What was the environment like back in Winstor and Isabella’s era?

  As Roel was transported into this Witness State too abruptly, he didn’t get a chance to investigate this crucial piece of information thoroughly. Nevertheless, through the huge collection of records he had read thus far, he could still roughly map out Winstor’s life and make some deductions.

  The current date was Third Epoch Year 261.

  This was a momentous year for all historians in the future as it marked the first war between humans and deviants.

  Humankind remembered this period of time to be dark and terrifying. Everyone’s attention was focused on the huge battles occurring at the eastern border, leaving very little attention on the southern border, where the elusive and little-known Sofya Kingdom was located. The war with the deviants resulted in the massive destruction of literary works and records, dealing a huge blow to humankind’s culture.

  That could be the reason why there were hardly any records of the Sofya Kingdom in later generations.

  However, Roel had just learned that the current Sofya Kingdom—or at least Queen Isabella—wasn’t really isolated from other nations. They hadn’t been just relishing in the prosperous haven they had created for themselves.

  “Six Calamities? Big sister Isabella, what’s that?”


  “Oh? Has Winstor not told you about that? Oh well, I guess that’s only to be expected. He’s quite tight-lipped when it comes to such matters.”


  Hearing Charlotte’s question, Isabella casually rested her head on her arm as she replied. A moment later, she suddenly chuckled awkwardly before adding on.

  “I suppose I ought to be keeping this matter confidential too. However, due to the nature of our clan, practically everyone onboard the ships knows about it. So, I can’t really be bothered to hide it either. Roel, you read the letter, right? Aren’t you curious what ‘egg’ refers to?”


  “Wait a moment, are you saying that……”


  “Yes. The Golden Fleet has received a request from the Twilight Sages Assembly to transport an egg of the Six Calamities.”


  As Isabella explained the matter, she glanced out of the window to watch the ship’s white flag fluttering high up in the sky. She picked up her cup and took a small sip of wine. There was a considerable moment of silence before she finally asked a question with a deep, grave voice.

  “Do the two of you believe in fate?”


  “Fate?”


  Isabella’s abrupt question left Roel and Charlotte taken aback. Roel displayed his confusion at the bewildering question he was posed with, whereas Charlotte, who was much more familiar with the topic, gave the question some thought before finally answering slowly.

  “Fate is a very broad term that encompasses many fields. Depending on your area of focus, the answer could vary greatly. May I know what kind of fate you are referring to here?”


  “Hmm. If I have to give a term to it, it’d be the fate of humankind.”


  “Ah?”


  Isabella’s response left Charlotte frowning in uncertainty. Meanwhile, Roel was failing to see where this conversation was heading and couldn’t help grumbling mentally.

  Is day-to-day divination no longer enough to satisfy you anymore, so you’re starting to prophesy the apocalypse now?

  Roel thought about all those wacky prophecies he had heard about 1999 and 2012 in his previous life, and it suddenly made him feel that Isabella wasn’t that reliable anymore. While it was said that the high elves were skilled in divining fate, the truth was that even divining a single person’s life was tough enough in this world filled with all sorts of supernatural powers. Attempting to divine the fate of humankind in its entirety was simply unthinkable.

  One of the common analogies used for fate was countless strings intersecting with one another. With the sheer complexity at play here—just the movement of a single string could have rippling effects across the entire web—it would mean that any single fate of humankind divined was meaningless due to the humongous variability at play.

  Even the more knowledgeable Charlotte was also feeling a bit skeptical about this topic.

  Isabella noticed the doubtful looks directed her way, but she paid it no heed. She swirled her wine cup calmly as she tossed out her second question.

  “It has been 200 years since we migrated into this new haven, and humankind is starting to recover its breath of life. With the foundation of a new civilization, a new order is slowly being put in place. It was tough and there were many sacrifices, but we still managed to triumph over the disastrous catastrophe we faced at the end of the Second Epoch. However, have you tried thinking deeper into it?

  “A long, long time ago, in the ancient times which we can only take a peek into through the legends that have been passed down, there used to be civilizations of incredibly powerful transcendents. Where do you think they have gone?”


  “Ahh? T-this……”


  Isabella’s question had stumped both Roel and Charlotte.

  The current transcendent and noble houses that inherited ancient bloodlines were extremely powerful. The Xeclydes even managed to build a powerful country and an influential religion, and they dominated both for over a millennium.

  Here comes the question…… Where are the real angels then?

  It wasn’t just about the angels here. There were also the giants, the high elves, and all of those ancient races. With their powerful spells and advanced technologies, they constructed prosperous civilizations that were far ahead of current humans. However, where had they all gone to?

  This was a question beyond Roel and Charlotte’s means to answer. In fact, there were probably no living beings who could give a definitive answer to that mystery.

  Isabella’s intention, though, was not to have them rush off and pursue the truth behind this ancient mystery of the world. She took another sip of wine before revealing the partial truth that she was aware of.

  “They have been destroyed. Utterly obliterated. Those prosperous civilizations have collapsed to rubble under the merciless flow of time. There are many plausible reasons for it—war, plague, changes in climate, and self-made disasters. It’s quite interesting how powerful civilizations can prove to be fragile at times.

