Soul of Searing Steel

Simboa. Nursery Fifty-Five—presently known as the Tank Plains.

The sun was rising, its summer glare bright and warm.

Tank, former ultrahuman and present farmer, watched was the sunlight illuminated the wheat fields over the plains. The well-built old man blocked the rays coming from beside him and smiled irrepressibly.

As time passed, the humans whose daily life were filled with endless terror and slaughter gradually accepted and adapted to the world’s present state. Tank himself would wake up before first dawn and complete every daily task with his ultrahuman body despite darkness.

Fertilizing, watering, weeding—there was no need for killing parasites, however, since the newly reborn Simboa had no such creatures. Holding his hip with one hand and a scythe with another, he would work the wheat fields. If he was frank, he had a little desire to cut something after wheat fields grew.

Though it was embarrassing to use strength capable of piercing a Soul Puppet armor to harvest wheat, did it actually matter? No matter how dull and uninteresting it was, peace was much better than the bloody thrills of war—as he drew in the scents of the plants that also carried the thick odors of fertilizer, Tank sneezed.

“Damn, it stinks!”

The old man muttered, and laughed even more happily.

The land itself was called Tank Plains—all of it belonged to him, and he grew his crops over the entire place. It was not as unbelievable as it sounds since his power as an ultrahuman allowed him to plough the steads at subsonic speeds, and his wielded power stronger than any combined harvester recorded in history. If he wanted to, his own power was enough to plant, grow and harvest the entire plains.

And that was what he did, just as the same thing occurred in every corner on Simboa.

After that battle that ended everything, the God of Steel from beyond had left the world, with no subjugation and slaughter since then. The Resistance and the Soul Puppets were in a ceasefire, and under the regulation of a certain mysterious will, both factions occupied a respective half of the world, living upon the continent side-by-side.

Using superpowers for farming was not shameful but praiseworthy instead. The farm that Tank sowed alone more than enough to sustain the Resistance’s food supply, and they would at most need several individuals who could control the weather or the earth to help. That way, everyone could focus their efforts on rebuilding civilization.

The Ruler of Time did not burn all books—in fact, he had basically maintained every classical text about thought and technology in the former Simboa civilization, keeping them beneath the central spiral tower of that world. Talented children with talent for superpowers would begin to learn from the skills of their predecessors to improve the world.

Compared to typical Extraordinary worlds, almost every Simboan intelligent being of this generation were ultrahumans. That in turn meant the ultrahumans could work in place for factories or tasks that usually had to be done in a group: processing metals could be delegated to those who control steel and electromagnetism, while those controlling flame and lightning could provide energy.

The partnership of a few ultrahumans was a sufficient substitute for the smaller factories of old, thereby creating well-made industrialized facilities. Moreover, powerful Ultrahumans could achieve many things such as reasonable proportioning of rain and snow to create optimum environments for the Resistance. Tank, for example, could farm an entire flatland region alone, something that may not be achievable even for thousands of farmers.

For the old man to turn his power for destruction and slaughter to creation and growth, he had to admit that he felt salvation after a life of slaughter.

Planting, harvesting, handing over the crops, witnessing the new generation grow upon age old ruins, turning wastelands and deserts into green pastures… it was a little chagrining, but the old man who never so much as complained when maimed to the point of death had actually shed tears last year, when he harvested the first batch of rations, giving his former comrades such a shock that they hurriedly dropped everything to console him.

Naturally, his tears did not come from sadness but the purest of delight.

“Come to think of it, we have to thank those Soul Puppets. Without those things—or them—without their help, we could not learn the old Simboan language from nothing and learn those technologies.”

At the thought, Tank remembered the negotiations between Soul Puppets and Resistance, the latter of whom had no fight in them at all. The Soul Puppets had occupied all Nurseries and Plantations, a complete set of industrialized soul technology. Their abilities were simply on different levels, but they still most earnestly negotiated with the humans.

Tank remembered what the leader of the Soul Puppets had said—the one that resembled a rather dainty young girl.

“The Ruler had said defects lie in delaying one’s improvement by the mechanism called emotions.”

“We neither want to be defective nor effective. We would not forget history, nor would it affect our judgment—Simboans, the past is the past. I am aware and understand that all of you once suffered beneath us, and you could so choose vengeance. Though meaningless it may be, we certainly would resist.”

