Chapter 233 - 233: Dawn Of A New Age

Mainu had survived the blast. His colossal form, however, was a testament to the brutal force of the dark matter explosion. The entire planet Terralia, now known as Earth, was engulfed in a swirling miasma of radiation. Mainu's body, however, fought a constant battle.

Each moment, the massive reserves of chaos energy he had accumulated over the millennia were spent on regeneration. But the loss of his wife and child, a grief so profound it threatened to tear his very soul apart, became a new poison. The grief itself, combined with the lingering light energy he had absorbed from Terralia's final moments, slowed his regeneration to a crawl.

He was a god-king, but he was dying, each passing minute taking a toll on his power. He needed a massive, immediate source of energy. His gaze turned to Mars, the planet's energy a meager meal, but a meal nonetheless. The Martians, a primitive, tribal civilization, were blissfully unaware of the impending doom.

As Mainu sat in his own temple, absorbing the planet's life force, Emperor Kharvann of the Krill arrived with his trusted four young kings. Kharvann bowed low. "My lord, I am glad you survived such a devastating attack on the planet Terralia."

Mainu's voice was calm, but his words were a cold blade. "I have no association with you and your race, insect. Leave me."

Kharvann was taken aback. "What do you mean, my lord? The contract still stands."

Mainu stood, his figure towering over them, his body still marked by radiation burns. "I have suffered enough foolish tricks. The contract is..." His voice cut off as he looked at his palm. The contract was indeed still active. It would only break if his child had died or has been cured. The fact that it remained meant the suicidal act was a lie.

He smiled, a mix of confusion and relief. There was hope. Kharvann, sensing this, gestured to his kings, who ordered their soldiers to enter the hall carrying a large egg. Mainu's relief was palpable. There was a faint trace of chaotic energy, but a much weaker one. He asked, smiling, "Did you already cure my child halfway?"

Kharvann, struggling to reply, lied. "Y-yes, my lord. That we did."

"I thank you for rescuing my child and for your efforts," Mainu said, his voice laced with gratitude.

Kharvann smirked behind him, a flicker of triumph in his eyes. "It was nothing, my lord. We have captured enough humans to continue with the cure, but we have found that other races might also be plausible to mix with the solution for you and your child's cure."

He was clearly biding his time, extending the lie to make Mainu a puppet for their galactic conquest. Mainu, desperate for hope, was easily fooled, smiling at the thought of a new solution. He had no idea he was being deceived. Unbeknownst to them all, the real one, was sealed deep within the Earth, waiting for the right moment. Mainu, now with the Krill, had turned Mars into a giant, barren planet before conquering other star systems.

100,000 years later. The radiation on Earth finally cleared, and the atmosphere stabilized. The planet's surface however, was still locked in a deep ice age.

100,000 more years later. Earth had finally returned to it's lush, blue-green world, its single landmass split into multiple continents. The Neanderthals and surviving humans emerged from their underground sanctuary, living multiple generations not having to see the sun.

Most of the old written texts were lost, but memories of the old era were etched into their minds. They had no guidance on harnessing the natural energies of the planet, and what little knowledge remained became known as the "Mystic Arts", passed down through lineages.

The Neanderthals, with their raw strength, began to slaughter the more fragile humans. Realizing their Mystic Arts, proved less useful, humanity was forced to adapt, forging weapons from natural resources and surviving on intelligence alone.

180,000 more years later. Humanity slowly but surely, spread throughout the planet, reclaiming every Neanderthal territory. More centuries later, humanity advanced from Stone age to the Bronze Age. They had dominated Earth, slaughtering any human hybrids, including the Neanderthals. It was also during this time that ancient texts written by the transcendants—Yahweh, Satan, Odin, Zeus, Shiva, Vishnu, and other transcendants—were found in caves.

Instead of providing guidance, they were misinterpreted. The knowledge themselves became a source of religion, belief, and division. Wars broke out over these new beliefs, and the Tower of Babel, the last bastion of ancient knowledge, was burned to the ground by the largest religious faction formed around Yahweh's texts.

Yeshua, having died in the reset, was reborn in Nazareth, Israel. He was sent by Yahweh to correct the misinterpretations and gather a new order of disciples. These disciples were taught by him and tasked with writing all the true ancient history of Earth, including the techniques on how to harness the planet's energy and other alternative methods that proved the same outcome.

His teachings garnered a massive following of Jews, but before the inevitable, he instructed his disciples to hide the most important texts and knowledge in a box, a sacred artifact that would one day be known as the Ark of the Covenant. The Romans persecuted and crucified him, hunting down and killing his disciples. But the Ark and its precious texts were safely hidden, carried in secret from location to location.

Yeshua had left his disciples a final task: they were to transcribe all of their knowledge and understanding of his teachings for the next generation that would one be known as the Bible. The most important part was the "Second Coming", where the transcendants—Yahweh, Satan, Odin, Zeus, and others—would return to Earth and meet it's descendants and prepare for the Dark Dimension's invasion.

Throughout the following years, humanity, though divided by religion, underwent a massive leap of technological evolution. They were stronger without the power to naturally harness energy. Brutal wars, curiosity, and the deep-seated fears of the unknown pushed them to great advancements in a short span of time. Even when the Krill returned and controlled everything from the shadows, it made no difference. Humanity was naturally a warmongering and territorial species.

The First Industrial Revolution began. Humanity learned to fly again, building cities that the transcendants never thought possible. New technologies arose. Then came World War II, a conflict so terrible that Yahweh and the other transcendants watched in horror, knowing that this great sacrifice would again push humanity forward. When the nuclear bombs dropped on Nagasaki and Hiroshima, the transcendants felt the great disturbance of energy on the planet.

Expecting the end of human civilization once again, they watched humanity evolved again in just a span of half a century. Every war that seemed to promise extinction, instead slingshotted humanity's technological evolution. Humanity arrived in the year 2012, with the Information Age still rapidly evolving.

Lethunia's scattered silver dust motes, dormant for hundreds of thousands of years, found their way to Richard Santamo, an unassuming human with no special abilities, drinking coffee on his balcony with his mother, Anita. The silver dust motes went through his brain, and the system integrated and awakened within him.

The Tyranny that would incur throughout the galaxy had finally begun.

Back to the Present.

Mainu fell through the void. His life, and the great deception that led him here, flashed before his eyes. He saw the Krill, their schemes hidden in the shadows, their contract a chain around his neck. He saw the false egg, the cruel joke they had played on his desperate love.

But as he fell toward the sun's fiery embrace, he felt a strange sense of peace. He had been a fool. His own arrogance and naivety, had made him vulnerable, a pawn in a game he thought he was winning. He watched Richard, a distant figure in the sun's corona, and felt no anger, only a detached sense of admiration for a cunning that he himself had played and lost terribly.

His only regret was that he would die without ever finding his child. He had clung to life, to the Krill's lies, all because the contract on his palm had recently faded. He believed his child must be alive, somewhere, and perhaps had even been cured after so much time. He came to Earth hoping to find them, but the humans had stood in his way. Now, there was no hope left. Or so he thought.

But then, a voice echoed in his mind, not through his ears, but through the very fabric of his being. It was a voice that was both a whisper and a scream, a sound that twisted the laws of reality around it, ancient and utterly terrifying.

V'yith-k'tharr, N'gah-shoggoth... ( Do you seek power? )

The words themselves were a paradox, a non-sound that resonated deep in his soul.