The monster’s origin story is all but handed out on a silver platter, all that’s left for us to do is figure out how much we should believe. Gehnna, as genuine as she seems, is not exactly the most trustworthy person given the circumstances. Unity meanwhile is, if Gehnna isn’t spreading lies, the fleshy amalgamation of a whole civilisation.

The two of them are making an offer that betrays all reason.

“I think I might go press her for more answers, are you girls coming with me, or do you want to explore this ancient city?”

“We’re coming with you, obviously,” Vii snorts a laugh. “This city is interesting, but what she was talking about… becoming part of an immortal being? That’s something much bigger than some old city.”

“That, and splitting up is never a good idea,” Eshya says. “Who knows exactly what this Unity can do.”

“I need to see how this ends,” Adler says. “Is there something more to this that we can’t see yet? Is this an option for a kinder world?”

“You’re taking their offer seriously?” Eshya asks, eyes wide with horror and looking the other girl over carefully. “Did they get into your head already?”

“No, but it is something to consider, isn’t it?” Adler asks. “I believe that most of the conflicts in this reality are created because of limited resources. All life is scrambling to get what they need to survive, from the smallest and weakest of creatures, scavenging what they can from piles of waste, to the titanic beasts crossing the darkness between stars consuming whole solar systems as it grows.

“If it’s possible to converge into one being then there would no longer be any need for conflict, at least not because of limited resources. We could all live together, forever.”

“Even with how awful it already seems, it’s still far too good to be true,” I say.

Everything that promises perfection is inevitably scam from ye olde snake oil salesmen of yore to the politicians of modern Earth, they’re all liars out to fill their own pockets. Gehnna might be convinced, and this Unity might even be a fairly okay sort, but it isn’t going to be some perfect solution to all of nature’s problems.

Then again, did she ever actually promise perfection…? She seemed confident that this was the right thing to do, but she’s never seemed anything but genuine. I can even feel the confliction she feels about having withheld this information until it was too late to run away.

“I’m not saying that we should join Unity,” Adler says firmly, “It was built on a foreign culture and foreign values. It won’t be what we would want it to be, but the idea isn’t wrong, is it?

“Even if this Unity isn’t an ideal that we can accept, then why don’t we consider the same method from our own perspective. Even if it’s impossible to create something satisfactory, we must at least consider it, otherwise what are we even doing?”

“What do you mean, ‘what are we even doing?’” Eshya asks, her tone low and threatening as she allows herself to get with us. “We’re winning, we’re surviving, and making a place safe for ourselves.”

“We’re building something better,” Adler corrects her. “If we don’t stop to consider our options, then how many missed opportunities will we lose to our arrogance. We must consider, even if we decide not to go ahead with such a…. radical change as this.”

Eshya still seems bothered by it, so proper leader that I am I step in and describe it in a way that she can understand.

“Some of these opportunities are things that will let us grow stronger, not simply more moral.” I explain, “Like the upgrades to Chip I got from that elf, our relationship with the dungeons is much the same.”

“And Unity could be something similar,” Adler says.

“Or it could kill us before Arduelle can come in to save us,” Eshya replies. “We should be focused on finding ways to kill it.”

“I have to agree with Eshya to an extent. I don’t like the entire prospect of Unity,” I say, approaching the room where Gehnna is still cleaning herself up. “I like being separate from you, trying to understand you from a distance. Being one with you would be…”

“Like the difference between masturbation and sex?” Eshya cuts in.

“I was going to say the difference between love and narcissism,” I reply, holding Adler’s hand in mine. She’s warm to the touch, and from how she twitches in my grasp I know that she’s lost in her own nervous thoughts.

“We would end up together for eternity, but still we’d end up spending eternity alone,” I say. “I wouldn’t be able to bear that sort of existence.”

“Just because this Unity is of one body, it doesn’t necessarily mean that it must be of one mind,” Adler says. “It’s worth considering what lessons we can learn from it.”

“I’ll keep that in mind,” I say. “If we can make it something like the matrix instead… then I guess it wouldn’t be too awful.”

“The matrix?”

“It’s from a movie,” I say, “we can watch it when we get back home. The Matrix a fake reality, all of humanity is locked in pods that keep us alive while our minds live fake lives in a fake world.”

