We don't really know how the disease came to be. There were speculations that it came from some research laboratory who did some inhumane experiments. Though, i hardly trust that speculations after all, these are just that, speculations with no evidence to back it all up. Yes, the Holy Church did went to war with that research center with the excuse that humans should not have the powers of a god for their powers are only theirs. Its a dumb and idiotic excuse for a Church of that size. None really knew why the Church went to war with that Agency, even lasting it for few decades. It was as if they want something from that agency, was it their research? Their results from studying the God's Blood?
The Disease itself is dangerous and spreads very quickly. I suspect it spreads by latching itself to the winds and the winds blow it all over the world, thus resulting to the massive infected people in such a short amount of time.
The Disease does not immediately turn you into a Beast or a Monster when you get infected. From my study, it actually eats away the brain matter inside your head, eating each brain cells one by one, slowly. Thus resulting in a slow yet painful way to die. As your brain is chewed up slowly, you'll start to have dangerous thoughts, the chemicals that the brain injects inside you became more random and abnormal. This is the state where you'll go crazy, and you would suddenly have intense reaction to blood, some would be so scared of blood so much that they would drain it all just to get it out, this only happens to special cases because most of the people who gets to this stage gets intense longing for blood for some reason.
I cannot explain how or why as of yet, maybe in the future. After this stage, the Disease starts changing your very being, your cells become twisted and turned upside down then mixed. It forces your body to change in a molecular level, slowly transforming you into something.
Though why one resembles an animal after they become Beasts, i have no clue. As for how the Disease itself manages to change you in molecular level is also something i cannot understand.
This is probably the work of "God", or something like one.
After all, "Gods" truly exist. And these horrors are not something we can ever hope to understand or comprehend.
Excerpt from a page of a study "The Pale Monster Disease. A Full Study about the Illness." By. Klein Hielms.
Rueben looked at the door infront of them, it was a steel door with cogs and other such machinery mixed in.
After walking for a while, searching for anything, they discovered this large steel door.
Inside the tree was a large place full of equipments and other tools. Hammers, anvils, smelters and many more could be seen everywhere.
There were also machine like things beside the walls of the tree and they didn't touch it, fearing that it might activate something in this place.
They took a look around for a while before finding this door and were now thinking how to open it up.
"Any ideas?" Rueben turned to look at Gwynne, while observing her movements.
Gwynne was sitting down and scribbling on her notebook, he didn't know what it was, but he didn't care to ask.
She pursed her lips and observed the steel door infront of them. Its machinery and cogs made it feel like it needs to be activated for it to open.
"Let's search around for buttons or levers or whatnot." She suggested while closing her notebook.
Rueben nodded his head, then he asked, "Why though?"
Gwynne looked at him and held the torch up in the air, "This type of door would only open if it had an activation key or something. We need to find that key in order for it to open."
He looked at her, then nodded his head again.
The two searched around for a long time before finding nothing, not even a semblance of a button or a lever or whatnot.
"That's weird."
Gwynne's eyes narrowed into a squint in confusion.
She couldn't wrap her head around how to open the door filled with unknown machinery that she could not understand. After all, it didn't matter how much of a bookworm she was, Steam Machinery was not her forte.
She mostly studies biology and some more studies that Hunters need such as Map Reading, sketch, hunting, tracking and many more.
"So what do we do now?" Rueben asked her while looking at the steel door.
Gwynne grumbled incoherence words before she suggested, "I might have some clues in my notebooks. Let's go back to the cart, i'll search around for clues there."
Rueben softly nodded his head and turned around, Gwynne looked at the door, studied it for a while before following after him.
***
For how long will the flames last?
A man looked at the embers that lit inside the lantern, his eyes gazed at it with hidden depression.
For how long will the world last?
***
Arshavin sat down as the ashes below his feet swayed with the wind, spreading everywhere.
He looked at the monstrosity infront of him with a tired gaze, he had fought this monster for 2 days straight, without any breaks or rest.
The monster now lied down, breathing heavily as countless swords and other weapons stabbed through its skin and yet no matter how much it was stabbed, it was still alive.
And the worst part was, that it successfully escaped.
The thing that suddenly sent his senses to madness escaped from his very eyes.
