Earth's Core 004

Year 4925, seventy-five years before the new millennia, three humans made a blood oath for peace with two beasts, each side representing its own species.

“Your prediction was right, Raroken”. On the back of the giant dragon beast, Raroken, sat Raroma crossed arms. The two headed back to their tribe. “The three had the smell of other humans’ blood when they arrived; apparently there were disputes over the offer…”

“Human beings always the same, yet once in a while there are exceptions. In the near future mankind will experience turbulences and their numbers will decrease even more, then I predict that these three will take over and mend the wounds”.

“Indeed, it will be for the best if humanity grows stronger”.

“Being fickle and self-destructive and at the same time desire everything and have the ability to force the surroundings to adapt to them is a trait only humans have. How long it will take I cannot say, a thousand years? Ten thousand years? Eventually they will open a path for us…”

“For the Blue Sky”. Raroma said and gazed up, imagining the beyond of the tunnel’s ceiling and the bright Sun Stones that garnish it.

“For the Blue Sky”. Raroken agreed.

As the news about the deaths of the UGNE’s one hundred and ten leaders by the Three Generals’ hands had spread across humanity’s territories two factions began to form. One faction supported the reestablishment of the United Governments of New Earth and was founded by high rankers of the late UGNE, which were the leaders of the remaining two hundred and two colonized caves – out of the five hundred and twelve caves within humanity’s territory, two hundred were nature reserves. The second faction was much smaller but also much stronger since its leaders were the former Three Generals, now Supreme Rulers. They did not force any one to join their faction or threatened war with the other faction. The Supreme Rulers declared the one hundred and ten caves of the former UGNE’s leaders as their own territory, following them were most of the army’s commanders and even the Striking Spear and Diamond s.h.i.+eld units, which if going back a few days to the date of the coup, submitted easily to the Three Generals’ force and ideals and were the first to join the Supreme Rulers’ ranks. As for the one hundred and ten caves’ residents, they cared little if not at all about the former UGNE, the low tier more than anyone was tired of the long war. And when the word got out that the Supreme Generals singed a treaty with the beast that will permit over the next decade to every human of any age and gender in their territory to possess an Earth’s Core without paying the nominal fee that the UGNE still stuck to in their promises, people immigrated in waves to the Supreme Rulers’ territory, now known as the new world within New Earth, Kingdom Earth.

Losing their subjects, afraid that soon they will also lose their caves plot, the new UGNE sent its agents to Kingdom Earth to find and recruit back every Earth’s Core holder and Core Beaker that could be bought, in the end spending as much as ninety percent of its treasury. Of course, the Supreme Rulers were aware of the new UGNE’s actions, and allowed it to happen simply because they preferred their forces to be known for their quality and not their quant.i.ty.

Year 4950.

Number of caves within humanity’s territory: Five hundred and twelve. Population number within humanity’s territory: Six hundred million, nine hundred fifty one thousand, one hundred and one.

New UGNE’s number of caves: Three hundred and seventy-six. Number of nature reserves caves: One hundred and seventy-four. Number of populated caves: Two hundred and Two. Total population number: Four hundred and seventy million, one hundred thousand and eighty-eight. Total number of troops: One hundred and seventy million regular soldiers, twenty-five thousand Earth’s Core holders, five thousand Core Breakers.

Kingdom Earth’s number of caves: One hundred and thirty-six. Number of nature reserves caves: Twenty-six. Number of populated caves: One hundred and ten. Total population number: One hundred and thirty million, seven hundred and sixty-three thousand, one hundred and one. Total number of troops: None regular soldiers, twenty thousand Earth’s Core holders (serving), twenty thousand Core Breakers (serving), three Mist Masters (Current location: unknown).

