1 Chapter 1 - The Anomaly

In a distant world, atop a large rock formation, in the middle of a vast jungle, far from the bustle of cities, was a small outpost. It was neither a military complex, nor a sanctuary of leisure, but a settlement made for scholars. Its singular purpose was to house those who studied the anomaly, a most curious phenomenon in which that world was located.

Of course, this phenomenon was much, much larger than that tiny little world, it was larger than all the worlds and all the stars put together. This was due to the fact that the anomaly was reality itself, or rather the reality contained within that particular realm of existence. There were scholars studying each and every realm, but that one baffled them all. It was unique, with very unusual characteristics. While other realms were smooth and harmonious, that one was quite erratic and unpredictable. This was why they called it an anomaly, instead of giving it a proper name.Now, as bewildered as the scholar community was with the appearance of this anomaly, when sentient beings began to emerge within it... That was when it truly caught everyone's attention. Even the empress, far away, in her pompous palace, had learned of it. That small outpost, just as the others like it, was quickly filled to capacity, with several expansions underway. Those outposts were built in specific locations, where the flow of ether was especially intense. Every scholar worth their light wanted to take a closer look at the ethereal readings and try making sense of it... though none had succeeded.One man, however, seemed to be getting nerve-rackingly close to a breakthrough. It was an unpleasant affair, not because he hadn't yet confirmed his suspicions, but because, if he did, it would lead him deep into territory that many in the community considered taboo. And so, he found himself wishing he were somehow wrong, that some new piece of information would arise to veer him away from his current path.As he sat there in his small study, lost in thought, rain thrashed against his windows, and lightning ignited the night skies, followed by the unmistakable rumble of thunder. It rained there most of the time, but it didn't bother him much. In fact, it somewhat reminded him of his homeworld, though the rain there wasn't quite as vicious. He was an aldor, a blue skinned man, with pointy ears. His kind originated from a misty land, where rain was the norm. The only thing he required was temperature regulation. The heat of the tropics was merciless, unlike the weather back home, which was much milder.Someone knocked at his door, disrupting his memories.He quickly rolled up the scroll he had been working on, sat up straight, and said, "Yes, come in."It was a curious looking woman, with curved horns sprouting from her head and goat legs, like a faun. She was wearing a scholar's robe, much like his. "Tenri," she greeted him, with a cute grin, "I'm done for the day. I'm ready to go wollow in the misery of underlingship? Want to join me? I have pixie whiskey." She pulled a bottle of luminous green liquid from within her robe. "Galant Grove flavor."He smiled at her, "Yula, you and your illegal substances. Where do you even acquire this stuff?""We neexs have our methods," she insinuated, before revealing nonchalantly, "There are a bunch of merchants at the docks. You think we're the only ones who need this to survive living in this forsaken place? Besides, it's not illegal. They can't arrest us for it.""You are right, of course," he said sarcastically, "It merely goes against guild policy. At most, it would land us an expulsion from the sanctum.""Oh, stop with the drama, Tenri. No one gets expelled over a drink of pixie whiskey," she insisted, "Besides, you seemed perfectly willing to share a bottle with me last week.""I did not think it would become a tradition," he sighed, before the smile faded from his face, "Although... I suspect I am in need of a drink right now."She studied his eyes, "Why? What happened?""Nothing really," he dismissed, "It is just the anomaly... I cannot stop thinking about its erratic nature. It tests my sanity.""Oh?" she glanced curiously at his desk, "Can I see?""Of course," he opened his scroll again and showed her his notes. There was a smooth parabolic line, with the title Humessian Realm, at the top of the parchment, with another much squigglier line springing from it, with the title The Anomaly. Around them were a bunch of symbols and numbers, like arcane calculations.At a glance, she knew what she was looking at. "These are the readings we got from the anomaly... I suppose we should stop calling it that. As erratic as that line looks, it IS a functional realm. What are they calling it now? Do you know?""Humanor," he answered her, "Realm of the Humans. Grandmaster Meifeln told me they named it just a few days ago.""Oh," she accepted, without much of a reaction, then went back to looking through his notes, "So... what exactly are you working on? This all looks like old data."He hesitated quietly.Looking up at him again, she inquired, "What's the matter?""I was merely going through the readings again," he finally said, "to make sure I did not commit any errors... and it seems to be in order." He went silent again, clearly troubled by something."Tenri," she called him softly, "what's wrong? I know you like being all enigmatic, but this is a bit much. We've known each other since we were young pupils at the sanctum. You know you can trust me, right?""Yes," he quickly confirmed, "You are the one person I would trust in the whole of the scholar community.""Then just tell me," she insisted, "What is it that's bothering you so much?""Well," he let go of his insecurities and began to slowly reveal his line of thought, "You must have seen the preliminary analysis of the native souls, yes? They came in this morning.""The soul scans?" she wondered, "Yes, I've seen them. Everyone was talking about it, how humans have almost as much darkness in them as they have light. It's crazy... much like their realm." She peered out the window. "Look at it. It gets so dark out there you can barely see a thing... especially with this wretched weather.""Yes!" he agreed emphatically, "That is part of it as well... I know it is a running joke, that darkness