, so how about making use of her one last time as an experimental subject? Moriya suggested.

That theory doesnt explain Amemiya Mei. Her parents are both reincarnated individuals, but she herself is a human who was born in this world. Wasting a precious subject for a pointless experiment would be Wait, Rikudou said, as if realizing something. What do Amemiya Mei and the Undead have in common? Is that where the key for my acquisition of death-attribute Mana lies?

With that, he sank deeper into thought.

If there was one thing the two had in common that could be a necessary condition to acquire death-attribute Mana, Rikudou could only think of one possibility. But because Pluto and Urr had died, there was no way for him to test his theory now.

But still, if this theory was correct

Very well, lets conduct an experiment on Metamorph, Rikudou said. I will proceed with my plans and adjust them, depending on the results, but it may take some time. It is possible that I will need to discard this current body of mine.

The events that would threaten the existence of the world of Origin were finally in motion.