As of April 25, 2022, this chapter has been revised

Cent. Calendar 10/05/1639 (DD/MM/YYYY), Ministry of Defense, Tokyo, Japan, 21:30

It was getting late at night in the Ministry of Defense in Tokyo, Japan. The air in the main building was hectic at best and depressing at the worst–a scene that reflected the entirety of Japan’s woes in the three weeks since appearing in Asherah. In one of the rooms of the highest echelons of the ministry toiled away Okada Masako, Minister of Defense. Checking reports and approving and denying papers and such, her eyes were still glued onto her computer screen as the distant wails of sirens continued to play outside. Due to rotating electrical blackouts and general restrictions imposed on electricity usage, an effort to curb the consumption of now extremely precious non-renewables, the only objects in her office that still consume electricity were her computer and her telephone. While opening the window to let more air in would have been a bad choice before the transfer, the lack of cars, given that unnecessary road travel was prohibited, meant that the air was cleaner.

As she finished the reply to an email, she heard a pattern of knocks on her door, a sequence that she immediately recognized.

“You don’t have to knock on my door, Matsumoto-kun.”

The door creaked as it slowly opened, revealing the figure of one Matsumoto Akira, a man in his late 20s and secretary of Okada.

“I still think it’s down to respect, Minister.”

Matsumoto responded with poise as he closed the door behind him.

“Should I take that as a compliment, then?”

Okada retorted without looking away from her screen, still finishing her reply to another email. As Matsumoto drew closer to her desk, she finally let her eyes off her screen to entertain the presence of her secretary, looking up at his fair face and young, innocent eyes. Wishing to wrap up his work and head home for the night, Matsumoto raised his hand, which was holding an envelope, and said, “Here’s the report.” Just as he was about to leave it on the desk and leave, Okada cried out.

“Wait.”

He looked back at Okada with a face that said, “Yes?”

“Come over here.”

Matsumoto hesitated, not knowing what the command meant. Seeing his confusion, Okada distanced herself away from the table on her office chair, and then beckoned to him with her extended arms.

“Here.”

Finally understanding what she meant, Matsumoto navigated around the desk towards Okada’s side.

“Turn around.”

Doing as she says, he turned about-face towards the wall with his back facing Okada. Just as he was about to ask her about what she was going to do, he felt the mellow, all-encompassing touch of a person’s arms locking onto his entire waist, along with the sensation of warm breaths intermittently blowing against his back. Aware of what was going on but still holding doubts, Matsumoto spoke up.

“Minister Okada?”

Silence. At least for a good ten seconds. In that time, his back muscles, originally tense and shivering from the sudden physical contact, had loosened and relaxed to accommodate the tight lock of the minister’s slender arms.

Then, he finally got a reply from the minister, whose face was firmly lodged onto his broad back.

“Don’t move.”

Heeding her command, Matsumoto stood still as he felt her embrace further clamp on his person. Even though he wanted to go home already, Matsumoto knew that he was not in the position to spoil this somber moment. Laying down his hovering arms, he put his firm, manly hands onto Okada’s. Sensing her secretary’s comforting gesture on her own tired, droopy arms, she loosened her guard and let go of her usual steely disposition.

“God... I’m so tired, Akira-kun...”

Jerking in surprise at his superior’s sudden use of his personal name, Matsumoto quickly started sweating bullets. Hoping to redirect the topic back to work, he quickly raised his left arm, still holding the report that he was supposed to give to the minister.

“Minister... The report... It’s regarding the Lourian troop buildup... The recon flight has returned...”

Silence.

Okada simply tightened her grip, possibly irked by the mere mention of work–work that she wished she could ignore and not return to.

“Why did they send it physically?”

“Minister... You asked for it.”

“Oh...”

Hearing his superior’s relatively wimpy “Oh...” had Matsumoto blush. While he had caught glimpses of his superior’s soft side before, he wasn’t expecting to witness it personally and upfront.

“Okay, you can put it on the table.”

Just as Matsumoto did as she asked, he heard a very faint sniff coming from his back. Despite the unnerved presentation of herself in public appearances and in meetings, he somehow finds it natural for her also to have her breaking points.

It has been a very shitty three weeks, after all...

The sounds of police sirens outside got louder and louder. Hearing the tireless repetition of alarming sounds in this calm situation, Matsumoto remembered his own tribulations in the horrible period that were the previous three weeks. In the moments after he looked up and sighed deeply, he felt Okada’s embrace loosen for the first time. The two then moved away from each other, with Matsumoto laying eyes on a different Okada from the one he had last seen. Hoping to at least save some face, even from her own secretary, she hurriedly wiped away semblances of tears from her eyes and cheeks. Despite her best attempts, she could not put away her red eyes and wipe away the tears that had stained Matsumoto’s jacket.

