The Dawn of the New World

The images showed what lay outside the city walls currently. It was full of destroyed structures as far as the eye could see. Hao Xuan could tell from one look that it was inhospitable for most life forms.

Just the toxic miasma alone was enough to snuff out most life not to mention a lack of proper shelter, fresh food or water, and all other necessities.

The images changed back to Altron one final time. He was standing in the same room.

[Today marks the 250th year of the death of the last organic lifeform. All attempts at creating new life were unsuccessful. Master...I do not know if hell is real but if it was, I feel like this would be it. I did not know I would be capable of feeling loneliness but through the miracle of time I have...and it is terrible]

[Please forgive me...I cannot wander these lands anymore. Today I will shut down and disconnect my matrix from the mainframe]

[I hope, if there is a way, to meet you once again somehow. I would love to go on great adventures with master in the Greater World, from the Golden Cities and Death Planets to the Virtual worlds and Abyss borders, I want to travel to all of them! Do you think...I will ever be able to dream? That would be SO cool!]

-End of Datalog-

-Last Entry Created 554 years ago

The screen flashed with a bright white light forcing Hao Xuan to turn away. In that instant, one last line flashed past the screen in bright red colors.

**Rewrite Complete**

Hao Xuan obviously missed it because it was deleted before he could look back. He pulled his hand away from the glass panel and looked around. Altron's bright yellow body was sitting in the corner just a few meters away.

He walked up to it and placed his hand on the back panel.

"Can you...can he be 'started' again or something?"

*Beep*

"Negative. Too much time has passed for the central matrix to go on without power. The overseer unit desired this outcome."

*BANG*

Hao Xuan's fist made a dent in the side wall as he muttered through gritted teeth, "Altron, his name was Altron. Don't call him that anymore."

"...."

"If host desires to converse with 'unit' again, the system can recreate the algorithm and install the databanks and mood sequences. It would be identical to-"

"No, it won't be. It won't be Altron anymore, he had already evolved beyond the limits of a simple program created by the likes of you. Otherwise, he wouldn't have killed himself out of loneliness."

"An error within the logic chip would explain the unit's actions. And 'it' did not kill itself, 'it' was never alive. The host is misunderstanding-"

"Okay, you're right. I don't want to argue anymore," Hao Xuan cut Baracus off before he really got going.

He stood up to take another look around the room and somehow it seemed much smaller than before. Storing a few items that Baracus pointed he slowly made his way out.

Standing alone in a city created for thousands, all of a sudden the defeating silence seemed a lot more threatening than it had ever before. An entire civilization had come and gone in his absence.

Hao Xuan looked to the sky with a woeful gaze whispering to himself, "No Orcs, no humans, no armies, no severs...no one to call on. Never thought I would see this day as long as I still had the 'Soul Severing Heavenly constitution'. Is it me or are the heavens laughing at me right now?"

*Beep*

"Unable to answer."

"Hmm, that's all you seem to be good for these days."

"The system does not understand."

"Of course you don't, forget I said anything. Can you still look something up or do I need to go back and manually connect with the mainframe?"

"All data has been downloaded. Permissions upgraded to set the system as Admin."

"Nidhora. Find out where she is and what happened to her. Why didn't she intervene? She could have stopped all of them if she wanted."

The minimap appeared in the top left with a rough direction leading to the North-East.

"Records are unclear. Sometime after the 80th standard year all communication seized with the entity."

"What about Black and White? I left them here too." (The two serpents)

"No mention of either entity within the records."

"I will go take a look myself then."

Hao Xuan followed the directions in the minimap and exited through the North gate of the settlement.

The moment he stepped outside of the forcefield a potent mix of foul odors hit him head-on. They were strong enough to instantly make him nauseous and he had to use his internal energy to guard against the effects.

'What the hell is that?! It feels a little familiar...'

He looked around cautiously but even with the help of the city lights to illuminate everything within a 200-meter radius he couldn't see further than 50 meters because of the thick miasma.

Hao Xuan walked over to a bubbling puddle nearby and held his hand over it.