Apocalypse Redux

Chapter 180: What goes around, comes around

Isaac’s visit to Camelot had been very enlightening, and downright relaxing once the issues had been cleared up as far as they could be until Loki got his payment, but unfortunately, that couldn’t last very forever.

Which now left him sitting in his apartment, reading the latest information his off-the-books, former-mobster investigator Gregorio Zambon had gotten him. It wasn’t much, or particularly useful. Basically, he’d spent every waking hour since the disaster in Hamburg searching high and low for the people responsible and he’d gotten nothing.

Not even the conspicuous absence kind of nothing that spoke of the cult’s concealment [Skills], but outright nothing, zilch, nada. Neither hide nor hair anywhere in all of Germany.

There were still hints of these fuckers being active in other countries, the oddly obscured actions that most investigation [Skills] could only read as “blank void”. They’d up and left Germany and while that might have been a good thing with most criminal organizations, this time, all it did was make all of the leads Isaac had still had lead nowhere.

He’d sneak a few of those documents to the police, but he doubted it would do much.

Now though, he had a job to do. Sadly, it wasn’t a big fight, an enemy to beat, a lesson to teach, or even research to help with. No, the only thing he was supposed to do was stand there and look pretty.

Isaac reached into his closet and pulled out his newest suit. His go-to semi-formal wear might have been decorated armored bracers and a polo-shirt, but the dean had wanted a suit, so the dean got a suit. Specifically, a suit made entirely by the university and its advances in material sciences.

Isaac’s tailor had helped with the final design, which had helped avoid ending up with a complete and utter fashion disaster, but it was still noticeably not a cut made by a world-class professional like most of Isaac’s other clothing articles.

But that didn’t really matter as the real treasure was the materials the suit was made from, all the latest mystic silks and strings, woven together into an incredibly flexible yet durable substance that outperformed the armor Isaac had had a few months ago without having been designed to function as such. It really was a miracle material and no small wonder that Dean Kass wanted to show it off as he held his speech.

Now if only the end result didn’t make him look like a clown …

Isaac sighed and just put on the suit. It wasn’t nearly as bad as he was making it out to be and appropriate for the occasion, just contrary to his usual style, but he still very much disliked it.

What one didn’t do for one’s boss on an occasion as auspicious as the anniversary of the [System’s] Initiation?

Today had started out with him visiting his family, then showing a few potential investors/future colleagues around their building with Bailey, then doing the same with his company, and was now finally getting ready to attend the big speech the university’s dean was going to give, followed by a tour of all the new facilities that had been constructed in the last year. Spoiler alert, those were all [System] related. Almost half a square kilometer of new buildings, placed in the area north of campus.

The first of those had been the team’s building, six stories of laboratories and administrative space, with a basement fit to summon even the most eldritch of horrors.

Second had been the crafter’s village, followed shortly afterward by the bunker they used for Hunting Grounds.

And then, the whole thing had kinda gotten out of control. Greenhouses, different kinds of labs, literal warehouses for when people built too much crap and the space elsewhere ran out.

A few minutes later, Isaac marched into the team’s building, heading into one of the offices that looked out across the plaza outside, waiting there until Kass started talking to him.

“So, is there anything more I should know about before I give the speech? Any last-second revelations that I might get asked about, ones that might bite me in the ass?”

“Don’t worry, there’s nothing,” Isaac said. Well actually, there was a whole laundry list of things, including such things as the truth behind the [System], Arthur’s latest [Class], and his own status as a time traveler, but there was no reason any of those should come up now of all times.

“And what about new tricks, is there anything I could unveil that the public doesn’t already know about?” Kass pressed. He already had half a dozen things to boast about, more than enough, but he was far more nervous than he had any right to be. The dean was a seasoned academic, he was used to talking to reporters and boasting about his and his university’s achievements without letting it sound as though he was showing off, but this whole situation was a bit beyond what even he was used to.

Isaac shook his head “We added a few new tricks to our company, but I don’t think you want to announce those at a university speech.”

“Probably not.” Kass agreed “You’re a good kid, you know? If I were one of the strongest people in the world … I wouldn’t go full supervillain, but I’d probably let it go to my head at least a little.”