Arshavin closed his wounds by stitching it up.
He looked towards the area where the thing just went to escape and clicked his tongue.
"Goddamnit."
He roughly said and turned around, unconscious to the fact that his mouth was turning into a wide grin.
***
Gwynne looked through her notes and found something about this place, she studied and read through it.
The two was currently infront of the steel door, sitting down.
Rueben was on the side practicing and training silently, each of his thrusts becoming more and more simpler and deadlier.
She turned to look at him, wanting to tell him what she discovered but soon held back upon seeing how focused he was.
With each movements, his form became more random yet more simpler, it was as if he was erasing the unnecessary movements from his attacks.
He wielded the dagger with precise and dangerous force, sometimes a wooshing sound could be heard from him. The air around him seemed to bend as a heavy pressure emitted from his display of skills.
Gwynne looked at him with bright eyes, as she admired the sheer technique he was displaying. She had seen such a thing countless times but each time Rueben displays his skills, it seemed that he would get more and more proficient.
After a while, Rueben stopped and let out a long breath. He had been holding in the air inside him for a few minutes, making him focus more.
Gwynne saw that he was done and pursed her lips.
'From what martial art is he practising. Or is it a self made technique? Its intriguing.' She then softy called out to him.
Rueben looked at her, then softly ran to her direction, "Have you found anything?"
Gwynne nodded her head and stood up, she stretched her body while speaking, "I did. I found a clue how to open this thing. Though how true the clue is, we would find out now."
Rueben softly nodded his head and followed her as she walked towards the steel door.
She looked at its mechanical designs and marveled how the past generation was more knowledgeable and experienced than the current generation.
She felt that steam was prevalent in the past generation, they probably managed to come up with a more powerful energy source than steam to come up with such machinery.
How they managed to build and create such machines are beyond her, though she would like to meet those geniuses in the past and learn from them.
Gwynne then started touching the inlaids of the steel door, as if looking for something.
Rueben looked at her, confused. "What are we looking for?"
She brushed her hands over the inlaids and said, "Something. I don't know what the name of that thing is but it should function like a button- Aha."
A click sounded out, then the cogs of the machine started running, just as Rueben was preparing for a fight, a screen appeared grom the ground and words formed from the screen.
The screen was attached to with a tube like steel cage in order to get itself to a higher altitude.
Gwynne saw this and then looked through the notebook once again.
"Fascinating." She said, amazed at the machinery, "How do they managed to create this thing? It can project images into itself and we can interact with it. How absolutely fantastic."
She tapped the screen and slowly, the forming words slowly formed.
[In the beginning, there are only three intelligent life forms, the first is a man, the second is a woman, what is the third?]
"....In the beginning, there are only three intelligent life forms, the first is a man, the second is a woman, what is the third? A riddle?"
She pursed her lips and turned to Rueben.
"What is it?" Rueben looked over and saw the words and his nose scrunched up while his eyes squinted. "Riddles."
Gwynne chuckled, "What is with that tone?"
Rueben turned to her and said, "I, hate riddles." His voice seemingly more malicious as he said the word riddle.
Her mouth turned into a grin and shoved her elbow, "Is our Rueben not smart?"
Rueben clicked his tongue and shoved her, "No, riddles make me overthink things."
Gwynne looked at him, then laughed softly, them she patted him in the back, "That's the point dummy. Riddles help you train your intellectual ability to think things."
Then she looked at the screen while Rueben grumbled, "Doesn't matter, i still hate riddles."
She shrugged her shoulder and placed her hand on her chin and started thinking.
"Should be animals?" Rueben suddenly said without a thought.
Gwynne stopped for a moment to think before shaking her head, "It should not be animals, after all, it says that there are three intelligent lifeforms. Keyword - Intelligent. It should be capable of thinking, feeling and perceiving like humans do."
She stopped and was stumped, "But what could it be? We cannot say human if the riddle had already described men and women, so what is the other one?"
"Dolls?"
Gwynne stopped, then turned to look at him with a blank face, "Dolls?" Her eyes narrowed into a slit as she looked at Rueben with judgemental eyes.
"?" Rueben looked back at her uncomfortably, seemingly uneasy from her gaze.
She couldn't really fault Rueben for saying that, after all, he himself have met dolls that talked and some even tried to kill him.
