Chapter 1871: Found Penelope? Part-1

Sss...hhhh...

The sound of something breaking echoed across the dry land as Young Aether and Lily, both wearing cloaks to conceal their identities, walked along the unpaved road.

Young Aether’s boot splashed into a small puddle as he glanced toward the settlement.

This wasn’t one of the high-tech cities he had seen in Terra... This was a place that looked like the world from a forgotten era, only far worse.

The road was cracked and uneven, with stagnant water gathered inside its deeper fractures, while dust drifted through the dry air.

There were people walking around the settlement, but something about them felt wrong. Their movements were slow and lifeless, their faces hollow, and their eyes had lost almost all their colour. Their bodies were covered in torn, faded clothes that hung loosely from their thin frames.

And the moment Young Aether and Lily came closer to them, those people immediately retreated into their settlement, disappearing behind broken walls and ruined shelters as though they were afraid that even being seen near them would bring punishment.

"What’s going on here, Lily? Who are these people... and why are they here?" Young Aether asked, his voice carrying genuine confusion as he looked toward the frightened people.

"These people... were abandoned by Terra," Lily muttered as she moved closer to Young Aether while they continued along the unpaved road.

"Abandoned?" Young Aether frowned.

Lily nodded slowly. "In Terra, Aevum determines a person’s worth. It measures everything from their power, wealth, and social status to the value assigned to their very existence. Those who possess little value are treated as inferior, and in many cases, they become slaves to those who possess more."

Young Aether’s expression hardened slightly as he looked back at the settlement. "So these people have less Aevum?"

Lily shook her head. "No. These people have zero Aevum."

"They are also known as... Dead Walkers. They were never allowed to set foot on Terra again."

Young Aether frowned deeper. "I haven’t heard anything about this..."

RIN AI’s voice echoed through his earpiece. ^My database did not contain any information regarding them either. Their existence appears to have been completely excluded from Terra’s recorded history."

Lily nodded. "Obviously. Even I didn’t know about them until I followed my parents..." Her voice became quieter before she continued,

"After the arrival of the goddess and the hope she gave humanity... the histories only talked about how our civilisation improved exponentially, how humanity prospered, and how the world became better than it had ever been."

She lowered her gaze toward the ruined settlement.

"But the ugly part was hidden behind that beautiful world. The part that was filled with despair."

"The people here are nothing more than mere livestock to the colourful world," she said in a dreadful tone as she glanced toward the thin figures hiding inside their broken settlements.

"They were simply removed from the story because their existence was inconvenient to remember."

Young Aether stared silently at the people through the gaps between the ruined walls. Some watched them with frightened eyes before quickly looking away, while others remained hidden entirely.

Livestock? Like pigs?

What the fuck?

They were human... Their own kind!

Just then, the sharp screech of tyres tore through the silence of the unpaved road. Lily immediately grabbed Young Aether and pulled him behind the wall.

Young Aether frowned as he carefully peeked around the corner and saw... a car.

It wasn’t one of the sleek anti-gravity vehicles used in Terra. This was an old machine powered by a real petrol engine, its battered metal body rattling as it came to a halt and kicked dust into the air.

Several heavily armed people stepped out of the vehicle. They carried guns that looked crude compared to Terra’s advanced weapons, while their clothes resembled old military uniforms from a forgotten age.

Their weapons might have been outdated, but they were clearly capable of killing.

Then another figure emerged from the car.

The stranger was cloaked, just like Young Aether and Lily. They slowly swept their gaze across the settlement, studying the broken shelters and the people hiding within them.

After a moment, the figure raised a hand and pointed toward a particular settlement.

The heavily armed men immediately moved.

Their boots struck against the dry ground as they marched toward the shelter. The people inside began retreating, but there was nowhere for them to go.

A few moments later, the soldiers dragged a man out of the settlement and forced him onto the road.

"N-No, no, sir! P-Please!" The man begged, but they didn’t care. They simply dragged him toward another vehicle with a cage attached to the back, where a few people were already being held inside.

They shoved him into the cage and locked it behind him.

The man continued begging, but no one paid him any attention. As for the people in the settlement, the armed men simply threw a few pieces of bread onto the ground before immediately turning away.

