"Jewel of Life?" President Cornelius took a step back in surprise and took a glance at Azzy, who was wondering how this three-eyed Arcana Master knows of this matter in the first place.
As he was about to deny having any relations with the jewel of life because of its real worth, the Reaper's voice echoed in his head, "No one below the demigod realm had the power to stop you as long as you master those three cosmic jewels. You can ask him."
"Ah, is that so?" Azzy was slightly taken aback, "then, you should have told me to use them against that Supreme realm expert." He argued back.
"Well, you don't have the protection of a guardian god before," replied the Reaper in a nonchalant way as if he was stating an obvious thing.
However, Azzy wasn't fully convinced yet. He asked, "Aren't you worried that the guardian god will not steal the cosmic jewels from me is make it public?"
"Nope," replied the Reaper and went on to explain, "That guy would have no use for the cosmic jewels as he draws power from the null dimension. So, there's nothing for you to worry about."
"Null dimension?" Azzy was confused even more as a few more questions popped up in his head. "I remember my older self saying about the null dimension, which is a gateway to a parallel universe. What is that place? And why do cosmic jewels resist that place's power?"
The Reaper then calmly replied, "I could explain you everything but you don't have such luxury at the moment.
"Ah, that's right…"
The Reaper's reminder brought Azzy back to reality and pay attention to the captain as well as the President who were staring at him in silence as if they wanted a clear confirmation from him.
And Azzy didn't disappoint them either.
Following the Reaper's suggestion, Azzy then confronted the captain on this matter right away. "How do you know about the Jewel of Life?"
Upon confirming that the crown is with Azzy, the President let out a sigh of relief while the captain gave a proper explanation without hiding anything, "Our organization is the one that sold the crown of life to Barton Everglade, who was also assassinated for the same reason.
Captain Neal wanted to avenge the death of his former master and pulled in connections to get the mission assigned to him. He was my partner. So, we were together on the investigation.
And 5 years ago, we got close to the culprit, who we heard to be hiding in the Temple of War. However, one day, Neal had gone missing. Ever since then, we haven't heard from him."
"I see…" Azzy's heart slightly softened for Neal, who was hated by the former for deserting Barton in search of power. Seeing that Neal had tried to do something for his master, Azzy felt like if they meet again, he should stop acting cold to him as he did in the past.
After a while, Azzy and Captain Rudra were seen walking around the place, the latter acting as a tour guide while speaking about the rules and regulations followed by introducing the other members like he was passing the info on them as everyone except for their commander is busy in missions. Rudra further stressed that because of the President's orders, he had to leave his team in the middle of their investigation and arrive at HQ in a jiffy.
On the way, as Azzy observed their facility, he saw an abundant amount of robots just standing against the walls like statues without moving a bit.
Soon, they arrived at a giant metal door, which looked quite imposing with the 3d image of three dragon heads and a long-legged tall female human with long pointy ears engraved on top of it. The dragon heads appeared to be burning the enemy with their flames.
As Azzy observed the mural, Captain Rudra explained without being asked about it, "This is Aidus, the Commander Kruger's Arcana. And that is an elf, precisely, the elven race's last queen who decided to declare war on the humans when we were vulnerable. He killed her and save a lot of lives."
"War against the humans?" Azzy was slightly taken aback. Since Kruger isn't even in the supreme realm, he will be around the same age as Ramiel Crescent and this story shouldn't have happened too far in the past unless the supreme commander had a special bloodline like the Blood clan people or the Druid race.
Being curious about the story of elves, Azzy asked Rudra to continue with it.
Captain Rudra adhered to his request and resumed the story, "It was around the time when the thunder emperor Aelius Crescent went on a rampage, i.e. about 6000 years ago (60th century of 10th epoch).
Everyone knows what happened in that event. So many Supreme beings (peak-rank-9), supreme realm experts (rank-9), and other top experts (rank-7 and rank-8) became martyrs before that devil was finally put to death.
As humanity became vulnerable to threats from platinum-grade beasts from Arcana world and terrorist organizations from within due to the economic and military collapse, the last remaining elven kingdom, Searvale, decided to take advantage of the situation and invade the human lands to reclaim their so-called the empire of Eden.
In order to prevent casualties, WAMO assigned the Zero Squad and top commanders to eliminate the elves altogether before they even had the chance to wage a war. Back then, we don't possess any modern technology and were completely dependent on Arcana Masters.
Hence, we had to take such a drastic step to save millions of citizens and safeguard peace. Our Supreme Commander, Kruger was the one who dealt the finishing blow to the Elven's queen and became the hero. If you ask me, I would say that I'm not proud of such methods but I would still support their method. After all, for the greater good of society, it is not a sin if one would have to sacrifice innocents. Happens all the time."
"I beg to differ, Captain Rudra," replied Azzy after hearing out everything. He was certainly displeased and lost his good impression on both this captain and the commander. Looking straight into his eyes, he further said, "According to what I have learned from my grandfather, the greater good itself is an act of evil.
Just like how polluted water cannot help a plant to become a tree, the peace built on top of an act of evil will not last much longer. The more it lasts, the more the incoming disaster will be heightened.
And when that imminent disaster will finally meet us, it will be several folds than you possibly expected. It is a fact that history tells mankind."
"You…" Rudra was taken aback by Azzy's words as he was trying to make an impression as a captain but instead, he felt like he was being lectured by a superior rather than a subordinate telling his opinion. He didn't like such a feeling and wanted to argue back.
However, before he countered with his own logic, a deep voice came from the other side of the door, interrupting their conversation, "Okay kids, enough chattering. You may come in…"
As the both of them turned their heads to look in the direction of the door, it was opened on its own, revealing a long pointy-eared guy with a pale-looking face and amber eyes. "I received the message from President Cornelius. Welcome to Zero Squad, Mr. Azrael." The guy greeted Azzy with a smile.
"Ho… no wonder this fellow was alive even 6000 years ago. Now it all makes sense. It's a pure-blood elf. I thought that kid, Louis is the last of his kind…" commented the Reaper as soon as Azzy's eyes fell on the supreme commander.
"Eh?"
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