original

The Dawn of the Fallen

Bab 1: Prologue

The noise of heavy rainfall accompanied by thunderstorms filled up the dark and isolated room with only a single desk lighting up. Rapid sounds of typing and clicking echo throughout everywhere.

On a closer look, a middle-aged man was sitting looking deprived of sleep with dead fish eyes working nonstop on a supercomputer. Only after several minutes, he leaned to his chair with his heavy shoulders.

"Ha~" He breathed out. "Doing this kind of work every single day isn't good for my health. My life wasn't supposed to be this way if 'that' would've just been successful.

'As they say, only regrets come in full after a major failure. How despicable, to think my life would be overturned like this.'

That same middle-aged man was supposed to be a leader, not a working slave. He was trained and educated as far as he could remember in his childhood. Martial Arts, Academics, Strategic Arts, Military Arts, Politics, and almost everything needed to be learned to become the perfect human ever built.

'However, when everything I presumed to be was going through my plan I was betrayed. Emotions are nothing but only a piece of crap giving rise to human weakness.'

From the beginning, he was just like a human with an empty heart devoid of all emotions. Yet, even he cannot escape the molding of relationships with people. From strangers to subordinates, and subordinates to being friends.

That is because for the first time in his life he came to experience the only thing he didn't learn during the experiments. That is the influence of a human being that constructs relationships with each other that keeps filling up his empty heart. Heretofore, he experienced how to love someone, laugh so much he was losing his breath, as well as mourn for his beloved.

"And the result was this." He mused. "And after that very day, I suffered and becomes an unconditional slave to my closest friend I suppose to call back then 'brother'."

He couldn't do anything now, there was a chip planted on his brain to follow every single word of what the owner says. The world he's living in right now was hell where even if he wanted to die he just can't.

Though, only from the perspective of others. Just a few months ago after several years ever since he's doing his job as a slave, he was coming up with a plan to end everything. The supposed brother of his is intelligent, but not compared to him.

This only happened because his way of thinking at that time was clouded and was unable to calculate every worst-case scenario that would happen.

The man who betrayed him became the representative of their nation while making him the operator of the supercomputer that does all the work from management and building the nation. Their nation is the most advanced and industrialized in the world. A supreme power no one could ever defy.

Though he could just do anything he wanted as he has control over almost everything in the nation's Internet, Machinery, Strategic Weapons, and Data, he couldn't because of the chip sending signals to his brain to stop. If he tried to do something stupid, the chip would send a cold stimulus to the capillaries of the sinuses which then results in a brain freeze so extreme that he loses consciousness.

'Well, I know that my life would be until here. If they think that I didn't know that they're planning to dispose of me, then they must be so foolish of man. Except for him, he must have expected that I already knew from the beginning that my brain is being analyzed by the chip to place and preserve my knowledge and skills to a loyal Robot that will replace me due to their fear that I would somehow retaliate and destroy everything they've built for the past decade.'

His chuckling noises were covered by the hefty downpour as he ponders but not as long as he wishes for because the iron door slowly opened and a man enters the room. The room was then suddenly lightened up and showed the man's face smiling and walking close next to him while another person entered the room and placed a seat behind him where he sat afterward.

"How many years has it been since I last saw your face." The man said.

"..."

"Hahaha." He chuckled. "Still ignoring m— Oh right! You have never spoken to me since that day. Hahaha!" The man's laughter surrounded the room.

"How sad it is to see my long-time brother be in this state. Well, it is your fault, yes it's yours. You led us through your impeccable knowledge and craftiness, even your martial art is almost unrivaled on this planet, a few of them can just be counted through my fingers. You were almost invincible in every way, however, you are still a human being, and ever since ancient times humans as they defined can never be perfect. They will have a flaw to their seemingly flawless capabilities and yes it was then, I noticed that you are slowly deviating from your almost flawless skillset as time flies."

"..."

"You are not talking back huh, that's rude, well, anyways your end is already near. To say near would be such mercy, to tell you honestly it's right now. Hahaha! I know that you already knew that I will finish you off someday, but we've got a hard time studying your brain as well as making a device to operate as its medium."

After the man said what he wanted, he stood and took the remote out of his pocket. That remote has the power to end the life of the man sitting in front of him.

"Well, you've done a great job serving as the brain of this nation. But that role ends today brother, well, you're not my brother anymore. Farewell, Gunther."

As the man in front of him with aged face and white hair started to bring down his finger to press the button, just about he was to die, Gunther made a small curve on his lips for the first time in many years.

