"You keep mentioning erasing the people's minds, explain."
"In due time, let me just continue the story of how it all started. Where was I? Oh, right after my research papers. Okay, I wasn't a hypocrite, so I had to try out my own words before anything.
One good thing had come out of the darkness, people always slept at night, and kept healthy, so lifespan had increased. I had about a couple of decades, but even still, for the soul in me, I wanted to do it in one night like you did, but it never happened. Every day, I would try again and again, retrying, and recording my findings.
Even in my failed attempts, I was soon approached by a group calling themselves a better future. Do you know them? They were so adamant that they knew you even though I'd never known your name myself, one of them told me."
The Knight quickly searched Backster's memories. "what would you know, it seems Backster did know them, not just that, he was part of them at some point, but back then they went by a different name. Continue if you may."
"I will. They asked if they could join me. I let them. We trained for hours a day, the whole week. Months and years passed. None wanted to believe I was a crazy coot, but I could see it in the eyes of some that they were starting to doubt it. This was nothing with any malintent, it came from a single pure hearted desire to be able to help the world before they went out of it.
I've always known that my research was still ill-fitted for practical use, but I had no intention of giving up, but something had to change. I began to make a crusade with gathering books as ancient as time. Any and all that noted the instances of human power fantasies. By the tender age of fifty-three, I finally had another breakthrough.
It was not our method, but what we are aiming for. Over the years I came to realise that power and strength were completely separate things, even if they did not live in isolation. Put simply, strength was ones capability to doing something. Like if one read a book fast, they were a strong reader. I had to figure out what made a powerful reader.
Power is the authority over something. If one got strength through repetition similar to training ones muscles, then power must be gained by subjugating something, or gaining enough effect over it that it translates to power. A powerful reader would be one with such immense clarity that they can decide which words they see when reading text. Similar to how many can read broken sentences as long as the first and last letter remained.
On this path, I realised, you might have not gained power, but a qualification for it. Like you were now able to exert your authority as physical strength by ordering your muscles and soul to remain long after exhaustion. This was realised when I thought that you left a message on the sword for me, and if I don't get this qualification for power, It might be lost forever.
I created a new regime, that relied on not getting some fantastical power but proving to ourselves and the world around us that we deserved it and were going to take it. Politicians from long ago before the darkness, called these elections and running for ballot. Me and the group began doing all of this in earnest.
We would order things to do this with all the constrained will we could muster. This specific exercise became worn out way faster than exercises of this calibre usually did. Yelling out commands at the air seemed so futile. I was tired on this day, being as old as I was, I ordered my fingers to rise in boredom and they did.
This was of course because I made my fingers rise myself. That is when I realised I was making a terrible assumption. If I had to think about this qualification for power in terms of levels, I assumed us humans were at level 1. But no, we weren't level 1, in fact we hadn't even been considered, so we weren't even level 0.
So, our goal had to change, not to gain the qualification, but prove that we were worthy of the qualification. Before running for presidency, we had to register to be presidents. At this moment we were basically just children making banners running for presidents, but our names weren't even on the ballot, so no-one could vote for us, if anyone even wanted to.
How did one register? Bare their spirit bold.
How did one qualify? They didn't, they just seized it.
How did one get power? By taking it when they wanted whenever they wanted it.
This is what I told them that night. And this time I told them that to register, one needed to show absolute control over themselves before they started demanding it of the world. I spent decades on my wheelchair, and yet in the span of that week I took my first steps. I told my legs they're mine, and they're going to walk again. They did.
If I had to take a researchers standpoint of view, I'd say that I was already close to registering, and demanding things from yourself was easier. The day I got up, two of the group had this crazy look in their eyes. And sadly, for all my talk, those two unleashed before me, reaching power level 0.
The rest either died or left us to go live out the rest of their lives. A decade later after the first two, Eruil and Vanarus, I myself unleashed. They were still at 0 though, without me being able to feel it, I couldn't as well help those ahead of me. Instead, I forced them to explain to me how it felt.
Now that I think about it, if they hadn't unleashed, I think I would have died before I ever did. Together we all worked and eventually all reached level 1 with a month of my unleashing. By the time I reached eighty, I was level 5, Eruil was level 4, Vanarus was level 9. Eruil and Vanarus were opposites at the start.
I passed Eruil, and when I did, I realised something. These levels weren't a predetermined path, and Eruil was having a problem because she was trying to copy Vanarus. As soon as I told her this, she became the most powerful of all of us, reaching level 10 and learning a special skill, whilst me and Vanarus were stuck at level 9.
We were like kaiju's in strength alone. Compared to this world, Earth was a weak planet, we had to hold back to avoid destroying entire towns. We weren't aging either, in fact I had grown younger by a few decades. The benefits we experienced were beyond anything. But we chose to keep it a secret whilst we learned and grew to understand more.
We already had skills, but from what Eruil told me, special skills were like granting a selfish wish, or in other words the first step in controlling something much larger than oneself. She said, she didn't know what power felt like, but she felt closer to it by learning this skill, and that one could not reach level 10 without this skill, and one could not get this skill without knowing themselves.
