Chapter 392: Unlocked

Early Afternoon - Late Fall : The Library of Eternity, Atlas | Bahamut

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-'Bahamut's Questionable Choice', 'The Bane of Progress', 'The Tyrant's Rule'..? Oh, it's another about Hera...- Reading the titles of books as I walked down one of the two layers of bookshelves, I paused to peek over the middle shelf at Hera. "~You really were a hot topic back in the day, huh...~" -This is like the eighth book on her and we just started...- Glancing back at the door, we hadn't gotten more than a few steps into the third layer.

"~Of course. Bahamut essentially handing the country to me was a very hot topic back then, especially with those who believed they had power and influence because he made the decision without their input. They liked Bahamut though, so in order to keep his favor they aimed their voices at me, whether I was the one that did what they were mad about or not.~"

-Interesting...- Lowering my head back below the top of the shelf, I got back to reading with my aura. "~So you were basically a scapegoat for everyone's dislike?~"

"~Something like that...~" Smiling with a somewhat reminiscent look, she continued. "~Back then, people said Bahamut put me in the position in order to court me. At that time, I was known for having quite a cold personality so they thought he was trying to 'win over the unwinnable' by laying the country in my lap.~"

"~So that's why these books keep claiming you were unworthy of the position... It looks like those rumors really caught on.~" -These books are from well after the war...-

"~Well, Bahamut never once corrected them, so it's what became the truth in the eyes of the public... But it worked better for me in the end, so I don't mind.~" Looking at me, her smile turned somewhat playful.

But I was too busy reading to notice. "~What do you mean by it worked out better? If instead of being hated, you were loved, you probably could have been saved from the Acardi.~"

"~But if I was saved from the Acardi, I wouldn't be alive now.~"

-Huh?- I wasn't following. "~What do you mean?~"

Looking over, I watched her nostalgic expression darken. "~I most certainly would not have survived even if I somehow managed to escape that facility alive...~" She paused before going back to reading. "~Even back then, I could tell the war wasn't going well. Battles were short, and regardless of which side won, it felt like we were just taking jabs at each other, even though we were fighting with everything we had... But honestly.. after seeing everything you showed me over the last few days... I've found myself questioning how this world still exists as I remember it...~"

Pausing as some memories gained a bit of clarity, I spoke more softly and carefully. "~So you think Delphi should have lost against the Acardi...~"

She immediately nodded. "~It wasn't Delphi against them, it was the draconic race.. and if I'm being honest, unless that laboratory was the absolute pinnacle of what they could produce.. I don't see a world where we could have won...~"

Finding familiarity in her words, I raised a question. "~Do you think they could have simply lost interest?~"

It was a blind toss, but she seemed to think differently. "~I don't know what, but Delphi had something they needed. Unless it was simply mana, the odds of them leaving us alone are slim to none.~" Peeking over the bookshelf at me, she spoke with a serious tone. "~One of the many things I learned being around them for so long was that they weren't a race to simply leave behind something valuable. They spoke about colonies on other worlds like we talk about kingdoms, and said that it was a shame to destroy certain worlds because 'the sector' didn't find them useful enough... The only reason I didn't get killed when they left my facility was because the guy in charge hated me, and wanted me to have a slow death.~"

-But if they were defeated, there would be traces...- For the Mothership to hold as many people as it did, I had expected to find colossal wreckages in the bottom of the Death's Gape, but not only was there nothing, there weren't any sizable debris fields at all. -So what happened to them...-

Once again, I was back to square one, questioning the purpose of the Acardi and wondering what happened to them.

But there was one thing I had to wonder as I read the ancient books lining the shelves. "~Do you think it could be related to Jormungandr?~"

If Delphi was an incubator for whatever kind of creature he was, maybe the Acardi needed it for something, came, found it was taken, and left.

If Jormungandr was as powerful as I believed him to be, it would be logical that they wouldn't try and piss him off.

But that theory held less ground the more I gave it thought.

So, for the next couple hours, Hera and I walked around the library, reading book after book about everything from the cost of living documentation and architecture blueprints to newspapers, old novels, and encyclopedias.

For the most part, the knowledge and information they contained was useless to me, more so just giving me a look into the culture of Bahamut from that era, but every now and then I struck gold, like finding a book detailing old studies taken to look into science, attempting to explain quantum physics with mana, or finding a series of handwritten pieces detailing experiences during the fall of Bahamut.

With every book, more and more memories seemed to gain clarity, not from my time as Nott, but my time as Bahamut.

However, it seemed those memories had a limit. -Bahamut's soul must have been really damaged when I absorbed him...- Even strong, core memories were so fuzzy that while I felt clear emotions and intentions from them, I didn't even know what the memory was.. to the extent I had to question if the void was what claimed his life.

But as I continued to read more and more books, and more memories returned, that no longer was the question.

Fragmented memories from a time when dragons were feral slowly began piecing themselves together, memories of a gold-scaled dragon hatching, alone in the middle of a swamp filled with monsters, forced to fight for its life in order to survive.

It was me, as Bahamut, being born.