The heavy downpour had ceased making the whole room dead silent. After observing Gunther's lifeless body limping down, the aged man turned then started to exit the room with light footsteps. Not for a while then when he arrived at the control room where he saw a Robot operating at the same rate as Gunther do. His lips curved thickly.

Yet.

"Hmm?" He felt something was wrong. And just seconds after...

"No!" He shouted as hard as his body could provide. He now knows why Gunther easily gave up and didn't resist even after several years.

"So this was what you were planning all along you son of a bit—!!"

°°°

"What's happening now?" I uttered, no I can't hear my voice, more like I said the words in my mind.

'Where is this?'

Weren't I suppose to die back then? No, I definitely died back then, I'm not mistaking it.

'Huh?' I noticed something weird.

At first, I thought I was blindfolded but I can feel that nothing is blocking in my eyes but, wait there is something.

But it is different, it's like soft tissues. And not only that I can't seem to move my body freely.

'Am I injured or something?' I speculated.

It as until a few minutes that I can move my arms slowly. I tried grabbing what's blocking my vision.

The dulling in my senses gradually diminishes and I can see the sight clearly and I was right. There were intestines and few dead bodies scattered everywhere in the dark and ravaged compartment. Then I noticed a wound slashed in my chest so I temporarily wrapped it with a cloth.

"I have an idea of what is happening right now," I said while slowly dragging my heavy body to a corner then rested my back on the wall.

He would have been surprised by my farewell gift to him. All I just did was gradually tweaking the robot's system using a code that could trigger a small explosion. He must be suffering from a light injury now.

It is small but that is everything that all I could manage to do within my capabilities. I made something that looks like giving rise to the chip's work capabilities. Of course, it is under the guise of making it stimulate performance, security, and encryption.

However, by a small tweaking, I've managed to create a code that disables the chip's control resulting in the chip overclocking until it overheats making the core system of the robot explode.

But if that's the only thing I've done, it is still not enough. So I made sure to add a command that will erase all databases in case an emergency happens. Of course, I found a way to trick the chips planted on my brain that will analyze every command in my brain.

That is where the loophole can be found. I have used my subconscious mind as it can't be detected by the chip's scanning so it is not possible to analyze the data coming from it. To explain clearly, it is when your body reacts faster than the brain if a stimulant can be met like when you felt a sudden pain, you will react even before you noticed it.

Having control over the subconscious mind will allow a person to become the master of the mind and emotion. And that is what I did for the past several years, I've trained without them knowing until I succeeded. There is maintenance once in a while that will also stop the chip from working so they isolate me in another isolated room built with thick iron walls, that place is where I trained.

And adequately enough in some good and bad ways, I've made something that I could say is the final progress in my life.

But from what I see now, I guess I was wrong, my life hasn't ended yet. To begin with, this kind of story is a thing that commonly happens in the novels I've read back then.

"Soul Transmigration." I think that's what it's phoned. It means somehow your soul got transferred to another person's body.

"Well, the general cliche about this is waking up to a whole new different world." My body rested enough to be able to stand up and walk, although sluggishly.

I walked by and passes through the scattered devastated bodies that even their face can't be recognized. Opening the door I saw the same thing as what's inside. "There sure are lots of them," I whispered.

I think this place was massacred and inside this house was my- no, the previous owner of this bodies' family members.

"Good thing they didn't burn the houses though, maybe I can find something to survive," I mumbled.

I still do not know what this place is so the first thing I need to do is to perform first aid to my wound and much better it's just a shallow one.

But as I was to go out, I heard several clatters from horses' hooves directing towards my location.

I doubt that they are the culprits of this massacre. They won't be coming back for sure because it'd be a waste of energy carrying their loots around. But still, I went to a corner enduring the pain from the now reopened wound.

"#%#&#%@%!!!"

"Hmm?" I murmured.

"%#&%#@%&!!"

It's a language that I can't understand. I can confidently say that I know and have learned several languages but this is the first time I have heard this one, let alone know.

The first thing I noticed was their clothes or rather their armor. They seemed to be formal troops from the medieval ages serving the territorial lord.

'It should be fine if I make some noises so they'll notice someone is still alive.' I mulled over. 'That way, maybe I could somehow ask for help.'

Then I intentionally stumbled upon a broken wall, however, it seems that this body already lost a lot of blood and my consciousness is slowly fading away so I fell with my body flat On the ground.

And not long afterward heavy footsteps are reaching my way.