“Thanks,” Isaac said as he stared out across the vast crowd gathering outside. Normally, a speech like this would have been given in the university’s largest auditorium. During the university’s normal annual “bragging day”, the Dies academicus, that was exactly how it went down. Or so Isaac had heard, it had taken place during the Kora incident and he hadn’t exactly been in a position to watch at the time.

However, this was no normal speech about the march of scientific progress, this was a speech commemorating the one-year anniversary of magic. Too many reporters were here to listen to the person who functionally spoke for Isaac and Bailey, so now, the whole affair had been moved to the square in front of the team’s building.

All day, the radio had been nothing but speeches, “expert testimony” on the effects the [System] had had on the world, grand promises on what this new world could become, and so on, and so forth. Also, a lot of doomsaying was spread about, stories of monsters destroying villages, monstrous humans slaughtering innocents, and a metric fuckton of “we can’t say this in public, but it was bad.

As for Isaac, he honestly had to say it had been a good year, his first three-hundred-and-sixty-five days in this timeline. He’d set up a fantastic research group, prevented several disasters from occurring and he’d found out about the cult, rather than being blindsided by them, nine years down the line.

Of course, by most people’s standards, this year had been filled with disasters. Millions dead from the Events. The attack on Seoul by the Demon Lord that had decimated the ranks of their military and Hunters. And that wasn’t even counting the series of nukes that had been deployed on rogue [Raid Bosses].

By Isaac’s standards though, that was a calm stretch and all those incidents/disasters might not even have been given more than a throwaway line on the news in his old world.

And yes, it was still at the start of the [System’s] reign, things could and almost certainly would get worse going forward, no matter what he did, but they were still fairly hopeful.

Now he just had to survive this speech, then pick up his sisters so he could show them the new pool and adventure playground he’d build on his property. Of course, that pool was soon going to be the site of aquatic summoning, and the “adventure playground” was actually the bones of a warehouse, but as a kid, he’d have killed to be able to run around on an “active construction site”, even if there wasn’t any construction equipment to play with.

The clock in the corner of the room continued to tick onward silently as the square outside grew ever so slightly more full, it would have reached the point of “overcrowded” if there hadn’t been a police presence. Most of the people down there had arrived hours ago, setting up camera equipment and getting into place to shout questions once the initial speech had finished.

Eventually, Bailey showed up and Isaac immediately noticed that he’d had to subtly manipulate his form to fit into the suit he’d been given. Sure, Kass’ arguments about how physically displaying one of the university’s achievements still held water but damn, the execution had seriously floundered.

The rest of the team showed up alongside Professors Bishop and Chandler, and then, they headed out. Kass stepped up to the podium and started to give his speech … and then the damn microphone died with an eardrum-shredding screech. That seemingly happened every single time someone tried to give a speech both at his university and his high school and somehow, no one had managed to create a fix after the millionth time that had happened. Seriously, how hard would it have been to have an [Engineer] set that up?

Of course, both Amy and Patrick cast [Amplify Sound] before the microphone’s death knell had even died down. Kass kept talking, and everyone pretended that hadn’t happened.

In his speech, the dean pointed out all the things that the university had achieved, how much better the world could become, and so on. He sounded proud, and while he had directly done very little, his support had been invaluable.

“… and as such, we will all be taking the world into a bright future.”

And that was that. The end of the speech. There was barely a split second of silence before the question began, some asking for the timeline on specific discoveries to be turned into viable technology and so on, and so forth.

But not all questions were so innocent.

“In what universe is summoning [Raid Bosses] a good idea? I thought you guys were meant to be the smart ones, not encouraging the dumbest part of the [System]?”

… yeah, that had been about as long as they could have avoided confronting that question. The official “we’re summoning this thing with all the right preparations, please don’t drop a nuke on us” paperwork had been filed just yesterday, and now, people were going over the top.

“Professor Bailey, would you like to take this question?” Kass offered and took a step back, letting the other professor answer.

“Fundamentally, if the [System] is available to everyone. At some point, every creature would get summoned even if we didn’t. This is something we’ve already seen go badly three times and each time, we can trace what problem back to missing preparation and backup.

“In preparation to summon a [Raid Boss], an artificial island was raised from the North Sea, enchantment arrays and warding circles are holding everything on the island in place and a large chunk of the nation’smilitary is on standby. In addition, we’ve gathered ten people with combat [Classes] over Level 90 to fight the monster. Finally, should something, anything, go wrong, we have several international allies ready to intervene in under a minute, should something go wrong.” Bailey explained.