But as the memories progressed, and the fragmented memories of me fighting for my own survival continued, the fragments started getting more and more spaced out.

Memories of the moment I gained magic bordered those of the day I escaped the swamp to see my first view of civilization, nearly ten years later.

But it was enough. While the fragments started slowing in frequency, and the memories started becoming more and more disconnected and fragmented, I felt oddly at ease, as if pleased that not everything had been forgotten.

However, just when I thought all the remaining fragments regained whatever clarity they would, one more was forced into my mind...

A fragment nearly sixty thousand years after the most recent fragment I had.

An image of a rune, and a sequence of numbers. -Huh?-

Unlike the other fragments, that one wasn't blurry, it more so felt.. fake... It felt as if it was a memory carved into my soul by hand rather than through evolution or reincarnation.

But I didn't have a clue as to what it could mean, even after dedicating some thought to it while Hera and I continued around the library, reading books that grew thousands and thousands of years older with every step. Ancient diaries of dragons who lost family in the war, recordings of huge ceremonies dedicated to those who were killed in battle, and logs of colossal battles where thousands of dragons fought as one bordered the praises of Bahamut, announcements of the endless progress in the Golden Era, and first-hand accounts of Hera's reign.

It was honestly like stepping through a time machine, but... -No wonder Bahamut's technology fell back so aggressively after the war...-

While the library was indeed packed with information, recounting countless huge events, cultural and technological milestones, and even the diaries of countless souls that had long since been lost to time, before the fall of Bahamut, details of technological developments vanished entirely. "~Bahamut's culture was preserved, but not the technology that supported it...~"

It was exactly as Hera thought. "~Back when Bahamut constructed this library, he wanted it to be a place dedicated to preserving our traditional values, keeping dragons moral, humble, and happy... But unfortunately, everything he didn't preserve was lost to time...~"

-Well.. that might not have been a bad thing...- Although draconic technology had indeed taken quite a few steps back, it not being too advanced would help science take its hold, inevitably raising the limit of technology to a realm well above what it could have before. -But we are quite a ways from that...-

Continuing further around the ring of shelves, books started getting noticeably more sparse, with more artifacts beginning to fill shelves, and leaving only massive cultural events such as Hera's coronation or the rumored appearances of the Ancient Fenrir or Scales of the Leviathan to fill the shelves.

But, while irrefutably fascinating, the information I originally hoped to find was nowhere to be found. Details about both Jormungandr and the Acardi were sparse at best, never being mentioned in any official documentation, and only ever being found in diaries and first-hand accounts, lacking the details to even tie them to an interstellar or intergalactic race. -Hm...-

To an extent, it almost felt like the suppression of information, as if Bahamut didn't want traces of the Acardi to remain after the war. -I wonder...-

Coming out into the hallway we first started in after doing a full loop around the third layer, I sat down and looked toward the final door, the entrance to Bahamut's nest.

Just like the entrance to the third layer, it was a map of Bahamut, this time lacking any indicator of cities as if to be a map from before the development of dragonic society.

The detail of the map was incredible, with small clearings and lakes even being visible amongst the sea of trees, but even though many of the parts were of places I had never been, I was confident that was how it was at one point.

I was confident that everything, down to the tiny lakes, and small dungeon entrances was perfectly accurate.

But it wasn't because of trust in the architect of the library.

-I.. carved this...- Although faint, the sensation of my claws carving away wood filled my mind while I stared at it. -How.. did I make the lock work though...-

Finally coming out into the hall as well Hera, holding her head and tail high gave me a curious look. "~It's beautiful, isn't it?~"

Unable to pull myself from my thoughts I didn't move at all.

"~Are you trying to figure out how to open it?~" Following my gaze up to the door, she sat down. "~He said he only ever planned to give the key to his children, but he never had any... That place was basically his bedroom while he was Monarch.~"

"~But.. I might know it...~" Slowly standing up, I walked toward the door and looked around at the hundreds of tiny, dark lakes carved into the wood. -They're Acardi sensors... The same I use to log into the laboratory...- It would act like a fingerprint scanner, unlocking whenever Bahamut walked close to the door. -But he wouldn't be able to pass the code on to anyone if that was the only way in...-

Thinking back to the countless scattered fragments of memories, I held them up next to the map in my eyes before finally, a pattern I held up to the map crossed over every single lake in a pattern.

The pattern of a layer of a space rune. -And then the numbers in that memory fragment...- They indicated the sequence of 'lakes' mana in the space rune would pass through. -They're the password...-

*Vwoom* Pulling out some mana, I flooded the sensors following the sequence of numbers from my artificial memory.

But.. nothing happened. -Huh?-

Tilting my head, I sat back down before trying again, this time dragging a cloud of mana over the sequence, rather than pressing them like buttons. -Is it a pattern?-

But that wasn't it either.

However, after sitting in focus for what felt like just an instant, I stood up and injected fire, electricity, and light mana into the wall at three points marked by mountains, as if it were being injected by a space rune.

Because the sequence of numbers wasn't the password, nor was it a sequence.

The numbers were coordinates.

*Click* And the moment I infused the right mana into those spots, a series of locks clicked open.

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