The Forgotten Ones

Lothar Golden, Surrounding of the Gardens of Love, Aria's World
8:37 PM

The great city was about an hour away from our party in the forest, a trip my father could make in about thirty minutes if the clocks weren't lying any more. The Great City of Lothar Golden lay on the eastern edge of the vast country state known as the Gardens of Love, where the great goddess Nediadis resided in her dangerous luxury. As the closest place to Aria's world government headquarters, it was also the place with the highest concentration of noble houses and their vast mansions, a hub of events, money, hardship, and immorality. The city itself was characterized by narrow, winding streets, perpetually dark and dirty. The atmosphere was heavy, depressing, and oppressive to the point of claustrophobia with its huge, disorderly Victorian buildings of black stone and Gothic facades with towers standing like sentinels, their gargoyles watching over passersby. Advertising and propaganda bombarded what little mental space remained, with streets flowing with red liquid, suggesting a point where the natural had been altered. The strange world itself was filled with peculiar anachronisms, where there was electricity for flashing billboards but not for houses still lit by candles, vending machines next to ancient cash registers, motor cars sharing the streets with horse-drawn carriages, and clocks as the only means of marking time. An elevated steam train passed through, and the cold of the night was fought by a vast network of pipes struggling to meet demand.

But no matter how much futuristic technology tried to fill the void that such a nightmarish landscape left in the minds of those who passed through the city, it didn't matter. Its inhabitants were for the most part elegantly dressed people in striking and noble attire, next to their terrifying white faces, completely black with crimson eyes, long teeth, and traces of dead blood under their supposedly honorable clothes - a society of cruel vampires in broad daylight .... kinda, where the few real humans left were their servants and workers who carried their heavy luggage or attended to the shops. A society divided into only two categories, masters and servants, where somehow both were equally miserable in this place. It was like witnessing a perpetual funeral throughout the city, pretending to be functional. Only my father and I stood out with our faces still full of vitality, or perhaps incredulity, in the midst of the place. Trying not to dwell on how this situation had come about, and momentarily forgetting the clear danger of the environment, I tried to talk to my father.

"So... what happened to your face, why the hair treatment? Is it necessary for today's event or are you suddenly interested in fashion?"

"What are you talking about? I just wanted to look a little better, that's all."
"What's wrong with trying to look a little younger?"
"Do I really look that strange?" My father said with a slight smile.

But I recognized that smile; it was the "I screwed up and I'm trying to hide it" smile he used to put on before he got caught doing something. I knew there was a second reason why he had changed his appearance and didn't want to be recognized, so with that clue, I started to think about what the reason could be for him not wanting to be recognized if no one here knew him from before. Unless it was at my sister's party, where there were people who knew him very well, I think I had already figured out why.

"Who are you hiding from so much? Are you so afraid of Adelis?"
"No, it's not that. Surely you've talked to her, maybe even joked with her, so it must be someone else."
"You didn't get along badly with Grandma... No, wait! It can't be her! It's Maria!"
"Are you trying not to be recognized by Maria?"

"What? Of course not!"
"What are you talking about, you're wrong," my father replied, so worried that he swerved and almost hit a pole.

"It's Maria, that's clear."
"Why don't you want to see her? Are you afraid she'll recognize her own father?"

"And what the hell am I supposed to tell her after what happened?"
"Hi, how are you, sorry for being dead, sorry for missing half of your life, have a cookie instead."
"....."
"She doesn't need to know I'm here, it'll only make her suffer more than she already has."
"She cried enough with the pain of my death and thinking it was her fault."

"And what about Mom, why does she have the right to talk to you?"

"Because she's different, she's stronger than me, strong enough to live without me by her side, to grow and take care of others."
"...."
"Instead of a poor man who spends every night crying in his loneliness."
"...."
"In the future, when she remembers this night, she will do so with a smile and joy, like the sweet gesture of a small reunion."
"The unique chance of just five more minutes."
"She, like the other guests, will see it only as a strange dream."
"By the time the sun rises again in the house, she'll just think it was no big deal and maybe forget about it by noon, while I'll be stuck with my little act of selfishness," my father said with a nostalgic look all over his face.

