Mass Evacuation

"Belle, Boo, can you help him?" I asked the two.

Boo turned her head toward the western part of the room, and her stones started to blink once more.

As soon as she moved, I was overcome with nausea again, falling to the ground clutching my stomach.

This was bad... I could feel vomit crawling up my throat.

Some people broke and ended up vomiting everybody. Even Hiyochi had joined them. Charlotte, Alex, and I all were able to keep it down, but the entire bunker started to panic once more.

"We can't stay here... we have to leave this bunker! Something is happening... something is causing us to feel like that, and the closer we got, the worse it got. Everybody! We have to leave this bunker!" I shouted out.

Where would we go?! We can't just leave with nowhere in mind...

Wait a minute...

"Charlotte... we can take these people to Ultima Tower, can't we?!" I asked her, grabbing onto her shoulder.

"Not into the Tower itself... but we can take them to the city! It's probably far enough away to avoid the vomit anyway... let's do it!" She shouted out at me.

"We can go to another place! We have to evacuate this bunker if we want to survive!" I shouted out.

Everybody, panicked by the profuse amount of vomit and dazed vision, agreed. We all started to head for the bunker door, where the food bunker used to be before it was blown out of the mountain.

"This has to work, right?" Alex asked me. I nodded, getting to the door, and pulling it wide open.

"Down here!" I shouted out.

People started to flood down the tiny hallway, and out of the room, helping each other get out of the building and running as fast as they could in the eastern direction. They must've known where Ultima Tower was...

That was the only thing that could save us now, coincidentally.

Asoh, who ran behind the crowd as they all left, ended up right behind me, panting as Charlotte stood on the opposite end of the thin hallway.

"That speech... you take classes for that? Not important... you two should go with them. Ultima Tower was missing all of its people... but if they come back, it was going to be a hell of a fight. I'll stay here, helping everybody and fixing who I can... Chi, you'll be okay with Charlie," Asoh said. She was still panting from vomiting.

"And Charlie... I'm sorry, for betraying you and fighting you in Ultima Tower. You're a good man, please keep Chi safe," Asoh said to me.

"Understood... keep yourself safe, Asoh," Charlotte said to her, before jumping down the path.

"Please don't let anything happen to her..." Asoh said, turning around to join up with Shike and the others.

I jumped down the hallway and slid down, ending up in the back behind everybody who was now walking, running, and sprinting to Ultima Tower.

"They're following the path... good... Charlotte, are you okay to run?" I asked her, watching her with a slight limp on her left leg.

"Nothing some dirt won't fix. What about you? Are you okay?" She asked me with a look of deep concern.

"I... don't know... everybody I know... barely anybody was in that bunker. I don't know if they're dead or what... but they weren't there. That scares me. All of my friends could be dead... but, I went through that pain. I don't know, it's like a weighted scale. I killed my friends in Ultima Tower, but it was all fake... if it turns out to be real after Quake got to them, I think that would counteract the way I coped, and it would truly feel like I killed them. I don't know, I know it's not true... but that was truthfully the last time I got to see them, right before I slaughtered them..." I told her.

"No matter what happens, Charlie... I'll be there, by your side, helping you. If they're alive... if they did pass during the fight... I'll help bury them. Anything I can do," Charlotte told me.

"And to think, we were enemies not too long ago... Charlotte, do you know the point of Ultima Tower? Why did we go through all of that?" I asked her.

"The purpose of Ultima Tower? When I was first thrown here... I was told that Ultima Tower was meant to be a 'substitute of something' and 'a challenge for the Deity', I never learned what they meant by that," She subtly said.

It almost made me stop running... but I started to think about it...

A challenge for the Deity... The First Trial?

No... that's not what that is...

If I piece together everything I've processed since I first remember things getting weird... Illya said Sky didn't need things to care about... and I killed all of my friends. I killed everything I cared about, but I wasn't the one that was supposed to do that.

Genesis... that man led me into that trap... he removed Shike's White Stone and put it onto Boo.

What was he doing that whole time? His movements were unpredictable, and threw everything I thought about through a loop.

That man... everything felt calculated, everything felt like it had a purpose, but in the very end, he got away, and he can continue his antics from far away.

I finally stopped dead in my tracks.

"Charlie? What's wrong?" Charlotte asked me, stopping right beside me.

I felt chills shoot up my back...

Far away...

I looked back toward the bunker, looking at the hole in the mountain as it started to crumble from the top.

Then, I turned my head upside down, peering at the hole in the mountain.

The shape of a G was what was blown out of the mountain.

He wasn't far away... was he?

"LOOK OUT!" I heard Charlotte scream.

I turned around, watching a blade scathe the ridge of my nose, almost cutting both of my eyes out.

I back-stepped and held my ground, kicking the sword out of the attacker's hand, and grabbing onto it for myself.

I wielded the strangely familiar glow of a sword that reminded me of the ones on The Isle.