Golden Experience

Normally, members of the church would rent out this room to hold religious meetings, but today it held an assembly of the people in charge of the kingdom. This included leaders from the church, starting with the patriarch of the Holy Church of Hiers and extending to other prominent bishops.

“—received an oracle. A new threat to humanity has been born.”

Furious whispers filled the hall in the wake of the patriarch’s words. One of the guards standing by against the wall, Thomas, felt the frenzied commotion vibrate through his body as though there had been an actual shockwave. For those gathered here, the news was in fact that shocking. And that was true even for a common soldier like Thomas.

Threats to humanity. The six catastrophes. The harbingers of despair. The incarnations of carnage.

There were many ways to curse them, but they actually all referred to the same things.

—On the western continent, rumors claimed that the lord of the infamous Genesis Castle was a true vampire.

—In the north pole, there was a giant wall of ice known as the Crystal Wall. Since ancient times, a golden dragon had been sealed within, one that had descended from above the heavens.

—In the vast sea of trees on the southern continent, beyond the gate that connects to the realm of demons, it was purported that everything had been conquered by an archdemon.

—Far to the east, in an island nation populated by demihumans, there were whispers that its sovereign was the king of insects.

—That same island nation was separated from the central continent by the world’s largest body of water, the Great Aegir Sea. At the bottom of that sea, the lord of mermen reigned over the entire ocean.

—Finally, while no one knew where it was, everyone knew of the sky castle. On its throne sat an archangel, leader of the abominable angels, who looked down on the lower world with contempt.

“How can this be… Where? Where is this newest disaster…?”

“—Here, on this continent. In the eastern part of Hiers, near the city of Erfahren, God has declared that it was birthed in the Great Liebe Forest.”

“Ohh… how terrible…”

“How can this be…? How can it…?”

Some of the attendees hung their heads, others looked up to the heavens and prayed, others still tumbled out of their chairs. The only thing they all shared was an overwhelming feeling of despair. And Thomas was no different. He nearly dropped the standard-bearing spear in his hand. Was it really true? A threat to humanity was this close?

These calamities had never threatened the central continent before. That could perhaps in fact be the reason behind this development. The residents here knew about the existence of human life on the other continents and islands from trade, but civilization in those places wasn’t very advanced. That was because their circumstances made it hard enough just to survive, so they lacked an opportunity to even consider improving their lifestyles.

And that was due to the six catastrophes. Their existence riled up monsters and wild beasts, leading to the appearance of powerful creatures the likes of which were incomparable to what was found on this continent. Wanting to raise the standard of living in such an environment was a dream within a dream. None of the six catastrophes settled on the central continent, so the people there only ever had to worry about the angels from the sky castle, who would appear at random to conduct raids. While they certainly suffered great losses from these attacks, it was always a temporary thing, completely different from living in constant fear of something that lived nearby. Thus, life was much more luxurious on the central continent compared to all the other major landmasses.

However, it appeared that such a blissful status quo would soon end. The worst part was that this was the birth of a brand new threat and not the relocation of one of the six catastrophes. Where once there were six, now there were seven. Simply put, the entire world would suffer from this development, and they could not expect to receive any outside aid.

“…There are no past records of a catastrophe being vanquished. However, there are also no records of a newly born catastrophe being challenged. If we were to act now, perhaps it could still…”

“…You have a point. If it was just born, it could be just a child, meaning…right now, it may be possible to defeat it!”

“Form an extermination force at once!”

In contrast to the rest of the people in the hall who flared up with enthusiasm, Thomas felt his blood running cold. An extermination force? Who was in charge of that? Obviously the person making that declaration wouldn’t be leading it. There was no way anyone here would be doing battle themselves. In which case, the ones mobilizing and facing off against this catastrophe would be soldiers like Thomas. This was no joke. Just because there was a disaster brewing on the edges of the kingdom didn’t mean it was going to be destroyed right away. So who in their right minds did they think would want to proactively march off to an early grave?

