"The intruder has broken through the P-Sector blockade! He is moving toward the transport helipad at high speed!"
"Where are the divine machines? Deploy Heimdall to the battlefield!"
"Heimdall is too far from his flight path!"
"We cannot let him leave!"
The command center was a mess because of today's uninvited guest. The continuous breach alerts had numbed them; this person knew the layout of KaliYuga better than they did with their maps. In the blink of an eye, he had left their men behind, appearing and disappearing like a ghost.
Now, that person was charging toward the helipad...
...
With a kick to the transport plane's door, the metal buckled. Lin drew his blade and sliced through it like tofu, then turned and fired a grenade.
Boom!
The heat wave briefly stalled the sea of incoming machines and Fusion Warriors. Lin rushed into the cockpit, switched the plane to manual flight, and used his helmet's system to hack the plane and forcibly override the lock.
Missiles locked onto his transport, but Lin calmly operated the plane's machine guns, maneuvering the fuselage nimbly to shoot down the missiles. Then, he fired his own missiles at the protective shield.
Boom!
The shield was blasted open. The transport plane immediately soared out of the floating fortress.
"Launch transports immediately for interception..."
Boom!
Before the command center could finish the order, the other transport planes on the helipad erupted in violent explosions!
Even the floating fortress beneath their feet shook.
Before boarding, Lin had conveniently tossed some grenades into the engines of the other transports.
The personnel and machines could only watch helplessly as the transport plane performed a mid-air loop and sped off into the distance...
Lin took off his helmet and sat in the pilot's seat, head lowered, silently clenching his fists.
...
Bang!
Lin arm trembled as he gasped for air. Smoke still drifted from the handgun's muzzle. The air was deathly silent.
Less than a centimeter from the Fusion Warrior's head was a bullet hole. The man was so terrified he couldn't even scream; his bloodless face was whiter than the wall, and his lips whiter than his face.
Lin had missed.
His hand had trembled the moment the bullet left the barrel. The bullet that should have pierced the skull failed to hit its mark.
No, it wasn't a tremor.
He couldn't miss.
If Lin used a bullet to hit a target, he couldn't fail.
Unless he didn't want to.
What have I done...
Lin clutched the hair at his temples, his mind a chaotic whirl of overlapping images and voices: blurry smiling faces, unfinished sentences, people falling to the ground...
He had fired.
He had fired with the sole intent of killing a person.
Regardless of the outcome, at that moment, he had pulled the trigger.
All the promises he had made, all the oaths he had kept, all the responsibilities he bore—they had all vanished with that shot.
He had done the exact same thing as the Fire Moth high command.
Those who had trusted him, those who had sacrificed for him, those who loved him... he had personally...
Stripped away their meaning.
.....
"Traitors?"
The female voice sounded confused by Mei's question. "You haven't heard him mention it?"
Mei recalled the situation. "Although Kalpas and Mobius mentioned it, everyone—including themselves—seems unwilling to discuss the details of the 'traitors.' And I didn't think it was right to ask him directly."
"Then you truly are kind." It was impossible to tell if the female voice was being sarcastic or sincere. "Don't worry, that guy treats opening his own wounds like a daily routine. Even if he's dying to punch you deep down, he'll tell you those stories with a flat expression on the surface."
"...It seems my decision not to ask was wise."
"Then I'll tell you. Let's start with the roots of Fire Moth." The female voice paused to organize her thoughts. "The origins of the Fire Moth organization are far more complex than you imagine. Your current era has a similar organization."
Mei's brow darkened. "Schicksal..."
"Of course, compared to Schicksal's reliance on religious forms, Fire Moth was a bit simpler." The female voice was mostly level; Mei wondered if it was her imagination, but aside from occasional bursts of emotion, the way the voice spoke was very similar to Lin. "It had a predecessor like a shadow UN. At that time, it didn't possess the political and economic power that later dominated the globe, and its leaders weren't directly heads of state or major organizations. It was just a slightly special organization."
Because of the previous warning, Mei knew the voice hated being interrupted, so she listened quietly as the voice began to describe that hazy era.
"But the hidden danger was buried then. In the process of 'Pre-Moth' becoming Fire Moth, the positions, values, and interests of those who joined were extremely complex. In their effort to 'place the world's resources at their disposal,' Fire Moth became a dominator while being a savior. And the high command dominated Fire Moth."
"Can you imagine a group of less than a hundred people who can manipulate the world at will? Or you could compare it to your former organization. That leader—even if his sphere of influence didn't match Fire Moth's, within his own domain, he was an omnipotent god."
The female voice stopped again. Mei felt it was okay to speak now and asked, "So you mean there were major conflicts among the Fire Moth high command?"
"Hah. There once were. But after the Sixth Eruption... it would be more accurate to say they became united."
The sarcasm in the voice was intentional. Mei fell silent.
"The high command shares a common trait: they are all 'dominators.' Since all power and resources flow from them, they have absolute dominance over Fire Moth. That is to say, Fire Moth is less an organization of different people and more their private property."
"Their thoughts are the organization's thoughts. Their plans are the organization's plans. Even if they deviate from their original intent, or reveal their true colors... they are still not the organization's traitors."
"In that case, then who is the traitor?"
After several seconds of thought, Mei let out a long breath.
"Those who oppose them... are the traitors."
Anti-Entropy was a group of traitors to Schicksal.
But Anti-Entropy was formed to resist Schicksal and protect humanity.
"Correct. But unfortunately, perhaps what others care about isn't this 'betrayal'."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean... I have something to attend to. I'll be away for a bit."
Mid-sentence, the female voice became cold and immediately vanished.
"..."
Mei leaned against the wall, pondering her words...