"Still, I think you should talk to Maria as well."
"She deserves to talk to her father at least one last time."
"Do you think it hasn't been hard for her, too?"
"It's been years since she last saw you, she was very young, her memories are a bit fuzzy."
"Do you know what her greatest fear is? Not being able to remember her own father."
"It's just having the memory of a tall person with a blurry face next to her in the hospital."
"She deserves to know that her father loves her, even from the other side."
"Maria has matured a lot, let her have a better memory of her father."
"Wasn't it for the same reason that events like this night were created? To have memories that would last forever, right?"

My father did not answer me, he had a thoughtful face, he was analyzing the possible reactions that would occur depending on what he did. There was only a very uncomfortable silence, so I thought of bringing up another subject, one that interested me much more.

"Could you tell me again what this is all about?"
"What is the rescue about? Who do I have to rescue and from where?"
" A bit of background maybe?"

"....."
"It's not that easy, it took me a long time to get the general idea."
"Almost everyone here is lying or not telling the whole story."
"But trying to summarize, a few years ago some guys appeared out of nowhere in the world of Aria."
"They were apparently military from far away, but instead of starting a war, the foreigners managed to talk to the goddess Nediadis and somehow convince her to let them stay."
"Supposedly, a guy named Dylan proposed several ideas for cooperation that excited the goddess of love enough to even allow a man near her."
"The central axis of the story is a gem, well, a reliquary to be exact, a reliquary with a small orange gem inside along with a clock system."
"Something like a royal Fabergé egg, but much more delicate and complex."
"It was created by an unknown inventor as an alternative way to achieve immortality, but was abandoned after a major flaw in its design was discovered."
"The jewel could store a human soul, but could not release it."
"The victims of the project were trapped inside it, which seems to be what happened to Luna."
"With the arrival of the foreigners and Dylan, they managed to repurpose the project and create computers."
"Very fast and monstrously powerful computers, a dangerous weapon of war."
"What we're trying to do today is just steal a few of these computers that are marked for disposal, that's all."
"They're throwing them away anyway, so I'm sure they won't mind if we take them instead."

"So this isn't a rescue, it's a theft."
"How did you even manage to trick the angels into letting you do all this?"
"And what does Maria's party have to do with all this?"

"It's quite... complicated..."
"Obviously, they wouldn't let me do all this if I just showed up and said we were going to steal a computer."
"I had to confuse them here and there, hiding this mission in another, less understood one."
"One thing led to another, and before I knew it, Stella was sitting with a model of Vajdahunyad Castle, making the guest list."
"I just said yes to everything to get her off my back; the plan was too far along to say no and delay it."
"It may not seem like it, but there's a lot of work behind this, several favors called in."
"For example, Urakaze lent me this car."

"What about the place we're going? Is it a military facility?"
"Why is there a powerful computer here, in this Sherlock Holmes world instead of a sci-fi one?
"And how will you get the computer out of there?"
"If the computer is old-fashioned and the size of a house, I may have to make more than two trips."

"Don't worry, the computer isn't that big, it might even help you, to be honest."
"As for the place, it's just a mansion."
"You see that wall about a hundred meters over there? That's a house near there."
"In this world, the closer you are to the Gardens of Love, the more prestige and nobility you have.
"This is the eastern entrance, the closest to the palace where the goddess Nediadis lives."
"About 200 kilometers beyond this gate."
"Complete nonsense, if you ask me, but it's just like the rest of this strange world."

