Chapter 392: Unlocked

Chapter 392: Unlocked

Early Afternoon - Late Fall : The Library of Eternity, Atlas | Bahamut

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-'Bahamut's Questionable Choice', 'The Bane of Progress', 'The Tyrant's Rule'..? Oh, it's another about Hera...- Reading the titles of books as I walked down one of the two layers of bookshelves, I paused to peek over the middle shelf at Hera. "~You really were a hot topic back in the day, huh...~" -This is like the eighth book on her and we just started...- Glancing back at the door, we hadn't gotten more than a few steps into the third layer.

"~Of course. Bahamut essentially handing the country to me was a very hot topic back then, especially with those who believed they had power and influence because he made the decision without their input. They liked Bahamut though, so in order to keep his favor they aimed their voices at me, whether I was the one that did what they were mad about or not.~"

-Interesting...- Lowering my head back below the top of the shelf, I got back to reading with my aura. "~So you were basically a scapegoat for everyone's dislike?~"

"~Something like that...~" Smiling with a somewhat reminiscent look, she continued. "~Back then, people said Bahamut put me in the position in order to court me. At that time, I was known for having quite a cold personality so they thought he was trying to 'win over the unwinnable' by laying the country in my lap.~"

"~So that's why these books keep claiming you were unworthy of the position... It looks like those rumors really caught on.~" -These books are from well after the war...-

"~Well, Bahamut never once corrected them, so it's what became the truth in the eyes of the public... But it worked better for me in the end, so I don't mind.~" Looking at me, her smile turned somewhat playful.

But I was too busy reading to notice. "~What do you mean by it worked out better? If instead of being hated, you were loved, you probably could have been saved from the Acardi.~"

"~But if I was saved from the Acardi, I wouldn't be alive now.~"

-Huh?- I wasn't following. "~What do you mean?~"

Looking over, I watched her nostalgic expression darken. "~I most certainly would not have survived even if I somehow managed to escape that facility alive...~" She paused before going back to reading. "~Even back then, I could tell the war wasn't going well. Battles were short, and regardless of which side won, it felt like we were just taking jabs at each other, even though we were fighting with everything we had... But honestly.. after seeing everything you showed me over the last few days... I've found myself questioning how this world still exists as I remember it...~"

Pausing as some memories gained a bit of clarity, I spoke more softly and carefully. "~So you think Delphi should have lost against the Acardi...~"

She immediately nodded. "~It wasn't Delphi against them, it was the draconic race.. and if I'm being honest, unless that laboratory was the absolute pinnacle of what they could produce.. I don't see a world where we could have won...~"

Finding familiarity in her words, I raised a question. "~Do you think they could have simply lost interest?~"

It was a blind toss, but she seemed to think differently. "~I don't know what, but Delphi had something they needed. Unless it was simply mana, the odds of them leaving us alone are slim to none.~" Peeking over the bookshelf at me, she spoke with a serious tone. "~One of the many things I learned being around them for so long was that they weren't a race to simply leave behind something valuable. They spoke about colonies on other worlds like we talk about kingdoms, and said that it was a shame to destroy certain worlds because 'the sector' didn't find them useful enough... The only reason I didn't get killed when they left my facility was because the guy in charge hated me, and wanted me to have a slow death.~"

-But if they were defeated, there would be traces...- For the Mothership to hold as many people as it did, I had expected to find colossal wreckages in the bottom of the Death's Gape, but not only was there nothing, there weren't any sizable debris fields at all. -So what happened to them...-

Once again, I was back to square one, questioning the purpose of the Acardi and wondering what happened to them.

But there was one thing I had to wonder as I read the ancient books lining the shelves. "~Do you think it could be related to Jormungandr?~"

If Delphi was an incubator for whatever kind of creature he was, maybe the Acardi needed it for something, came, found it was taken, and left.

If Jormungandr was as powerful as I believed him to be, it would be logical that they wouldn't try and piss him off.

But that theory held less ground the more I gave it thought.

So, for the next couple hours, Hera and I walked around the library, reading book after book about everything from the cost of living documentation and architecture blueprints to newspapers, old novels, and encyclopedias.

For the most part, the knowledge and information they contained was useless to me, more so just giving me a look into the culture of Bahamut from that era, but every now and then I struck gold, like finding a book detailing old studies taken to look into science, attempting to explain quantum physics with mana, or finding a series of handwritten pieces detailing experiences during the fall of Bahamut.

With every book, more and more memories seemed to gain clarity, not from my time as Nott, but my time as Bahamut.

-I.. carved this...- Although faint, the sensation of my claws carving away wood filled my mind while I stared at it. -How.. did I make the lock work though...-

Finally coming out into the hall as well Hera, holding her head and tail high gave me a curious look. "~It's beautiful, isn't it?~"

Unable to pull myself from my thoughts I didn't move at all.

"~Are you trying to figure out how to open it?~" Following my gaze up to the door, she sat down. "~He said he only ever planned to give the key to his children, but he never had any... That place was basically his bedroom while he was Monarch.~"

"~But.. I might know it...~" Slowly standing up, I walked toward the door and looked around at the hundreds of tiny, dark lakes carved into the wood. -They're Acardi sensors... The same I use to log into the laboratory...- It would act like a fingerprint scanner, unlocking whenever Bahamut walked close to the door. -But he wouldn't be able to pass the code on to anyone if that was the only way in...-

Thinking back to the countless scattered fragments of memories, I held them up next to the map in my eyes before finally, a pattern I held up to the map crossed over every single lake in a pattern.

The pattern of a layer of a space rune. -And then the numbers in that memory fragment...- They indicated the sequence of 'lakes' mana in the space rune would pass through. -They're the password...-

*Vwoom* Pulling out some mana, I flooded the sensors following the sequence of numbers from my artificial memory.

But.. nothing happened. -Huh?-

Tilting my head, I sat back down before trying again, this time dragging a cloud of mana over the sequence, rather than pressing them like buttons. -Is it a pattern?-

But that wasn't it either.

However, after sitting in focus for what felt like just an instant, I stood up and injected fire, electricity, and light mana into the wall at three points marked by mountains, as if it were being injected by a space rune.

Because the sequence of numbers wasn't the password, nor was it a sequence.

The numbers were coordinates.

*Click* And the moment I infused the right mana into those spots, a series of locks clicked open.

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