Chapter 612 - 608: I'm You
"Alright. I'll meet you after getting the Fragments back," Janus said as he disappeared.
Chaos was left alone behind. He didn't leave so fast though. Instead, he glanced towards the sky.
It was only after a few seconds that he disappeared.
He appeared in the desert of Sahara in the middle of nowhere.
Standing in the middle of the desert, Chaos looked down.
He looked around, wondering where the fragment actually was. All he had was the general location. Finding the fragments from there was a different matter.
Instead of searching everywhere, he decided to take a shortcut.
His body started flowing in the air. He slowly raised both his arms and clapped once.
A mysterious red wave was created from his clap, which hit the sand under him in the area with a radius of one kilometer with him in the center.
Wherever the wave hit, everything was destroyed. Even the sand wasn't safe from it as most of the sand disintegrated, leaving a massive crater under Chaos.
Inside the crater, Chaos found a blue crystal. A smirk formed on his face as he found the crystal he was looking for.
Instead of searching everywhere, it was easier to just destroy everything. As the fragments of the bracelet of immortality couldn't be destroyed, they were left safe.
He flew down, landing in the middle of the crater. Reaching out his hand, he picked up the fragment.
"Fragment of Destiny... Not much use for me but decent," Chaos said, smiling.
He placed the fragment inside the bracelet of Immortality, merging the two together.
He disappeared again.
This time, he appeared in a different place altogether.
Everywhere eyes could see, there was snow. It was a freezing place with only white visible everywhere. The temperature was already in the negative in Antarctica when Chaos appeared here.
There were still a few people here though. It seemed like there was a small settlement here, camping for some reason.
Seeing the people here, Chaos couldn't help but frown. If he used the same trick as last time, these people were going to be disintegrated as well. Even though it didn't matter if a few humans died, he didn't want to take their lives when there wasn't a need to.
He took a deep breath as he said, "Fine. It'll just waste a few seconds anyway."
He raised his right hand and snapped his fingers. The sound of it reached far and wide. Everyone who heard the sound dropped to the ground, instantly falling asleep.
After everyone was asleep, Chaos made a strange gesture with his hands, making all the equipment of these men and their tent fly in the air.
After everything was floating in the air, the ground was clear of any obstruction.
With a casual wave of his hand, Chaos made everything land in a different place, far from here.
After he was finished with shifting the location of the settlement, he once again clapped, making that mysterious red wave appear again.
This time, it was the Ice that disintegrated, leaving another crater in the ground.
Chaos floated down and picked up a red Fragment.
"Fragment of War. Not bad. This will be pretty useful in what's to come," Chaos said as he placed the red fragment on his Bracelet of Immortality as well.
After finishing, he disappeared again.
...
Janus was also on the same job, but unlike Chaps, it wasn't easy for him.
The places he was given to search were in crowded cities. There was no way to use the trick of Chaos here.
All he could do was actually search, which was a time consuming process for him.
He couldn't help but wonder if Chaos actually gave him these locations because it was a boring and time consuming task to search here.
Having no choice, he got to work.
...
Janus was still searching for the first fragment, whereas Chaos was already on his third.
This time, he appeared above an active volcano.
"Inside this place?" Chaos muttered, sighing. "It's good that I came. Ryder could never have found it here in his entire lifetime."
Without wasting a single moment, Chaos jumped inside the molten lava as if it was nothing but ordinary water inside a swimming pool.
He swam inside the lava, trying to find the Fragment.
"There it is."
It didn't take long for Chaos to find the Fragment which was lying at the bottom of the volcano.
The blazing red fragment was easily noticeable by Chaos. He swam down and picked up the Fragment before he flew out of the lava.
As Chaos came out of the Lava, he seemed completely fine. Even his clothes were fine since he wasn't wearing human clothes but his old clothes. This bit couldn't harm his clothes.
He glanced at the fragment as he muttered, "Fragment of Fire... Another useless one, but at least it'll contribute to completing the bracelet."
Finished with his task, he disappeared again, returning back to the Maxwell Estate.
He appeared inside his room, where he had awakened.
"It looks like Janus will take time to get the other two. In the meanwhile, I should introduce myself to my other self. He has been kept in the dark for quite some time."
Chaos made sure that no one other than Janus could step inside the room before he closed his eyes.
...
Ryder found himself in what seemed like a dream.
He was sitting in his room when he heard the door open.
He wondered who stepped inside without even knocking, but as the door opened, he was stunned.
It was none other than himself. The person who entered looked exactly like himself. The only difference was that he had long hair and deep red eyes.
"Am I dreaming again?" Ryder asked, frowning.
He tried pinching himself to wake up.
"It's not a dream," the long haired man said softly. "You are in my domain."
"And who are you? Why am I in your domain? Is this a trick of Janus?" Ryder asked, standing up.
" It's no trick of Janus. It's the reality. As for who I am, the answer to that is very simple. I'm you, and you are me. We're both Ryder, and at the same time, we're both Chaos," Chaos replied.
....
"Did you get any report from our envoys?" In another meeting of the gods, the Lord of War asked.
"Not yet," the Goddess of Destiny replied, shaking her head.
'Hasn't it been a long time since he left? What's taking him so long? Why don't we try contacting him instead?" Another god asked, feeling like it was odd.
" We did try contacting him as well. There has been no response. Lord of War is right. Something is out of place here. We sent an Envoy on a simple task to contact our sons and tell us if they're safe or not. But for him to give no reply, there's certainly something going on," the Goddess of Destiny answered, also feeling concerned.
"Let's go ourselves! It's about the safety of our sons. And if we go together, there would be no concern about breaking the rules," The God of War suggested.
"Let's wait one more day. If we still don't get a reply even then, then we would go ourselves," The Goddess of Destiny agreed, giving their envoy one last chance to reply.
"I don't agree! Why are we delaying it again and again! This is about the safety of our sons! What if we are late and something happens to them? We should check as soon as we can! Everything else can come later!" The Lord of War stood up, not agreeing.
"I agree with the Lord of War. I don't want my son to be at risk while I wait here! We don't even have any way to contact them. Even in feeling concerned for them now," the God of Fire said, siding with the Lord of War. "I can't wait for even a second!"
"I also think we shouldn't delay even a little. What if something goes wrong because we were late? Who will take responsibility for that?" The Goddess of Water also chimed in as she stood up.
Since the atmosphere was so serious, even she couldn't sit idle. Her worries about her son's safety were also increasing, now that there was no reply from the envoy.
" I also support going down right now. We don't have time when it comes to such things. Since so many of us have concerns, let's go down and see for ourselves. In any case, it's not like we're going to affect their trials in such a way. We won't interfere at all. We'll just watch and come back," Another god said.
Seeing so many of them willing to go down right away, even the goddess of destiny couldn't oppose it. She didn't want them to seem like they were overreacting, but now when they all wanted it, she couldn't say no either.
" Fine. We'll go down," she agreed.