[Video | Public]

[otakuro]

Hey.  Looks like I've got this working.

[Atsuro's face appears on the network under somewhat inadequate lighting.  An astute guess would place him in his room illuminated only by the backlight of his laptop.] 

Everyone get out of that first mission OK?  I can't speak for anyone else, but geez, I think I slept for a few days straight there.  If they, uh, wanted a report or anything, the research labs are fine.  ...Probably.

[He stifles a yawn before continuing on, the camera zooming out slightly to reveal a lot of bedhead and a conspicuously absent trademark floppy hat.]

Hnn...  Sorry.

So!  Anyway.  I've been thinking a lot.  About what they've told us and about... what they haven't.  Hah, I'm still surprised this place isn't some weird hallucination.  It's a little unreal, right?  Like they're asking us to act out a game or a fantasy novel.  But... even if it seems like it might be fun to stick around, I think we need to find out what it is we're really getting into.  ...There's something I want to say about all this.

You've all run into the monsters by now, right?  They talk, they cast magic, they do tricks.  Not all of them are bad, but they're things we've heard of in myths and stories from different cultures all across the globe - Cerberus, the hound of Hades.  British pixies and kobolds.  Nekomata and other youkai from Japan.  So... what gives?  What're they doing here?

...I'm not gonna get into details, but I should say that these guys - the exact same identical demons - have popped up in at least two other worlds that I know of.  And both times.... they showed up because the world was about to end.

I'm not saying this place is the same way, but... maybe that's why they need our help badly.

[addendum a few minutes later]

Ah, someone reminded me - if you guys want to see a database of all the demons I've ever met, you can drop by my room.  Libra 5-07.

Comments

[otakuro]

Oh.

Er.

...I'm not sure if that was philosophy or if you're saying you've seen the same things.

[greyerrant]

Consider that for a moment. Which do you think is more likely?

[otakuro]

Well...

How many burning worlds could you have seen?

[greyerrant]

A galaxy full.

[otakuro]

Er. So... you're saying... you're an alien from the future?

[greyerrant]

I am no Xenos. I'm am from the Thirtieth Millennium, however.

[otakuro]

Thirtieth -- We just started the third! People are still around in 28,000 years?!

[greyerrant]

Yes. Though some of us are much changed.

[otakuro]

If you're a normal human being, I'll say. You'd think our growth would have been stunted or something when we ran out of food on Earth.

Are there lots of inhabitable planets out there, then?

[greyerrant]

Many more than once were. Terraforming has become a lost art to some extent, but it was widely practiced earlier. As for me, I' have been altered and enhanced for war.

[otakuro]

...No chance of world peace, huh? Intergalactic war in the 30th millennium... Not sure I want to try and imagine that.

[greyerrant]

None. There is only war.

[otakuro]

H-Hah...

Is it really a good thing to persist for so long, then...? There must be something positive about exploring the galaxies - we've made friends with at least one new species or something, right?

[greyerrant]

We tried. It did not end well. But mankind itself was united until recently.... But that isn't a story I wish to tell for the moment.

[otakuro]

Right.

Sorry. I didn't mean to pry.

[Atsuro wasn't about to tell the details of his own story to anyone else, yet, either.]

[greyerrant]

I do not take offense from questions.

[otakuro]

W-Well... At least you can take a break here from all that. If they can send you right back to where you came from.

[greyerrant]

I think not.

[otakuro]

You... want to go to war? Ah, but there's not much to war against here...

[greyerrant]

We shall see about that.

[otakuro]

Fighting a terrorist group is less a war than it is, uh... a scuffle.

[greyerrant]

You would be surprised.

[otakuro]

...

You just really like fighting, huh?