Chapter 124: Ch162. Sickness - 17 (The truth)
"The force that... Gave birth to the awakened...?" Kurt half asked, half stated.
"Yes. My name... It’s Essentium."
Kurt nodded.
It was the first time he had heard that name said that way, but it wasn’t the first time someone had mentioned the word Essentium to him.
Kurt remembered that very well.
"Someone once called me the Child of Essentium..." Kurt replied, a little perplexed, as if he didn’t know exactly what to say. "What does that mean?"
"It means that you carry my power in your veins, in a much deeper and more primal way than your other fellow wielders, Kurt. It means that you and I, child, are... Entwined."
Kurt felt like asking what that meant, but he also felt that the answer might have something to do with another question that was simmering in his mind.
"What are the Conquerors?"
Essentium, still in the form of Nina, gave an enigmatic smile to Kurt, who remained impassive, waiting for her to answer the question.
"Allow me to tell you a story, Kurt Blake.
A story that begins a long, long time ago..."
"As you and your fellow humans may have realized, you are not alone in the universe.
And as much as you want to believe that your existence, even somewhat arrogant, in your attempt to show some pride in the face of something as vast as the universe, is older than the one with which you had contact...
Rest assured, even the Ishir are as old as any human will ever be able to conceive.
Even though the Ishir aren’t a race in the strict sense anymore, given that they currently are nothing more than slaves to the one the Conquerors call Master.
The Conquerors come from a planet very similar to Earth, up to a certain point. And, even though they are much older than humanity, understand that your planet and theirs have a much closer relationship than you can imagine.
When Earth was still forming, it was a planet with two cores. What would make this planet something never seen before in all of history.
However, an accident, or a causality of destiny, whatever you want to call it, split the huge planet in two, and both were shipwrecked in space, aggregating matter from other dead bodies within themselves, with the unconscious intention of recovering that piece of themselves that had been lost.
Eventually, after eons and eons of drifting through the universe, each of the twin planets was absorbed by the gravitational pull of a solar system, which culminated in causing them the perfect conditions for them to give rise to life.
However, the planet that gave rise to the Conquerors began the evolutionary process of life long before the Earth was capable of generating the first life, in that primordial soup that, nowadays, you call the ocean.
The Conquerors did not yet have this title, in the cradle of their civilization.
They, in fact, were creatures very similar to humans, perhaps because they originated from the other half of the same planet.
I mean, they were similar to humans, to a certain extent, as the physical conditions of the planets were somewhat different.
The inhabitants of that planet lived peacefully, coexisting with nature as a single organism, living in a symbiotic relationship with the whole.
That is, until they discovered what was in the core of their home planet..."
"Your opposite." Kurt replied, interrupting her.
"And by discovering my opposite, as you so accurately pointed out, they ended up awakening the dormant consciousness of that sentient core.
Because he is my equal, he can also think, feel, and even understand that life on that planet was only what it was, thanks to him.
But at the same time, being my opposite, my counterpart, he developed something similar to what you humans call... Hunger.
And upon awakening, after millions of years of evolution of the people he had given birth to, it would not be surprising that he would be hungry.
But an unexpected change happened to him and the inhabitants of that planet.
When trying to escape his rocky prison, invading each of his creatures, the sentient being realized that he could not survive for long in those bodies.
No...
He needed something more.
Something more powerful than a mere creation.
The will of that being then possessed the minds of his creations, and from that point on, the Conquerors were born.
The few members of that race, once peaceful, and now forged for war and conquest.
They sailed through the stars, looking for planets rich in other lives, that could have a sentient nucleus, like me, like him, so that the will of the planet could absorb them, in the hope of generating stronger children, and finally, conquering a body suitable to be able, one day, to finally reunite with me...
However, Kha’Ur’s plan was far more ingenious than anyone could have imagined.
And he planted seeds of chaos and corruption on every planet his children passed through, ultimately turning those planets into mere stepping stones to the real starting point of his heinous plan..."
The voice of NIna’s form fell silent, and it took a while for Kurt to realize that the gallery around him was enveloped in an abysmal silence.
The gears in his mind turned endlessly, trying to make some sense amidst all the madness of ancient civilizations traveling through space and sentient planets.
However, Kurt lived in a world where people awakened magical powers and superhuman abilities, fighting monstrous beings coming from dimensional ruptures.
There wasn’t much more than that that could really be called madness, was there?
Kurt exhaled slowly, focusing his attention again on the figure of his mother, who was silently waiting for him.
And, seeing that the young man had paid attention to her again, she continued telling the story, amidst that atmosphere of the crystal cave, which seemed strangely darker than before.
"The Conquerors went from planet to planet, not just conquering them and handing over their cores to their Master.
No...
They began to terraform each of the planets, turning their inhabitants into mindless slaves with a single goal.
To kill.
Kill what? Such a purpose was still shrouded in fog during such a period in history.
Until the terraforming of the conquered planets reached another level.
The Conquerors managed to channel the remaining energy of the sentient cores of each planet into a single point, and it was from there that the second step of Kha’Ur’s plan took place."
Kurt’s eyes widened, and he felt his heart beating faster, harder.
"The Nests are..."
