“Oh, it’s already this late.”
Yushia, regaining her composure, straightened up and asked the green beings,
“You must be hungry. Would you like to order something to eat?”
The green beings exchanged slightly puzzled glances,
a faint smile flickering across their faces.
Then they spoke.
“We are always absorbing special particles floating in this layer of air.
They aid our metabolism and allow us to move.
It is because we are gods-though only lower gods, of course...”
Their voices were low and gentle,
yet carried a resonance that subtly stirred the listener’s heart.
“Oh, and as for Kalmeon or Leisa...
Beings from before the Big Bang do not know the concept of ‘food.’
They eat a teal gemstone called Etheria.
Just a tiny, sparkling gem...
But on their star, it is a common stone.
Eating a single one triggers internal fusion, supporting their metabolism,
so they do not need to eat anything for about three hundred years.
That’s why, unlike humans, they do not excrete,
and because it is pure fusion energy, only a fragrant scent remains...”
They finished speaking and looked at Yushia.
With that gaze,
a gentle, iridescent green light began to emanate from their bodies.
It was no ordinary illumination.
It was alive, fluid, and carried the waves of ancient secrets whispered from the dawn of time.
That green light enveloped Yushia’s entire body-
no, her very existence.
A mysterious sensation, as if climbing back through hundreds of millions of years,
filled the space.
As the waves of light faded, they spoke softly.
“...You are the same.”
A gasp-
Yushia flinched, her heart dropping with a shock.
Goosebumps prickled across her skin.
Her deepest secret-
perhaps a fundamental trait she herself had never fully recognized-
felt utterly exposed.
“How... did you... know...?”
How did they know?
The green beings gazed at Yushia with calm eyes and answered.
“We followed the Chroma.
Chroma is a kind of ray that appears in beings of fusion-like Kalmeon, Leisa, and you.
The story has been stolen; if detected on Amazon, report the violation.
A mysterious, nearly undetectable ray.
But it cannot be seen by three-dimensional beings.
Only gods like us can see it...
It is the color and mark of your very essence, emitted by your existence itself.”
Once more, they seemed to scan Yushia’s being.
You are one of the rarest beings in the entire universe,
one who has interacted with the genes left by pre-Big Bang entities.
That is why we have come all this way.
A soft gasp-
Yushia was completely frozen.
Her mouth hung open.
How...
How could they...
Her deepest identity,
her true nature so thoroughly hidden beneath a human guise-
how could they see right through it?
In shock, she realized
her very existence reached beyond the timeline of this universe...
...
Their gaze drifted from Yushia,
as if looking far into some invisible distance.
The green light that filled the space subtly shifted,
and a new weight entered their voices.
“Now, we must go to capture Leisa.”
It was a firm, unwavering declaration-
as if the earlier mysterious explanations were merely a prelude,
the words fell upon Yushia like a sudden storm.
“What? Leisa...?”
Yushia’s voice trembled with anxiety.
The name, faintly sparkling in the primordial memories etched deep in her mind,
the beautiful, distant being she remembered alongside Kalmeon.
“That... that beautiful woman? Kalmeon’s woman...?”
The green beings nodded.
A simple affirmation, yet the gesture itself seemed to confirm some vast ancient saga.
“Yes. We must go to capture her.”
‘Capture her? Why? Where is she?’
A thousand questions exploded in Yushia’s mind,
but what came out was the most primal one.
“Where is she...? And... capture her...?”
Their green eyes shone with the depth of the universe.
When they spoke next, Yushia could barely breathe.
“Leisa... is on Earth right now.”
A silence fell, as if the time of the universe itself had stopped.
“What...? Earth...?”
Yushia was utterly frozen.
A pre-Big Bang being...
on this tiny planet? At this very moment?
It was a reality beyond imagination.
“Yes. She is on Earth...
in a very deep cave in what you call the Himalayas.”
Their voices echoed low, like the depths of a cave.
“A place untouched by human feet...
where even light can barely reach...
A place where only ancient secrets sleep...
That is where she is.”
A chill ran down Yushia’s spine.
In that deep, mysterious place in the Himalayas...
a being unimaginable to human civilization was hiding.
A gasp-
They calmly watched Yushia’s shock,
then began to explain their current state.
Their voices were calm,
but the magnitude of the hidden truth was unmistakable.
“Right now, we have left our pure ‘informational state’
to descend into the physical three-dimensional world...
We left most of our power and abilities in our ‘inner space’
to take on this form.”
It was as if gods had limited themselves to descend in human form.
For a moment, Yushia thought the green light surrounding their bodies dimmed ever so slightly.
“That is why... right now, we do not have enough power to fully subdue Leisa.”
Gods... without power?
Yushia found it hard to understand,
but their seriousness left no room for doubt.
“Of course... that does not mean Leisa could completely overpower us.
But... a decisive subjugation is difficult in this state.”
They turned their gaze to Yushia again,
their green eyes piercing to her very core.
“That is why... we need you.”
All focus converged on that sentence-
the reason for Yushia’s existence, the destination of her innate secret,
the urgent necessity tied to the ‘rare trait’ they had just revealed.
“You, and your beloved family...
And everything we cherish in this universe...
the countless beings of many dimensions and the order they create...”
Their voices lowered,
reciting the enormous stakes of this mission.
In Yushia’s mind flashed the faces of those she loved,
and at the same time, the vast image of the universe swept past her.
It was a warning that all these things were in danger.
“To protect... all of this...”
In the suffocating tension, the final sentence fell.
“...You must subdue Leisa.”
Yushia’s entire body went rigid.
Her mouth fell open.
It was hard to tell if what she had just heard was even real.
That she-
a ‘fusion being’ hidden in the guise of an ordinary human...
A being with the genes of a pre-Big Bang entity-
was being told to capture that primordial being, Leisa?
A gasp-
She barely managed to whisper, almost inaudibly,
“Me... me...? I have to...?”
Her heart was filled with confusion, fear,
and the overwhelming weight of a fate she could not bear.