Year 5315. The Supreme Rulers’ whereabouts has remained unknown. Kingdom Earth is governed by a council of ten surrogates, all loyal to the Supreme Rulers and at the peak of the Core Breaker level. On the sixth month of the year, around the time for the Half Year celebrations that represented people’s grat.i.tude towards Nature for a good six months in Kingdom Earth, fifteen bombs attacks in five different colonize caves occurred all at once and created instant havoc, resulting in thousands of deaths and hundreds of injured. The council immediately dispatched an investigation team to confirm their suspicions, but before the investigation team arrived to the bombs’ scenes another nineteen attacks occurred, yet again, at the same time. The death toll rose to the tens thousands but there was one silver linings, a Core Breaker has managed to prevent a twentieth bombing that was about to take place near his residence by noticing the menace that some Earth’s Core holder’s aura radiated just as he was about to commit the bombing with an unfamiliar device. The Earth’s Core holder was brought to and investigated by the council of ten. After a few days he broke and confessed that he was sent by the UGNE and he doesn’t know how the device he was given works, only that after he got to the designated location, he was supposed to feed his aura to the device. The Earth’s Core holder finished by telling that he had to obey the UGNE, that they threatened his family, that under the surface anyone who doesn’t enlist or found unfit to serve is sent to labor camps that mine for Earth’s Cores.

Hearing so far, the council was furious. For the last couple hundreds of years they did not meddle with the UGNE and the UGNE, in return, did not cross the border of two species to look for Earth’s Cores or asked Kingdom Earth for the right to partic.i.p.ate in the search for Earth’s Cores that takes place every year within ten caves in the beasts’ territory, from the beginning that privilege was reserved only to the followers of the Supreme Rules. And then there was that detonation device, it was metallic and round with grams of Sun Stone inside it. Now, since humanity was divided to two factions the UGNE, for the lack of Earth’s Cores, has pursued every field of science, with the current resources available to it, that could improve its army, while Kingdom Earth advocated the proper teaching of Ariel Dauch, one of the Supreme Rulers, and others who studied Earth’s Core and the phases of its advancements, different practices to better cultivate the mist and the laws of formations.

The council of ten did not sit idly and sent an emissary to the UGNE, they had no doubt that in a war their forces can wipeout the UGNE’s, so they waited and kept searching for planted UGNE’s agents in the kingdom. Two days later, the council’s scouts reported strange movement of the UGNE’s army, and a day later the UGNE replayed officially by deploying its army to Kingdom Earth’s territory. Leading the charge were big machinery, some type of machine guns, thousands in number, which were operated by the UGNE’s regular soldiers – mainly to mobilize and reload.

Cautious from the unknown capabilities of the red and silver machine guns, the council responded by sending ten units of one hundred advance Earth’s Core holders. What followed was a complete ma.s.sacre of the Earth’s Core holders. As soon as the ten units were detected by each machine gun’s radar, which was also able to measure the level of Mist Users – a term that formed in recent years that meant to generalize anyone who possesses the energy of an Earth’s Core regardless of his or her level – the machine gun’s computer a.n.a.lyzed the enemy’s path and opened a fusillade. The thousand Earth’s Core holders acted by executing the most basic move for defense and warped their bodies with a brown layer of mist energy, yet the countless rounds were too terrifying. The bullets pierced through the Earth’s Core holders’ aura and body and continued onwards to hit and ignite the agricultural farms across Kingdom Earth’s border.

Startled by the intensity of the machine guns and raged by the loss of a thousand good men, the council of ten sent to the front lines, of what has been declared Humanity New Earth Great War, all of the Core Breakers in its corps and additional Mist Users of the same level that were not originally part of the army that enlisted for only to protect their families and homes. Eventually thirty-three thousands Core Breakers entered the battlefield. On the hand, the UGNE only had nine thousand Core Breakers to support its long rang machine gun corps.