During our conversation, the car stopped at a red light when, in less than a second, the violence of the world showed its true claws before our eyes. A group of protesters took over the adjacent street just a few meters away from us, raising banners in their ranks showing their displeasure with the Red Love Project, posters of a couple of poor parents demanding their children back from the Holy Church of Nediadis, some even prominently displaying the word vampires. An angry mob expressing their discontent, it was clear from their clothing that they were not the favorites of the leaders. Unfortunately, the event didn't last long as the police arrived just a few seconds later - to call them police was stretching the word considerably, for if the nobles were vampires, the officers seemed like true vampires compared to the vampires shopping nearby. From the rooftops they jumped on the bodies of their victims, with just a few bites and cuts the people were silenced, the freshly spilled crimson blood arousing the passion of the nearby nobles, who couldn't resist the temptation to drink some of the freshly harvested fruit, while the other humans and the herd left nothing behind but to watch. One of those damned beasts in her thirst and lust approached the car in search of a better snack before jumping and biting my arm, due to my anger and disgust at such an act of challenge against a true ruler, I looked her directly in the eyes to kill her, the girl simply fell back with her life consumed by the true hunter hidden among the prey.

"Cesar, did you just..."

"I'm already sick of this city."
"Just get the car out of here before I become the one to bring the end of the world to this place."

"Yes, right away, sorry sir."

My father started the car again, and the world continued with its functional facade just a few streets after the argument. His face showed more nervousness next to me than whatever he had endured in the last few days living here, which had undoubtedly been tough.

"Sorry about before, I lost my cool there for a moment."
"I was a little disgusted with this place and I didn't want that animal to give me an infectious disease."
"It's no big deal, maybe I look a little more girly, but inside I'm still the same old Caesar."
"The world doesn't revolve around me."

"No, don't worry, I get it, you were stressed about what happened back there."
"This place is really messed up."
"It's hard not to make comparisons..."
"..."
"..."
"Tell me, was Atlantis really as screwed up as they say?"

"What do you know about Atlantis?" I asked my father.

"Well, I had some free time after I died, so I started reading a bit."
"What a surprise to see that you were already an icon when I arrived."
"I never imagined what a horrible life you had in that place."
"Even worse, to have to keep it a secret for so long, without anyone knowing the true pain of such a victory."
"To know of so much suffering and sacrificed lives, that even when they were given their second chance at life, unaware of their own deaths, it was all spent in a second war of man's own making."
"...."
"But the most surprising thing is to see that you are still you after what happened."
"Still grounded, despite the Jade Throne."
"Pretending it was never the big deal it really was.
"But still, your red eyes don't lie, your gaze betrays what you really thought back then."
"The environment feels familiar to you, vampires harvesting blood, dragons harvesting life, both are the same to you."
"Don't you want to talk about it? Let go of the burden."

"I have nothing to talk about, period, end of discussion."
"I only did what was necessary to win, no more and no less."
"Whether I was the last to die among my comrades or the one who killed the bastard emperor, it doesn't matter."
"I only followed the will of those who died, those who sacrificed their lives for a chance to win later."
"I just did what any of them would have done at that moment, wishing it was all just a bad nightmare that never happened."
"The truly lucky ones are those who didn't have to live with the memory of the war against the dragons."

"Well, it's still thanks to you that the world continues to be a better place to live, even with the continental war that would have happened with the dragons."
"It's because of you that humanity has a chance to smile, even if they don't know you or your story."
"Dragon, emperor, fox girl, burnt man, it doesn't matter what they throw at you, what matters is that Cesar is still there, being the same Cesar."
"To stand firm in the face of adversity, against power and corruption, not everyone can do that with a weak or lacking heart."
"That people get up every day without fear that it's their last day and they don't even know you, that's a victory of yours over the dragons."
"Don't forget that."

" Shut up, I don't like to talk about that subject."
"Besides, I don't know what you're talking about, isn't the here and now supposed to be about stealing a computer?"

"Sorry for talking so much nonsense."
"'That's the mansion I was talking about, try to act like a maid from now on.'"

In the distance, near the Great Wall, a large mansion with extensive gardens rose above the rest. The origin of such a strange night in my life, and whatever my father intended to do with what he thought we were going to steal, would undoubtedly be a small adventure in itself.