No Second Chances: The Beginning Of The End

Upon opening her eyes, Gree noticed she could only see from one of her eyes. Quickly addressing the situation, the fact that she is alive meant that Lawrence got killed, which calmed her a bit. After realizing she was missing an arm and a leg, Gree attempted to look around to see who was in the room with her, seeing Elvira sleeping in a chair in front of her bed. A memory came to her mind and her heart sunk, realizing the most probable reason for her being alive is because Phil was there. Her suspicions were that Phil most likely was killed, but Gree didn’t want to think about the matter anymore. “Where…is Sinns?” –She faintly asked while trying to make an effort to speak.

Elvira suddenly opened her eyes while raising her head to look at Gree. “She was taken by people from Delcyt, Chronos tried to stop them but one of them had a custom weapon you made.” –She explained while keeping eye contact with Gree.

“Did… Chronos…?” –Gree attempted to ask before being interrupted by Elvira.

“No, he is actually better than he should, he might be resting now. Hopefully, he will recover fast.” –Elvira answered without letting Gree speaking too much. With a faint sigh, Gree closed her eyes again, falling asleep while Elvira walked out to search for the doctors and ask about Gree’s condition, to which they weren’t really positive.

On the other side of Casamira, Lorenz began to take care of the damage done to the structures while looking through Ivan’s belongings in his office, noticing a couple of weird items among the pile he salvaged. A box with his and Gree’s names was intact in one of Ivan’s desk drawers, leading to a key to open a certain part of his workshop that no one else had access to. As this was something Lorenz didn’t know about, he went to the town hall almost immediately and search for any place where the key would fit. Under the main desk, there was a small keyhole that Lorenz noticed after a couple of hours of searching in the office. Once he placed the key in, the keyhole began to turn on itself and the floor next to the desk opened a trapdoor which revealed a stairway that lead to Ivan’s workshop. As he walked down the stairs, Lorenz noticed several pieces of different equipment that resembled exoskeletons and lead Lorenz to sit on one of the chairs to stare at them in awe. After taking a look at the equipment, Lorenz attempted to log in to the pc that was there in a table with several attachments for the exoskeletons and found several recordings that were directed to him and Gree as well.

“Lorenz, this recording is specially directed to you, since you will take care of Casamira for me, you will also notice there are several things left in here. The main thing you need to know is that the equipment here is, indeed, for military purposes.” –The recording briefly stops as Ivan sighs. “I saw something that goes beyond what we could imagine. It was a disease that will plague the world as it once did, but I won’t be around to be able to help. So I will entrust this work to someone called Grace Myers, the group she travels with is of utmost importance to what is going to happen to Falladis in the near future.” –The recording ends there following with the computer showing several more files with information regarding the blueprints of the exoskeletons and several more devices to measure the number of certain elements in the environment.

A note in front of Ivan’s pc showed some special instruction for Gree, to which Lorenz realized that Ivan might have been able to see more than just his death but also the fact that she would lose some of her limbs. “Use these for your recovery, Gree.” –The note had written on it while a code leading to a safe in the workshop required that same code. Right after opening the safe, Lorenz could see prosthetic limbs that could be adjusted to the owner. This finding immediately calmed Lorenz down, as it meant Gree would survive to use the equipment, according to Ivan.

In Delcyt, Cristobal and his team reported what they witnessed while following Lawrence, and how they took action to retrieve the target, which was Sinns. The report stated the loss of Lawrence and the dragon he controlled, confirming that Elvira was alive as well as another individual that helped her kill Lawrence. As Yan kept reading the report, his eyes widened when he saw Gree’s name in it. Gree was reported to be dead as well as the one she took before going missing from the research facility, this was referred to be Phil but the picture taken from afar couldn’t confirm it since the body was decapitated. With this information, Yan proceed to check on Sinns, who was in a comatose state due to prolonged use of the drugs that weaken her. Once he confirmed the reports were correct, Yan decided to make a call to prepare a meeting with the Ruler of the Federation of Orst, Christina. Besides Christina, Yan contacted another benefactor who would agree on bringing him help upon receiving a very important active he currently possessed, which was Sinns. After hesitating a couple of minutes due to the proposal and the weight it has over the future, Yan accepted the deal as the outcome of his plan would still require using Sinns as a very valuable active for research, given her assimilation of the virus. Once Cristobal submitted his report, a next mission was given to him and his team, which was to carry Sinns to the religious nation of Metan in order to carry out a ritual for Aster.

