Check out more than 45+ chapters right now? š„
š patreon.com/Mr UmU
https://www.patreon.com/Mr_UmU
__________________
Chapter 64: The Weight of Erased Souls
"Many would perish in such an undertaking," Noy admitted, her expression betraying the weight of moral uncertainty that pressed upon her conscience.
"Do those erased through timeline manipulation not qualify as casualties?" Valdor's voice cut through the chamber's sterile atmosphere like a blade through silk.
His question hung in the air, challenging the assembled Time Bureau personnel with its stark implications.
"These are living beings, individuals with bonds of kinship and friendship, possessed of their own thoughts, their own capacity for joy and sorrow," the Captain-General continued, his auramite-clad form radiating the authority of millennia.
"Does the absence of visible blood and corpses grant you the comfort of believing such erasures are not deaths?"
Valdor's interrogation rendered Noy and her colleagues speechless, forcing them to confront the philosophical implications of their temporal manipulations.
What constituted death? It was the termination, the absolute obliteration, of existence itself. The knife-thrust that ended a life was murder, certainly.
But erasing an individual from the timeline, rendering them as if they had never drawn breath, this too was murder. Perhaps the latter represented an even greater malevolence than the former.
At least those slain by conventional means left behind memories, witnesses to their having once walked among the living.
Ā But temporal erasure consumed even these traces, obliterating every record of their existence with surgical precision.
Such cruelty transcended mere death, it was the annihilation of ever having been.
"Abandon this hypocrisy and embrace my Lord's counsel," Valdor declared, his gaze sweeping across the assembled temporal technicians.
"The casualties inflicted through timeline modification will scarcely differ in number from those of conventional warfare. What we must ensure is that their deaths serve a greater purpose."
His voice carried the weight of absolute conviction. "Destroy Eternal Spacetime. Preserve the Time Bureau. Grant humanity the glorious future it deserves."
Valdor's words found fertile ground among many of the Bureau personnel. The plan he described would indeed prove more brutal in its execution, but it would preserve their organization and its capabilities.
The foundation stones of this new epoch would rest upon the salvaged remains of the original timeline and its appropriated technologies.
Victory against Eternal Spacetime would herald humanity's ascension to the stars in the twenty-fourth century, the precise moment when the species would achieve temporal mastery without external interference.
Beyond mere stellar expansion lay treasures harvested from countless obliterated realities.
The large-scale matter replication systems of the three-hundredth century exemplified such prizes, miraculous devices capable of converting pure energy into perfect material duplicates of any conceivable object.
Eternal Spacetime had seized this technology to fuel their expansion, then systematically erased the timeline that birthed it through orchestrated revolution.
Such acts of temporal larceny had repeated throughout the aeons.
Whenever Eternal Spacetime deemed a technological advancement undesirable or threatening to their hegemony, they would appropriate it before obliterating the entire causal chain that brought it into existence.
With access to these stolen innovations, humanity could establish a civilization spanning multiple galactic clusters.
The twenty-fourth century marked a critical threshold, the moment when humanity first constructed their temporal field generators.
All history preceding this point constituted what scholars termed "prime history," and alterations to this period carried unpredictable consequences.
After extensive deliberation, the Time Bureau's leadership council reached consensus: the Human Empire would serve as their instrument of resistance against Eternal Spacetime's tyranny.
Reports then reached the chamber, representatives from Eternal Spacetime had arrived, demanding audience with the Bureau's senior command.
Initial discussions favored refusal, but the Emperor's will superseded such caution. He desired to hear what these temporal manipulators might offer.
As they proceeded toward the diplomatic chambers, the Master of Mankind established psychic contact with his corvid companion.
'Raven, why has no reward manifested for altering this timeline's fate node?'
The Emperor's calculations indicated his actions had shifted this universe's predetermined destiny by more than five percentage points.
Under normal circumstances, such significant alterations should have triggered their cosmic reward mechanisms.
The Raven's mental voice carried notes of grim understanding. 'This reality operates under different parameters, my Lord. Here, beings traverse timelines with impunity. You must see this endeavor through to its conclusion to claim your prize.'
'Otherwise, the moment we depart, these temporal manipulators will restore everything to its original state.'
The inhabitants of Eternal Spacetime had designated the span from the 100,000th to the 150,000th centuries basically between 10th and 15th million years as the Hidden Epoch.
