The World after the Fall

Due to the recent large scale renovation, Fortress Carpediem was merged with Gorgon Fortress, thus exceeding the 10 billion population within the fortress. There were various towns and regions within the fortress and at the entrance of all the towns, there were sculptures of Jaehwan with his sword pointing up into the sky. It was a common sight to see a young man who dreamed of becoming the next 'Sole-King' to be practicing their stabs in front of those sculptures.

"One-two! One-two!"

People shouted while training. Some had put down their swords while taking a break from the hard training.

"Hey, how many times did you stab today?"

"Me? I think about 100 thousand…"

"What? Don't lie!"

"…No, I'm not."

"If you stab once per one second without eating or sleeping, that's still not enough to reach 100 thousand! Don't even try."

"…I heard Master Jaehwan did that."

"And you are him?"

Young men quarreled and the instructor shouted angrily at them. And then the shouts came again.

"Slight Stab! Normal Stab! Strong Stab!"

Some of these 'stab trainees' were very into Jaehwan's stories that they shouted the skill name that Jaehwan used with their mouths.

"But aren't the names a bit cheesy? Who names it like that? 'Slight stab'?"

"…I heard an old man named Chung-something named them for him."

"No. I heard Master Jaehwan named them like that because he was lazy."

And the gossip was swept away by another set of shouts.

"World stab! World stab!"

A bit later, one of the trainees who had been shouting screamed as he looked up into the sky.

"WAAAH!"

Then, everyone turned to the man. The man yelped, "I-I did the world stab! The world ripped!!"

"Huh?"

"What the hell?"

The man pointed to the sky. Some of the trainees gasped as they turned toward the direction. People were shocked. Even the instructor was shocked.

"The sky…!"

The sky was tearing apart.

Chancellor Euren Chiver of Carpediem Fortress was having a headache as he tapped on his pen on the table.

"It is just a name… why does it matter?"

"It matters! The name is the only thing left for all of us!"

It had been a long time since all four fortresses had been united, but there were still various minor fights happening within <Chaos>. It was apparent based on what was happening in this meeting room.

"We must name it Gorgon!"

"No, Garuda!"

"It must be Dryad."

"D-don't forget that Manticore is there too!"

Leaders of the Four Fortresses were quarreling with different matters after the fortress had united with Carpediem. This became more fierce due to the recent change in policies that required them to rename the fortress. The problem was as follows:

"Doesn't Carpediem-Garuda fit the best?"

"No. Carpediem-Dryad is the best there is."

"I think Carpediem-Manticore is more…"

"Hey, you were destroyed by Golden Sky croons. Don't even try."

They all agreed on leaving Carpediem as the first part of the name, but the problem was the latter portion. Everyone wanted to name it the fortress they came from. Euren looked at each of them and frowned.

They were all good people individually. They all agreed to Jaehwan's will and trained hard on the tower that Jaehwan had left behind to become Awakeners.

It wasn't only them however.

Now, there were more than a million Awakeners within the Carpediem Fortress. Millions of Awakeners. It was a number that can protect them from most Lords, but since there were no enemies on the outside, they were fighting internally instead.

Euren thought as he scratched his mustache.

'It was good when we had the Master.'

If Jaehwan were here now, they probably would've all been 'stabbed'. Or maybe he might have opened a tournament of some kind to decide the name of the fortress. Of course, it will end up with Jaehwan charging into the tournament, making everybody fight him at once only to beat them all up.

Since everyone will lay there beaten down, the problem will naturally be solved.

And…

'I miss those times.'

Euren smiled. He did not like violence or tyranny. Even so, Euren still missed Jaehwan's such fierce attitude. The world needed a man like Jaehwan. Cayman spoke from the side.

"I miss Master Jaehwan."

Cayman seemed to think the same way. He was now a Minister of the Fortress and the most powerful being of <Chaos>. Euren asked, "Cayman, how about you take care of this?"

"…And how would I do that?"

"Uh, hmph. You know how Master used to do?"

"…You mean destroy everything?"

"Well, I'm not exactly saying that but…"

Euren was trying to put it in a more indirect way or a softened description of what Cayman said when the door to the meeting room burst open.

"C-chancellor!"

Euren then realized something had happened as he looked at the man with a pale face. At the same time, some of the officials pulled the window curtains open.

"What is that…!"

Gasps and screams came from all over the fortress. There was a giant screen-looking thing swirling above the sky.

"Is… is that…?!"

Soon people realized what they were seeing. They saw a world that was filled with blood and corpses. And in that horrible world…

Someone was fighting.

A man was bleeding in silver. There was a man who was still holding back against it. He was countlessly swinging his sword at something as if he was fighting an entire world.

"He's…"

They weren't sure about the enemy he was fighting against, but they could see the determination and desperation of the man fighting it.

"Ah…"

Some remembered his face and cried. Some grabbed other people's shoulders in joy. The ones who did not know him personally recognized who he was. There were sculptures of the man all over the fortress after all.

'Jaehwan…'