Then Reality Came Crashing Down [End of Vol 1]

Subject: Glacies | Classif.: Mashar

The motorcycle’s engine howled for no one except Glacies. It exhaled a trail of smoke that did not vanish—suspended in midair, caught in the web of frozen time. Across the dimly lit streets of Pitstop, no one realized the Queen of The Surface rode through their wartorn town.

If anyone in the kingdom caught her biking in her lavish robes, it would no doubt lead to a scandal. The mere thought of the press getting wind of this and seeing herself on every tabloid sent shivers running down her neck. With the king in the state he was in, the image of the Kingdom of Antediluvia rested entirely on her shoulders. She could not afford to let this rowdy side of her be exposed.

Then again, it might be a good idea. Word of Vita’s death was bound to reach the ears of the citizens soon. An exposé would do well to distract the commonfolk from such shocking news.

Oleous was a recluse and didn’t really have any public standing, but if any other Council member were to fall as well, war might truly be inevitable. Did the other Council members not consider who had to run PR for such an outrageous campaign? Just thinking about all this was giving her a migraine.

Royal duty was already enough of a pain. She was envious of how her sister got to travel around the Spire as an Executrix. If she had a choice, she would rather go joyriding, maybe even go on a cross-country trip, rather than having to ride a stolen bike in secret. This was the fastest way back up to The Surface, after all. Too bad she couldn’t go up The Wishing Well the same way she jumped down.

Thinking of Lynn, part of her regretted not saying goodbye before leaving the Holographic Sea. As the elder sister, she should have been the bigger person and looked past the murder attempt and all. The brat was still so young. In time, she would mature as an Immortal and realize the futility of her vengeance.

Looking back, she should have said something instead of asking the Doctor to play mediator.

But even with regret simmering inside her chest, she could not afford to breathe. The clock was ticking. She had to make it back in time and prepare for the delegation’s journey to Anterey.

Cutting across the town square, the pile of bodies burning in the middle caused her to wince. The literal mountain of charred flesh reminded her of the true victims of armed conflict. Not the combatants, but those caught in the crossfire. She had to prevent the war no matter what. If only she were not restricted, she could have spelled it out to tell the Doctor.

She hoped he figured out the true intent of the Council meeting. If the Reformists had their way with him, all hope would be lost.

But even with all the suffering around her, she was impressed by the resilience of the Pitstoppers. Despite living in poverty, they successfully fought off the superior force of the Greerian Military. Traps, ambushes—the tactics they employed were identical to those of Lynn. But it wasn’t just her sister; it was the shapeshifter that truly hammered the lesson into her to avoid underestimating a weaker opponent.

Never in a million years did she imagine the Doctor to have a daughter. Granted, she was adopted, but where did she inherit such a Gift? Throughout her entire life, Glacies never recalled such an ability manifesting among the citizens. A mutation like Lynn, perhaps? She made a mental note to look further into the records once she made it back to the kingdom.

The Greerian blockade didn’t make it easy, however.

Armored vehicles. Makeshift chokepoints. Fortified buildings. The entrance to Pitstop was an impenetrable gate. The fighting in the rest of the town might have stopped, but the Greerians hadn’t retreated. Why?

They wanted to capture the princess. The Doctor’s words played back in her head. Expending this many military assets for a kidnapping was bordering on madness. Then again, considering what her sister was capable of, this amount of force didn’t seem too out of place. The bigger question was the motivation. What would drive a mercenary nation to these lengths?

But then, it finally clicked. Vita could have been played off as an isolated incident, but Oleous? The only way the assassin would have known where he was hiding, and the only plausible reason for the Greerians to interfere with her sister’s mission at this particular time…

This entire thing reeked of an inside job.

Someone connected to the Council, or worse, one of the members, had to be working with the enemy. The assassin was only one part of the puzzle. Looking at the bigger picture, it became clear that whoever was behind all this must be someone of great influence.

Think, Glacies, think. Whose idea was it to meet at Anterey? Fulgur? Aqua? Who among the remaining members could she even trust? The encounter with the Doctor’s shapeshifting daughter made her way too paranoid. Anything and everything felt like a trap waiting to be sprung.

But looking at it logically, the delegation should be safe. In theory, anyway. Why go through all the effort to push for a meeting in The Mids when the assassin could just pick any of the Council members off on The Surface? If the intent was to kill the members, then it made more sense to do so when they were alone, like what happened with Vita and Oleous, instead of having them together. Based on this line of thought, the safest course of action would be to have the meeting proceed as planned.

There were too many variables, too many uncertainties for her to be 100% sure, but she didn’t have the luxury of having options. She hated how this was looking more and more like a game of mafia or werewolf.

If only His Majesty were still around…

No point reminiscing.

Between taking quick breaths, snapping fingers, and stopping time, the scenery around her had swapped more times than she was comfortable with. From the ruined tunnel to the forest, and from the bullet hole-ridden town to the Greerian encampment, she found no solace in these landscapes. There was little to admire in these sights. How the Doctor found it in him to call The Depths his home, she could only wonder.

