Chapter 6: Chapter 6
If there are words that can explain Adam's state of mind. Then it would be this, 'My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined.' and that would be absolutely correct.
Throughout his ten thousand years of life, it's inevitable that he will start forgetting things or his memory gets foggy, especially when his memories of his past life only amounted to less than twenty years. He didn't have eidetic memories after all. However…
This familiar futuristic sterile hallway with a certain animal that DEFINITELY isn't dangerous at all like it's appearance suggested, making weird noises while trying to wake him up.
"Nope. I'm out of here." Adam, still laying on the floor, using his right hand to navigate the menu and tries to do another world jump only to see an alert.
[Insufficient points, please complete some tasks to earn more.]
"Freedom my ass! Give me back my gratitude! Mark my words. I'm going to find you and shove a Cyclonic Torpedo up your ass." Adam swore upon his vengeance, unaware that the purple haired girl was poking at his armor-covered shoulder and fell to her butt when he started yelling curses.
"Fou Fou!" The fluffy creature jumps on the girl and checks up on her in worry before turning to Adam and growling, blaming him for scaring the girls.
"Fuck off, I'm having a mental breakdown over here and I'd rather not to be interrupted." Adam snapped back at the fluffy creature who got angry and beat his helmet with its fluffy paws.
"Uhm… I'm sorry to interrupt you, senpai. But we must hurry, the Director's orientation will begin soon and you mustn't be late or the Director will get angry." The girl said.
"I don't care. I saved humanity once and I'm not doing it twice. Besides, haven't you already met another Master Candidate sleeping on the floor too?" Adam grumbles and give an automated response while his mind is still fully occupied on the System, finding the function that allows him to file a report.
"What? You already did once? Also, how do you know about Fujimaru senpai?" She asked in both a mix of shock and curiosity.
Adam gave up after failing to find any way to file a report. He picks himself up and looks at the girl, surely she is the infamous Eggplant Kouhai whose name he couldn't recall.
Adam sighed with disappointment after looking at her for a bit.
"Girl, don't you have any commonsense? You clearly saw a 15 foot tall man in this much armor and your first assumption of me is a candidate?" Adam lectured the girl without holding back his disappointment in his voice.
"Are you not a Master Candidate, senpai?" The girl looked confused behind her glasses, and couldn't figure out why Adam would feel that disappointed.
"Tell me, do I look like one?" Adam asked with a deadpan look behind his helmet. But his voice was enough to convey his emotions and the girl actually nodded.
'Benevolent Isha, grant your champion strength…' He thought, praying to the Goddess because she is the closest to a God that he is familiar with and didn't mind praying to.
Looking speechlessly at the clueless girl. Adam gave up. He unequipped his Power Armour, now made easier with his Inventory and replaced it with a luxurious silk robe. The least inconspicuous attire he had in his inventory as others are either too attention grabbing or too gaudy as he is provided with the best of the best due to his position and have very little that are not attention grabbing.
"Lead the way then." Adam said, not caring about the numerous questions the girl had in her mind after seeing Adam's armor vanished, replaced with a white robe.
———
Sitting through the orientation, Adam heard many familiar terms and it did help jog his memories quite a bit.
He is a Master Candidate. However, deemed useless and only a spare while the 'A-Team' group of Elite Magus from the Clock Tower is the hope of Chaldea to resolve those so called 'Singularities'. It's painfully obvious to those 'Spare' when the Director dismisses them as if they are air and instead focuses her attention solely on the A-Team.
Next to him is this familiar redhead, sleeping through the orientation and shielded by the Director's view due to his large figure. However, the director soon discovered that and flipped.
Adam's attention however, is on none of them but on the man in green suit and top hat because he can sense he has the presence of a Daemon. The man seemed to notice his gaze too and shifted uncomfortably the entire time, confused by the weird discomfort he sensed.
After the girl, Ritsuka was kicked out by the Director and excluded from the mission. The Director finally announced the start of the mission and they are going to do this 'Rayshift' thing.
Adam unfortunately found himself excluded. Not because he is also kicked out by the director. But because the Rayshift device, ominously named 'Coffin' does not fit his size and the Director simply excluded him because she isn't important anyway in her eyes.
So, that led to Adam roaming the hall of this facility called Chaldea. Although he is told to find his room and be on standby. He had other ideas. That Lev guy that exudes demonic presence like a demonically possessed person. He wanted to investigate him and if possible, kill him.
"I know you are here. Come out." Lev called after he stopped suddenly in the hallway.
Adam appeared on cue and looked at the demonically possessed person. He sensed the unsettled feeling he tried to hide and also curiosity.
"Is there anything I could help, Master Candidate No. 49?" Lev asked with suspicion in his voice.
Adam figures that it might be with him being the 49th Master Candidate as the Director also confused because the Chaldea only plan to recruit 48 but due to some 'error' Adam got selected too and it became 49 candidates.
The silent standoff lasted for less than a minute before Adam said, "I knew you are a Daemon or at least something of similar nature."
A sudden panic appears on Lev's face but then it turns into a smile which confuses and alerts Adam as he immediately summons his Nemesis Force relic blade.
"So, you do know. However…" Lev wields his walking stick which turns into a staff that summons the power of wind. "You are too late."