For sixteen months eight of the border caves held an unsightly attrition war. Each side pushed strong enough only to keep its position. Under the machine guns’ fire, even the council’s elite Core Breakers struggled. The alloy of both the guns and the bullets was a new type of an unbelievably st.u.r.dy metal. During these sixteen months a few Core Beakers dared to take these weapons lightly and as a result lost their lives gruesomely. Twenty seven intact bullets, that is, ones that were stopped midair by a Six Hands formation before they exploded and two machine guns that the council’s corps managed to grab were sent to the council’s a.n.a.lysts only to reach the conclusion that it is the hardest substance they ever encountered.

One thing the council of ten held above the UGNE was the quality of Core Breaker. As a nation which encourage the practices of Mist Users and has a variety of cultivation techniques, their Core Breakers had a clear advantage. On equal grounds an average Core Breaker from Kingdom Earth could fight evenly with three UGNE’s Core Breakers, while a Core Breaker who was educated in military techniques could handle ten to fifteen UGNE’s Core Breakers. There were two reasons for the big difference; one was the absence of Mist Users experts, second was the treatment Mist Users received after the UGNE discovered the new alloy.

On the second month of the third year, for the first time since the war began, the UGNE pulled back its forces. The council rushed to seize the opportunity and initiated a complete takeover of all the UGNE’s previews posts. The fourteen bases that were taken were rigid with smart mines, thus the UGNE’s three parts plan has started to be realized. One thousand and forty-four Core Breakers perished by the blasts and another five hundred or so were severely injured. Then, two more blows were given; sending swarms of weaponized drones for the next wave of attack, the UGNE was able to restrict the council’s Core Breakers’ techniques and formations enough to also lead them to believe that they replaced entirely their flesh and blood corps on the battle field with manmade war machines. Lastly, millions upon millions of refuges from the UGNE sought an asylum in the neighboring Kingdom Earth. Men, women and children alike attempted to cross the border to Kingdom Earth like their life depends on it, and indeed they depended on it. The UGNE used this tactic knowing that even if the commoners stormed past the border, even in this time of war, the council’s soldiers will most likely follow regulations than attack innocent people, and so the UGNE made sure to mix its Mist Users Earth’s Core holders in the great crowds and strapped thousands of regular people with small explosives.

Kingdom Earth has fallen to one knee. Being struck three times consecutively, the council of ten has concluded that they were frivolous towards the UGNE and too confident in their Mist Users army to believe that men as finally surpa.s.sed technology. How wrong they were, no words to describe won opportunity to be said out loud. Further negligence was no longer acceptable. Once, the Supreme Rules, for the benefit of Humanity, had to make a difficult decision. The council of ten has decided to follow the same steps as their Supreme Rulers. The UGNE will once again and forever be eradicated from this world.

The war for control over humanity’s territory has evolved to the war for extermination. Ten years. Twenty years. Hundred years. The council of ten and all of Kingdom Earth’s experts developed new methods for dealing with each appearance of new machines and currently were on the verge of winning the war.

The UGNE lost a chunk of its support forces when seventy five percent of its Mist Users surrendered and sought refuge in Kingdom Earth, rather than die for the small change their wages has turned to after the usefulness of the machines surpa.s.sed their achievements. Furthermore, for the last eleven years the organization that once led more than half of humanity has faced a tremendous obstacle. Through all this years, Sun Stones’ energy was the fuel that ran their machines. The bigger a Sun Stone, the purer its energy and the purer the energy the more destructive force it could generate. Till now, the UGNE could extract the energy of Sun Stones up to size of fifty centimeters in diameter, and in all honesty, even that was an above and beyond operation that required utmost delicacy and maximum accuracy when the smallest mistake could led to disaster. But at this point in the war even that kind of force has been neutralized by the enemy Ten Souls formation. The UGNE’s long range A cla.s.s weapon BC, “Beam Cannon”, and close range B cla.s.s weapon TBD, “Thousand Blades Dancer”, when surrounded by the Ten Souls formation, that could expand to over ten kilometer in diameter, were nothing more than expensive tin cans with energy depleting in an alarming pace.

The UGNE had only one move left, a last resort that their lead scientists estimated has twenty percent of success and as of now accomplished only in theory. Combining a Sun Stone’s energy with an Earth’s Core’s mist energy.