Rueben coughed and said, "There are dolls that can move and talk, i experienced it firsthand."
"You experienced it???" Gwynne looked at him confused, her eyes wide from the weird thing that Rueben just said.
'Is this guy insane?' Her eyes suddenly dulled in worry, she softly patted his shoulder and sighed softly.
She then turned to the screen and focused.
Rueben looked at her, then coughed even more loudly before huffing out loud. "You thought wrong."
"Yes, yes, i thought wrong." Gwynne answered without looking at him.
He stared at her blankly, then went to the side and sat down with his hands on his forehead.
Gwynne took a while before finally coming up with an answer, "It should be "GOD"." She said aloud while typing on the screen.
The screen had a circle on the center before turning into a green check mark. The screen then became white and another riddle was formed on the screen.
Rueben looked at the screen and asked, "How did you come up with that answer?"
Gwynne smiled, "It had said that in the beginning, three intelligent lifeforms exist. Note the "beginning" and you would be able to piece the clues after a while."
Nodding his head, "Then how did you connect the dots?"
She turned to him and huffed, "Have you not studied history before? The world was only chaos in the past, so many unimaginable things still lived and did countless depraved things until Almer, the god of the world, appeared and cleansed the whole world and turned it anew."
"He then made two humans, male and female, Jouvin and Delia. To which the two eloped and spread their seeds around the world. The riddle is asking the third person to exist when humans first existed, who else could it be other than Almer himself who created them?"
Then she spread her arms and proclaimed, "So the answer would be God. Which was correct."
He nodded, understanding her logic and reasoning before standing still as she turned her focus to the screen.
[There are three Gods that ruled the world, 4 Devils that sought to deprave the world, and 10 Kings that destroyed the world. Which of these Myths are true?]
"..." Gwynne looked at the screen, then read them again.
"This is nonsense." She churned. "This is not a riddle, this cannot be a question either. Its all nonsense, what was the creator of these riddles thinking?"
She scratched her head, frowned before sighing and sat down. She then placed her hand over her chin and started thinking.
"What's the next riddle?" Rueben came over to take a look after Gwynne let put her frustration and frowned, "What are these?"
Gwynne smiled and said, "All three things are true, none is false. But the question asks which one of these three are true."
She huffed, then went to her notebooks and started reading, intent on finding clues or anything to answer the question.
"Once upon a time, there were three gods that ruled over the world, we once called them the Sky God, the Sea God and the Land God, each having their own domains after Almer gave birth to them."
"The 4 Devils that depraved the world were named War, Plague, Hunger and Death. War would make the whole world be stirred, and people would create depraved things to fight against one another, Plague would spread disease and plunge the world into chaos, Hunger would decrease the resources of the world and make everyone kill to survive while Death would harvest the dead souls that these three Devils left in their wake."
"The 10 Kings was said to be a snake like dragon with ten human heads, each having powers that could lead the world to destruction and chaos. It was prophesied that the 10 Kings would first split from the center of the world, spread through the world, then converge with the world before destroying the world."
Gwynne said as she explained to Rueben, who had little to no knowledge about history or religion.
"And all three of these are true." She solemnly said. "The Three Daughters of Almer, the Skies, The Earths, and The Seas are said to exist, though their faith have ceased to exist due to what happened to the world. They were the ones who shaped the world and gave life to many creatures on the world."
"The 4 Devils, i think, had already happened or is currently undergoing or something. War had happened in the past, Empress Victoria's Era, the war that happened then might be the prelude to the 4 Devils."
"While for the 10 Kings, although it hasn't happened yet, it will happen in the future. All these Myths and prophecies came from the Setaraph after all."
Rueben nodded his head and took the screen from her. He then typed "All".
The device processed it for a moment before a green check mark appeared.
"..."
"..."
The two became silent.
Then the cogs of the steel door moved and churned, the floor beneath them shook as a load sound of machines hitting one another plunged to the darkness.
Slowly, infront of them, the door opened.
Rueben and Gwynne looked towards the darkness behind the door and turned to look at one another.
Gwynne put down the books and notebooks in her arms to the cart before rushing towards Rueben, waiting for her.
The two nodded their heads together and entered the darkness.