The person who’d asked the question looked ready to explode but one of the nearby reporters was furiously talking him down. Few wanted this to devolve into an argument about the ethics of summoning.

“What do you expect to learn from the [Raid Bosses]?” came the next question.

“Everything about them. We’d like to know how to beat them more easily, how their abilities work, and possibly even how to replicate their ability to endure incredible damage.” Bailey said.

“Have you ever been able to replicate a monster’s abilities without using Aspects?”

“Of course. We’ve created several enchantments, basic Spells, and alchemical compounds based on monsters and even [Skills].”

“Name one.”

Isaac sighed at the challenge but decided to not say anything as he could see Chandler step up.

“Other than the few potions that were introduced by the mysterious message, most alchemic substances were created to replicate some effect seen in nature. For example, the ‘emergency healing’ potion that is used to prevent even catastrophic injuries from turning fatal is based on the regenerative ability of a Hydra.” The older professor explained. He was still an elderly man who would have looked more at home in a retirement home than a laboratory, surrounded by exceedingly dangerous tools and materials, but he’d changed massively since Isaac had met him.

Chandler was standing straighter than before, the back no longer bent with age and the sheer number of wrinkles on his face had been reduced down to almost nothing. And his eyes shone with the vibrancy of a young explorer, eagerly drinking in anything and everything they saw, never satisfied, ever searching.

And then came the question Isaac had really been hoping wouldn’t come up.

“May I ask about the plan to empower politicians? There are certain … rumors floating around involving how high Level [Politician]-[Skills] will basically amount to mind control. Now, I realize that the ‘new world order’ conspiracy theories are just that, conspiracy theories, but there are parts that ring painfully true. So, what is the reality of the rumors? And why was it all kept a secret?”

Not even a question about whether there was really a plan, just someone asking for clarification. Sigh.

Isaac had, of course, warned Kass that someone would probably be asking about this, especially when one of the politicians who had been told they wouldn’t be allowed in the program started complaining to the press. So when the question was asked, the dean just said “I’ll let the person working on the project answer that question. Dr. Thoma, if you would?”.

Isaac stepped up to the place where the sound amplification Spell was still in place and began to explain.

“There is a lot of truth to those rumors, yes. In the wake of the Hamburg incident, we were looking for ways to prevent another incident like it from taking place and figured out that [Politicians] might have access to certain [Class] Evolutions that focus on country-wide boosting [Skills], some of which might potentially reduce collateral damage from high-Level fights.

“From that point on, we’ve been hammering out the particulars of that plan, which basically boils down to this: politicians without scandals from the parties currently in the Bundestag will be chosen at random, though we will make sure no party is left out or benefits excessively. These politicians will be given the choice to be brought up to Level 25, the point where [Classes] that are not explicitly magical breach the boundaries where they only allow mundane things to be done better. In exchange, they’ll be agreeing to share all the information they have available on their various possible Evolutions and choose the one that sounds the most like it would grant boosting [Skills] to give us all the information possible on that topic.

“We will not be leveling anyone past Level 25 as the world’s current average Level is 18 and anything beyond that would have the potential to shake up the status quo too much. Incidentally, a new law is currently being written that will count power-leveling candidates for a political office and limit it, just like any other campaign contribution. While it won’t be in effect by the time our leveling program takes place, we will be complying with the law and we’ll also be choosing whom we level at random. If they have a clean vest and show that they are willing to obey orders in a combat situation, they’re eligible.”

“What do you have to say about the rather more extreme interpretations of your program?”

“The talk of a new world order was caused by a big misunderstanding. No one publicly announced the program because so much about its final form was uncertain that we’d just end up with a lot of ‘maybe’s and ‘despite what I said last time’-s. And then someone started ‘inviting’ in politicians with the exact kind of track record that would bar them from our program.” Isaac explained.

“So your stance on this is that nothing can happen, that there’s no chance for the politicians you empower to choose a [Class] other than what you want them to? What happens then?”

“Then you’ll know about two seconds after we do.” Isaac grinned viciously “This is a research project, and we intend to publish its results.”

There were a few scattered chuckles at that. Many of the reporters here were of the political variety, who could already picture the headlines.

