Part 1: Fate
Seeing the absolute, terrifying chaos unfolding right in front of them.
Haruto and the others don't get any viable plan to do something to escape.
The entire situation is completely insane.
Then suddenly, without any warning.
A massive, roaring mechanical drill appears out of nowhere.
It moves incredibly fast through the air.
And it completely destroyed Eiji's lifeless body, grinding his flesh and the tattoo to pieces.
For that precise reason, Sloth fail to fully reach their location, his anchor severed.
Then, Haruto carefully looked around him and saw a familiar figure standing nearby.
"Humility."
Haruto has meet with Humility before in a quiet local bar, never suspecting his true identity.
Humility casually comes near him, stepping over the shattered debris.
And Marin instantly recognized Humility as he approached.
He is actually one of the revered 7 Heavenly Virtues in the world of Tenzu.
Like the malicious 7 Deadly Sins.
There are also 7 Heavenly Virtues who protect the balance.
1. Humility
2. Kindness
3. Chastity
4. Charity
5. Temperance
6. Patience
7. Diligence
They actively work for the authority of the Main Kingdom.
And they have fought against the 7 Deadly Sins since ancient times.
And the mysterious man before them is one of those 7 Heavenly Virtues.
And he is, in fact, Humility himself.
Haruto and the others become profoundly shock to hear this.
Especially Haruto, because in the personal point of view of Haruto, Humility looks completely normal compared to everyone else.
Nothing special or extraordinary he has visible on his outward appearance.
"So now, we should open the gate and see what is inside that."
"Don't you think, Haruto?" Humility says with a calm smile.
"Okay, come with me," Haruto says, gripping the heavy key tightly.
Everyone come with Haruto as he steps toward the stone wall.
They stand directly in front of the ancient mountain gate.
Then, they carefully entered the key into the stone mechanism.
Then, the massive gate slowly opens, groaning on its old hinges.
And they cautiously entered inside it to look for answers.
They saw a dark, ancient stone-made square shape room.
They look all around them to inspect the hidden chamber.
And they saw 4 different statues standing silently.
Directly in front of them.
In one specific statue, a noble person is riding on a horse.
He is facing toward the left side of the room.
And he is tightly holding his personal pendant.
It looks exactly like a holy cross that he was wearing around his neck.
And the whole design gives a very royal, polite, and holy vibe to the viewer.
On the other hand, another distinct statue on the left side is riding on a horse.
And its pale face is completely covered with a dark cloak.
And he is carefully carrying a dead human skull in his grip.
And the skull shows a very creepy, bone-chilling smile.
It looks exactly like a dead person's head.
He is clearly representing a mysterious and a very creepy death vibe.
In the right statue.
Another brave man is riding on a horse.
And it looks like a fierce female warrior upon closer inspection.
And she is carefully carrying a sturdy shield and a sharp sword.
It looks like she is about to go out on a massive war.
Or perhaps she is locked in a long, endless battle.
She looks incredibly elegant.
And looks like she is currently in a long battle that never ends.
In another final statue.
Another mysterious person is riding on a horse.
And he is holding a human stomach in its right hand.
And a distinct, broken heartbreak symbol is deeply carved on that stomach.
It looks like a miserable man is carefully carrying the concept of hunger.
A vessel that breaks completely from emptiness.
And it perfectly represents a state of deep hunger and starvation.
And seeing all the statues lined up before Haruto could even react or say a word.
He suddenly got forcefully teleported into a completely different place.
And he find himself standing in the middle of absolute darkness.
And he saw a magnificent, swirling galaxy directly in front of him.
And he saw multiple other galaxies looking like tiny glowing dots in the vast distance.
And then, a giant, weird, and incredibly ugly-looking squid and octopus type monster comes there out of the void.
It was a staggering 10 times bigger than the entire galaxy itself.
Then, it mercilessly devour the entire galaxy right in front of Haruto's eyes.
Then, he saw multiple cosmic eyes opening in the dark, gazing directly at Haruto.
Then, Haruto suddenly felt a mysterious figure's heavy presence right at his back.
The figure speaks, and its voice says.
"It's your fate."
"In the future of possibilities of fate, in a countless number."
"It could be you who would destroy everything."
"The destroyer of the world."
"Haruto Tabata."
Then, the mysterious figure slowly came directly in front of Haruto.
It looks exactly like this.
An off-white, cream-colored hooded robe with a large cowl hood worn completely up.
The edges of the hood and the open robe feature geometric embroidered trim in navy blue, teal, and bright gold accents.
Hanging down from the collar are white tassels detailed with small green and gold beads.
