The Experiment Continues (5)
Having returned to the real world once more, the coaches' seat was handed fully off to the masked Cyrus as awareness returned completely to him.
He saw the now undead Ares in front of him, his eyes glowing in an eerie white light that looked like incandescent orbs in the back of his hollow eye sockets.
His short sword was placed upon the neck of the undead, ready to behead it if anything unexpected were to occur. He also detected that a combination of both Vita and Mors had been at play just a split second ago, made obvious by the flow of essence that just finished being absorbed by the undead as he also became aware and the slight physical weakness from activating two domains at once.
Stepping back and sheathing his sword, Cyrus felt around for a moment to figure out what he could do with the bit of his soul he left inside Ares.
Summoning the dark shadowy smog of his soul manipulation technique on his hand, he created a phantasmal recreation of Ares' penultimate soul core and tried messing with it for a bit.
"What a weird thing I have created, but an extremely useful tool" thought Cyrus as he connected to Ares' core and gave an order with his mind.
"Listen and obey: Take two steps back."
Cyrus felt something return from the two's connection, visually representing by the floating marble like orb in his hand vibrating for a moment, before Ares did as he was told and followed the command.
"All that is left is to name this thing I suppose. I really do hate naming things but if I am the first to invent such a technique then it should sound rather domineering. How about…The Death God's Seal" said Cyrus aloud, extremely pleased with the results of his experiment.
In the next moment his pleasure left him, as out of the corner of his eye he spotted the second hand of the laboratory clock freezing. Not only that, but he could see the perspiration that had fallen from his face when he moved had also completely stopped in place. The world was once again…
"Between once second and the next" was the last thought Cyrus had before the scenery around him seemed to evaporate, being replaced by an all too familiar room.
The walls were all equal distances to one another that were of a light blue color, made of some kind of substance that was neither wood nor stone. The table and chairs were of fine make, so much so that not even a single expected flaw was present like was the result of how they were normally constructed. The glass lighting fixture up above shone like a miniature sun but gave off no heat and the floor was covered entirely in an all too soft rug that connected to every wall at once.
Cyrus found himself sitting on the chair in a natural posture that suggested he had been sitting all along, to his left was someone else who looked just like him except everything from his facial expression, aura, and look in his eyes were all completely different from him.
The memories of each of the halves of the whole surfaced, of the time that they were still one and had visited this place not long before separating from Cato.
Looking across from them, a figure popped into existence right in front of them. Each of the halves saw something different in the figure, one saw a sinister and cunning young man while the other saw a bright and cheery one.
"I did say I had high hopes in you, but I truly did not expect us to meet again so soon. This would be…a surprise yes. What an odd feeling hmm, maybe I should pay more attention to the parts of me that take human form" said the figure in front of the two, who was none other than Mundus.
Seeing a chance to extract information, the dark half wasted no time and asked "Surprise? Are you not Mundus, the representation of the planet itself? An avatar of omniscience and omnipotence, omnipresent and all powerful?"
Mundus let loose a chuckle in response, the same one that the dark half himself would use when he heard something redundant.
"You do not believe that yourself, corrupted one. I clearly have limitations placed on me, either by my own design or by rules placed on me by the universe itself. Rules that control all of reality, that are immutable and unchangeable by even me. For example this ability to see the future, while it sounds useful at first in practice it is just horrible. Think of it like this: If you saw a future where you died, and you took actions to prevent it by preemptively removing the reason for your death, what happens?" asked Mundus.
"The cause of your death is removed, so then you live of course" said the dark half with a roll of his eyes.
"Wrong. The actions you take to cease your own death instead become the very reason for your downfall. The moment you see the future, assuming you are doing it correctly, it becomes unchangeable. Knowing this, of course I would never choose to do so just in case I see something that I do not like. Now, enough of the free information. That should be enough of a greeting gift for you, let us get down to business."
Mundus pushed a part of the table near him, causing a small section of it to sink in slightly and a glass like ball to raise from the center of the table out of a hidden space.
Light emanated from it, recreating the scene of where Cyrus had theorized, discovered, created, and finally named his latest and greatest technique.
"The Death God's Seal, quite the naming sense you have there by the way" said Mundus in clear mockery.
"Using your experience of witnessing a soul's true death as inspiration no doubt. Still, to happen upon this technique so early in your life is an achievement that I can safely say belongs to you alone. Even if you did rely heavily on that foul ability. Nevertheless: Congratulations to you, but, such a discovery comes along with a warning personally granted by me" explained Mundus, its voice slowly separating from the tone of a mere man to that one of a god of ultimate prowess.
With a snap from Mundus' fingers, the walls and ceiling of the room that they were in shimmered out of existence revealing the outside world to them.
A wonderous sight was seen, as they were in the center of a city that appeared to come out of a fairy tale to the two halves of the whole. The buildings were towering towards the sky and aplenty, made of metal and glass they had a glossy look when light reflected off of them. And light did indeed reflect off of them, as there were illuminated signs everywhere that had various pictures on them with words that they could not understand written on them. High up in the sky were what appeared to be metallic birds, slowly crossing the vast skies at a rate that looked no faster than the pace of a snail but the sight of one much closer to them taking off told them that the slow pace was just an illusion of the distance between them and the metal bird.
"This is your predecessor, the civilization that conquered the world for me. They expelled all of the foreign entities, even counter invading them which was extremely pleasing to me at the time. Alas, eventually they forgot their most ancient of accords which forced my hand in the end" explained Mundus, its tone neutral and godly in every regard.
The scenery changed once more, this time showing a vast ocean in front of them. However, what should have been a beautiful sight, as prompted by the descriptions the two had read in books, was instead a pitiful sight of dead marine life face up in the blackened water and pieces of what looked like human waste littering the entire ocean as far as they could see.
The scene changed again, showing them massive forests cut down leaving only their stumps. Rivers that had turned green with some kind of glowing sludge, and massive holes in the ground as if the stars had fallen and collided with the earth.
"So powerful they became, so extreme was their greed…that they eventually became as harmful to the planet, to me, that the foreign invaders they expelled were. Thus, I ended them" explained Mundus, the scenery changing once more to a birds eye view of several impressive cities at once. People could be seen walking along the roads, floating along glowing lines while metal boxes moved above them with more people clearly inside moving at high speeds.
Then, several loud and deafening horns played all at once with a sound so loud and powerful that one might think it signaled the start of the apocalypse, of rapture. Except in this case it was just so, as a white light descended upon the entire planet from the sky above that purified the land of the filth that had devastated it so.
"Thus, they were no more… I should also let you know that not only were your direct predecessors erased, but all other life on the planet at the time as well. I cannot pick and choose when it comes to resetting everything, thus even if just one race is the problem they will drag all of you down with them."
"The power that you have stumbled upon has the potential to lead the human race of your time down a similar path of your predecessors, despite the great lengths I went to in order to try to stop a repeat of that failure. So I warn you tainted one, exercise the utmost care moving forward as your actions will have an effect far beyond what you can affect in your lifetime."
Mundus then looked to the bright half, whom had been neglected up until this moment.
"Innocent one, it is your duty to keep the growth that is bound to your soul in check. Whether you decide to remain as two or combine into one, do not let his greed go unchecked. The creation of the Death God's Seal is not the only thing that could result in all life being wiped out…" said Mundus rather ominously, as he snapped his fingers and everything began to fade away once more.
"Do make the correct decisions, strive to be my champions and not my scourge" were the last words the two heard, before they were returned to their previous positions once more and time began to move forward once again.