The Mechanical Era

Jonus was sitting in the fancy chair, lost in his own thoughts. He was not sure how he can present himself; how should he even start, what to bring up first, and all that. When he got out of the fortress, he immediately sent off a letter to the city of Vallina via carrier pigeon, to inform the imperial queen that he needed to talk to her himself.

He remembers using a lot of languages, to make it seem as if the world was at stake. Although to be fair, it IS at stake, he wished he had used his brain that one time and given him some more time to prepare.

"Mr. Jonus? You are up next. Her imperial majesty wants to speak to you." Herrold informed Jonus. It immediately snapped him out of his world and caused him to stand up.

"Right! Where do I need to go, exactly?" Jonus asks Herrold.

"Down the hall and to the left. You will arrive at a large door. That is where you need to enter." Herrold replies.

"I see. Thank you."

Jonus walks out of the door and follows Herrold's directions. Just like he said, he come across the large wooden door Herrold had talked about. It was guarded by two knights, who raised their hands to stop Jonus from getting near the door further.

"Stop! May I ask you your name?" the knight questions him.

"Jonus. Jonus Hull. I am the head of the demonologists of the expedition to search the recently-discovered, abandoned fortress, built by the demons," Jonus replied.

The knight opens the door, walks inside, and closes it. He then comes out of the room and turns towards Jonus.

"Come in."

Jonus enters the throne room and walks on the red carpet. Once the queen was about 10 feet apart from him, he kneeled and bowed down. It appeared that it was only the two of them, while the knights were behind the door.

"Your imperial majesty, I have arrived from my expedition. I have a lot of information that I wanted to tell you," he told Rose.

"I understand, Mr. Jonus Hull. However, there are a few questions I wanted to ask you before we discuss the main topic," she replied. Jonus suspected that it had something to do with the creatures that he encountered at the fortress. Regardless, he continued.

"I understand. What are they?"

"First, what were those... creatures that possessed Knight Esther? Do you have any idea of what they are?" she asks. With that, his hunch was right.

"... Well, your imperial majesty. From my understanding, they are creatures that come from another world, existing in our plane of existence, but still... far away from Eden..."

"I beg your pardon? In our... existence, but a different world?"

"Yes. I believe we live in the same... universe. That is how I understand it, that is," Jonus replied.

"What does their world look like?"

"I am not sure what their world looks like myself, but from what I can understand, they come from a place with a dimmer sun, and a world ravaged by demons.

The air they breathe there and here is also alike. However, they did mention it was hotter back there."

"How did they come here?"

"They say that they came through a portal made by the demons. Like us, they do not like the demons. Once they came through, they went on and killed them all. All that remained in the fortress that is."

"I see, and why did they possess knight Esther? Why didn't the others help him?" she asked next.

"Well, Knight Esther instructed Carson and the others to not attack so he can get the first fill. He tried to stab them but the spear just went through. The creature then enters inside of Knight Esther, and takes over him," Jonus explains.

Jonus can see Rose make a little smile.

"Hmm... It appears that Second Luitenant Herrold was not lying," she remarked.

"Can you tell me more about these creatures? Are they friendly?" she asked next.

"From my experience, they are very friendly and do not like to harm our species. We attacked them first, and yet, they gave us an opportunity to resolve our differences peacefully."

"But what is just stopping them from leaving the fortress and causing a bunch of trouble?"

"The outside, your majesty. Our world and their world are too different for them to survive comfortably.

In the day, the sun is too hot and in the night, the world is too cold. They are forcibly stuck there as they can only work properly in a limited temperature."

"How have they been eating then? How are they alive?"

"They manage to possess any animal that comes close. They then use that animal to eat whatever it can and absorb its energy. However, due to the lack of food, a lot of them have to... hibernate to stay alive.

I believe they did mention that some of their kind had passed since they came there. So they should all die out in a matter of years. So I don't think they would have a problem with that." Jonus explained.

Rose leans back on her throne and thinks it through. Assuming that they have been there for a long time, and the fact that they haven't bothered leaving the area, it was safe to assume the townsfolk could be safe.

"Hm... Alright then. I will take your word for it, Mr. Hull. Now, can you tell me what you found inside of that fortress? What do you think the demons were doing in there?" she moved on to the main topic.

"Well, your imperial majesty. We found a lot of writings, detailing their own history, and knowledge. We also found a model of the... cosmos, a model of our own world, and a giant runic circle on the wall made of calk.

Though I haven't managed to decipher a lot of the text in written form, I have found a lot of things that I think your imperial majesty might find interesting." Jonus told Rose.

"Alright then. Let's hear them." Rose replied.