Sacrament

Chapter IX: The Beginning of the End

I woke up and opened the window of the Helios. I saw that the sky was red. Asgard was visible, and red lightning blasts were striking it repeatedly. I did not know what was going on. I decided to ask Nova about it. When I asked her about it, she said: "This is not a good sign. In fact, this is the worst sign imaginable. This signifies the end of Asgard, and the end of the Gaara civilization as a whole. Even Gaara that are outside Asgard cannot survive. However, there are things that will stay. The Gaara artifacts will remain, such as the Helios, which I entrust to you beforehand. After the Gaaramageddon will wipe our our civilization, all that we have created that is not part of Asgard will stay. Another thing that will stay is our souls and our power, all inside the Crystal of Sanctification. The Crystal of Sanctification is a gigantic crystal kept in the Celestial Palace's largest tower. Once Asgard is destroyed and our souls are all sealed within the Crystal, it will crash down onto Vatican, destroying it and a large part of its surroundings. The Crystal will not be affected, and will remain standing there, like a tombstone for both the Gaara and the citizens of Vatican." I was shocked by this revelation. I was going to lose the Celestial Sages, my dearest friends, as well as the entirety of their civilization. I hugged Nova, tears streaming down my face. She pet me on the head and said: "Syrtos, you will not be affected. This is our demise, and ours only. We must accept fate." I asked her why it had to be this way. She replied: "There is a secret I have been hiding from you all this time. We are loyal to the Sanctifier. The Sanctifier gave us our knowledge and helped us grow our civilization in exchange for having us entirely separate ourselves from humans. He despised humans, and He wished to put an end to their existence. We, His followers, obeyed His every command and satisfied His every desire. So, we agreed. However, we had been having more and more contact with humans over the past millennia. We enlightened and protected them. This went against His will, so, He set an ultimatum for us. We could interact with humans as much as we pleased, however, we would be destroyed in the end. The Sanctifier, after destroying us, would devour the Crystal of Sanctification, the object He Himself created, and then regurgitate it in the form of an unstoppable, obliterating force, and end the existence of humanity, as well as Planet Earth as a whole." I asked her if we could do anything against this. She said: "Unfortunately, no. The Sanctifier is an omnipotent deity, and trying to stop Him is basically suicide." I didn't think this was true. I wanted to protect my dear friends, even if it meant fighting a god. As we were discussing this, we heard strange sounds outside our window. It sounded like a woman's voice. She was screaming at someone. "Nate, hurry up!" "Hank, you got some explaining to do!" "Kristof, where are you!?" This voice was unfamiliar. I decided to go outside the Helios and saw a woman with dark red hair in a black office dress with black knee-high boots. She looked at me and said: "Oh, hey. Name's Rosemary, codename Commander. I was talking to Nate, codename Heavy, Hank, codename Soldier, and Kristof, codename Assassin. Oh, and Garett, codename Scout, missed his shift. This is our team: Commander, Heavy, Soldier, Assassin, and Scout. If you're wondering why I'm telling you this, it's because I haven't had anyone to talk to for quite a while. Also, this is an emergency mission related to an incident that affects the entire city, so, there's nothing confidential here. Everyone knows that something unusual, to say the least, is going on." I put on the hood of my Gaara outfit and walked forward. I asked Rosemary if she needed help with anything. She said: "Oh, yes. Help. Since Scout missed his shift, you'll be his replacement. If you're asking why, we're severely understaffed, and the agents that we do have are overworked. Including me." I agreed to help her. I asked her what the plan of operations was. She said: "The plan of operations is that after Asgard is destroyed, a robot piloted by none other than you catches the Crystal of Sanctification and fires it at the Sanctifier, killing it. This way, humanity will be saved." I agreed to the plan. The plan was to be carried out tomorrow. We were making preparations today, all day. Even though this plan seemed like a good idea, I still wanted to find a way to save the Celestial Sages and the Gaara...