To clarify, extracting the energy of either Sun Stone or Earth’s Core of any size is by no means an easy task, and one the UGNE spent years developing.

It occurred while mining for Earth’s Cores in one of the UGNE’s fifteen labor caves. After digging to a depth of several dozen meters, a woman worker waved downward her pickaxe to break a boulder that prevented further excavation. Three centimeters into the boulder, the tip of the pickaxe hit something so hard it almost bent. That is how the UGNE discovered the black Pelar metal, named after the woman worker. Shortly after, additional tests of the Peral metal produced incredible results. The metal was as hard as the Earth’s Cores’ and Sun Stones’ sh.e.l.ls or at least couldn’t be penetrate by any of the UGNE’s scientists’ efforts. Then the UGNE’s engineers began to experiment on ways to melt and forge the Peral metal. After a while regular forging methods were blatantly revoked and were deeming ineffective. Limited due to their meager resources, the UGNE’s engineers explored for new ways of forging, commencing with embedding the Peral metal with Mist Users’ energy, which unlike other substances had no effect on the metal, then one engineer came up with the idea of using some of the collected water that seeped from above the ground and see if the Peral metal will have the same reaction as the small Sun Stones’. Although never finding the difference between the clear water lake caves and the water from above the ground, no one could deny that the two were not precisely similar due to the latter’s effect.

Smeared on the Peral metal, the water sizzled as if they were on a hot frying pan, permitting the engineers to a breath of relief, at last they have progress. The Core Breaker that was present asked for a second attempt at forging – that is because at that time Mist Users, especially at the Core Breaker level, could generate much more force than any machinery.

Once he received permission, the Mist User took by hand the chunk of wet Peral metal, simply because he did not feel a temperature change. Its level of hardness remained the same, a bit discouraging the Mist User since as one at the Core Breaker level he did not want to embarra.s.s himself a second time. Summoning his mist energy, a white aura wrapped the Mist User’s body and through his hands tried to enter the metal. An odd thing then happened, contrast to before the Mist User could have a feel of every millimeter on the Peral metal’s outer layer. Even more strange, the Peral metal began draining the Mist User’s energy into itself in a pace that could endanger his life. Realizing the sudden risk of forging the Peral metal, the Mist User severed the connection of his aura from the metal and as he released a cold breath from his mouth he noticed that the metal is no longer wet and its outer layer slightly deformed.

Following the success of the water from above experiment, the UGNE’s engineers proceeded by creating a needle size drills with the help of the UGNE’s Core Breaker as their working hands. After many trial and errors the first Sun Stone and Earth’s Core were penetrated. The two raw energies, outside of their sh.e.l.l, were violent and berserk. Thankfully, their containers were made out of the Peral metal and were able to keep them from leaking. With the ability to investigate beyond the Sun Stone’s and Earth’s Core’s sh.e.l.ls a new understanding of the two has emerged. In contact with air both energies transform to an explosive force, and in terms of raw and destructive power, a Sun Stone of the same size as an Earth’s Core is nearly a hundred times more powerful yet needs one or two formation to control, sometimes without even completely removing the sh.e.l.l.

Getting back to the greatest challenge of combining the Sun Stone’s energy with the Earth’s Core’s mist energy. First trials have shown that within the same s.p.a.ce, the two energies attract to each other. Problems started to occur when the energies successfully combined to a new energy in the shape of a smoke in red and orange, lava like color. The new energy was about fifty times more powerful than a Sun Stone’s and as a result required a st.u.r.dier container that had to meet three conditions in order to be sufficient. First, it had to be made from a lot of Peral metal and to be around seven centimeter thick, at least. Second, the Peral metal had to be entirely cleansed from impurities. Third, besides from the computer of the machine that will contain and put to use this great energy, many formations need to be made in the body of the machine to directly control the flow of the energy and keep it from losing stability.