“But if possible, and if you be willing, we could walk hand in hand towards the future.”

Future.

Tank digested the word. It was once so luxurious, so unachievable.

But now it was not, and every Simboan had obtained it.

The old man seated himself on the little stairs leading towards his hut at a corner of his lush wheat fields. He dabbed at his forehead, although there was no sweat on it at all.

Present-day Simboa was beautiful, peaceful, without war or stride. Everyone was working heard for the future—although eighty percent of the continent was barren deserts and stony plains, restoring the world’s former glory was a matter of time with Soul Puppet and former Simboan technology. Furthermore, observers reported discoveries of large islands on the other side of the sea, or perhaps an entirely new continent altogether.

If that would not do, they could simply head over to those new worlds. Surely it would not be as bad as it was now?

Tank would rather his life would waste away like this in abandon. He knew that his power was not useful in the golden fields, but it was not important—compared to being a leader of the Resistance, he would rather be an aged peasant whose body was baked into an old copper color, scything away weeds and occasionally fishing by the sea shores.

Imagining that peaceful and idle future, the old man narrowed his eyes at his glove and smiled with his scar and wrinkle-laden face.

There was a gem on his glove.

A silver gem.

The God of Steel had left six different colored gems before he left, each symbolizing a different power that could be cultivated in the future. The silver denoted control over steel and stone, the green could create flame and thunder, the white was powerful vibration, red was radiation and explosion, the golden one was teleporting and the black could cast an energy absorbing shield that could block everything.

It was not a legacy left for them, but for their successors who were not certain to obtain superpowers. That way, those powerless heirs could learn those abilities and thus grow their power.

Naturally, there would also be those amongst them would could not even train in such superpowers… but that was not important. After so much had happened, none could now discriminate against non-ultrahumans.

Perhaps, their successors would forget that pain after centuries and repeat the cycle of conflict between ultrahumans and non-ultrahumans, but this time, they would not destroy themselves in such a conflict.

Though humans are not creatures who learned from history, before the utter destruction that the Ruler of Time had wreaked upon their world was forgotten, they would keep that torment in their books with reverent fear.

“Tank, what are you blanking out for?”

“Oh, commander!”

The pondering elderly man heard a familiar voice and hurriedly stood up to look at the nearby lane between the farmsteads. There, a Soul Puppet was pushing a wheelchair, where a bald old man who had trouble walking sat.

Tank hurriedly went to him. The other old fellow who was twenty years older than himself, even more wrinkled and appeared ready to die anytime soon had been one of the former commanders of the Resistance.

And the only one.

Tank took the wheelchair off the Soul Puppet, who nodded before warping away.

Old man hence pushed old man along in a stroll between the fields.

“This is it, right?”

Pushing the little wheelchair, Tank watched the golden sun and wheat fields in front of him, saying quietly, “All that we wanted to see is so beautiful.”

“Oh, kid. Don’t mention it.”

The former commander who had simply come for a visit laughed, his eyes squinting. “Wheat fields that stink like children? You think this bit of farm is alright? This is not what I want to see! I wish to witness the sights ten years later, when they raise huge cities taller than that tower before… Ouch!”

“What are you even deluding about? Why not train with the God of Steel’s legacy and live another few hundred years!”

Tank patted the other man’s bald head without restraint, and the two geezers guffawed at once.

The laughter was filled with pleasantness and delight, as well as tears from complicated emotions after long periods of bitterness.

***

Meanwhile, deep within the spiral tower—now a forbidden zone, at the center of the world.

A dainty Soul Puppet strolled over a ground of minuscule ashes, her feet never touching it no matter how soft the ground was.

Soon, she arrived at the heart of the forbidden zone which was filled with raging energy radiation after the decisive battle between the God of Steel and the Ruler of Time.

The former had triumphed, the latter reduced to ashes.

As the Soul Puppet approached the very center of the former battlefield, her feminine features were impassive, but her heart was stirring in a growing turmoil.

Ruler, she thought as she watched the energy wavelength kept beating, I think we have learned the purpose of our being.

Soul puppets exist and sacrifice themselves for you. But be it for faith or some other reason you have neither sacrificed nor abandoned us. You turned time again and again, and yet did not threw us burdens away.

Some believed that it was simply because you needed our faith. But is that true? You would rather die, yell at us defects and would sever your bond to us.