If the nobles here had been lords of knight orders, then things would be different; as long as their lord was unharmed, knights couldn’t die. In order to become a knight, you had to swear loyalty to the lord, signing away your entire life, but in exchange you were freed from having to die alone. In most cases, knights who were subordinate to a lord were much more proficient in battle than the masters were; since knights were expected to constantly protect their lord from danger, there was little appeal for lords to entrust their lives to people who were weaker than they were. Rather, lords tended to die during political power struggles, far away from the battlefield. Thus, almost no regular soldiers became knights; the only people who did belonged to families who had pledged their servitude for generations, or servants or slaves who had no other option but to go into servitude.

It would have been better to send knights like that out instead. If they could, then they could launch an offensive without having to worry about loss of life. But at the same time, Thomas already knew that it would never happen. Knights were armor for nobles; they would never be allowed to stray far from their lords. And no nobles would be willing to risk their own lives for a greater cause.

Knights were the professional soldiers who served in personal armies for royalty and nobility. Therefore, conscripted soldiers became indispensable as a national military force that maintained order and stability, and they served for a period of three years. Just a year ago, Thomas was simply tending to his fields in the village that was his home. It was a poor but peaceful life. In other words, he had two years of service left. As far as he knew, there were no wars on this continent, so conscription should consist of standing guard, putting down bandits, and maybe monitoring town gates. Basically, activities like what he was doing now.

So when he heard about the birth of a new calamity, Thomas foresaw the way the conference was heading and cursed in despair.

“Then it is settled. All that is left is to inform the king. Can I trust you all to take care of everything else?”

“Leave it to us, patriarch.”

“This crisis threatens all of humanity. We must do everything we can while there is still a window of opportunity.”

The meeting had slowed; there was no more progress being made. Instead, it was now concluding having cobbled together a unanimous response with shocking speed. They had only come up with a single objective, and the way the legislators coordinated and distributed the work was astounding.

In other words, they abandoned the problem to their chosen sacrifices—the conscripted citizens—to solve.

Normally, assigning any excessively dangerous task to a conscript required consulting with both the soldier and their family first. However, since this was an extraordinary worldwide crisis concerning the birth of a seventh catastrophe, they just drafted up a new, emergency wartime law right here and now, and they would use a free pass resolution at the next conference to force it through. And to fill out the numbers, they would be reconscripting former soldiers who already completed their service as well as lowering the eligible age for conscription. This law was the worst nightmare for the kingdom’s laypeople. Partway through the meeting, Thomas found himself trying to escape from reality by daydreaming the best way to smuggle his family out of the country.

Once the discussion was over, the nobles with domestic responsibilities left the venue. Thomas silently held open the door, his head bowed as he saw them off. The only people left in the conference hall were the patriarch and bishops from the Holy Church of Hiers.

“Patriarch… Um, you seem despondent, is something…?”

“…Yes. About the catastrophe…”

“Sure, what about the catastrophe…?”

“By definition, a threat to humanity cannot be a threat if it’s only beginning to develop… In other words… How can I say this… There wouldn’t be any reason for a newborn disaster that was still in a weakened state to elicit an oracle… As soon as we received the oracle, the calamity may have already reached maturity… That is my fear, at least…”

The bishops all fell silent. However, nothing could now overturn the conclusion that had been reached at the assembly. In fact, even if they had determined that it could not be defeated and they could only monitor it, it wouldn’t change the fact that the future of the kingdom had become shrouded in darkness. Whether or not Hiers made any moves, a threat to humanity was still an existence capable of thoroughly massacring the humanoid races around it. If it had been far away, then the potential damage could be minimized somewhat, but it was right here within the kingdom. Even in the best case, the Kingdom of Hiers could still be wiped off the map.

Thomas looked over at the distraught bishops with their heads bowed; he had already stopped thinking and now only wanted to leave as soon as possible.