✧ Chapter 61 ✧

Back at Diamondion’s Ice Castle, Chelbie had caused a huge commotion after feeling a strange type of energy crawl up from her new prosthetic boots to the tip of her knee’s joints.

It was itching her so much that she couldn’t help but yell out of surprise.

In accidental fashion, she ended up kicking the shard a bit too far. Fortunately for Solar Ninja, he was trained enough to catch it with relative ease by using only one arm. While this was good, time ran short for the trio when they saw Fluffle guards sprinting towards the center.

Without hesitation, Eternika instantaneously teleported all of them back to the world of Animearth inside of a new Kra Forcefield. Knowing that returning to Cherry’s house would pose more issues, the weapon decided to choose staying at Twilight Terrace again instead.

“Shit! That was too close! My legs nearly fucked us up. I think Compass must’ve added somethin’ else in ‘em that he didn’t tell me about. Is the shard okay Kade?” asked Chelbie.

As Kade inspected The Shard Of Surreality with technical prowess, he discovered something interesting that had to deal with what recently occurred.

“The power within this shard seems to have activated on its own. It was attempting to merge with your boot and nearly connected with your entire nervous system. According to my analytics, this simply means it triggered a genetic transformation across your body at the time. A biomechanical mutation. You are lucky to even be alive.”

Hearing this genuinely shocked Chelbie at her core. Regardless of what would’ve happened, they did collect the shard successfully.

Eternika, on the other side of the spectrum, knew full well what problems lied ahead. Could it be? Perhaps Styra’s close interactions with these humans not only bestowed Flight and Hisa with the potential ability to become ethereal hybrids, but Chelbie as well. For billions upon billions of years, it saw that Eternal Lights had never been wielded by mortal beings. What could have possibly changed?

Fumbling through these thoughts, it decided to eventually put that question to rest in favor of addressing a more tangible concern.

“Either way we look at it, another situation remains. The world of Animearth is not safe to stay in, which means that Voltaze could come back and decimate it to crisps if he wants to.”

Coming to grasp with the realization that an entire living planet might disappear at the hands of such a ruthless alien, Chelbie thought up of an idea that could help them gain an edge against him.

“Thinkin’ out loud here, but since we have the shard in our pockets now, I might have a way for us to equip ourselves. If we’re going to defeat this guy though, we’ll need to go back to Wisteliah and StarSpace.”

Kade and Eternika were without a doubt interested in her proposal, but it raised a few concerns about what she was planning on doing and if it would even work.

“I can see us going back to Wisteliah for Flight’s spaceship. Otherwise, StarSpace was visited by Voltaze already and it certainly would not be the greatest choice to return. The fact that an elite guardian was destroyed there would not bode well for us in the same sense,” said Eternika.

“M’kay… Well, I guess we will have to rely entirely on booting up Compass for this one. Let’s just say that I have a lot of technical know-how and everything I’ve done in my auto shop holds plenty of secrets to help get us cookin’ up some upgrades. What do ya two say to that?” asked Chelbie.

Being the immediate skeptic that he was, Kade squinted his eyes at the idea of it.

“Don’t see it. Also, how in the world are you an expert at auto mechanics? Let alone, running a store centered around it from scratch?”

“Seven to ten customers per week and vehicles’ prices range between nine-hundred thousand to four-hundred million dollars. If we’re going in with our A-game on the line, I could offer you a selection of our top of the line Hotpod Buggies or something smooth and dark like the MadCyke Motorbike. Since you probably aren’t interested though mayb—“

“Okay, okay! Fine. I get it… Just one request...”

Raising an eyebrow at what she was hearing, Chelbie listened with optimistic intent.

“Save the MadCyke for me.”

Standing with confidence, Chelbie patted him on his back.

“Heard ya loud and clear my guy! One bit of advice though… Turning with the handles is going to require a lot of finger coordination from both hands. Seeing as you need another arm, I will work with Compass to see how we can get this off the ground. It’s goin’ to need a bit more tinkerin’ to make them better than the last one you used. Shouldn’t be a problem from my perspective. Once we have things set, we can return back to Wisteliah and work from there.”

With the group now fully convinced of where they were headed, Chelbie reassured them that Wisteliah was going to be a much more suitable temporary base that even Voltaze wouldn’t know about.

Their mission to capture the shard was complete, and because of that, Eternika remembered a certain promise it made that correlated from another ongoing adventure outside of this universe. One which it also knew Voltaze had no clue of.

“That reminds me, I was told to say that if you ever go to visit Tartropolatté, do not say anything related to a monster named The Traveller or mention violent words in particular.”

Digesting this unusual information out of curiosity as to why this was the case, Chelbie and Kade continued on with carrying out their plan of reviving Compass alongside Eternika.