“A world where the rules are engineered by the creators of the Matrix? By us, if we can make such a thing?” Adler asks. “Yes, if we could be of one body while we are free to live our own lives in a fake reality where we can be free from conflict and pain and suffering.”

“It’s too good to be true,” I say cutting her short before she can leap to anymore ridiculous jumps.

“Even if we’re the ones to make it?” Alder asks, “If we are the ones in control, then the flaws we make, we can repair.”

“We aren’t perfect,” I say. “Sometimes, we make things so flawed that they can’t be fixed.”

Before they can make any more fuss, I walk through to where Gehnna is standing in wait of us. She’s cleaned herself up and no longer looks to be crying, though the emotion is still there flowing just under the surface.

“Is there something more you wished to know?” She asks, “I’ll try to answer what I can, but there are some things that words cannot describe.”

“What’s the plan?” I ask. “You want to incorporate us into Unity, right?”

“Not right away, and perhaps not at all for you,” Gehnna says. “This world is going to become unstable, and their city will eventually become unliveable. If they do not become part of Unity, then they will eventually die as they lose their place in this world.”

“You can’t keep things as they are?” I ask.

“No,” Gehnna replies firmly. “Unity has considered it for a long time, consuming the core of this world will doom it to decay and eventually complete destruction. Yet, if we do not step up to this challenge then someone else, someone stronger, will come and take it from us.

“If we want to survive, if we want to save anyone, then we must become strong enough to face those villains,” she says, bowing her head low, her voice cracking. “A sacrifice we must make for a chance at a future.”

“A choice with consequences.”

“We know,” Gehnna says, her voice firm, determined. “We’re going about this slowly, for their sakes.”

“I didn’t say that to judge you,” I tell her, shaking my head. “I’ve made choices too. Ones that… would lead you to think poorly of me.”

She nods quietly, her fingers weaving into one another as she listens carefully. Her attention is focused on me.

“I don’t want to judge, but if this Unity can’t take ‘no’ as an answer, then I’ll have to fight it,” I say.

“I understand your concerns,” she says, nodding firmly hiding the pain bursting to light in her heart at my clear distrust. “We will not force you, the townspeople were returned, were they not?”

“Were they?” I ask.

“They were,” she says firmly. “They’re still recovering from the experience, but they are still the same people who left.”

“If you say they are, then they are,” I reply, meeting her eyes. She believes that she’s telling the truth, I can be sure of that much.

Silence hangs between us as we consider one another. This situation is far from ideal, and depending on just how this pilgrimage ends we could very easily end up murdering one another. I’m trusting that Arduelle will save us should the worst come for us, but even so, there’s a good chance that people will die and Arduelle has been sure to reinforce the point that I can’t fully trust the insurance that she provides us.

“How long until we arrive?” I ask Gehnna, “What happens then?”

“We’re already in Unity’s grasp,” She says. “How did you think we’re moving?”

“Excuse me?” I ask, “We’re already…”

“One of Unities limbs is wrapped around this city, in a strange sort of way this city is like a treasure to comfort us. To comfort Unity, I mean. This place was a home to so many of us, it isn’t simply transportation or anything. This is a show of respect.”

“There is a ‘limb’ wrapped around this city, and it’s pulling us down to the centre of this world?”

“Near the centre, we haven’t begun work on consuming this worlds core just yet.”

“I thought that it was sleeping…?”

“Oh, we’re mostly resting, there isn’t much to do down here so long as we refrain from eating the whole world.” She explains, “There’s still more than enough of us awake to be able to show you who we are.”

“You keep saying ‘we’,” Vii points out. “You were a part of Unity, or are you still a part of it?”

“That’s… complicated,” Gehnna replies. “I’m more akin to a… a person in a story. I exist to tell a story, and to serve a purpose to a greater plot. I’m just a figment of a greater consciousness, or I was before I was given this purpose.”

A figment of a mind, the mind of a dark god, cast out into the world to serve a purpose in the greater plot as written by that enigmatic god? As what else can something like this be considered but a god, when they’ve literally forged life from a figment of imagination.

Gehnna doesn’t even seem to realize just how awful this sounds to anyone not her, or perhaps she does and that’s why she hasn’t explained it before now.

