"Hard choices?" Erik's attacks intensified. "Like experinting on children? Like unleashing the Heniate on civilians?"
"You understand nothing. The world isn't as simple as you think."
More soldiers rushed the aircraft in tight formation, moving like a swarm of killer ants having pointed their prey.
Erik's plant cut down the enemy forces. The soldiers dropped in succession as Erik maintained his position above, engaging Bill while defending against incoming attacks. The floor beca increasingly hazardous as evidence of the conflict accumulated beneath them.
"Then enlighten ." Erik launched another combination of attacks. While the vines whipped at Bill, shards of ice materialized around him, which were then sent hurtling toward the second division commander.
"What great purpose could justify all this death and suffering? How many lives were worth your precious experints?"
A brief pause settled between them, though their battle never ceased. Bill's Matter Disruption tore through Erik's vines and elental attacks as if they were paper dolls in a hurricane.
The clash of their powers filled the area around the hangar with flashes of light that overtook even the light from the rising sun.
"We were those who unleashed the Sinister Cold on the world." Bill's speed burst carried him through the storm of attacks, his invisible hands dissolving everything in their path.
That admission surprised Erik, but not as much as it should have. He had pieced together enough of the puzzle during his investigations. The timing, the patterns, the Blackguards' obsession with control-it all pointed to their involvent.
"You motherfuckers!" Erik's plants erupted with renewed fury, killing blackguards faster than before. The remaining soldiers below died in waves as his rage manifested through his powers.
Yet the most pressing question in Erik's mind was why he candidly admitted to having unleashed the most devastating disease known to mankind on him. What was the purpose?
"Want to know why?" Bill's voice carried an edge of pride mixed with what almost seed like desperation to be understood.
"You found mana. Once you did, you wanted to control it!" Erik's elents combined violently, creating storms of fire, wind, and lightning that forced Bill to use more energy defending.
"We did," Bill said, while reducing Erik's attacks to nothingness. "The Sinister Cold was necessary to create brain crystals and control mana. As many suspected, it was the direct cause of brain crystals appearing."
Erik laughed maniacally. "Congratulations! You fucked humanity up! Now what, do you want a round of applause?"
"Aren't you curious why I'm telling you this?" A weird spell spread to the area.
Erik got angrier. He clenched his jaw and narrowed his eyes, trying hard not to lose control. His whole body tensed as he fought the urge to attack with abandon.
"Why? So you can justify your atrocities? Tell how your master plan makes all this death worthwhile?"
"Brain crystal powers gave people power. Yes, unfortunately, Thaids had been a byproduct of this, but they weren't the goal. That was an accident." Bill's admission ca with a subtle shift in his stance.
Then he paused, as if trying to find the words, as if trying to collect the thoughts Erik was already reading.
"There was soone who could use mana before the rest of us could." Bill's invisible hands were basically destroying the surroundings. The ground got dented; everything was turning to nothing where his Matter Disruption touched. The hangar's structure groaned under the assault.
"Exorcists, diviners. They were real. It was just that they controlled mana in so ways we couldn't, and that we still can't. Trust , we tried. Based on their words, only a person in a billion could use mana, aning none of us could."
Unfortunately, these people went extinct after the Thaids appeared.
[LEVEL UP]
The constant influx of experience from killing soldiers kept Erik's mana reserves high, feeding into his increasingly destructive attacks.
"One of them told us about sothing. A nace, killers trying to reach us, to reach humans, to reach earth."
Erik remained silent.
"She told us, she told the Silver Line Corporation, to find a way to make humans control mana, because that was the only way we would have survived. So we did. We created the Sinister Cold, which was simply sothing ant to create brain crystals, a way to control mana."
Erik's eyes widened, his jaw clenched. He couldn't believe what he was hearing. The audacity, the sheer absurdity of Bill's claim, left him montarily speechless.
"You expect to believe that?" Erik said. "That you unleashed a global catastrophe because so fortune teller scared you with ghost stories?"
He shook his head, a bitter laugh escaping his lips. The idea was so preposterous, so utterly divorced from reality, that Erik found himself questioning Bill's sanity.
Yet sothing in Bill's voice-the gravity, the unwavering conviction, and the certainty radiating from his thoughts-sent a chill down Erik's spine. He wasn't lying.
Yet Erik's attacks intensified. Below, more soldiers fell as Erik's rage manifested through his powers. Bill saw this with increasing worry.
"Ghost stories? The diviner gave us a ti limit! 2000 years. 2000 years, and humanity would be destroyed!" Bill's own emotion fed into his powers.
The commander's emotions rang true-there was fear there, old and deep, mixed with a desperate conviction. Erik felt it. A lot of ti passed since brain crystals ca into existence, and not much ti remained before this catastrophe, or whatever it was, fell on the remnants of the human race.
"So you created brain crystals, only to discover you could control mana in just one way? Brain
crystal powers."
[LEVEL UP]
"That's exactly what happened. Brain crystals allowed us to only do one thing. They gave us one brain crystal power, and it even is random!" Bill's speed burst carried him through Erik's assault, but his movents betrayed increasing strain. The constant use of Matter Disruption was taking its toll.
"So you tried to co up with sothing that would make you get past this limitation. The biological supercomputer."
It was at that mont that two voices echoed around the area.
"Second Division Commander!"
Erik turned. There were two people joining the fight. No, in truth, there were more,
thousands. It was just that those on the front were...
"Vindicators..." Erik turned to Bill.
Bill said nothing.
Reviews
All reviews (0)