The Primordial Record

1007  Awakening Of Madness (9)

Noah Rithmast joined them in bowing toward the Ascendants, the truth was that even though just seeing and hearing whatever was deep inside the earth had been enough to kill him, there was still a terrible fascination in his heart for him to look at what was happening below.

He needed to see what had changed, even from this high up, he could hear a loud whooshing sound like multiple massive typhoons blowing with fury, and he knew that something had changed, but what? Noah was too scared to find out. He could accept dying, but not due to stupidity.

Noah should be wise enough to keep away thoughts that would lead to bad consequences out of his mind, no matter how much the need arose to peer into the Abyss, yet he was aware that soon, he might not have the chance to choose for himself, they had been resurrected this quickly for a reason. Thankfully they were not kept in the dark for long, but what he heard next made his skin crawl, and made him slightly regret finding the continent of New Hope.

As always, it was impossible to tell which of the Ascendants were speaking,

"What lies below is not a Piece of Heaven, at least, not one that we currently understand, but by some chance that it is… a Piece of Heaven, then it is alive, and what we heard was its awakening cry which has led to corruption in your Core Aura. From what we can infer by peering into your Cores, then it is most likely that you might have to die multiple times before the corruption is eliminated, but you are here for a mission, you are Explorers and therefore you can still be used. There might have been a chance you might eliminate this corruption if you leave now, but you will not be leaving but pushing deeper. Make peace with yourselves."

'Corruption? What corruption? I still feel fine!' Noah scanned his body with a quick mental wave, parsing rapidly through his Natal Treasures and his flesh and he discovered nothing at first, but then he looked deeper into himself, touching his cells and he recoiled in shock and disgust. n/ô/vel/b//in dot c//om

His cells were mutating and consuming each other. The mutated cell resembled tiny snakes that numbered in their millions, and although it would take a while, in a few hours, perhaps even less, he expected his body to explode once more into a rain of snakes before he turned to ash.

This would not be a problem if he died a few more times, but the Ascendants wanted them to push deeper into the earth, the chance for corruption was no longer a chance but an assurance. If they could not find a way to contain this corruption, they were all dead.

You would think after so many millennia of war, Noah should be used to the thought of dying. But he was not.

"As you all should now be aware, the severity of this corruption is unknown, and until the entity below is dealt with, it is unknown if any of you will survive, but we are Explorers of the Unknown and the Wicked, this has always been our fate. One of loss and sorrow, and surviving at the edge of existence. Standing on that thin line hanging over the Abyss whilst in the midst of a raging storm."

Noah had heard many speeches like this before, he had even given it to lesser Explorers, and they never sounded more hollow.

"A thousand of you can be resurrected only two more times, you shall be the first to push below, and begin laying down Null Charges into the crater of New Hope. we don't understand what is down there and so the first thing is to contain it. The rest of you shall follow behind. That is all, go to your positions and prepare for the drop. The entity below is consuming the purified Aura, so there can be no delay, it must not be allowed to grow stronger."

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Noah stood towards the back of the Deific Ranked Explorers, held in his grasp was a special Storage Device that held tens of thousands of Null Charge. Their mission was to drop into the crater and place a Null Charge every thousand feet.

The effects of Null Charges were simple. It was to devoid the surrounding space of any form of energy except for the ones permitted to exist.

A Null Charge was a powerful tool, and Noah had seen it used once, and that was only a single Charge, in total, the Charges all the Deific Rank Explorers held between them numbered in the millions.

The Council was pulling out all stops, such a great amount of Null Charges could seal a hundred thousand continents.

"Begin!"

They had all moved towards the index finger of the warship and Noah watched the first Explorers leap off the ship without hesitation. He knew they could do this not because they did not feel any fear, but because it was their duty.

Quicker than Noah had anticipated it reached his turn, and Noah rushed to the edge of the finger and he leaped off. The winds blew harshly past his ears, as he allowed himself to be affected by gravity, although the air above the crater that looked like the mouth of a gigantic beast felt heavier than normal, increasing his falling speeds dramatically, it was as if he was being pulled downwards.

It took only seconds, but Noah felt his ears pop as he broke the sound barrier leaving a shockwave behind as he dropped ever faster. Clearing the rim of the crater, the light suddenly vanished, and he was plunged into darkness.

Knowing his eyes were useless, Noah closed them and reached for his Aura senses. The world exploded into color. He could see large red bubbles that were tens of thousands of feet in diameter that were arranged in an overlapping fashion. These were the Null Charges that were stripping space of everything, down to the molecules.

This had stripped the air of the countless dangers that Noah had noticed when he first arrived at the continent and many others he had not seen, but there was a price for this progress.

Noah's falling speed only increased, and before long he began to see traces of ash floating in the air as the first of the Deific Explorers. They were tasked with clearing the way and suppressing the entity below, but they could not avoid every danger before the suppression field was completed.

Before long, Noah saw that he would be reaching the point where there were no longer suppression fields, and of the thousands that had leaped ahead of him, only hundreds remained and they were dropping like flies.

"I am an Explorer of the unknown and the wicked, and this is my fate."

Steeling himself, Noah roared and ejected ten Null Charges, as he plunged into the fray, his surroundings suddenly filled with hissing frost bolts, spatial distortion, and dozens of other weird phenomena. He avoided those that he could and began launching Null Charges at the wall of the crater, he had launched hundreds before his luck ran out and a spatial tear cleanly sliced him in two.

An hour later Noah woke up screaming, and beside him was the spatial bracelet for the Null Charges. Gritting his teeth, he leaped off the ship.