NOVEL NEXT B3 | Chapter 8
Aria
The three of us proceed through the city and then out of it in the direction of the capital city on the planet through one of the trains. The city where the Gate to Eternus is located. And throughout our trip, we don’t run into a single ounce of trouble.
Yet, for some bizarre reason, terrorist activity keeps popping up in every city we pass by.
Strange.
Doesn’t have anything to do with us though.
And since we never see any, we kind of just ignore it all.
Although Shirogane seems to have figured something out, he’s not saying anything about it.
Hannah’s too focused on watching the scenery of the planet. Since there really is a lot of that.
Lots of massive cities, large light-speed trains, and even floating space stations high above the planet. One of which is the size of a damned moon.
And apparently the Rex Dynasty of the Dead has a larger version. One of which, Rex itself – which is apparently not a natural planet despite what I assumed – being the largest.
Imagine that. A massive artificial planet made entirely out of technology and movable as their capital.
The Rex Dynasty of the Dead is one of the few nations no one ever wants to pick a fight with for a reason after all. Considering that the Dynasty can simply turn off every Gate in the universe and then fly on over on a spaceship and start attacking them.
Not exactly safe for the other nations. Only the other eight of the Nine Grands stand a chance.
Then again, most of the Nine Grands are people no one ever wants to mess with.
Crimson Flag is a nation led by a Horseman who doesn’t tire or ever run out of energy. Pestilence is a man who quite likely would ignore them before fighting back while devastating half of their planets by turning them into plagued wastelands on accident somehow. Famine has the most manpower in the entire universe with the largest number of planets under his control. Mostly because War often sells planets to other nations after conquering them. Choosing to do that instead of ruling over them himself.
The Arcadian Society is the foundation of all mages in the universe. Going after it would mark you as an enemy of mages. Plus the Archmage can shoot down a star from her home planet.
Scary lady.
Council of Darkness’s leader has never been found unless he wants to be.
And if anyone went after the Eternal Dynasty, then pretty much every other nation of importance in the universe would go after them. Just so that their economy doesn’t collapse. So no one ever goes after the Eternal Dynasty.
No one knows where the Crimson Empire is, and the Grand Silvanian Empire has a habit of going overboard in his revenge. To the point of wiping out every last person belonging to the nation that attacked his people. And the Emperor is physically strong enough to cut a planet in half. Which doesn’t bode well for someone taking him on.
I lean against the window just looking out into the night through the heavy rain. Rain so heavy that I can barely even see anything.
Guess there’s not much scenery right now after all.
Considering this rain.
After staring out into the night for a bit, I feel like I notice something. Some random flashes of light shining through the rain quite a ways away from the train. But no matter how hard I try to see what it is, I fail to figure it out.
Huh. Odd.
I think I hear some crackling and explosion sounds from there too.
Fireworks, maybe?
I stare for a bit before shrugging and closing my eyes, deciding to get a little shuteye.
Just barely out of sight from the train
The Governor of Aral grits his teeth as he sends one bolt of crimson energy after another into his undead, making them all rush forwards to attack the opposing army led by one of the biggest and most psychotic death cults on the planet. A cult that is known for their psychotic obsession towards Death. An obsession so great they’re willing to kill anyone who gets in their way of worshiping her.
Willing to do anything just to be able to worship her at their shrine from dawn till dusk every day.
Even if Death herself may not want that.
“Let us through Art! You will pay if you don’t!!!” the leader of the Cult of the Underworld declares as he sends waves of specters at the governor, not losing much ground despite the governor’s attacks. But after some more enforcers begin to arrive alongside the governor, he finally begins to find himself pushed back a little. His army no longer matching the army of enhanced undead controlled by the government.
“I highly doubt that,” Art says rather dryly as he continues sending more and more undead while also ordering more enforcers to surround the cult on all sides. “Our Lady is not a belonging for you to obsess over. Please keep that in mind in your sentence.”
The enforcers all slowly surround the Cult of the Underworld, making them attack in a more frenzied manner out of panic. But after seeing that nothing they’re doing is managing to push past the enforcers, each one of them begins to take one last risk.
Art’s eyes narrow as he sees the necromancers of the cult all, with the exception of their leader, activating a suicide skill that turns themselves into a massive abomination. One made up of each one of their bodies along with a bunch of the undead around them.
Then the abomination rushes straight through and bowls over all of the undead attacking them in the direction of Art and the train Lady Death is on.
Art sighs once and claps his hands together, making a massive spell circle appear as the Class S death mage begins casting an Eighth Tier spell.
The leader of the Cult of the Underworld’s eyes widen in shock and he mutters, “D-d-dom-”
Before he can finish muttering, Art’s eyes flash with a pitch black light and he speaks quietly despite his words echoing all around for hundreds of kilometers, “Dominate Undead.”
The spell circle flares outwards before expanding and moving straight to the massive undead abomination made up of hundreds of suicidal cult members, only to move partway into the thing, locking it in place.
Then the spell circle shrinks and binds the thing for a second before vanishing as a black light shines from the abomination.
A few seconds pass in silence, following which Art says, “Kill him. But don’t eat him.”
And without any hesitation, the abomination rushes at the leader of the cult and begins tearing him limb from limb. But it doesn’t devour him, instead tossing the limbs aside for the enforcers to pick up.
They need to raise him as an undead for his punishment after all.
Art then turns around and looks in the direction where the train is moving, a faint smile on his face.
I hope she has a pleasant trip through our world.
Aria
I’m woken up by what sounds like someone’s voice saying something like ‘dominate undead’ or something, but I quickly put it out of my mind. Since I don’t really feel anything’s wrong nearby, and Shirogane would’ve woken me up if there was. But instead he’s just ignoring it and focusing on his phone. On the universal stock market like always.
Hmm. This planet has actually been rather relaxing.
I look out the window again, still finding those lights there, only for them to begin fading.
Huh. Guess the fireworks show is over now.
Although, I do have to wonder why someone would have a fireworks show out here in the middle of nowhere.
Actually, on the topic of fireworks, I kind of want to see some. Since I’ve never really seen fireworks before outside of videos on the internet, and I do still want to know what’s so different about them from regular explosives.
Then again, regular explosives are great too.
And they make fighting strong things and people a lot easier.
A large mana creature eats me, I just blow us both up.
Easy peasy.
Anyways, I look down at my phone in my lap, taking it off sleep mode as I glance at the GPS map I have pulled up on it. Then after finding that we’re still a few minutes away from the capital – the train not actually going at lightspeed since that’s only for emergencies and is instead going slower than that for passenger safety – I put my phone on sleep mode again and lean back in my booth.
Still a fast trip. According to the time on my phone, I was only asleep for a few minutes. So our trip to the capital across tens of thousands of kilometers was only around ten or so minutes long at most.
Quite fast. Even if it’s not lightspeed.
I look out the window again when I begin to see some lights, following which we see the city along with it. And while I do that, I can’t help but wonder briefly how I’m able to look out the window clearly despite our speed.
Then I just decide to reason it away as science and refocus on the city again.
Certainly is beautiful.