Once Eloise went back to the capital of Falladis after her meeting in Metan, a report was given to her about the situation with the bordering town of Casamira and how some terrorists from Delcyt lead by a guardian ended up killing several people along with the commander of the patrolling unit, and guardian associated with the Falladis militia, Charles Ford. Upon reading this, she could only feel anger and nausea, quickly realizing it was Yan who pulled the strings for this to happen.

There was a press conference given by the ruler of Delcyt, announcing the aggressions and cover-ups Falladis have been doing in order to harm Delcyt. Most of the questions were related to the future of the border between Delcyt and Falladis, and the answer seemed to be war. To the reporters, the idea of war was outrageous due to the military power that repelled the Federation of Orst. The reporters made Yan speak the truth behind genetically enhanced soldiers that would serve the nation and conquer Falladis to end the possible war.

The reporters naturally demanded evidence of the situation, and so Yan began to show them images taken by Cristobal’s team of a location destroyed near the border, as well and several other pictures of dead and half-eaten soldiers who ended up being victims of Lawrence’s dragon, but Yan covered it up as a terrorist action from Falladis in a way to kidnap his daughter and use her as a hostage. In the images, it was shown how Elvira brutally killed Lawrence and so Yan used this as a way to point her out as a terrorist and traitor to the nation. After the reporters saw the images, a sudden silence filled the conference room; a couple of them stood up and asked once again about the upcoming war and how it will affect Delcyt and the overall stability of the militia.

Back in Casamira, Gree kept resting as several life support devices were keeping her alive. Elvira could only help the town by removing rubble and digging tombs for the victims of the destruction produced. On the other hand, Lorenz was still looking around Ivan’s workshop as the soldiers were mounting guard in the area in case there was something else happening.

A convoy approached the town from the inner side of Falladis, but it was stopped by the soldiers who needed some confirmation of the identity of the one in charge of the transport. It happened to be Ali, who received bad news from his contacts about Casamira, so he went back to check on what happened.

As Ali arrived, the soldiers guarding the gates requested for his personal identification and permits of transport along with licenses, which he naturally had and showed. To his surprise, the town seemed to be in better shape than he expected. However, he couldn’t help but feel a knot on his stomach while thinking it was such a beautiful place a week ago. The convoy cargo happened to be resources funded by Ali himself to help feed the victims of the horrible event.

Elvira was called by Lorenz who was done with reading and hearing instructions left by Ivan inside of his workshop. She was clueless of the reason but couldn’t brush it off as something unimportant. As she walked into the town hall and notice the absence of Lorenz, Elvira simply looked around to see several people cleaning the inside of the building, trying to take off the stains and the bodies that Lawrence left behind.

Lorenz then popped out of Ivan’s office and invited Elvira, who was waiting outside, to go in. The main objective of this brief meeting was to let Elvira know about Ivan’s workshop, but to his surprise, Elvira seemed to be familiarized with some of the equipment she came in contact with, denoting, she has already since similar devices in the past. “Do you by any chance know if in Delcyt they have developed these kinds of exoskeletons?” –Lorenz asked as he caught Elvira’s attention while she was tinkering with the devices.

“Honestly speaking, it is harder to imagine them not perfecting anything that they deem important, so your question is a bit off since it is a nation with a very strong military. However, I think these devices Ivan left here, don’t seem very… conventional..” –Elvira replied while letting the armor on its spot, as she took a glance of the prosthetic limbs while her eyes widened.