But once she got past the Greerians, she could finally catch her breath. Let her respiratory system relax instead of tiptoeing on the line between breathing and asphyxiation. The road was clear. The motorcycle’s exhaust system sighed in relief. And with nobody to catch a glimpse of her, her hands and elbows loosened. The upper half of her body untensed. She let her hair down, letting the breeze carry some of the burden above her shoulders.

With both wind and time flowing unhindered once more, Glacies found the headspace to plan the course ahead. There were many exits into smaller roads along the way, but the two main routes out of The Depths were through Heathen’s Highway or the Underspire. The former was the only way wide enough for the Greerians to transport their tanks and other armored vehicles from The Mids down to The Depths. So, she went with the latter, the faster way connected to the Grand Elevator.

But just because there weren’t any Greerians didn’t mean it was safer.

The road grew more cracked and desolate. The pungent odor of garlic filled the air. There were no plants or vegetation whatsoever; that was the distinct smell of white phosphorus. Ignis’s Gift permanently scarred the lands here, turning the earth into a pale, ashen wasteland.

Exhaling frost, Glacies lowered the temperature in her immediate vicinity. Even after so many years, the flames of her former colleague could be rekindled from lukewarm air alone. But the pyrophoric environment around her was not the danger. Merely the warning.

She steeled herself, taking her right hand off the handlebars, ready to snap her fingers at any moment. Steering the bike with one hand, she avoided the main road, swerving over into the charred lands as she conjured a path of ice for the motorcycle. Pockets of spacetime were spread all over the area, marked by floating debris and bending light. Moving across the Aberrant wasteland was like navigating through a minefield.

This place used to be teeming with life at one point. A hub of industry, the original lifeblood of Spireforge. The occasional factory or floating machinery that entered her vision reminded her of the mortals’ greed. Had they not dug too deep into The Depths and frayed the fabric of reality, maybe they might still have a place to call home. Maybe some of the old Council members would not have died cleaning their mess.

Worse still, whatever wiped out the entire population here might still be around. The concept of life and death didn’t exist for it. The Armageddon Angel. Officially, Glacies, the Doctor, and Ignis drove off that Sirath-Class Aberration, a feat that took the lives of the three other Council members who went with them. But in truth, the Angel got bored.

It was a miracle that she survived; there was no coming back from getting hit. While the Doctor could shrug off its attacks, he could not heal those who were struck. There was nothing left to heal. That day, she learned that there were fates worse than death for Immortals. A traumatic firsthand lesson on how reality erasure worked.

Despite his status as a traitor, she was truly grateful that the Doctor was on their side. To think that he placed all those limitations on himself just so that he could co-exist side by side with humanity…

It was always easy to assume he was some god who just fancied roleplaying with humans. But what most people forgot was that there were beings above him who saw him the same way. Inexplicable horrors that viewed an apocalyptic entity as nothing more than dust. So if he was that insignificant, where did that put humanity?

Glacies froze her heart, keeping the existential dread from seeping in. Whether it came from her own mind or from being in the presence of the Angel, she wasn’t sure. She knew that thing was there. Watching her. She could feel it inside her nerves. The question was whether it felt bothered enough to attack her.

Her right hand trembled. Fingers on edge, ready to snap in an instant. Stopping time at the wrong moment would leave her vulnerable to the entity. She fought the urge to cave in to the maddening pressure, dodging the anomalous zones of spacetime on her motorcycle, freezing the combustible ground, and preparing the snap, all at the same time.

But as signs of life entered her line of sight, she let out a genuine sigh of relief. She had crossed the Underspire unharmed. The earth returned to normal, as did the plane of reality. The Angel decided not to collect the toll. Her gamble paid off.

The entrance to the Grand Elevator was a settlement of sorts. Too small to be called a village, but big enough to be a campsite for bounty hunters. An oasis for Exiled and ordinary humans alike, hoping to make money from hunting the monsters in this locale. With the exception of the Underspire, trucks came from all sides, carrying large beasts and tiny critters alike. Some dead, some alive, ready to be turned into materials and ultimately, cash.

Grabbing a cloak from a nearby stall, she made sure to leave some money behind, as she did with the motorcycle earlier. With her appearance hidden, she felt comfortable enough to unfreeze time, blending in with the locals who moved in and out of the Elevator. She finally made it.

The Grand Elevator was like a vertical subway system. A station that housed elevator units of varying sizes, transporting everything from people to convoys of vehicles. An engineering marvel of gears and steel, built by none other than Council Member Metallum. But to her, it was nothing more than a “CSR project” for the kingdom.

Typically, she would get on the exclusive carriage, paid for by the kingdom whenever she had business in The Mids. But in order to maintain her disguise, she paid the fee for a cheap elevator unit, joining a small group of merchants and bounty hunters.

Going from The Depths all the way to The Surface would take a while, but it was a much-needed break. She thought of all that had happened so far, piecing together fragments of the investigation’s progress while thinking of how to handle the fallout from Vita and Oleous’s deaths. Every other Council member was likely making their own moves, too, whether it was to fill the power vacuum or save their own hide.

But amid all these thoughts, a flash of silver within the elevator caught her eye. A pistol. One of the bounty hunters drew their weapon on her. No words. No warning. Just a pull of the trigger. Glacies reacted quicker, snapping her fingers a split second earlier. All time had stopped.

The bullet, however, did not.