*Boom!*
A loud explosion went off in the Rayshift room and an alert immediately broadcasted across the halls of Chaldea. But Adam's focus is entirely on Lev. Warp lightning gathered on his blade as he slashed with the intention to cleave Lev in half. But a ball of high pressure wind blocked his slash and exploded, throwing him several meters away as he fled immediately. Vanished from Chaldea entirely which made him cursed and gave up on the slippery Daemon.
Instead, Adam returns to the Rayshift room only to find it in ruin and fire. His attention was immediately on the familiar purple haired girl, looking miserable and dying after she was pinned under the rubbles.
"Ad… Adam… senpai?"
"Save your breath, girl. I'll free you in a moment." Adam ordered as he once again harnessed the might of this universe's nascent Warp and lifted all the rubbles before he pulled her from underneath.
The girl immediately passed out once Adam rescued her, she seems to hold on with sheer willpower alone.
"MASH!"
Two more people rushed inside the room, one was a redhead and another was an orange head wearing an outfit similar to a doctor. They both looked at the state of the room and gasped.
"I'm heading to the power station to turn on the emergency power supply. You and the other Master Candidate try save as much as possible." The doctor guy said to the redhead and left in a hurry.
As for the redhead, no need to save others. She simply stood stunned as she looked at the many critically injured people in the room, groaning in pain and confusion. Then her eyes seem to land on the girl called Mash who is injured, bleeding from her head and leg.
"Mash! Are you alright?" Mash?" The redhead tried to wake Mash up.
Adam hands the injured girl over to the redhead and tries saving others as the doctor ordered. But he was stopped by another announcement.
"System switching to the final phase of the Rayshift. Coordinates, AD 2004, January, 30ths, Fuyuki, Japan. Laplace's shifting protection was established. Singularity's additional factor slot secured. Unsummon Program set. Please start final adjustments."
"Warning all observation staff. Chaldeas' state has changed. Now rewriting Sheba's near-future prediction data. Unable to detect the existence of mankind 100 years in the near-future of Earth. Unable to confirm human survivors. Unable to guarantee mankind's future."
Mash on the redhead's embrace woke up briefly by the announcement and mutters,
"No. Chaldeas… has turned bright red…" She mutters with her last strength in regret before she passes out again due to her excessive bleeding.
As for Adam, he would like to get the fuck away from here. He meant it when he said he had saved humanity once. He didn't want to do it the second time. However, a new screen popped up in front of him while another announcement went off.
"Central Area, sealed. 180 seconds till internal containment procedure."
Adam can rip those blast doors open and escape but his attention is on these 'tasks' that he was informed about by the mysterious being.
***
[The First Order]
Participate in the Rayshift and resolve the Singularity F.
>Reward - 500 Points
[Accept / Decline]
***
A measly 500 points is just a tenth of the required points for World Travel. It was rigged so he would have to participate in more tasks and be involved with the world and he had no other options unless he wanted to stay trapped in this world either.
"Heh, should have known that freedom of choice was always a lie." Adam already gave up resisting and accepted the task.
"Rayshift requirement not met. Searching for qualifying Master...found. Candidate No. 48 and 49, Ritsuko and Adam reset as Masters. Unsummon Program, start. Spiritron Conversion, start. Rayshift starting in 3… 2… 1… All procedures are clear. First Order, commencing operation."
Adam can feel weird things are happening to his soul. But they aren't harmful. So, he allowed it and there he was, hurled back in time to play hero once again.
———
When Adam open his eyes once again, he found himself in a burning hellscape of a city in ruins.
Darkness of night shrouded the city, demonic tainted flames raged on and consumed the city and all its residents. No different to a world consumed by the Chaos into the Immaterium. Although, it does look a hundred or a thousand times more tame than the world engulfed by the Warp because he still has the leisure time to enjoy the unironically beautiful view of the burning city instead of being besieged by hordes of Daemon and Chaos Warbands.
Immediately opening his Companion Menu, Adam summoned Alina and Sif who look confused because passage of time does not flow in their unsummoned state and also the current landscape that looks familiar to both.
"Milord, where is your armor? It is unwise to be without them in the middle of a battlefield, especially inside the Warp." Alina urges him, not daring to chastise her lord. Sif too nodded in support of Alina.
"Indeed, I was too distracted that I forgot." Adam quickly swaps to his Power Armor with a few taps and corrects them. "Also, this is not the Warp. Although it does have great resemblance. Or else, we would be seeing hordes of Daemons already."
Hearing this, Alina couldn't refute as it is indeed too peaceful. No enemies, nothing. Just a burning empty city.
"Then, where are we?" She wonders as the architecture of the city looks so foreign and inefficient compared to the ones she is familiar with. Sparsely spaced buildings that rarely reach over two storeys high.
"It's complicated. But just think of it as Terra in the second millennium. Long before your age and the Imperium." Adam said and Alina nodded, not asking any further because they are in a battlefield even if it's this peaceful.
With a hand gesture, Adam called Sif forward and rode on her back with Alina before he ordered her to set off.
"Try looking for any human." Adam ordered and Sif gave an acknowledging howl before her powerful limbs ran across this hellish burning landscape, unaffected by the weight of her passengers.
Meanwhile in the distance, a certain magical familiar was watching the scene of a wolf the size of a van approaching the inner city with speed impossible to its size while carrying two figures clad in purest and shining silver, a group not at all conspicuous.
"It is getting more interesting…" A voice speaks behind the veil of darkness.
—————
AN: Why FGO? Waifus.