Previously, they had maintained careful distance from this period, avoiding interference for fear of provoking catastrophic warfare.
Now, desperation compelled them to breach their own protocols. They had fought their way into this forbidden era to seek out the Time Bureau of the Hidden Epoch, driven by necessity that brooked no alternative.
Various sectors of Eternal Spacetime burned under the wrath of the tyrant from beyond time.
Only his elimination could halt the devastation consuming their civilization.
They had journeyed from the future to this temporal coordinate with singular purpose: to persuade the Time Bureau against cooperation with the interdimensional despot.
They sought assistance in eliminating the tyrant and preventing the temporal war that would consume countless realities.
The delegation's leader was High-Level Temporal Technician Harun, a man whose very presence spoke of authority earned through centuries of service to Eternal Spacetime's cause.
In the Time Bureau's original stratagem, fate would have arranged for Noy to encounter and form romantic attachment to Harun.
Through this relationship, Harun would have assisted in severing the causal chains binding Eternal Spacetime's existence, enabling humanity's earlier expansion into the void.
The Emperor's arrival had shattered these careful arrangements.
The Time Bureau had abandoned their subtle approach in favor of establishing the Human Empire, preparing to destroy Eternal Spacetime through direct military action.
Harun and Noy, naturally, had never met under these altered circumstances.
Upon witnessing the Emperor and Time Bureau personnel arrive together, Harun's expression shifted from surprise to indescribable rage.
Recognition dawned, he had arrived too late. The tyrant had already swayed the Bureau's leadership, and cooperation had been established.
"Are you aware of the atrocities he has committed?" Harun demanded of the Time Bureau assembly, his voice carrying the weight of witnessed horrors.
"This being has launched temporal warfare, obliterating numerous spacetime sectors. Countless Eternals have perished in that conflict."
"And what of the crimes perpetrated by Eternal Spacetime?" Line retorted, his square features hardening with righteous anger.
"Humanity lost its opportunity to reach the stars because of your interference. Your actions condemned our species to despair and extinction."
Harun's response carried casual dismissal that chilled the assembled listeners. "What matter is extinction? Every species faces such fate, it is merely a question of temporal sequence."
"If you consent to remove the barriers preventing our access to the Hidden Epoch, we can correct this trajectory. Throughout all eras accessible to Eternal Spacetime, we have consistently achieved humanity's optimal welfare without failure."
Before the Time Bureau personnel could formulate responses, Valdor stepped forward, his voice cutting through the chamber with imperial authority.
"Welfare as defined by whom?"
"Executioner of the tyrant, you possess no standing to speak," Harun shouted, his composure cracking under the Custodian's scrutiny.
Valdor's response carried the cold contempt of one who had witnessed true nobility. "My Lord may be your tyrant, I may serve as his instrument of justice, but what are you? Eternals who fashion yourselves as deities?"
"We are the devoted guardians who protect human civilization through sacrifice and contribution!" Harun retorted, his excitement betraying the desperation beneath his words.
Valdor's tone remained arctic. "Permitting humanity's extinction, manipulating the fate of every individual, disregarding their free will, casually erasing their existence, you term this sacrifice and protection?"
Harun's face flushed with anger, his counterarguments appearing increasingly feeble. "These are necessary sacrifices made to preserve human civilization."
To Valdor, such reasoning represented the height of absurdity. "You murder entire populations, then proclaim it serves human civilization?"
Harun attempted forced justification. "You deliberately misrepresent our actions. We do not murder."
Valdor's voice resonated with the power of absolute moral certainty. "Altering time, erasing conscious thought, is this not murder? Appropriating technologies from various realities before obliterating the timelines that created them, is this not a crime against all humanity?"
The accusation hung in the air like a death sentence, its truth undeniable despite Harun's mounting protests.
In the sterile diplomatic chamber of the Time Bureau, two visions of humanity's future stood in stark opposition, one offering transcendence through conquest, the other promising safety through submission.
The choice would echo across eternity itself.
____________
Want bonus chapters? You got it.
Goal:Ā 450 ā Achieved: 402 = 2 Bonus Chapter
š 1 Power Stone on the Book Page = 100 on Chapter Pages!
!! VISIT the BOOK PAGE to donate your Power Stone.
Leave a REVIEW and drop a COMMENT!!
Also, get access to 270+ bonus chapters across all my stories.
š patreon.com/Mr UmU
https://www.patreon.com/Mr_UmU