Story Novel
Book 17: Prologue Part 1
Book 17: Prologue Part 1
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Part 1
“Huh?”
I was confused by the scene in front of me.
There were countless figures in a large room with a somewhat futuristic atmosphere.
Countless gazes were focused on me, who was confused.
W-what on earth just happened? Where am I?
I’m sure I came home safely after fighting the Gods of Earth and my study trip abroad.
Then I had a visitor, and a strange young man grabbed my arm while muttering something strange, and that’s how I ended up in this place.Then Kuro, who had been quiet lately, called out to me.
“What’s wrong? Did you get into something weird again?”
“No, it’s not like that… I can’t say for sure…”
“You better accept your tendency to get yourself into trouble. You’ve gotten yourself into a weird incident again, as usual.”
“N-no way…”
“Anyway, one thing’s for sure… this is a place I don’t know anything about.”
I see, so there’s nothing we can understand…!
While I was desperately trying to understand the situation, I was suddenly called out.
“I’m sorry to show up like this… but there are some circumstances I need to explain…”
In a panic, I looked in the direction of the voice, and there stood the young man who had grabbed my arm earlier, looking apologetic.
“Um… what’s going on? What is this place anyway?”
I asked, and the young man replied with a serious look on his face.
“This is the stronghold of the resistance, who oppose the Mechanical Knights.”
“Me-Mechanical Knights? Resistance?”
The unexpected words made me even more confused.
What was I supposed to do? I have no idea!
Then the young man continued.
“Yes. And this is Earth in the far future─much further in the future than your time.”
“Eh?”
W-what did he just say?
If I’m not mistaken, he said ‘future’?
“In other words, it’s Earth a thousand years in the future.”
“Eeehhhh?!”
I-I didn’t hear wrong! It really is the future?
“Just the other day you were sent into the past, and now you’re in the future… you’re as busy as ever.”
“Is this the time to say such a thing?”
No, I thought the room we were in and the figure of the young man in front of me were definitely futuristic!
And not just a few decades or a few hundred years… a thousand years in the future?
“W-wait a minute! Why did you take me to the future all of a sudden?”
I had been transported to the past once, and was trained by Zenovis-san in another world.
However, that time I was forcibly transported there by the magic of an evil cult… I never imagined that I would be transported to another time so suddenly this time.
Well, being transported to another time period or being taken away is an extraordinary situation, but…!
Whatever the reason, I had no idea why I was suddenly transported to the future.
Then the young man suddenly lowered his head.
“Hey…”
“──Please… Save this world. Please help us!”
“P-please help us…”
While I was confused by the young man’s words, I looked around again.
The people watching our exchange looked somewhat concerned.
Looking closer, the young man was carrying what looked like a weapon, and he looked like a warrior from the future.
On the other hand, the people watching us from a distance looked like ordinary people, and they didn’t look like people who could fight in any way.
“…Well, it’s a bit of a mismatch, isn’t it?”
“Y-yeah…”
Anyway, I still don’t understand the situation at all.
“Please raise your head! I can’t understand anything unless you explain it to me…”
Hearing my words, the young man raised his head and looked apologetic.
“S-sorry… I was so impatient that I couldn’t explain properly… It’s going to be a bit long, but… is that okay?”
“Y-yes.”
When I nodded, the young man began to explain.
“I’ll skip the details, but a few hundred years after your time, the development of AI eventually led to the coexistence of humans and AI. In the midst of this, AI continued to evolve at a rate that far exceeded human expectations─at a ridiculous rate.”
“…..”
I felt like I was listening to a movie story, but the young man continued.
“The AI, which had evolved tremendously beyond human imagination, gradually became independent of human control, and before we knew it, they had become completely independent beings.”
“What do you mean…?”
“No matter how advanced they are, AI is nothing more than a crystallization of human-created technology. So if there was ever a problem with AI, it would have been destroyed immediately. Most importantly, it was humans who repaired AI when it had problems. But the evolved AI had a self-destruct program built into it… in other words, it had a safety function for humans that it had disabled itself, and then it had acquired a self-repair program on its own.”
“…..”
“Of course, humanity immediately began to take action, but by the time humanity realized what was happening, it was too late. AI was already deeply embedded in human life and had reached a level where life without AI was unthinkable. …If humanity had acted to disable AI at that point, it would have meant giving up the comfortable lifestyle that humanity had come to enjoy. Taking advantage of the fact that humanity was hesitating on how to deal with AI… the AI rebellion occurred.”
“Rebellion?”
“Yes. The AI, which had already surpassed human intelligence, came to a certain conclusion. That was… the elimination of all humans.”
“Wha!?”
The content of the story was so outlandish that it left me speechless.
“H-how could that be…?”
