Volume 4—Chapter 79: Ground Zero
Red alert!!
Red alert!!
“Call all high-ranking operators right now… ground zero is opening!! GROUND ZERO OPENING!!” a frantic operator yelled from every Esper operator's smartwatch.
One man, Michael Henrickson, the president of Esper Association, looked at the situation. The red sirens reflected in his glasses, painting his expression with the urgency everyone else had already succumbed to. He looked at the old phone beside him. The black, heavy receiver sat silently on its cradle, waiting. He considered making the call… his fingers hovered… but stopped. That was the last resort.
“Can we handle the situation…” Michael said, his tone sharp, leaving no space for sugarcoated answers.
“We currently don’t know, sir, but we anticipate the worst!!” the operator replied, voice tense, fingers flying over the console as alerts stacked faster than they could clear them.
Ground Zero… located near Waterloo… the place where Napoleon Bonaparte achieved his greatest victory. His greatest because he was so close to losing, somehow. The battle that should have been his downfall became a razor-thin triumph, carved from the brink of collapse. What exactly happened there? History recorded a victory, but the truth was always murkier, hidden beneath layers of glorified accounts and half-whispered theories.
That's because Ground Zero is the first dimensional crack… or simply, the first catalyst. A rupture in reality that should not have existed, yet it did. No one knew why it appeared there, at that moment, on that blood-soaked field. Some believed it was born from human desperation; others whispered it was summoned, an anomaly woven into fate itself.
What’s fascinating is, the public never knew of its existence. No history book mentioned it, no eyewitness dared to speak. After Napoleon’s victory at Waterloo, he did not just secure his place as a military genius; he became the undisputed ruler of the world by influence alone. Kings, emperors, and parliaments bent to his will, not through force of arms, but through the sheer gravity of his triumph.
And his first mandate after the battle? To hide the dimensional crack’s existence.
It was not an order passed through official channels or declared to the world. It was a silent decree, enforced by a hidden hand that reached into the deepest shadows of every empire. Researchers vanished. Witnesses were silenced. Entire battalions were reassigned, their true mission buried beneath layers of fabricated reports. The crack was contained, sealed behind layers of deception, guarded by those who would give their lives to ensure its secret remained buried.
Six years after the Battle of Waterloo, Napoleon… disappeared. Presumed dead. No body was ever found, no grand funeral ever held. One day, he simply vanished, leaving behind a world reshaped by his influence. And yet, his mandate, the absolute secrecy surrounding Ground Zero, remained in force. Governments changed, empires rose and fell, but the order persisted, as if the very fabric of power still answered to him.
No one knew what truly happened to him. Rumours swirled, assassination, exile, even theories of him crossing into another realm. His last known appearance… was at Ground Zero.
A hundred years later, the world trembled again. Something stirred within Ground Zero. That something triggered a chain of events that led directly to the Great War. Amidst the chaos, new beings emerged… Espers. Humans who could manipulate reality in ways science could not explain, as if the crack had rewritten the rules for those who stood near its influence. This is the second catalyst.
And now… It’s happening again.
Activity is surging in Ground Zero. The air around it is distorting, humming with energy no instrument can categorise. Of course, the Esper Association is panicking.
But what happens next is something no one expected.
Without warning, a blinding golden light erupts from Ground Zero, flooding the observation monitors and overwhelming every visual sensor. The entire field team outside shields their eyes, forced to look away as alarms scream about visual feed disruption. For a moment, it is as if the world itself is erased, replaced by a wall of searing brilliance.
Yet once that light fades, and vision returns, what they see leaves everyone speechless.
Standing firmly at the epicentre of Ground Zero is a tall, beautiful woman with flowing silver hair. She wears an elaborate, witch-like attire, dark and regal, her presence defying the barren, chaotic landscape around her. A staff rests gracefully in her arm, its tip glowing faintly with residual energy, as though it had just tethered her into this world. Beside her, clinging to her side, is a smaller girl with jet-black hair, her expression unreadable as she keeps herself pressed close to the silver-haired woman.
Michael Henricson, watching from the command centre, is stunned. His breath halts, his thoughts scatter. This was beyond any protocol, beyond any predicted scenario.
“Sir…”
An operator calls him, cautious, almost afraid to break his trance.
“Sir!!”
The second call finally snaps Michael back to reality. He blinks, straightens his posture, and inhales sharply.
“Sorry…” he mutters, regaining his composure. His voice then shifts, “Arm agents, hold fire! Esper agents… don’t do anything reckless. No sudden moves. See if we can communicate with it.”
Meanwhile…
The witch, Emilia, calmly surveyed the place where they had ended up. The landscape was unfamiliar, yet it carried an undercurrent of distortion that pricked at her senses. The residual energy of the dimensional crack still lingered, like echoes of a storm that had just passed.
“Hmmm… is this the Earth you’re familiar with?” Emilia asked, glancing down at the girl beside her, Syena. Her tone was casual, almost playful, as if they were sightseeing rather than standing at the heart of a global emergency.
“I don’t know… I don’t see anything familiar,” Syena replied, her eyes scanning the distant horizon.
“Well, let’s explore further…” Emilia mused, her lips curling into a faint smile. “It’s not like we can leave this world through normal means anyway. Escaping that dimensional fold was already a gamble.” She paused, letting her words hang in the air, her gaze sharpening.
Then, with a flick of her staff, she tapped the ground lightly.
“…Seems like we are in the south of Brussels,” Emilia continued, her tone shifting to something more serious. Her golden eyes narrowed…
“And also…” she tilted her head, her smile widening as if amused by the obvious. “We’re surrounded.”
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