is everywhere here, but when I saw that preliminary analysis... Yula, it is not that these humans have ALMOST as much darkness as they have light. Individually, some have a little more, some have a little less, but as a whole... they have EXACTLY as much darkness as they have light. If ever there was a love child of light and darkness, it is them. When I looked at those numbers... the preciseness of it... a troubling thought bloomed in my mind. What if it is NOT just a joke? What if, in this realm, there actually is as much darkness as there is light, as a whole? So... obviously... I started looking into the possibility, checking all the data we have accumulated thus far... The first place I looked was their stars. You would think such powerful light sources... Surely, they have very little darkness, if any, right? WRONG! You know how, if you were to expose yourself directly to a star here, its radiation would kill you?""Yes," she confirmed, "I remember your face when they warned us, as we were boarding the ship to come here." She imitated the instructor, "Oh, by the way, watch yourselves out there. Even the light in the anomaly can kill you. You'll be safe as long as you don't go out into space." She searched her memory for the reasoning behind it, "It's the atmosphere, right? It keeps us safe.""Indeed," he continued, "It is the most curious thing. Throughout this realm, inhabitable worlds, such as this one, develop a natural barrier, a shield, all around it, in the atmosphere. It is what keeps the deadly radiation away from us. Without these barriers, life in this realm simply would not even be possible. Do you know how they found out? Our orbital team discovered it the first time they went into space to place the sensors. It was a good thing they followed protocol and kept their shields up. They told me the crew thought they were being attacked. That is how intense the radiation is. It is the darkness, Yula. The darkness within the stars causes this dangerous radiation. Anyway, guess how much darkness there is in the stars here, on average.""The same amount as light?" she quickly guessed."The same exact amount," he repeated, "I've looked at the stars, the worlds... the creatures, the plants... it is almost as if..." he trailed off.But she finally realized what he was getting at, suddenly, becoming very tense, barely brave enough to speak above a whisper, "It's as if it were all by DESIGN... By the Gods, Tenri... We all assumed it was a natural occurrence, an anomalous natural occurrence, but a natural one nonetheless... You think someone might have..." she glanced over her shoulder just to make sure the door was still closed, before finishing her sentence, "You think someone might have really CREATED the anomaly? But why? Isn't tampering with realms about the most illegal thing in the empyreum? You'd have to have one hell of a good reason to even consider it. And also, how would anyone manage it? The sheer amount of ethereal energy required to do such a thing must be astronomical...""It was," he said meaningfully, handing her another scroll, "Look at this. These are the readings from the origin point when the anomaly appeared. And, you know me, I checked to see what kind of cosmic events were taking place at the time. There was nothing in the records, not of this magnitude, not even close. Whatever it was that caused the anomaly to appear is no longer there."She studied the scroll, "Well, with these numbers, I imagine maybe a small fleet of dreadnoughts could have pulled it off.""Or a single colossal machine," he reminded her, "It has been done once before.""Yes," she recalled, "Automata, the Zarton Realm.""It was once called the Automata Anomaly," he added pointedly, "The zarton created it using that machine of theirs, it was quite a feat of engineering. If I am not mistaken, it was due to their achievement that meddling with realms became illegal in the first place.""Yes, but they didn't create a fully functional realm, Tenri," she argued, "There's no native life in Autoamata, they simply carved out an empty realm for themselves. And the only reason they did so was because they were robots who incidentally didn't have a realm of their own. Also, they didn't create their realm by leeching off of another preexisting realm. If they had, it might have destroyed that realm. But the Human Realm sprung right out of the Humessian Realm, without incident.""Perhaps someone found a way of perfecting what the zarton did," he suggested."Maybe," she considered, "But still... it sounds an awful lot like crazy conspiratorial nonsense, doesn't it?"He kept quiet, just shaking his head, as if his suspicions were a curse."I see why you're so troubled," she sighed, passing her fingers through her hair, "Do you have any evidence that the anomaly might have been engineered?""No," he answered in a low voice, "I have tried looking for patterns in the anomaly's... I mean, the realm's structure, but I haven't found anything yet. It is a whole realm, after all. It could be eons before anyone finds a pattern. But you know as well as I do, even the most stable of realms have some small inconsistencies. This kind of precision... across all the elements... across the ENTIRE REALM... It's unheard of. Even Automata has its imperfections.""Yes," she agreed, "but, Tenri, if you're going to see this through, don't even think of telling anyone else until you find proof, concrete undeniable proof, that someone is behind it. You know what the elders are like... You want to get expelled from the sanctum, that'll do it, and much quicker than any pixie whiskey, I might add.""Yes, I know," he agreed.She looked out the window again, as another lighting bolt crossed the sky. After a moment, she asked almost as if to herself, "There's just one thing I don't get. If you were going to create a realm, a whole new universe, why would you fill it halfway with darkness? You'd think one would want to make a realm where there's no darkness at all, right?"He looked at her, with a grim look in his eyes, "You assume whoever did this seeks light. Clearly, that is not the case."She stared at him for a moment, terrified of the implications. Then, she took the bottle of pixie whiskey by the neck, popped the cap and drank directly from the mouth.