I had to ask myself a particular question daily, what did I most want to be able to do. I got home, looked at my dusty wheelchair, and right next to it lay the sword, then I remembered. I wanted to be able to hear it speak to me like I felt it was trying to that day I left that hole. The fact I wasn't aging made me forget about this urgency.
Without any training at all, that moment I looked at the sword, I just reached level 10, instantly learning my special skill, [Confide in Confidence]. In that moment, I realised I didn't know as much about power and skills as I thought I did. This did not require any form of effort, just a willing being to accept themselves truly, and listen to their own voices.
My skill allowed me to be able to hear and speak with whatever wanted to speak with me. It went further than just a simple communication skill; I could even hear the thoughts of others if they wanted me to.
I approached the sword, kneeled on the floor, like some corny imagination where I was getting crowned by the king of sorts. As it glowed blue, I knew it could see me, I felt so embarrassed, especially with how the sword replied.
'Oh, no, stop it, don't bow on my accord.'
is it really you?
'No, not really. I didn't understand the power I had gotten, but in my worry of if the monsters would get into the well, I managed to tear a piece of my soul and attach it to the sword. I didn't know I had done this until I spoke.'
What about the monster that I saw on the blade?
'Believe it or not, they got universally bound to me. If I had to explain it in as far as I myself understand, when I severed my soul, those connected to it, got severed from their boss. Can you believe it, this means somewhere in that dark night, as I fought for your life, there was an even bigger stronger monster, just ignoring us, their boss? And I severed them from it, being mindless, they bound to my soul, I can't control them, but don't worry they have no orders, so they won't do anything.'"
'So, she knows about the vermin, she just doesn't understand them…' thought the Knight.
"I spoke with the sword all night, it had a fractured sense of self, but I tried to keep the conversation to what it could accomplish.
This is all good news, it means you're not dead, and I can bring you back.
'NO.'
But you're here…
'I think I failed to explain something. I don't know where the rest of me is, or what is happening to it, but I can feel a change, soon enough I won't be myself. I won't even be able to speak to you. And I don't think I have much time left before everything changes. So, I have a few things to ask of you.'
I won't do them, all of this, every bit of it, was for you. I began crying, not even waiting for a response. The words your fragmented soul told me made me realise you were going to leave again, before I even showed you my appreciation, but it kept speaking.
'Listen, I'm proud of you, you managed to make more progress in this century alone more than all modern warfare has been able, take pride in it, I sure do.'
But… but you managed it one night, I did nothing special.
'I'm dead. I won't be coming back, at least I don't think so. So, unlike you, there's nothing I can do to help this world.'
You make it sound like today is the last day we're going to get to speak…
'It is.'
But isn't it supposed to take long, that process that is destroying you?
'well, it is, but I have not much strength left with in me. For the past century, I have been waiting for the moment to tell you something. I conserved my remaining strength after helping you get out of that well, for this single conversation.'
Then please, conserve that strength, don't use it now, talk to me once I've accomplished something great, once I am worthy of receiving your praise, once you can tell me saving me was worth it.
'I'm sorry, but I have to tell you all this now. I might go silent tomorrow, the day after, or even a decade from now, but the uncertainty is why I need to tell you now. There is no point in conserving the meagre strength I have left if I never end up using it.
Listen, these being do not move with the night as we thought, they appear out of it, whatever they are, they aren't monsters, something more akin to destroyers. I believe if we got enough power, we could one day oppose them, and fight at equal footing and decide then if the battle is over. For now, conserve your strength.
Gather the strong willed, let their power grow, gather heroes, and become a force worthy enough to warrant caution from even the darkness. Then, this day, I promise, I'll come back, and I'll congratulate you myself, in the meantime keep this sword safe.'
I took every part of what it said seriously except the last part, I knew that even it knew it could never keep this promise to me; it was just something to keep me motivated. I chose to believe it anyway and keep the sword long after you fragmented soul vanished completely, becoming one with the blade and the destroyers within it. Before you vanished, you said one more thing.
'And don't worry about it, saving your life was worth it, regardless of all that you did. Never forget that I saved you because I wanted, not because I wanted something from you…'
It then floated out of my hands. The white steel darkened beyond recognition. Staining it with a colour beyond the darkness I knew, at that moment, I realised what you meant by using your strength. For all that time, you actually kept yourself from fusing and by having this conversation, you wattled down the rest of this strength to nothing. I had learned a lot about the direction we should go and the fight we must put up against the darkness, but as the last embers of your pristine blue sparked, you said one last thing.
'… and tell Eruil… I said she's welcome.'
When I told her this, she winced in anger. Throwing everything she could grab to the floor, and for someone as powerful as her this was not good. After her tantrum finished, she stopped yelling and asked me, what else you said…"
The Knight interrupted her, standing up as well, she felt a pang of fear arise in her, but she had to remind herself, deep down through all that lifeless steel, this was the same old Backster. It then spoke to her.
"I don't have the memories of this fragment you speak off…"
"I'm sorry, I wasn't strong enough to collect and preserve memories back…"
"You misunderstand. I mean, even though I myself had not promised you this, I have to give it to you, indeed, the knights and heroes you have crafted are something of a marvel."
The Knight clapped its hand's the first it ever had; it sounded like someone smacking large shovels against each other.
"I commend your work, it is worthy of praise, you have done us proud."