Nexus Awakened (An Isekai LitRPG Gender Bender Story)

942. Gaze Upon The Stars When You Feel Lost

“Are you talking about Caldera Industries? Their Eyes in the sky? Or, do you mean their personnel on the ground?” Frost interrogated it, but she did it with a lighter, airier voice. “If that’s an Eye, then you were probably bound to Caldera Industries’ surveillance.”

Frost was aware of how brutal they were. In the Nex Megalopolis for example, using flight would result in death ray smiting down the unfortunate soul.

With them now gone, Atelier Personnel such as Justica Arms and the notable Oathbound Association, who gained popularity since the fall of Scarlet Logic.

With no external paramilitary to call upon, and with their Branches so fractured, they turned to this Association amongst others, including Branches, to fill those positions.

As a result, there were a considerable amount of people who sat atop rooftops ready to cripple the wings of anyone who dared to fly over the Nex Megalopolis.

She hacked all of its limbs away, leaving behind a quivering ball that tried to bury itself into the sand.

“… So you weren’t the observer itself, but someone who acts upon it commands. Why is that? What makes you so afraid of it?”

Death. No one would be afraid if there wasn’t some sort of punishment involved. The Suppression Requirement also alluded to this.

With gentle hands – the same that had mercilessly chopped off its limbs – tenderly cradled the large eyeball.

“Being bound to something you can’t reach or interact with… It’s hell, huh. It can see everything you do. Every action logged by people you will never know the names of. You kind of remind me of Act X. Maybe that’s what made you. I wouldn’t know.”

Frost looked up at the colossal eye above with furrowed brows.

“… But I do know that thing up there is the reason why you’re like this.”

< “It laid waste to the lands. Forests burned. They became sand. Sand became glass when they noticed it.” >

< “To remain happy, we must ignore the forces around us.” >

It desperately tried to burrow past her fingers, quivering as it no longer had the power to fight back.

< “They know it exists. But to acknowledge it is to lose access to happiness.” >

Frost was tempted to make it face the eye above. But instead, she held the feeble creature close, and then, an ominous purple flame appeared on the wrist of her free hand. The purple aura burned the air, and with three simple flicks, a massive cross-shaped beam of light cleaved through the heavens.

Each dealt 2x of her MAG ATT, dealing over 40,000 damage – more than the HP of The Observer Upstairs. It was split into six equal parts. Blood poured from those wounds. It returned the sand to grass as it touched, and the glassy area into the waters of an oasis.

It was not the reaction Frost thought would happen. Regardless, it painted a terrible image of Caldera Industries’ atrocities. She vaguely remembered their war against the Dragons and the machines that littered the skies of Scaldak.

The Fata Morganas, otherwise known as the Eyes. Those machines surveilled the entirety of that desolate Region. Remnants of floating fortresses scorched the Region, leaving nothing behind but sand, and in extreme cases, a glass desert.

People lived there. Or at least there were people who served Caldera Industries. They had to ignore the suffering if they wished to preserve their happiness.

Frost also saw it as an allegory for a myriad of other things. Act X, Syndicates, Puritas, the Blood Festival – One had to keep their head down, obey, and ignore the misery of others around them.

< “Dear observer in the skies… your only wish it to not be observed. No gaze must befall us. But the world we see is still so very dark.” >

That ignorance was their bliss.

It was their hope.

“It doesn’t have to be.”

Frost spoke internally to the Corrupted.

Slowly, she turned it over, revealing a sight that caused its trembling to cease.

Amongst the void, in that starless night, her eyes shone like stars.

“A being that demands it remains to be unseen and punishes those who look at it doesn’t deserve to be revered.”

“Turning a blind eye to the misery around us will only remind us that there is no escape.”

“Can you call it the right thing to do if you enforce this false sense of hope onto others? By eliminating them just for the one small act of acknowledging your existence?”

< “It… is all I know. All I have ever known.” >

Ah… Yeah. That’s right. Corrupted… don’t get a say in this at all, huh. They’re born one day for a purpose they don’t understand. It really is… all that they know.

Frost remembered a term Elysia once said.

The egg is the world.

“This applies for a machine. Everything we know is confined within the extent of our knowledge base. With no way to experience the world… that is all we will ever know. And people will wonder why machines are so cold.”

For Corrupted… and I guess for machines, it’d be no different from living inside of a Black Forest. Everyone has their Black Forest, like what Jury said. But not everyone can get out or find a star to guide them out.

Their existence was beyond pitiful. It was sad. Could one truly call a Corrupted evil for their actions?

Frost mentally argued this. On one hand, it is all they are. On the other, the fact that they have the potential to break free counters that claim.

She gently brushed a thumb against the eye, as though to wipe away its tears.

“Then, would you be willing to follow another observer?”

“An observer who will not punish you for looking their way.”

“A star that will not impose their rules unjustly from out of reach.”

< “Can such an observer exist?” >

< “Can bliss exist without ignorance? When they part their hands from their eyes… will it be a requirement to remove their hope?” >

“Never under my sovereign rule.”

“I, the Amalgam, guarantee that.”

< “Will I be subjected to misery if I look your way… star…?” >

“You may always look upon me when you feel lost.”

She didn’t feel any ill will in this Corrupted.

It asked with the same innocence as a child.

And because it knew nothing else but the darkness, Frost’s light allowed it to see a new side of the world that it otherwise would never have seen.

Not only that, but it had found something to guide it.

“That is what stars are for.”

A star.

The Corrupted, who know nothing of the world beyond their woes and its imposed purpose, look up into Frost’s eyes and acknowledged them as stars.

It trembled again.

But it was not out of fear.

< Realization Criteria Reached >

< Do you wish to grant The Observer Upstairs your Blessing? >

< No | Yes >

It was out of reverence.

< Confirm? >

The dark pupils of the Corrupted carried a glimmer of golden light.

Those same particles surrounded it, encasing it into a cocoon.

< “A star exists to guide… a sovereign of hope…” >

< “I wish upon that very star… to enact this rightful duty of mine… under a just observer.” >

< The Observer Upstairs has successfully been Blessed >

Once that last prompt appeared, and when the Corrupted was fully encased in its cocoon –

“… Just like what happened to Ber, huh.”

–She awoke to a sight of a giant egg made from Genesis Stones.

Within was the unhatched embryo of The Observer Upstairs.

“The bird fights its way out of the egg. The egg is the world. Who would be born must first destroy a world.”

The egg cracked.

Pieces of Genesis Stone fell to her feet.

Eventually, enough was broken where the top slid off.

“Hmn… I… I am…?”

And staring back at her, with a pair of beautiful pitch-black eyes – which had sprinkles of golden stars along it like the night sky – was the Realized The Observer Upstairs.

“A…mal…gam...”

The Corrupted spoke cautiously, not knowing if it could even acknowledge her.

As more pieces of the egg cracked, Frost reached towards the Corrupted.

It winced. White threads kept it in place. There was nothing it could do to stop Frost from hurting her.

But rather than feeling pain, she was enveloped in warmth.

“Welcome~” Frost hummed motherly.

She had embraced the Corrupted, wrapping her arms around its neck. Her eyes widened. As a Corrupted, she didn’t know what this sensation was. Touch, scent, taste – they were all new to her.

And Frost’s presence overwhelmed her, yet at the same time, it soothed her soul.

< Jury will be arriving shortly >

< Please do not name your new child without your wife >