“I’m sorry that you had to deal with that.”

Returning to her usual, formal manner of speech, the mood in the room was well on its way to returning back to normal. With the words stuck in his throat, Matsumoto struggled to say something to the still recuperating minister. Before he finally found the will and strength to speak, Okada raised her hand.

“You may go home now.”

With that, he swallowed the words that had just reached the tip of his tongue. Matsumoto then sealed his mouth shut and bowed before making himself scarce. Taking one last look before closing the door behind him, he saw the same scene of the minister toiling away on her computer, having now returned to her sense of duty and professionalism.

Cent. Calendar 07/05/1639, somewhere in Hyogo prefecture, 15:00

“Shit!”

Pestered by the incessant ringing of her home phone while tending to her daughter and her homework, one Izumi Hikari had inadvertently tripped on her matting.

With the ringing telephone mercilessly blasting away its annoying chime in endless repetition, Izumi recovered from her fall and fixed her now messy chestnut hair. As she traveled to the other end of the room where the telephone was, her tracks were then stopped by another noise coming from behind her.

“Okaa-san! What does ‘shit’ mean?”

Her 4-year-old daughter had now learned how to curse. Irked and completely out of it, she simply cursed herself for her blunder as a single mother.

“I’ll hafta get back to ya, Sayaka!”

Kicking that proverbial can down the road, she went on to finally pick up the phone.

“Hello?”

Another annoying voice clawed at her ears from beyond the phone before she could even complete her hello.

“Yo, Hikari-chan! ‘This a bad time?”

Instantly recognizing the voice on the other end of the line, Izumi let out a loud, hopefully, audible-to-the-other-end sigh. Coupling it with a facepalm, she finally responded to the other person’s greetings after two gritty seconds of asking herself, “why the fuck...”

“What is it, Kita? It’s our scheduled break from the mandatory labor program... Curse my luck!”

The person on the other end, Kita Michi, was a close friend of hers.

After having gone through middle school and high school together, they then went their separate ways when Kita was held back a year in high school while Izumi moved on to Keio University in Tokyo, taking up Archaeology and then later a Masters and a Doctorate in History. Kita followed suit, taking up Archaeology at Hiroshima University and later moving to Keio for her Masters and Doctorate. Both of them ended up teaching undergraduate courses at Keio, much to the chagrin of the more senior Izumi. After the transfer, at which point higher education institutions were either closed or forced to operate at reduced capacity to redirect labor towards urgent and important sectors, Izumi returned to her home city of Kobe in Hyogo prefecture. Since then, she hasn’t spoken to many of her colleagues in Keio, including her long-time friend.

“Same ‘ere! Anyway, did’ja receive an email from yer department?”

“My laptop broke after the transfer, and I can’t get it fixed since most shops have closed down.”

“Yer phone?”

“Sayaka has been playing on it, and I don’t really get the time off to check it...”

After a momentary pause, Izumi finally realized what receiving an email from the department may entail. Hot on the heels of this realization, she quickly broke the silence.

“Wait, we’re being called back???”

“Nah, Keio U’s still closed... Anyway, I’ll be forwardin’ the email over to ya, so check yer phone!”

Hearing her phone notification chime go off, Izumi quickly walked over to pick it up. Unlocking the simple swipe lock on her phone, she then opened her email and checked the newly forwarded one on the topmost part. After opening it, she read out loud the subject title.

“”Recruitment for a commission from the government regarding Asheran archaeological sites”?”

“Yeah! That’s da one!”

“Not gonna lie... I have been interested in the cultures of this supposed new world. If only there weren’t so many pressing problems at hand!”

“True that. Anyway, I beckon ya read further. There’s a shitton more to it than just archaeological sites.”

Egged on by her friend, she scrolled down to read the main body of the email. Scrolling past and ignoring the formal introduction from their department, she went straight for the juicier parts below.

“They’re recruiting archaeologists, historians, linguists, and those from related fields?”

“Not just any frickin’ archaeologist! Read deeper, dammit!”

Blissfully ignoring her friend’s friendly banter, Izumi looked further into the recruitment details; finally getting to the weirder parts.

“Hm? The fuck? They’re looking for historians with expertise in Japanese military wartime records? Why? They’re also looking for those with expertise in infrastructure from the early Showa period? This is too niche and specific, don’t you think?”