  “Fate is strangely partial about this. Be it transcendent races or humankind, whether they are strong or weak, their futures are always uncertain. It’s just that…… the scales of fate, from time to time, could be tampered with by shadows lurking in the dark.”


  With a calm voice, Isabella unveiled one of the truths of the world to the two children before her.

  “Some civilizations were destroyed not by natural means, and the culprits were the Six Calamities left behind by the Mother Goddess.”


  “Destroyed? Mother Goddess?”


  “Six Calamities? What in the world is that……”


  The revelation spread further confusion, imploring the two young listeners to quickly seek clarification. Roel’s pupils were slowly dilating as he felt that he was slowly approaching one of the core secrets of this world.

  “The Six Calamities, that’s what our clan call them in a folk song passed down orally from generation to generation. ‘The Mother Goddess closes her eyes, heralding the rise of the black sun. Chaos and calamities escape from Her eyes. Freezing glaciers and searing heat, torturous suffering and miserable cries; they descended upon the world with bodies and forms. Divine retributions, we call them. Six of them, they are.’, this excerpt came from the high elves’ Fulier’s Poetry.”


  Isabella recited a part of the folk song with a melodious tune before she shook her head ironically.

  “When I was younger, I always thought that this folk song depicted a terrifying tale. Yet, when I grew up, I realized that I’m a part of this tale too.”


  Following this, Isabella began to unveil another secret to Roel and Charlotte. It was a story about a group of people who worked for the best interests of humankind, using an organization and, at times, a country to accomplish their aim. They were a group of sages whose eyes peered beyond the fabric of time and space to bear witness to the true history.

  The Twilight Sages Assembly.

  This was a group of people who had chosen to devote their lives to preventing the destruction of human civilization.

  The Six Calamities were said to be monsters that came to life after the supreme existence known as the Mother Goddess breathed her last. They were the embodiment of the most terrifying elements in the world. Similar to the curses in Pandora’s Box, these Calamities were born as the nemeses to all living beings. Their traces could be seen in the downfall of many of the ancient civilizations.

  The ultimate aim of the Twilight Sages Assembly was to eliminate these harbingers of destruction.

  However, similar to those prosperous civilizations of the past, humankind was already disadvantaged in the war against the Six Calamities because of a lack of reliable intelligence. Despite the tireless efforts of the Assembly for the past century, it had only managed to find traces of three of them.

  Sire Darkness, Devourer of Light, and Glacier Creator—these were the calamities the Twilight Sages Assembly had deduced thus far. These names were accorded by one of the destroyed civilizations of the past, and the last one was the true identity of the ‘egg’ the Golden Fleet was transporting……

  Inside the hold of the flagship of the Golden Fleet, SS Saint Mary, Roel held onto the railings of a staircase so cold that it was almost sticking to his hand as he gazed downward in awe. Gusts of cold air rose from below, chilling his face.

  A golden fluid was revolving inside the ship’s hold down below, suppressing a light-blue ice fragment. The ice fragment was less than a meter in width, and there was a silhouette within it. The silhouette looked like bundles and bundles of something, reminiscent of an infant huddling inside a mother’s womb.

  “That’s the egg of the Glacier Creator. We stumbled upon it by coincidence while fighting against the Seafolk. By the time we found it, the area around the sea had already frozen up to form a massive iceberg. If we were two months later, the place would have already turned into a glacier. By then, no one would be able to find it anymore.”


  Eyeing the cunning enemy below, Isabella began sharing the process of how she used an icebreaker ship to smash open a path through the iceberg and subjugate the egg. Just listening to the process made shudders run down Roel’s spine.

  Coldness was a huge enemy to most civilizations. Fending off starvation and keeping warm—these were the primitive instincts most lifeforms possessed in order to survive, for failure would spell death. The Glacier Creator was the calamity of coldness.

  Even in its unincubated state, the Glacier Creator was already able to freeze the sea over to form an iceberg around it. Roel could hardly imagine just how terrifying of a calamity it would become once fully developed. On top of that, just the knowledge that there were another five counterparts to it lurking somewhere in the world, biding their time to pay a visit to human civilization, left Roel with a heavy feeling inside.

  “It was said that the Country of Dwarves, Alefolte, was destroyed by the arrival of a cold spell that lasted for decades. It was initially just treated as a fable, but from the looks of it now……”


  Isabella breathed out a cold stream of mist along with a sigh. On the other hand, hearing that there was already a precedence to the tyranny of the Glacier Creator, both Roel and Alicia were appalled.

  “Your Majesty, how do you intend to deal with this egg? By the current looks of it, this egg has only been temporarily sealed here, right?”


  “You’re right. We have only sealed it for the moment, and honestly speaking, that’s all we can do here. The true terror of the Six Calamities lies in the impossibility to fully eradicate them. Rather than calling them a lifeform, it would be more accurate to view them as the manifestation of a concept……”


  Isabella’s words made Roel’s heart fall heavily. The strength already displayed by the egg was evidence of its terrifying destructive potential. No wonder it could kill whole civilizations. How in the world could mortals cope with something like this……

  Roel pondered with a tightly furrowed brow, but before he could figure out anything, a familiar voice suddenly sounded in his mind.

  【Ding!】


  【The Crown’s Stone has been detected.】


  【Initiating ’Reconstruction of Bloodline’.……】