“Kyra, don’t go making any imaginary kids, okay?” Eshya says, snorting a laugh out even in this situation. “With how you split your mind up with that Skill of yours, it seems like something you’d do.”

Refraining from making creatures like Gehnna to serve as pawns in evil plots, it would be rather nice to split into multiple people. I could get so much more done that way.

“So is that what we’d become?” Adler asks, stepping up to Gehnna, “Fragments of a greater mind, no not even that, fragments of a memory of who we are today?”

“Time changes us all,” Gehnna says. “Who you will be thirty years from now will be built upon the foundation of who you are today. Yet, by that time, the you of today will be gone, an incomplete memory of a person that’s gone.”

“It’s different,” Adler says.

“It is,” Gehnna admits with a nod, “Unity can correct flaws that we cannot see in ourselves, sometimes due to lacking perspective or experience, sometimes due to arrogance, or any other such thing. As part of Unity, we are more than we could ever hope to be apart.”

“No,” I meet her eyes and say the word in firm denial, glancing briefly over at Adler who seems to be coming to the same thought as me. “It sounds as if this Unity is the arrogant one to me, set in a path and unwilling to consider other potential directions.”

“We still consider other things,” Gehnna shakes her head firmly. “You’ll see, I can’t explain properly. Please have patience.”

“Gehnna.” I say her name, “I think that, regardless of your origin, you could become a person much more than this Unity. You could do more with your life, other than just giving it up to add more flesh to… to Unity. You could stay as you are.”

“Thank you,” she doesn’t seem even a little tempted by my suggestion. “You will understand when we get there.”

Leaving me no further room to press her for answers she turns around and leaves, bowing her head respectfully and leaving us to this empty city. The precious jewel that Unity has lent to us to carry us all the way to it’s wide maw.

“So, it’s awake.” Eshya’s voice is dry. “What can we do?”

“I sounds to me like it’s going to be converting us,” I say, “or trying to. I’ll go first and then it’s just the same plan, no?”

“Do you think you can?” Vii chirps in. “This is a really big monster, you know?”

“Who knows, maybe we really can talk our way out of this.”

“Have you been paying attention to Arduelle’s lessons?” Adler asks.

“Hey, who wants to check out those movies,” I say. “What does a slug romance look like, I wonder?”

~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Stats and Skills

~Mana Form:

Current mana density: 42,391 / 60,892 units

Current mana volume: 21,073 / 30,271 shards

Mana volume at crystallisation density (Max. mana volume):

Kyra: 30,271 shards

Kyra’s armour: 20,777 shards

Kyra’s throne: 1,109,298 shards

~Forms

Mana Canon

-Annihilation Heart (Adapted)

-Blood Fuel (Adapted)

-Bone Magic Storage (Adapted)

-Nail Shifters (50,000 mana shards)

Dancer

-Flash Nerves (Adapted)

-Quick Perception Mind (Adapted)

-Burst Reflex Muscles (35,000 mana shards)

-Layered space Muscles (80,000 mana shards)

Turtle

-Rebinding Tissue (Adapted)

-Catalyst Sweat Glands (140,000 mana shards)

-Repulsive Skin (Adapted)

-Prehensile hair (Adapted)

-Fatty Tissue Blood Storage (100,000 mana shards)

Investigator

-Wide eyes (Adapted)

-Wide ears (Adapted)

-Sharp nose (Adapted)

Misc.

-Clean bowels (Adapted)

-Mana Drive (Adapted)

~Favourited Skills:

Magic:

-Annihilation Magic (Customised)

-Fire Magic (Functional)

-Space magic (Broken)

-Force magic (Functional)

-Ice magic (Broken)

-Wind magic (Broken)

Movement:

-Hand-to-hand casting (Functional)

-Mana surge movement (Functional)

-Stealth (Functional)

Senses:

-Eyes of an Empire (Customised)

-Combat Awareness (Functional)

-Watchmen (Functional)

-Hidden bug (Mastered)

-De-tagging (Mastered)

-Anti-stealth sight (Mastered)

Special:

-Spirit Transformation (Broken)

-Conformity (Broken)

-Training mana form (Functional)