That should not have been.

We should have been punished with you for your sins, and should have perished as you did for it. You had given us life, and we should thus have exchanged that great advantage with our lives—it would hold meaning even if our existence had added an insignificant progress for your plan.

But you did not.

Arriving at the center of the battlefield, the soul puppet that resembled a young girl looked up at the afternoon sun, grey dust and abnormal radiation splitting it into dull grey light.

“You yearned for a world without sorrow and war.”

The soul puppet who had accompanied Fattrovi over three hundred and twenty shifts of World Lines said softly. “That was all you wanted—happiness and peace in all things.”

And yet that simple yearning was warped by radical hatred. You have forgotten your early purpose and descended into madness, tormenting for the sake of tormenting and unable to escape from the spiral of misery.

Even so, my lord…

“I would make it come true for you, even if you could not see or acknowledge it. I would accomplish it, turning you who had been a hateful person and yet loved the world into an admirable star of this galaxy.”

“I hope you would forget it all then, and live in this beautiful world as a normal person, living a life without hate, sadness but was also filled with love and hope.”

The soul puppet slowly crouched.

In the center of the former battlefield, grey sunlight shone over the land.

There lay a small, inconspicuous grave.

Upon it was inscription of orderly old Simboan language.

[Father, mother, sister, me]

A small, myriad colored spiritual crystal was embedded on it.

Back in the negotiations, the Resistance never asked to destroy that little grave.

“But is that enough?” There were former Resistance members who asked that, puzzled.

It was.

Instead, it shall become their most hated, most reviled, most miserable beginning and end.

Forgetting it? No! Fattrovi shall be the most sorrowful eternity, noted in the first page of the new Simboan civilization’s history books, a perpetual caution to all future generations!

***

Just as Tank and the former commander weaved in and out of the golden wheat fields, and the little soul puppet reached out to touch the seven-colored spiritual crystal…

With a mild hum that resounded over the world, the entire Simboan realm trembled.

Silver beams descended from the skies.

By the quiet permission of the Steel Python, through a medium left by a certain being, crystal obelisks descended from beyond worlds!

Over the Simboan continent, the six gems flickered with infinite light. As if transmitters, they were providing the most precise coordinates for the obelisks.

“What, what are those!?”

In the fields, both Tank and the former commander gaped as a bunch of lights erupted out of the silver gem in the former’s hand and materialized a silver crystal obelisk that was several hundred meters tall!

It would have been a fight if it was all that it was. Both elderly men had gone through countless battlefields and experienced many things. Soon, however, the obelisks abruptly projected the forms of unusual creatures in the empty lands around.

Those projections were all beastly, and both Tank and the former commander were faintly aware that they were not intelligent creatures, but would definitely benefit their ecosystem and adapt to it. After deteriorating into a piece of barren wasteland after a thousand years, all wildlife was essentially extinct and every livestock had no part to play in a natural environment. The creatures in the projection on the other hand could do that, they would develop wildlands, spread seeds, nurture plants, purify the air and water sources.

Meanwhile, aside from Tank and the commander, the other Resistance members, soul puppets—even the girl puppet at the heart of the forbidden zone arose.

She heard it.

All of them heard it.

In the galaxy of countless worlds across the Void, the solitary echo of a horn sounded. It transcended the darkest turbulences, deathly ruins, and dormant dreams. Its sound, at once filled with rage and vigor resounded over the entire galaxy.

“Long dead failures—awaken!”

“This is the moment to reclaim your glory!”

All of them heard it.

Those in the farmsteads and deserts of Simboa heard it.

The champions and survivors of Karlis, the Silver Fairies wandering amongst the flowers, the Drakonids and Ancient Dragon of Thunder in Kronos all heard it, pricking up their ears.

In the silence of the Bloodmoon Abyss, the gigantic luminous human silhouette heard it.

The shadow standing alone in the Sixth Abyss—Goliath, King of Demons, heard it as well.

Over hundreds and thousands of places where silence presided, in the depths of the Darkest Abyss, every former failure heard that voice—the war cry, the rallying that was filled with vigor.

Then, one by one, with searing and powerful light along with dazzling silver luster, the crystal obelisks began to shin, thus filling every projection.

All of them began to awaken and called out as well, answering the lonely horn, roaring at the future in resistance.