The moment the bread hit the dirt, everyone crawled toward it like hungry zombies, clawing and fighting over whatever they could grab. Some even picked up pieces covered in dirt and disgusting puddle water, swallowing them without hesitation.

Then... just like that, the armed people climbed into their vehicles and left the area.

"What the..." Young Aether frowned as he looked at Lily.

Lily shrugged her shoulders. "I don’t have a particular answer for this, but... I do know that those who are taken never... ever return."

"..." Young Aether remained quiet.

Slowly, both of them emerged onto the unpaved road and looked toward the people who were desperately eating the pieces of bread, their hands and faces covered in dirt.

"Keep moving," Lily said as she took Young Aether by the hand and walked forward.

As they went deeper into the settlement, they noticed more people like them, cloaked and walking in a seemingly organised line.

"Where are they going?" Young Aether asked quietly.

Lily waited until she found an opportunity when no one was paying attention to them. She then slipped into the crowd and joined the line, taking Young Aether with her.

Young Aether glanced behind him and saw... more cloaked figures entering through what appeared to be some kind of doorway.

Lily leaned closer and whispered into his ear,

"This line is VIP. Well, only VIPs are allowed to enter these slums anyway."

Young Aether frowned for a moment. "A line? Why?"

Lily quietly muttered, "What we saw was just the beginning... The real thing is over there..." She touched the ring on her finger, and it suddenly pulsed for a second... as if she were calling someone.

As Lily and Young Aether continued along the line, they gradually drew closer to the armed men standing at the entrance.

"Origin Card, please," one of them said with a serious expression.

Before Lily could respond, a brown-haired boy suddenly walked toward the man and whispered something into his ear.

The man frowned, but when the brown-haired boy tapped his ring against the man’s ring, making a transaction, his expression immediately changed.

Without any hesitation, the man nodded.

"You may pass."

Lily nodded and took Young Aether with her, but for some reason, he remained frozen in place as he stared at the brown-haired young man.

After they passed through the entrance, the young man led them toward a group of tents scattered throughout the area. Armed people constantly moved in and out, escorting cloaked figures between the tents.

Eventually, he brought them to his own tent.

Upon entering, he looked at Lily with a faint smile. "It’s been a while, Ms. Lily."

He sat down in his chair and motioned for them to sit before him.

Lily lowered her hood and smiled. "Hello, Lucas. How have you been?"

Lucas nodded his head. "I’m fine... Haven’t seen you in a while. What happened?"

Lily shook her head. "Nothing much... I’ve just been busy dealing with my own problems."

"Haha... Here I thought you had forgotten me," Lucas said with a smile as he stared at her beautiful face.

Lily chuckled. "I hope not... You’re not someone I could forget easily..."

Lucas smiled even more before his eyes slowly turned toward the cloaked person sitting beside her.

"And who might you be?"

Young Aether remained silent as he stared quietly at the brown-haired boy. There was something strangely familiar about him, though Aether could not immediately place the feeling.

Lily coughed awkwardly and said, "He... He is someone I know."

Lucas raised his eyebrows. "A secret? I see... I see..." His eyes glimmered with amusement as a teasing smile slowly formed on his lips.

"Maybe... your boyfriend?"

Lily’s face immediately turned red. "N-No! Obviously not—!"

"HE IS MINE, BITCHES!"

Suddenly, a cold, authoritative voice echoed through the tent, startling both Lily and Lucas. \

"What the... Where did that voice come from?" Lucas frowned as he looked toward the cloaked Young Aether, clearly trying to understand what had just happened.

Lily, already aware of the voice and knowing exactly who had said it, immediately stepped in before Lucas could question him further.

"I-It’s just... he mimics people sometimes. But anyway... he is not my boyfriend. He’s just someone I know. Can you take us to the usual place?"

Although Lucas was still frowning, he eventually nodded at her. "You mean that place?" he asked, rubbing his chin with a thoughtful expression.

After a brief pause, he nodded again. "Okay."

"About the payment..."

"Oh, please, Ms. Lily... You’ve already done enough favours for me. If it weren’t for you, I would never have reached this position," Lucas said with a faint smile as he stood up. There was genuine gratitude in his voice, unlike the cold indifference of the soldiers outside.

"Give me a moment... I’ll prepare my vehicle."

He then left the tent.

Young Aether watched him disappear through the entrance before looking toward Lily.