“Politician power leveled for country-boosting [Skill], chose manipulation based [Class] instead, career ruined”

The questions continued in a more standard vein, with people asking about the latest innovations and where the university was aiming to go with its research.

And then came the next banger.

“Dr. Thoma, earlier, my colleague suggested that high-Level politicians functionally have access to mind control and you didn’t refute it. Does that it’s possible that one day, democracy might end up failing as a matter of course?”

Ah yes, the darkest take on all this. Kass immediately let Isaac take the question.

“Yes.” Isaac said, nodding, and let the word hang in the air like a thundercloud for a moment “High-Level individuals gain [Classes] of immense power, capable of change on a grand scale. I’ve met a couple of individuals at the beginning of the fourth Evolutions and if you pardon my French, the [Skills] at that level are utterly broken. But there is nothing in the [System] that is insurmountable, no [Skill] that is unbeatable, and high Level politicians who can change public opinion with a wink and a nod are no exception. And that counter is vigilance.

“Actually, that’s how it’s always been. People in positions of power will take as much of it as they can, and if no one stops them, they’ll take it all. That’s why we have the separation of powers, why we have systems of holding even the people in charge of the country as a whole to account for their actions, why we have freedom of speech to allow us all to express our opinions on our leaders and call them out for potential bad behavior. When we the people grow complacent, bad things happen, whether magic is involved or not.

“For example, in Ancient Rome, when Caesar died, his heir ‘reinstated the Republic’ with himself as the princeps, the first citizen when in reality, he turned himself into the first Roman emperor. If people hadn’t believed him, if the Populus had been more focused on ensuring the Republic was truly reborn, it might have.

“Or for a more recent example, I believe some of you might be familiar with a little incident known as the Watergate scandal?”

Many people nodded, while others just rolled their eyes.

“Richard Nixon abused the power of his office and he might well have gotten away with it if the scandal hadn’t been uncovered by a pair of reporters, working tirelessly against such oppositions that no one could fault them for giving up. But they didn’t. Bob Woodward and Howard Bernstein did not give up and uncovered a conspiracy that led all the way to the White House and changed the course of history.

“On the other hand, we’ve seen what happens when blatant abuse of power isn’t checked, right here in this country, ninety years ago, when a failed art student took power bit by bit. He blamed the Jews for all that ailed this country, and even though it was fundamentally illogical, people believed him over using their own heads.

“He trampled over international treaties to take possession of Germanic nations and the other nations let him, believing that at some point, he’d be satisfied.

“He built weapons of war that violated treaties all treaties that limited those, and the other nations allowed it while obeying the treaties themselves, preferring to preserve peace over fighting a war even though everything was pointing towards that war being inevitable.

“And here in Germany, every alarming change was ignored by most people until that man was unstoppable.

“I believe we all know how that ended, but let me remind you anyway: The Second World War was the deadliest conflict in history, killing around eightymillion people directly, with another twenty or so million dying to war-related causes like famine or disease.”

Isaac paused and took another deep breath.

“All of that was a very longwinded way of saying: democracy can work, come hell, high water, or magic. We just need to pay attention and make sure that it remains a true democracy, that no one starts to gnaw away at its foundations, starts twisting it into something that might technically still be a democratic system but had lost its spirit long ago.”

He shrugged and cocked his head to the side. It couldn’t hurt to throw in a little flattery after all the doomsaying.

“Like I said, Watergate was solved by reporters. If something like it happens here, which one of you lot will get the scoop?”

***

“Hey Isaac, look at me!” Tanja squealed as she did a cartwheel across the girders that would one day become an office that overlooked the warehouse from just under the ceiling … seven meters off the floor.

That little gremlin was going to be the death of him, one of these days.

Isaac shook his head as he turned around to watch while he flipped the burger patty on the grill. He’d finally broken out the mystical cow meat he’d gained during the first Event and was making a meal for his family to celebrate or commiserate this day, he wasn’t quite sure which it was.

His parents were currently at the pool with Viktoria, having decided they didn’t want to watch their other daughter’s death-defying stunts. Sure, they weren’t anywhere near as dangerous as they looked, but internalizing that knowledge wasn’t simple.

The speech and answering all those questions had been exhausting, sure, but it had gone reasonably well, as had everything else he’d done today. And now, the day was ending on a pleasant note with a nice family meal.

In a few weeks, though, things would go to hell in a handbasket when they summoned their first [Raid Boss].