∗ ∗ ∗

While The Judgment Warriors were making significant progress than before, Voltaze had received a striking cosmic signal from the world of Frostice.

Upon checking what had happened, he realized that upon looking closer at what was going on, a certain castle was abrupt in a disoriented frenzy. Fluffles were searching through corridor after corridor in an attempt to find out where the Shard Of Surreality went.

The Lucid Light told him about how Ethereal Forcefields worked in advance to prepare him for a moment like this. There was no clearer way to describe his suspicions other than The Judgment Warriors possibly having returned. Their tampering with such a powerful item, yet failing to cover any traces of said evidence made it all too simple for him to recognize it now.

A question remained on whether or not he could figure out where they went specifically. His first obvious choice was to rummage through Animearth itself. His starting location, being Cherry’s house, didn’t prove to be anything promising however. Switching in and out of different places, it became frustrating to find nothing substantial or relevant to what he was seeking. Unbeknownst to him about the team having left Twilight Terrace earlier than usual, this tower was also vacant of any signs.

Only one thing stood firm amid all other practical considerations.

This robot that Sapphirion sucked the power of an Eternal Light out of, was currently missing from Cherry’s house.

Stumped at the implications of not getting anywhere so far, a malicious idea popped up in his head at the prospect of what he was going through.

“At the very least, I know they are using that shard to revive that robot of theirs. I was able to get a headstart by gaining a few individuals to use at my disposal. If I want to achieve true freedom and destroy all that Prism cherishes, I need to start at where all of its lies ended,” he told himself.

Pacing back and forth inside The Singularity Stronghold, he came to the ultimate conclusion.

UVOCA’s laboratories still existed and definitely would provide a newfound understanding of what capabilities he could be using to strike The Omniverse at its core. To his knowledge, the past version of himself didn’t know which world he was on.

Fortunately, this problem would now be solvable with the help of The Eternal Timeline. Upon revisiting it again, he touched the indescribable glowing purple energy connected to this specific event in particular. The whispers of a world known as Earth located in a galaxy called The Milky Way caught his attention. Upon using The Eternal Light Of Time to travel there at exactly around its present year, he saw a large futuristic dock that led him into the abandoned Liquatics Laboratory Headquarters.

Its massive structure showed just how dedicated the agency was at their work. Begrudgingly heading downstairs, the dark yet aquatic environment echoed hollow from engulfing waters that covered it in full.

Once he reached the lower level, a familiar section of the hallway unveiled an ambient glow of the ocean shining through the glass. An open door with the room label as TR-5750 looked as if it had been untouched for centuries.

Walking into the dark entrance unafraid, Voltaze started to see the same twirling spiral that he saw when the scientists experimented on him with The Eternal Light Of Fractality. A strong gust of wind was taking as much force as it possibly could to pull in whatever was within its vicinity.

Even though Voltaze could have chosen to leave, he stood his ground, walking inside casually with a determined boost of strength. His form started to dwindle, unleashing its aggressive side out of instinct. After a couple of seconds, he arrived at the strangest place he had ever seen.

Rows upon rows of towering supercomputers the size of skyscrapers lit a minty green glow as this fog covered what could have been endless miles of an expansive mainframe grid.

By stepping foot into the environment, he ended up causing a loud booming voice to erupt.

“Welcome to Ambit’s Database. It appears you are a new member of UVOCA’s agency. You are inside of The Omniverse’s largest supercomputer library. We handle all information retaining to all lifeforms, realities, and confidential files regarding past to future projects. Now that you have been informed, how can I help you today?”

This digital assistant’s interesting appearance floated in a cubic design filled with matrix code written all over it. The perfection of its design made it seem like an all-knowing entity that would make use of being serviceable to Voltaze’s plan.

“I am here to collect all the information on experiments done to Test Subject 45,” he said, knowing full well that it was in reference to himself.

Requesting the intel needed caused the highly intelligent AI to become skeptical of his motives as an unidentified user.

“According to Article Code 2 of Section 2.05, I cannot grant an unidentified user access without proper credentials being provided. A UVOCA agent will be alerted to assist you if you have forgotten your ID. At this time, would you like to come back later or alert a UVOCA agent? You have 30 seconds to comply.”

Impatience began to stir inside of Voltaze as his eyes twitched from the irritation of his own situation. As he attempted to use The Eternal Light Of Fractality on Ambit, the machine ended up unaffected by his attack. However, something changed about the AI itself after analyzing what it was dealing with.

“Access granted. Cat Nakahara, here is the information you requested from our previous interaction.”

Hearing a UVOCA agent’s name being spoken just by him making the Eternal Light he wielded known, made for a mind-boggling experience. He knew that name clear as day because it was the very same person who kept staring at him during the sessions in which he was experimented on.

At the moment, he considered this payback at her expense for how long she stood there smiling at him while he was imprisoned.

Now he was the one smiling.