Chapter 231 - 231: Sacrifice

"The price of a secured future is to relinquish the memory of a past that might have been."

Terralia's anger had been replaced by a chilling clarity, the terror of the founders' messenger now a heavy weight on her soul. She lowered her head slightly, her voice a fragile whisper. "So the whole point is to accept the sacrifice for a better future? Is that all there is to it?"

Lethunia nodded, his unmoving gaze fixed on her. "Yes. A sacrifice even I cannot escape."

Terralia, her immense body still trembling, looked at him with profound confusion. "What do you mean?"

Lethunia gestured to himself, a silent acknowledgement of his own tragic existence. "I was born in one of the last refugee colonies, 1,340 light-years away from this planet. The last surviving transcendant colony, devoid of advanced technology. Our lineage was defined by the energy coursing through our bodies, unreliant of any form of advanced technology, but on that particular planet, the leylines were disrupted, and my people were no different than normal humans. Energy was scarce. I was only born because of the chaotic timeline I'm in now. To know that the future has been altered by my actions, I will cease to exist. It will be as if I never existed. You will forget about me. Everything I have said, every single imprint I have left on this reality, will also disappear. That is the sacrifice I have to pay for changing the future."

The words hung heavy in the air. Lucifer, Gabriel, Loki, and Yeshua all listened, a somber understanding in their eyes. They acknowledged the great sacrifice he had to make. It was heavy, and so was the decision they were asked to make—knowing they could have made a difference and saved everyone, but that doing so would only stall the inevitable reckoning and lead to a far more devastating end.

Terralia, accepting the crushing truth, slowly raised a clawed hand. The gesture was both a formal oath and a sign of immense grief. The light on her palm pulsed and she cut her skin with a single, sharp motion, golden ichor flowing freely. "I, Terralia, the guardian dragon of light, hereby accept all the burden and responsibility for the death of billions of souls, native to this planet."

Loki, seeing this, gave a tight, sad smile. He had known the risks. He had always known. He muttered softly to himself, "There's no greater sacrifice than to secure the future of our descendants and of the galaxy."

Terralia finished with her oath, then looked back at Lethunia, her voice heavy. "So, what do we do now?"

Lethunia smiled, a ghost of a genuine human emotion. "Everything should be flowing towards the other way now. The only thing I need to do is to spread this into the air." He revealed a small, silver cylinder, which contained a shimmering dust within. "Anything I tell you from here onwards will only endanger the future and to that end, all of our sacrifice will have no effect."

Terralia lowered her head in a bow, her ancient form showing a deep reverence. Lucifer, Gabriel, Loki, and Yeshua bowed as well. "Thank you for your intervention, O great messenger."

Lethunia bowed back, a final, poignant gesture. "No, I should thank you for the hardest of choices you will make. I am merely flipping a switch. Thank you again. I should say my farewell to Hephaestus." He bowed one last time before a green vortex opened behind him, a gateway to the next moment in his desperate mission. He stepped back, and the vortex disappeared, leaving an echoing silence in his wake.

Terralia sighed, the sound a low tremor that reverberated through the temple. "Escort my child to the deepest depths of the temple," she commanded Yeshua. "The elders and disciples should be making everything ready to seal it. Mainu should not be able to detect the chaos energy once it is done."

Yeshua bowed and gently took the egg, which floated beside him as he turned and walked away. Terralia then turned to Loki, her expression softening. "You should take yourself to safety, Loki."

Loki smiled, the mischievous glint back in his eyes. "No, my lady. I will help distract Lord Mainu."

Terralia's eyebrow arched in a silent question. "How?"

Loki opened his palm, and a flawless, ethereal replica of the dragon egg appeared, shimmering with an illusion of chaos energy. "This will distract him away from the real one. He might see it as an illusion right away, but with Asmodeus already channeling the chaos energy from the crystal on Atlantis, he will assume that we've hidden the real one far away. Once he gets close to the center of Atlantis, Hephaestus will detonate the dark matter bomb."

Terralia smiled, a faint, sad smile. "I can't believe I have to help you deceive my husband. But if that's what it takes to end this all, then I will do it." Loki nodded, a silent promise hanging between them.

Meanwhile, deep beneath the temple, Yeshua and two hundred disciples of light gathered in a crystallized chamber. At its center, a pedestal awaited the egg. Yeshua gently placed it upon the pedestal, and the obsidian crystal pulsed faintly. Elder Petre, his face etched with worry, asked, "Teacher, will everything be okay?"

Yeshua looked at the others, their faces a mix of fear and faith, awaiting his answer. "I will not lie to you, my students. Our current reality is facing a turmoil, and a greater cataclysm will befall upon the great people of the galaxy. But a samaritan has graced us with a great hope, a future of endurance, survival, and utopia. Not everyone on the surface will survive, but we must plant the seeds of the future and you with it. I don't know where in the future you will wake up, but I have great hopes that you will see how the future will change."

Elder Murak, a wise old transcendant, then spoke up. "Teacher, does that mean you will not be staying with us?"

Yeshua shook his head. "No. I will watch upon the last moments of our era. I will be reborn again sometime in the future, much earlier than you, disciples." He looked at Murak and the others, his gaze warm and reassuring. "You will know who will guide humanity into the future. He is a figure of courage, will, and fearlessness. But he is the most vulnerable to the dark side. You must help him anchor towards the light. He will become the strongest transcendant, and he will be the key to the truth, the one who will lead us to free will."

He smiled one last time, a brilliant, beatific expression, before the chamber was bathed in a wave of blinding light. The crystalline walls vibrated, and the entire chamber was sealed off, its location now a secret deep within the earth, waiting to be found far towards the future.