Chapter 15: Echoes of a Dying World
Cold wind whispered across the ruined landscape.
The battlefield was silent now.
Only smoke remained.
Burning fragments of the destroyed drones lay scattered across the cracked ground, their metal shells twitching occasionally as dying circuits struggled to function.
Tharion stood among them.
His breathing was heavy.
Blood dripped slowly from the shallow cut along his arm, staining the dark fabric of his sleeve.
The injury wasn’t deep… but it shouldn’t have happened.
Not to him.
He looked down at the ruined drone at his feet.
Its mechanical eye flickered weakly before finally dying.
“Strange…”
Tharion murmured.
Those drones were not ordinary machines.
He had felt it the moment their weapons struck him.
Their energy signatures were… wrong.
Almost as if they had been designed specifically to harm beings like him.
A thought crossed his mind.
And it was not a pleasant one.
Someone knows.
A sudden gust of wind swept through the battlefield.
The clouds above churned slowly like a restless ocean.
For a moment, Tharion closed his eyes.
Fragments of memories flickered in the darkness behind his eyelids.
A distant star collapsing.
Endless cosmic storms tearing apart galaxies.
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Voices… ancient voices… calling his name.
But before he could grasp the memories—
They vanished.
Tharion opened his eyes again.
His expression remained calm, but something inside him felt unsettled.
“Who built them…”
His voice was quiet.
The question hung in the empty air.
Because machines like those did not appear by accident.
Someone created them.
Someone powerful.
Someone who understood forces beyond ordinary science.
A faint metallic sound echoed from the distance.
Tharion’s head turned instantly.
His senses sharpened.
Footsteps.
Not mechanical ones.
Human.
From beyond the shattered remains of a collapsed tower, three figures slowly emerged.
They wore dark tactical armor marked with a strange silver emblem across their chests.
An organization symbol.
The man at the front raised his hands slowly.
“Easy,” he said cautiously.
“We’re not here to fight.”
Tharion said nothing.
His gaze remained fixed on them.
The three men stopped several meters away.
Even through their armor, Tharion could feel their tension.
Their heartbeats were fast.
Fear.
But they forced themselves to stand firm.
The leader removed his helmet.
He was probably in his early thirties.
Sharp eyes.
Military discipline.
“My name is Kenji Takeda,” he said.
“We’ve been tracking those drones for months.”
Tharion’s expression didn’t change.
Kenji continued carefully.
“They’re not from any government on Earth.”
That statement hung heavily in the air.
Tharion’s eyes narrowed slightly.
Kenji studied him quietly.
Up close, the man before him didn’t look like anything extraordinary.
Just a young man standing alone among destroyed machines.
But Kenji had seen the satellite footage.
The way this man moved.
The way those drones were torn apart.
It wasn’t human.
Not even close.
“You destroyed an entire strike unit by yourself,” Kenji said slowly.
“Most of our soldiers couldn’t even damage one.”
Tharion finally spoke.
“They were poorly designed.”
The three soldiers exchanged looks.
Kenji exhaled slowly.
“So you noticed it too.”
Tharion remained silent.
Kenji’s voice lowered.
“Those drones weren’t built to fight humans.”
A pause.
“They were built to hunt something else.”
The wind howled softly across the ruins.
For a moment, neither of them spoke.
Then Kenji asked the question he had been holding back.
“…What are you?”
Silence followed.
Tharion looked toward the sky.
The clouds above parted slightly.
A distant star flickered in the vast darkness beyond.
For a brief moment, something ancient stirred inside him.
A feeling older than the universe itself.
Then he looked back at Kenji.
“I don’t remember.”
Kenji blinked.
“What?”
Tharion’s voice was calm.
“I don’t remember what I am.”
That answer was not what Kenji expected.
Before he could respond—
A sudden alarm blared from the device on his wrist.
His eyes widened.
“No… that’s impossible…”
One of the soldiers spoke urgently.
“Sir, orbital detection just updated.”
Kenji stared at the holographic display that appeared above his wrist.
His face slowly lost color.
“Something just entered the atmosphere.”
Tharion felt it.
Even before Kenji spoke again.
A presence.
Far above them.
Descending from the sky.
Cold.
Ancient.
Hungry.
Tharion slowly looked upward.
The clouds above the battlefield began to swirl violently.
Kenji whispered in disbelief.
“…It’s heading straight for us.”
Tharion’s eyes sharpened.
For the first time since arriving on this world—
He felt something unfamiliar.
Anticipation.
And deep within the sky…
Something was coming.