Beneath the heavy robe, a dark grey chainmail collar sits high on the neck over a dark blue under-tunic.
The forearms are tightly covered in dark brown leather wraps.
A rugged, weathered brown leather belt is buckled at the waist, holding a small utility pouch.
It slowly pulled up its hood just a little bit.
Its face looks exactly like a young boy that has deep red eyes and messy brown hair.
It looks exactly like Haruto Tabata himself.
Back in the real world.
Haruto unconsciously click his pocket watch out of sheer panic.
And goes in the future a little bit to escape the vision.
And then, Haruto goes in the future through the temporal jump.
Something is completely changed now about his surroundings.
Haruto clearly remember everything that was happening in that mountain gate.
And he remembers exactly what he saw in that another place or cosmic dimension.
But when he asked everyone around him about the secret gate.
Everyone has completely forgot about the gate and what was inside of it.
And Haruto look back at the rocky mountain.
And he saw there is absolutely no gate in that mountain anymore.
Looks like someone has completely erased it away from physical reality.
And its very memory is entirely erased for everyone except for Haruto.
Haruto desperately tried to use his watch to go in the past to fix it.
But he suddenly noticed a terrifying detail.
The watch doesn't work that way anymore.
He can't able to go in the past now no matter what he does.
Haruto become deeply confuse and alarmed.
What does he actually saw in that chamber and cosmic void.
Is that the evil entity's deliberate work.
Or what was that strange phenomenon.
Who was that mysterious person.
The one who is looking exactly like Haruto.
And what just happened with all of them.
And what was the true meaning of that situation.
Every single mystery started to flow rapidly through Haruto's brain.
Training his mind to try to complete the complex puzzle to find out what is truly happening with them.
Then, Marin and the others start to look at him and suspect Haruto because of his weird behavior.
Haruto also decided to side this dangerous question for now to avoid suspicion.
But from now on, Haruto can't side it too easily or ignore it.
He has to deeply think about everything from the beginning.
Because looks like there is a hidden thread that is connected with everything in this world.
In the very next day.
Haruto and the others start their long journey toward the Main Kingdom.
Humility is also traveling along with them in the carriage.
Because Humility have to go back to the Main Kingdom to report.
So for now, he is traveling with them on the road.
They are riding together on a large horse car.
Inside the carriage, Leo, Marin, and Ryuk were sleeping deeply.
Because they do a lot of intense fighting during the last night against Eiji.
Then suddenly, breaking the long silence.
"Hello, Haruto. I suppose you are from Japan, right?" Humility says in fluent English.
Haruto become completely shocked, his eyes widening.
"What do you mean?" Haruto says, trying to keep his composure.
"Don't try to hide this from me."
"I know for a fact you are from Japan."
"And you were transport into this world just like me."
"And did you know how I know it?"
Humility says calmly.
"Tell me how," Haruto says, leaning forward.
"When an outsider like you tried to tell anyone native about the outside world, you can't able to tell them about it."
"Your mouth will be forcefully shut down by the world's laws."
"But the Earth people could talk with each other about it completely freely, who is come from Earth."
"Because they are originally from the same home world."
Humility says, explaining the rule.
"Wait a minute."
"That means..."
Haruto says, the realization hitting him.
"Yeah, you guessed it absolutely right."
"I am from Earth too."
"And my real name is Rentaro."
"And I identify you by trying to talk about Earth in your presence."
"I found that I could able to talk about Earth with you without any restriction."
"Then I instantly realized that you are from Earth too."
Humility says with a reassuring nod.
"Oh, that's nice."
"Nice to meet you, Rentaro," Haruto says, feeling a sense of relief.
"Me too."
"And I noticed you are very smart according to my vision and observation."
"And by the way, I came here to Tenzu when I was only 7 years old."
"Now I am 21 years old."
"That's why I want to tell something very important to you about the Paranormal Troupes."
"Some hidden mysteries that I have found during my time here."
"But the strict condition is you can't tell them to anyone else."
Rentaro says seriously.
Then, after some long hours of continuous journey.
They finally reached the outer gates of the Main Kingdom.
Marin then left them at the entrance.
And she go for her own separate way into the city.
And she said bye to everyone in the group.
Then, Ryuk and Leo go for a kingdom visit section to look around.
And they specifically asked for instructions on going to visit the Fate Kingdom next.
On the other hand, Rentaro and Haruto went straight to a quiet library.
And they sit down together in a secluded chair and table.
And Rentaro finally told Haruto about some dark secrets of the Paranormal Troupes.
The Paranormal Troupe is originally founded by the 7 Deadly Sins' leader, Pride.