"Who is he?"

"He is someone I encountered when I tried to infiltrate this area. Unlike the others... he has a heart. So we teamed up to help each other."

Young Aether frowned and nodded quietly. He glanced at her for a moment, his expression becoming slightly more thoughtful.

Lily blinked as she sensed his deep stare.

"W-What?"

"Well, I just remembered... You’re only thirteen and already doing shady things."

Lily’s lips twitched as she flipped her hair over her shoulder, trying to hide the slight embarrassment that had lingered on her face.

"That’s why I told you not to treat me like a child."

Young Aether fell silent, but inwardly, he thought,

’He is that boy... Yeah. He... is the Arcane King during No. 25’s timeline.’

He never expected to meet him... Not like this, and certainly not with Lily knowing him.

What kind of weird fate was this?

Soon, Lucas returned and guided them toward a sleek, black car.

After entering the vehicle, Lucas started the engine and drove through the unpaved road. The tyres rolled over loose stones and shallow puddles, producing a steady rhythm beneath the low hum of the engine.

Unlike before, there was no one in the settlement now.

The streets were completely empty.

Only the occasional creaking of a damaged structure disturbed the silence, while the abandoned shelters stood motionless on either side of the road.

Lily quietly asked Lucas, who was sitting in the driver’s seat beside her, "How are things going?"

Lucas’s faint smile disappeared.

He remained silent for several seconds before finally sighing and shaking his head. His fingers tightened slightly around the steering wheel.

"Things have gotten hard..." His voice carried a tiredness that seemed far deeper than simple exhaustion.

"The men have been pushed to their limits these past few days. Their workload has increased exponentially, and some of them haven’t even been given enough time to rest properly."

He stared at the empty road ahead.

"And so far, thousands have died over the past week."

Lily’s expression slowly hardened.

"Thousands... in just one week?"

Lucas gave a bitter smile.

Lily lowered her gaze for a moment before quietly asking, "Is it because... Delta Division?"

Lucas’s expression tensed as he nodded. "Yes... Delta Division is going to war with another world, so they needed more materials. We had no choice but to push these people harder..." His fingers tightened around the steering wheel.

"And... even a few children were crushed and killed inside the factories..." His voice dropped, and for a moment, the anger disappeared from his face, leaving only a painful heaviness behind.

Lily fell silent.

She did not ask how it happened.

She did not ask how many children there were.

Perhaps she already knew that there were questions whose answers only made the truth harder to bear.

Lucas clenched his fist, "If those motherfuckers didn’t win the war—"

"They lost," Lily interrupted.

Lucas blinked before slowly glancing at her. "Lost? You mean... all our hard work and the deaths of thousands went in vain?"

Lily remained silent.

She knew there was no comforting answer she could give him. Whether those people had died for victory or defeat, their graves would not care about the difference.

"FUCK!!" Lucas shouted furiously, slamming his fist against the steering wheel.

Young Aether remained quiet, watching Lucas from the back seat. He could hear the anger in the man’s voice, but beneath that anger was something far more painful... guilt?

It was the kind of guilt that did not come from killing someone with your own hands, but from knowing that people had suffered and died while you were powerless to stop it.

Young Aether smiled softly, ’It’s just a game to gods...’ he thought.

The car continued moving through the silent settlement.

Soon, the car came to a halt in front of a small, broken wooden house.

Lily stepped out of the car.

"Are you sure about this?" Lucas asked in a serious tone. His expression had become noticeably more cautious. "This is the Governor’s favourite spot. If we enter, they’ll receive a notification, and... things might get worse."

Lily simply smiled.

"It’s alright... You stay here."

She pulled the cloak over her head and looked toward Young Aether, who had already stepped out of the car.

Young Aether followed her without saying anything.

Lily and Young Aether walked toward the door.

Lily raised her hand and softly knocked on the door.

For a second, there was nothing.

She knocked again.

Then a voice came from inside.

"This belongs to Governor Zeta. Please leave."

Lily stared at the door for a moment.

She continued knocking, again and again, each knock becoming more impatient than the last.

Thud!

The door opened as the voice followed.

"What the hell do you want? Didn’t you hear me? I said this belongs to Governor Zeta!"

!!

Young Aether’s eyes widened when he saw her.