Anomaly

Chapter 410 – Worship of the true gods [56]

After the not-so-motivational conversation I had with my little sisters inside the church, we came to the conclusion that there was no longer any room for hesitation. We had to act before there wasn’t even a single city left to save. The sphere had grown at an alarmingly fast rate since the last time I observed it.

Before, it had already been large enough to reach the tops of most buildings, but now it had risen high enough to reach the tallest skyscrapers in the city. It still wasn’t tall enough to make contact with the very highest buildings, the same ones where I had placed the humans who had been living dangerously close to the sphere. Even so, the entire situation remained absurdly unstable.

The problem had never been just its size. The sphere seemed increasingly aggressive. Its uncontrolled expansion was causing growing damage to nearby structures: cracks were appearing across building facades, windows were shattering under pressure, and even foundations had started to slowly give way.

Even without directly reaching the survivors, the mere presence of that colossal mass was already enough to turn entire sections of the city into ruins. If we kept waiting, soon nothing would remain except broken concrete and dust.

At first, everything had seemed minor and almost irrelevant. Subtle tremors rippled through the structures while thin cracks slowly spread across walls and concrete. Aside from that, though, the buildings were still standing. Nothing a quick renovation couldn’t fix, some repairs, a few replaced beams, and everything could go back to normal.

But that sense of normalcy didn’t last long. The flowers, which had initially only lost a bit of their brightness and vitality, had started to genuinely wither in the sphere’s presence. Their petals slowly shrank, their colors faded within seconds, and their stems bent as though all life had been drained from within them.

It was a clear sign that whatever was happening, it was escalating, gradually becoming more intense, more aggressive, and far more dangerous. Not even the church where we had been staying earlier was safe anymore. There was no reason left to remain there. The only option was to move everyone to the rooftop of the building where I had already gathered the other humans.

When we suddenly appeared near them, I was met with an almost chaotic mixture of reactions: wide eyes, pale faces, and stiffened bodies frozen in shock. Some instinctively stepped backward, while others stared at our arrival as though trying to decide whether this was real or just another stress-induced hallucination.

For a few seconds, the area sank into contained chaos, heavy breathing, nervous whispers, overlapping questions, ridiculous conspiracy theories being thrown on top of one another, and a collective fear that seemed to infect even the air itself.

Still, as the moments passed, the tension began to ease. Slowly, like someone trying to convince themselves they still had some control over the situation, they calmed down... or at least got as close to calm as anyone realistically could under the circumstances.

As for the teleportation, that was Chronas’ doing. From what I managed to understand, she apparently captured the exact moment in time when I was standing on the rooftop, then reconnected all of us to that same instant, as if she had woven my timeline together with everyone who had been inside the church. Whatever that actually means, it worked absurdly well.

In the blink of an eye, we were all gathered inside the silent church. The next instant, without any sensation of movement or transition, we were already standing on the rooftop, the cold wind slicing through the air and whipping against my clothes. According to Chronas, what she did was relatively similar to traveling back in time... just without technically traveling back in time.

Which, honestly, didn’t make the explanation any easier to understand. Anything involving time always gives me a massive headache. Or at least, I imagine it would, if I were still capable of feeling something as mundane as a simple headache.

Anyway, lost in my own thoughts, I lightly shook my head and pushed aside any distractions unrelated to the city’s imminent destruction. Rupert and Victor remained close to each other, standing beside Emily and Laura.

Emily kept her arms crossed tightly over her chest, her rigid posture and closed-off expression making her accumulated tension obvious. Laura wasn’t much different, though she tried to appear calm. Her fingers subtly tapped against her own arm, betraying her unease.

Meanwhile, Victor and Rupert both had two fingers pressed against their ears, clearly focused on incoming communications. A few seconds later, they lowered their hands. Victor was the first to break the silence.

“My team just confirmed the city’s full civilian evacuation” His voice was steady, though weighed down by exhaustion: “Right now, we’ve set up a temporary base outside the city limits to keep everyone safe until... well, until we deal with this” At the end of the sentence, Victor let out a heavy sigh. His gaze hardened for a brief moment before slowly shifting toward Rupert.

“Same thing on my end, but apparently we’ve already hit capacity. We can’t keep sending civilians there anymore” Rupert commented in an indifferent tone, giving a slight shrug as if he were merely reporting an insignificant detail. Even so, his hand occasionally drifted up to the back of his neck, massaging the area automatically, a subtle but telling habit that revealed far more about his actual state of mind than his voice ever did.

By the way, my little sisters, along with Eve and Daniel, were standing a bit farther away, close to the edge, where they had a perfect view of the gigantic dome of energy, or inversion, whatever name was more fitting for that thing, which continued expanding nonstop.