“Yep! Sounds intriguing, doesn’t it? The commission, assembled from the good ‘ol government, for studying them Asheran archaeological sites, and they’re looking for those with Showa-era expertise? Like... It sounds hella interestin’!”

While the prospect of the commission coming from the government warranted more than enough suspicion on its own, the details of the recruitment were equally sketchy, if not even more so. Her curiosity, now undeniably piqued, had her clawing for evidence to quell her own suspicions. In this pursuit, something came to mind.

“Hey, Kita. Remember that elven princess showing a rising sun flag in the Diet last week? Maybe it has something to do with that?”

“Yer onto somethin’ there! So does that count that’cha wanna do it?”

Investigating archaeological sites in a new world felt like an otherworldly opportunity. However, her own pressing issues close to home kept her down to earth.

“I don’t think I can...”

“Didja even read it all? It says ‘ere that the government will pay us fair compensation, which is up for negotiation, and that they’ll provide lodging and basic necessities! Ain’t that a steal?!”

That did sound appealing. Izumi had been struggling with helping her daughter through her preschool, having spent the majority of her time in Tokyo, with Sayaka having to stay with her grandparents back in Kobe. While she felt obligated to help her as her mother, she did want to have an escape from her motherly duties and her obligations as a citizen. Taking what she still assumed to be bait from Kita, she relented.

“Alright, I’ll consider. I need to know more about the details, though.”

To be continued in the ‘Emissaries’ side story

Cent. Calendar 19/04/1639, Otaheit, Mu, 2:30

Things were... absolutely splendid, if not downright glorious.

The enemies that had once assaulted the united realms of Mu were now firmly defeated–a feat that the ancestors of all Muish people had long dreamed of attaining. Those bastards across the pond to the east, the imperial worshippers of the vanity of Mirish, have been silenced by the ever-present, ever-expanding, exceptional Muish armies for good. The backwater larpers, the Leiforians off to the west, gunned down to the ground, their blood to stain the earth for eons to come.

On top of the overthrown statue of Mirish in Runepolis, its silver edifices and golden crown soundly stripped of their dignity,  was a man so brilliant and cunning, he single-handedly led the invasion force that easily toppled the fragile Imperial forces as soon as the first boots made contact with the fragile Central World sand. Waving his hands at crowds of cheering Muish soldiers, civilians, and children, he smiled triumphantly as everyone cheered in song his name: "Theodore! Theodore! Theodore!"

Just as he began to join in the chanting, he began to feel that something was off. The chorus of praises soon faded away, followed by the silhouettes in the crowd being reduced to sand dispersing into the air.

Stepping down from the toppled statue of Mirish in confusion, he found himself alone in a rapidly disappearing landscape. Desperate for company, he was looking around when he came across one silhouette that had remained, staring back at him with emotionless eyes and an equally nonchalant expression. The silhouette, that of a woman, revealed its features to him. She wore bright clothing emanating rays of soothing golden glow, the details of which were indiscernible and unrecognizable, with the only thing Theodore being able to take from her was that she was divine.

The woman continued to look at him, as if waiting for him to say out loud a realization that he wanted to keep to himself that was either out of shame or lack of necessity. Still...

"So it was all just a dream... A century’s worth of humanity, and yet I still fall folly to unattainable desires."

For the first time, the woman finally moved, turning half a side away from him as a faint smile appeared on her face. When her mouth opened to speak, he heard a voice so unusually calming that it felt as if he would never forget it, if not for the fact that he was dreaming.

"You, of all people, know how desires are not entirely unattainable. “Nothing wit and will could not solve”–in your own words."

Feeling mildly disturbed by the woman's statement, Theodore looked away, off to the sunset that he pretended existed.

"It's been nice talking to my subconscious. I have no idea why I had to take the form of a beautiful woman, but I digress. Farewell."

Unilaterally withdrawing from a conversation with what he assumed to be his subconscious, he closed his eyes.

Wake up.

Two seconds passed. Three. Four. Thirty. A minute.

It felt as if nothing had changed.

He felt not a single tingle in his hair strands reacting to the chill wind that would blow within his chambers, nor the ungodly cloth that gave him the power to conquer sleepless nights as soon as it touched his skin. The gravity of the world pulling him down laterally all across his body still eluded him.

Wishing he was wrong, he opened his eyes, which unfortunately shattered his expectations as he found himself in a bright, white landscape devoid of features. Worst of all, the only feature that managed to stand out from the barrage of white was the figure of the same beautiful woman standing before. Freezing in disbelief, he watched on as the woman took soundless steps towards his person, the unrecognizable features on her apparel reacting to the subtleties in her movements. Soon, he found himself staring at the woman's gorgeous, crystalline eyes at point-blank range. As he started to sweat from subconscious fears welling up, the woman broke the silence.

