[Mark your era, and it will bear your name.]
...
That was the phrase printed on the prefaces of most history books he had ever skimmed through. It was strange how such a strongly philosophical expression could appear so frequently in works supposedly dedicated to recounting events as objectively as possible.
But perhaps even stranger was the fact that all history books went back only about six hundred years to the year 618. It was as if everything that had happened before the Great Flood had been meticulously erased and deemed unworthy of remembrance.
...
The Great Flood marked the starting point of every history book. It was the cataclysm during which a vast portion of the emerged lands was swallowed by the sea, causing countless casualties.
Currently, only 25% of the land remained above water, and if you excluded the death zones which were occupied by hostile creatures, less than 20% was actually under humanity's control. And that percentage was only shrinking, as cursed beasts grew more numerous and dangerous over time.
Since the Great Flood, there had been three major eras, and now twenty-five years ago humanity had stepped into the fourth, The Age of Change.
The three previous eras had each been marked by major events or breakthroughs. The first was The Age of Blessings, recorded as the time when the supernatural abilities known as blessings first appeared, heralded by the birth of the so-called Man of Light.
The second was The Age of Curses, defined by the rise of cursed creatures, or at least the era when they began posing a truly devastating threat.
The third was The Age of Progress, during which humanity achieved major discoveries both scientific and in its understanding of blessings.
And now came The Age of Change, the era in which humanity was under greater threat than ever before. The cursed were closer than ever to their peak. Even six centuries later, humanity was still recovering from the Great Flood, and another disaster of similar scale could strike at any moment, one humanity might never recover.
...
"Maybe this world isn't as well off as I thought."
After being transported into a concert where everyone sang and danced with joy, and seeing the carefree smiles of the people in the streets, he never would have guessed that their situation was this precarious. Ice sighed and stood, stretching his arms to loosen his muscles before heading for the shower.
He had already finished reading every book he found interesting and now had a slightly clearer understanding of his surroundings. Once under the warm stream of water, he lingered for a moment before stepping out and facing the bathroom mirror.
A face stared back at him, his own. For the first time since waking up, he truly studied the features he had forgotten. Just as with the memory of his name, he had only a vague idea of his own appearance.
Perhaps a faint resemblance to Celestia... Now, however, standing before the mirror, the similarities became undeniable. His hair, his eyes, even the shape of his nose mirrored hers with uncanny precision.
His gaze then shifted to the glove on his right hand and the emblem marked upon it, a serpent coiled around the neck of a dragon, or perhaps strangling it. He had tried to remove it once before, without success. But now he was an Awakened and had access to essence, all the essence of the world. It seemed unthinkable that a simple glove could still resist him.
He focused his essence into his left hand and pulled at the glove on his right. It did not move. He increased his strength.
"Ow," he hissed through clenched teeth. The glove shifted slightly, but so did his skin, as though the two were fused together. It seemed the glove had become an inseparable part of him, and removing it would be far more difficult than he had imagined first.
After showering and slipping into some of Jean's clothes, shortened with scissors to fit, he made his way to the living room.
"I really need to find some clothes of my own." Jean's clothes were far better than the tattered rags he had worn before, but they were still not made for him. He could practically swim in the shirt, and there was enough room in the pants for two of him.
He opened the door and stepped into the living room. Celestia was lounging comfortably on the couch, her eyes fixed on the TV, while Ray seemed to be cooking something in the kitchen.
"Good morning," Ice said, walking toward Celestia.
"Good evening," she replied without looking at him.
'I slept that long?'
Given his accumulated fatigue and the fact that he had spent almost the entire previous night reading, it was no surprise he had woken up so late.
"By the way, where's Jean?" Ice asked, glancing around.
"He left a letter and went out," Celestia answered.
Ice frowned slightly. "What letter?"
Celestia stood up and handed him the piece of paper she had been holding. "This one."
Ice took the letter and began to read. It contained nothing but a location and four numbers.
'Let's see what this is about.'
He headed to his room, with Ray temporarily abandoning his cooking to follow. Opening the door, Ice walked straight to the wardrobe in the center of the room and pulled it open.
Inside, revealed for the first time, was a massive steel door with numbers engraved at its center. He entered the code from the letter, and the door slowly creaked open, revealing a sight that was, in a word, heavenly.
Ice's jaw dropped. He looked at Ray as if to confirm what he was seeing, and Ray's reaction was exactly the same.
'Maybe this is why they were after him.'
The room beyond was stacked high with an enormous quantity of money, stretching for more than ten meters, piled up on top of each other as far as the eye could see. Not just a fortune, but enough to feed a family for five or six generations.
"We need to figure out a way to take as much of this as we can," Ray said, grinning.
Ice turned to him, and they both stepped out of the room, closing the door behind them.
"I was thinking the same ."
They returned to the living room and headed to the dining room for what would be their last meal there before setting off toward their next destination.