Usually, every individual Sin fought with each other due to their natures.
But Pride forcefully assembled everyone under one banner.
And it forms the unified group called the Paranormal Troupe.
And this is what he find out in his personal discovery on the Paranormal Troupe.
Basically, Rentaro is a highly skilled detective in the world of Tenzu.
And he thoroughly investigated about the Paranormal Troupe's ultimate intention.
And he find out that.
"The Paranormal Troupe wants to completely cover the world with an incurable Darkness."
"They want to perform a massive Dark Ritual."
"A Dark ritual is very much like Earth's ancient black magic."
"And they want to perform a practical, large-scale Dark ritual."
"And the specific Dark ritual is called 'The Celestial Boundless'."
"To successfully perform this Dark ritual."
"They absolutely need to do some specific things first."
"They need to turn the sky of Tenzu with a total eclipse."
"The eclipse is a special day where everything covers with absolute darkness."
"And the whole world become incredibly brutal and chaotic."
"And during that time, multiple terrifying monsters from hell started to raise on Tenzu."
"And they would completely devour every single human without any hesitation."
"They are the vicious devils and demons from hell itself."
"And everyone will surely die there if it happens."
"And they also need 3 specific items to complete it."
"Yin."
"Yang."
"And a final, special item to perform the Dark ritual."
"After performing the Celestial Boundless ritual, they will completely reset the world."
"And they will rule that new world as gods."
Rentaro says, laying out the terrible plan.
"Oh, then how it would help me to know this?" Haruto asks.
"So basically, if you find anything regarding the Paranormal Troupe out there."
"You at least have a clear idea of their grand plan."
"So you might be safe from their traps."
"I also want you to think about it every time you encounter them."
"So I can slowly know this world's inner truths through your observations."
"And solve these deep mysteries together."
Rentaro says.
"Okay, I will later think about it very carefully."
"And thanks a lot for this crucial information."
"It will definitely help me," Haruto says gratefully.
He then added a lingering question.
"Did you know there is a magical element called Earth ritual?"
"Is it related to our Earth planet?"
"Nah, here 'earth' is just a standard element like stone, ground, dirt, etc."
"Here, if you say earth, it is an element."
"Not a planet name at all."
Rentaro says, clearing up the misunderstanding.
"Oh, also, how did you become this powerful?" Haruto asked.
"Actually, my specific case is very special."
"Usually, ordinary people who transport into Tenzu don't have any Eco energy at all."
"But I don't know why, I can able to use Eco energy the moment I teleport here as a child."
"And I become strong slowly by training it over the years."
Rentaro says.
"Oh, thanks a lot for explaining," Haruto says.
"You know, this world is commonly called the Land of the Dreams."
"But did you know there is also another world called the Land of the Mysteries?" Rentaro says, dropping his voice lower.
"What?" Haruto says, completely taken aback.
Then, Rentaro reaches into his coat and shows a detailed world map.
"It's not the world of Tenzu at all."
"It is called Lilusia."
"But it's a massive mystery whether it truly exist or not."
There is an old myth that there is a specific person who claims himself coming from the Lilusia world.
It's a completely different world from Tenzu.
That traveler person's name was Alex.
He told everyone that he randomly teleport here into our world.
And he told that the world he comes from is completely full of dark mysteries and deep secrets.
And he carefully drawn the Lilusia world map from his memory.
But most of the ordinary people doesn't believe Alex at all.
They don't believe that a separate world called Lilusia actually exist.
But because of Alex, an interesting new thing comes into Tenzu's culture.
It's the grand Church system.
There are 6 major churches in total.
And every single kingdom has its own church.
And they worship each specific Lord in each separate church.
But every single church firmly believes in one true God.
And all the local Lords are merely the servants of that True God.
"And personally, I strongly believe that Lilusia does exist."
"We are also come from another world across dimensions, after all."
"So there is a very high possibility a third world could easily exist."
"A world that is far more mysterious and full of dark secrets than Tenzu."
"And according to the journals of Alex, the world of Lilusia is much more dangerous than Tenzu," Rentaro says grimly.
Haruto genuinely likes and processes this profound information.
Then, they firmly shake their hands across the wooden table.
And they said that they might will meet again in the near future.
Haruto then left the quiet library, stepping out into the sunlight.
Haruto now become super excited to find every hidden mystery and secret to solve and find out the truth.
And Haruto has firmly decided he absolutely can't go back to the Earth without finding out this ultimate truth of everything.
Then, Ryuk and Leo came meeting up with him on the street.
They have gathered the directions and can now go to the Fate Kingdom.
Then, they eagerly begin their long way to the Fate Kingdom together.