The Golden City was once the last bastion of the human race, It was where the entrance to paradise was located.
5 years after the appearance of paradise and the ascendants, the beasts started to appear, and a long war broke out. They appeared out of thin air and started to spread a corrupted version of Essence that would terraform all kinds of environments to be suitable to their kind, and deadly to humans.
The government and the ascendants tried to eliminate them all and stop the spreading of corruption, but it was to little avail. A long war of attrition started, and the humans were rapidly losing land, when the humans were on their last leg, whit only about 20% of their land remaining they all gathered around the Gate and built the Golden city, a fortress city that was made whit the intention to be impossible to invade, and to buy time for the Ascendents to reach Godhood.
And 100 years after the war started it happened, Lion Musa, the patriarch of the Musa family, was the first to ascend and engrave his name on the Golden Gate. Whit his new powers he stopped the spread of corruption and pushed the beasts back, regaining part of the human territory and making the war reach a status quo, and now, 300 years later, there were six gods.
As a way to honor "him", they named the only bridge that led to Golden city the Musa bridge, the very same bridge Nero and Jake were crossing right now.
***
'Fuck, we are so dead'
Nero and jake were both dead silent inside a government truck, the duo had yet to exchange a single word since the "pickup crew" arrived at the school to take them to the gate, after all, they both knew how this journey ended.
'A Slums kid surviving the calling is as rare as a unicorn! We are not like those pampered young masters, we don´t have any combat training! I can't die here, If I die, Bianca will be left alone.'
"Hey, Nero."
"Yes, Jake?"
"Do you think we will die?"
"Yes."
"I think so too."
"Then, why did you ask?"
"Just trying to make conversation I guess."
He looked straight at James
"The last time I've seen you soo pale, you had just broken Samanta's hair clip."
"True, I was terrified, thought I had just earned a lifetime ban from the workshop. That baldie is really vindictive of his daughter's grudges. But then, out of the blue, you said you did it."
"You owe me a lifetime of beating for that one"
"Why did you do it?"
Jake was staring deep into Nero's eyes
"Out of friendship, I guess. Nothing in my house can be fixed in the workshop anyway, it's the hidden advantage of being a poor orphan. You had a lot more to lose than me, and I owed your mum for all the help whit my sister."
A sad look appeared on jake's face.
"I will miss Bianca."
Nero paused
"So will I."
"We will arrive at the Gate in 5 minutes."
They were currently being taken to the gate by a pair of two men in army uniforms. After so much time passed since the first mass calling, the ascension process had become an integral part of society, and a lot of laws and services had been created to regulate it.
The "pickup crew" was one of these services every police station and army base was obligated to have, at least, one person dedicated to carrying the listeners to their destination in a special mark van.
In the slums, this process had another name, the "reaper's crew", since someone who was taken by them rarely returned.
'Not the conversationalist type, but I guess if I had to take kids to their eminent death, I wouldn't want to make small talk.'
The rest of the journey was silent. It was Nero's first time in the city, but he was hardly in the mood to marvel at its sight. After all, he had all the time in the world to go sightseeing if he managed to return since ascendants that came from outside the city were always granted residence inside its wall.
When the van arrived close to the Gate, the duo was shocked. It was a gigantic golden structure, very similar to a pair of double doors, but if those Dors had been designed by the greatest of architects, and sculpted out of pure gold, every detail on it was perfect, it had an oppressive presence but at the same time it was impossible to stop looking at it. On it were inscribed countless runes and sigils, some similar to one another, some that looked nothing alike, but all transmitted a feeling of immense power. At the bottom, were six stings of human letters, words that every youth on the planet, no matter the pace, learned and every person alive respected.
'Paint, Martial, Space, Night, Sword, Illusion. The six ascendants Gods, the saviors of the human race.'
The van dropped the duo at the gates of the most famous military base, the golden camp, it was constructed around the Gate and was tasked whit receiving the Listeners, scientists, and
any other person that wanted to get close to it.
'The Gate, it's so big! And so Perfect!'
While the duo was hypnotized staring at the Gate, the "pickup crew" van departed, and a new person arrived close to them whiteout any of the two noticing anything.
The person remained silent staring at them, a sad look appeared on her face when she saw how young the two looked.
"I guess you two are the Listeners I was warned about."
'Fuck!!!!!'
They both flinched, the sudden voice had scared them both out of the trance.
"I'm sorry for the scare."
Nero looked at the woman, she appeared to be in her early twenties, with a beautiful face and a good body. She wore her hair in a ponytail, covered by a military cap, but Nero could see some bits of black hair escaping from it.
"I'm sorry, but who are you?"
"I'm Clare Saliver, my job is to group up the Listeners and bring them from here to the briefing tent, to explain what will happen to them."
'Saliver! That's the Night Goddess family name!"
From the corner of his eye, he saw Jake bow down immediately.
"It's an honor to meet the young miss of the Night clan!"
"Stop that, I'm not even an ascendant, from a technical point of view your position is higher than mine."
'As if.'
Everyone knew that a God clan descendant was to be respected by everyone, no matter the status of said person. This was one of the first things every parent taught their kid, if you see a person from a God clan, especially if they are direct descendants, you must bow your head and get out of the way.
'Even if the government makes it look like they are the ones in power, everyone knows that's not the truth, the God clans are not under them but at the same level, like equals.'
"Come now, you are the last from this batch, normally we would let you sightsee some more but we have a type one Listener in the group about to go crazy."
She turned around and started to enter the base, Nero and Jake followed behind her.
"Sorry, what's a type one listener?"
"You don't know? The Listeners are divided into three categories, and they are differentiated by the symptoms they have, for example, you are a type three Nero, and Jake is a type two."
"Is there any difference between them? The teacher at our school said that someone who sees essence is "blessed" by the essence."
"That's a good question, I will explain that when we join the other Listeners inside that tent"
She pointed at a big tent in the middle of the camp, through a crack in it Nero could see around twenty youths inside it, everyone had a somber look on their face.
Nero and Jake could sense it, whit every step they took closer to the tent, they were approaching their death.