"Theodore Gabrielle Leonard Aldher. A man of many titles. Sovereign of the United Realms and Dominions of Mu."

The woman grinned after having named him, the sovereign monarch of Mu. Ignoring Theodore’s now apparent confusion, the woman continued.

"I am Shamash. Goddess of the Sun."

"A goddess? Lady, that’s not how you introduce yourself to a king like me."

Pushing aside Theodore’s remark, the woman who called herself Shamash gripped Theodore's right hand and held it up at face level. Despite calling herself a goddess and appearing as such, her hands felt awfully human; warm, slender, motherly.

"You will wake up from this dream and return to a different Asherah: an Asherah irreversibly changed."

After having pressed it for a good amount of time, she let go of Theodore's hand before looking at his still befuddled eyes with an ominous glare.

"When you wake up again, the sun will rise, this time from the far east."

"But that's how it's always been, hasn't it?"

The woman shook her head.

"I command the sun, but this sun is different. Its 16 bright rays will extend outwards, first the east, and then the west, before finally engulfing the world in light..."

After a slight, discomforting pause, the woman removed her ominous glare and returned to her indifference.

"...A light born from the embers of a ruined Asherah, or in the glorious rays of prosperity."

Theodore shuddered. What is this woman yapping on about? As if hearing his inner thoughts, the woman leaned forward, eager to answer them.

"You, as the king of Mu, proud descendant and bearer of her legacy, get to decide which of those will happen. This “other” sun... it will be the key to your future."

Exhaling from the pent-up tension, Theodore wanted to speak.

Before he could, however, the entire ‘place’ that he was in turned pitch black. The woman’s divine presence disappeared from his senses, leaving Theodore truly alone.

Then, he felt the highly intense heat of hellfire burning all over his body. As he struggled to put out the imaginary fires that had suddenly come upon him, out of nowhere the ‘place’ that he was in gained form, manifesting into the darkened flaming ruins of a building. Looking outwards, he saw the indomitable silhouette of a city’s skyline, one which he immediately recognized, but it was perverted by the massive cloud of fire and mana that protruded from somewhere off in the distance. Immediately, he forgot the scorching heat that had assaulted him, replaced by his urge to fall down on his knees and weep.

"O–Otaheit! No!!!"

The glorious capital of the united realm was in flames.

Just as the first teardrop formed in the corner of his eyes, something caught his attention. Far off beyond the extensive girth of the mushroom cloud that had devastated the beloved capital of the great kingdom, he saw something parting away from the clouds of destruction–something inherently menacing. The pain in his knees gave way to jitters as terror gripped his thinking, made worse by each passing second he spent looking at what he recognized from some text that he had seen long ago.

"The ancient empire?! Here?! Already?!"

Now on his rear, he instinctively scampered away from what he and the rest of the world had come to know as evil incarnate. However, before he could fully retreat, his back pushed hard against a wall, the shock of which caused loose debris from the destroyed roof to fall on his head, knocking him out.

Immediately afterward, the blazing heat from the dream was replaced by the familiar, chilling wind offered by the air conditioning that he usually fell asleep to. Drowning in sweat at the unforgettable dream, Theodore rose from his slumber, wiping away the perspiration that had built up over his face. As he tried to wipe away the greasy sweat with his clenched right fist, he felt that he was gripping something hard and circular. Relaxing his tense fingers and spreading them out to reveal his palm, he saw a shiny, metallic, circular object.

Not knowing what it was, he got up, went to his study, and turned on the lamp to further examine the object. What greeted him under the warm light of scrutiny was a small, silver coin of a currency that he didn't recognize. Engraved on the coin were strange symbols in an alien language which said, The State of Japan, 100 YEN, Heisei 30 (2018).

"What the hell is this coin? I've never seen this writing before! How on Asherah did I get my hands on this?"

Answering him almost immediately, the intact memories of the dream that he had come back to him, reminding him of the goddess's angelic voice. Recalling the woman taking his right hand for some moments, he came to the conclusion that the coin in his hand was definitive proof that the dream was real and that her words were genuine. Playing her words back in the honey-like voice that he couldn’t force himself to forget, he came across some lines which he considered instrumental.

"Its 16 bright rays will extend outwards, first the east, and then the west, before finally engulfing the world in light..."

Theodore took a deep breath as his legs started shivering from the memories of the more horrible parts.

"This... This is a matter of great concern!"