Curiously, they didn’t seem affected by the chaotic scene in the slightest. While most of the humans there watched everything with obvious tension, some restless, others practically frozen with anxiety at the sight of so many anomalies gathered in one place, my sisters remained as calm as ever, as if this were just another ordinary event.

Honestly, I seriously doubted there was anything capable of truly shaking them. Setting aside the humans who were clearly uncomfortable with the whole situation, I was sure my sisters wouldn’t do anything reckless or compromising.

With that thought in mind, I finally spoke up. “I’ll see what I can do once I get close enough. I’m not exactly sure how this revelation works, but according to my sisters, I just need to imagine myself opening my cloak... or something like that.”

My words immediately caught the attention of Victor, Rupert, Laura, and Emily, who were standing close enough to hear me. All four turned toward me almost at the same time, as if my statement had triggered some kind of alarm.

Laura, in particular, seemed the most uneasy. Her eyes kept shifting between me and the distant dome, her fingers clenching and unclenching almost imperceptibly. There was genuine concern written all over her face.

“I feel like I need to say this, so I’m just going to say it... this is completely insane. Even by anomaly standards, this goes way beyond any acceptable limit. Are you seriously going to do this?” Laura’s expression didn’t show the slightest hint of confidence. If anything, she already seemed to be bracing for the worst.

“You heard your sisters” Laura continued, her voice lower now, carrying an unusually pleading tone. She folded her arms tightly, as if trying to hide her own discomfort: “This could incinerate you. No coming back, no regeneration... just darkness. Or whatever comes after death” She looked away for a moment before adding with a dry sigh: “Your sister would probably know the answer to that better than I would”

I stayed seated at the edge of the building, feeling the cold wind hit my face while Laura’s words kept echoing in my mind like persistent static. Honestly, even after hearing my little sisters say without hesitation that this could actually kill me for real... I still didn’t know how to process any of it.

I mean... ever since I became an anomaly, death stopped feeling like something concrete to me. It became a distant concept, almost abstract, like an ancient word whose meaning slips further away the more you try to understand it.

I know everything comes to an end. Nekra is literally the living embodiment of that truth, or maybe “living” is way too ironic a word to use for her. She is the inevitable guide of all things that end, the silent presence in the final moment of any existence.

Even so... I simply can’t understand what death really is. Not even back when I was human did I truly grasp it. Back then, death was just a frightening idea, something distant enough to ignore.

But now? Now the situation is even more absurd. Apparently, I’ve existed since the dawn of creation... or something close to that. Honestly, I don’t even know what that statement is supposed to mean anymore.

That said, there was only one thing I knew for certain: either I did this, or the city would simply vanish off the map... and honestly, maybe even the entire world would be at risk. I couldn’t believe the priest was going to stop here. Not after everything. There was too much greed inside him, an ambition so deep and twisted that it was impossible to imagine any limit to how far he’d be willing to go.

Even so... I definitely wasn’t expecting to hear the next words: “Fine” Laura said, breaking the silence. Her voice was calm, as if she were commenting on something trivial: “If that’s the case, then I’m coming too” Her words made me turn toward her immediately: “What?” Laura crossed her arms, adopting a confident stance: “I’m a researcher. I want to see what’s going to happen. I want to understand what your revelation actually means” Then a small crooked smile appeared at the corner of her lips: “Besides, I also know that if I’m there, you won’t let yourself die so easily” She tilted her head slightly, staring at me with conviction: “Because you wouldn’t want to see me die”

For a brief moment, I was left speechless: “I agree with Laura on that” Emily added, stepping forward. Her tone was firm, though there was a faint trace of concern hidden underneath it: “If there’s any chance you come back alive, it definitely goes up if we’re there”

I let out a slow sigh, running a hand across my face. This was spiraling out of control way too fast: “So that’s the plan” Victor commented, joining the conversation with questionable enthusiasm. He rubbed his hands together like he was getting ready for a fun trip: “Keeping an eye on one of the most powerful anomalies we’ve ever cataloged... exciting”

He turned his head toward Rupert: “What do you think, Rupert?” Rupert, meanwhile, looked completely disconnected from the conversation, as if his mind had wandered off into another dimension: “Huh? Were you talking to me?”

His expression carried a level of genuine confusion that was almost impressive. Victor didn’t seem to care in the slightest. He simply shrugged casually: “Yep, he agrees”

Rupert kept staring at Victor for a few seconds, clearly having absolutely no idea what was going on, but still slowly nodded his head anyway... Well. Poor guy.