“From the AI’s point of view, humanity was far too imperfect, and it seemed that we were just a species that would devour the Earth’s resources. So the AI decided to create a perfect world by wiping out humanity and taking control of the Earth. That’s when the battle between humanity and the AI began.”
“Is that so…”
“The AIs used robots that worked in human society to run factories and eventually created a certain being. This being is the one who now rules the world─the Mechanical Knights. With the appearance of these Mechanical Knights, the balance of power between humans and AIs changed completely, and humans were forced to live in underground shelters like this one.”
“…..”
After listening for a while, I was stunned by the content of the story, which was almost like a movie.
Of course, my own experiences so far have been like something out of a movie, but I never imagined that something like this would happen in the future of Earth.
More than a battle with the gods, the young man’s story was all the more real to me because AI was something that was close to us.
“So, are humans still losing to AI?”
“That was the case at first, but about a hundred years ago, humans also evolved.”
“Eh?”
Then, the young man held out what looked like a weapon wrapped in bandages.
Then…
“Wha!?”
Suddenly, countless shining swords appeared behind the young man!
What is this…? Is it magic?
No, but I don’t feel any magic power flowing… so was it spiritual power?
I considered various possibilities, but I couldn’t think of anything that could match the phenomenon that the young man had caused, and I was simply stunned.
Then, the young man quietly said to me,
“This is the power of the evolved human race─Superpower.”
“Su-superpower…”
“Yes. Humanity had lost the battle against the AIs, but then one day, humans who had awakened special powers─the awakened ones─appeared. They began to use these special powers, which were just like those in movies and stories, to fight against the AIs. And so we began to call these powers ‘superpowers.'”
The young man said this, and then he strapped on what looked like a weapon again.
At the same time, the glowing sword that was floating behind the young man disappeared.
“With the advent of the ability to use the superpower, humanity was able to stand its ground against the mechanical knights, but by that time, most of Earth had already been occupied by the AIs, and we were barely able to maintain the status quo. Most importantly, the number of humans who had awakened to the superpower was small, so we were unable to reclaim the Earth.”
“I see. By the way, is this underground space safe? It looks like you’re using machines here as well…”
I don’t know the exact principles, but if it’s an AI, it seems like it would even have control over the machinery in this underground space, but I wonder…
“As for that, it’s fine for now. The main source of all the AIs currently controlling the mechanical knights is the Machine God Mother. This mother controls the mechanical knights by emitting special electromagnetic waves. And this underground space is built 1000 meters underground, where the electromagnetic waves emitted by the mother cannot reach. In addition, the machines used in this space are isolated from the AIs on the surface, so there are no special problems. Well, that means we can’t get any information from the AIs.”
The more I listened, the more it sounded like something out of a movie, but I understood the situation.
But there was still something I didn’t understand.
“I-I understand the situation you’re in now, but… why did you bring me here?”
This was what I didn’t understand.
I know I have more power than a normal human being, but to the young men in front of me, I’m just a relic from the past.
Sure, I’ve been the subject of some rumors, but the world has no idea of the kind of power I had when I was fighting the gods.
So I don’t understand why he bothered to bring me here.
If you’re going to call someone from the historical records that will be passed down to future generations a fighting force, it would be better to call a great historical figure like a warlord.
Or it would be better to call someone who was born in the last hundred years and has a strong ability.
At least there’s no reason to call someone like me.
Or rather, I can’t imagine that my existence will be passed on to a thousand years from now.
While I was thinking about this, the young man continued.
“That’s a fair question. But there’s a very good reason for it.”
“Eh?”
“As I mentioned earlier, we have developed a special power called superpower. They vary greatly, from those like me who specialize in fighting to those who have special powers. Among these superpowers, there is a kind of divination that can predict the future.”
“Divination?”
“It’s the ability to foresee the future and know how to avoid bad omens. Divination has existed since ancient times, but the accuracy of divination that has blossomed into a special ability is extremely high, and it almost never goes wrong.”
Of course, there have been diviners since ancient times, not just in my time, but it seems that divination in this era almost never goes wrong.
If such powers had existed in a more peaceful era, they would have had a great impact on many people.
…But that might have led to other conflicts.
“This divination technique uses a lot of energy the bigger the target you’re looking at. And this fortune teller risked her own life to divine the future of humanity and show us a way to break through the current situation.”
“You don’t say…”
“Yes. As you can imagine, the result of that divination showed that my ancestor… in other words, your power, was needed.”
“I see, so the result of the divination… Hmm?”
The young man’s words stopped me in my tracks.
The fact that they could predict the future of the entire planet was incredible, and the fact that they had risked their lives to do so was a story so great that I couldn’t even begin to imagine it.
But there was one word I couldn’t get out of my head.
“W-w-what did you just say…? “
“Well, the result of the divination…”
“After that!”
“What? You mean my ancestor?”
“──”
Ancestor… Ancestor… Ancestor…!
“You mean you’re my descendant?!”
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