Late Monday morning, inside a briefing room within the rehabilitation building, Clyde and Casca sat side by side in the designated chairs on the highest tier at the very back. Aside from them, roughly twenty other people were attending the world "education" session. Clyde recognized a few of them from the therapy sessions he had shared with them during his three days there.
After a half-hour wait, a military officer who looked like a middle-aged general with a slight limp walked into the room alongside a woman who appeared to be a colonel. The pair walked up the low podium at the front and stood before the microphone.
"Good morning. My name is Daniel Connors, and beside me is Colonel Irena Stoikov. I am the director of this rehabilitation facility as well as the governor of Neo Ark. Welcome, everyone. We will begin with an introduction to this world and what has actually transpired in the real world, the reality outside the simulation where you have resided all this time," Daniel said, introducing himself.
No one replied to Daniel’s words; many of the attendees looked bewildered, and a few were visibly terrified. Clyde and Casca sat quietly. Clyde glanced toward the exit and spotted Julia standing there. After introducing himself, Daniel walked over to a seat on the podium behind a desk; only then did Clyde notice that one of Daniel’s legs was bionic, clearly more than a standard prosthetic. Once Daniel sat down, Irena stepped to the center and stood before the microphone.
"As Mr. Daniel just mentioned, my name is Irena. Before we begin, I will play an introductory recording showing what happened to the world. Please pay close attention."
The room went dark, and a ceiling-mounted projector lit up the screen at the front. Irena stepped away from the center to avoid blocking the view and watched alongside them. The footage displayed a feed from an orbital telescope circling Earth in the quiet, pitch-black void of space, with distant stars scattered across the dark.
When Earth aligned with the moon at a considerable distance, a giant magic circle, perhaps as large as a planet, suddenly opened and rotated counterclockwise, a swirling white vortex resembling a white wormhole expanding in its center. As the footage shifted to display the spinning vortex completely eclipsing the dark space beyond, a planet identical in size and shape to Earth slowly emerged from within.
The telescope captured every detail: the newly arrived Earth possessed a single massive continent wrapping around the planet, with the remainder covered by ocean. The planet continued to drift toward Earth, drawing closer to the telescope; moments later, the telescope caught fire, flames licking across its frame as it was pulled into the gravitational field of the newly appeared planet, plunging downward.
The footage then captured a highly advanced civilization on the planet’s surface, pyramid-like structures towering like skyscrapers, supported by pillars radiating streams of energy.
Before crashing into the ocean, the space telescope managed to record and transmit signals of a giant civilization with human-like bodies, alongside a slightly divergent human civilization possessing wings, serpentine lower bodies, and other altered traits within a massive city, right before the feed cut off entirely. The lights flickered back on, and Irena stepped back to the center.
"That was the last signal we received 300 years ago. After that, the planet, which we later learned was a parallel Earth vastly different from ours, opened a stargate to cross into our dimension, merging with our Earth. That is what we now call the Great Transition," Irena explained, concluding the segment.
The entire room fell dead silent, Clyde’s jaw virtually dropping; he had never expected to view a recording that resembled a sci-fi and horror movie combined. Casca stared unblinkingly at the screen before turning her gaze to Irena without a word, seemingly processing everything all at once. Suddenly, a man raised his hand, and Irena permitted him to speak as a staff member handed him a microphone. Holding the mic, the man stood up.
"Excuse me... so what happened after that?" the man asked.
"Very well. Before I answer, I will play the next recording," Irena replied.
The room went dark once more, and the projector beamed onto the screen at the front. This time, the video displayed a series of continuous natural disasters that decimated both civilizations, a consequence of merging two Earths that were never meant to combine.
Subsequently, the leaders of the giant nation inhabiting the parallel Earth began collaborating with humanity to salvage their civilizations. They contributed technology infused with magic and natural power, while humanity provided cutting-edge technology to support their mutual efforts.
Fifty years after the Transition Era, life began to stabilize. The inhabitants of the parallel Earth, who named their planet "Gaia," lived side-by-side with humanity, working together to rebuild society. That was until the human government uncovered a hidden agenda behind their cooperation, discovering that the Great Transition that had merged two planets from different dimensions was no coincidence of nature.
Gaia had deliberately created the stargate using their technology and magic to migrate into our dimension. Upon learning this, human leaders began investigating Gaia’s history, and the findings convinced them that humanity was under grave threat. The reason Gaia was inhabited by giants was finally answered: Gaia was just like Earth, but it had lacked one crucial historical event, a great flood that, according to legend, wiped out the giants, saved humanity, and established humans as the rulers of Earth.
Their reason for opening an interdimensional portal and moving their planet into our dimension was that they needed humans to survive; on Gaia, humanity had gone extinct due to endless consumption by the growing population of giants and demi-humans who preyed upon them. Having uncovered the truth, humanity severed all ties with the giant race, plunging both sides into a 100-Year War that ultimately ended with humanity, relying solely on conventional technology, suffering a crushing defeat and falling under occupation.
The video cut off, leaving an image of a massive crater resembling a meteor strike atop a facility situated deep in the wilderness. The lights turned back on, but the screen continued to display the final image—a hospital-like structure in a valley bearing a giant crater, as if struck by a meteor.
By now, the faces of everyone in the room, including Clyde and Casca, had turned deathly pale, especially after witnessing the final segment depicting the 100-Year War, a clash of nuclear warfare against destructive magic equal to, if not exceeding, the power of nuclear weapons. The man who had asked the question remained standing, completely frozen, much like everyone around him; a heavy, suffocating silence gripped the room.
"We apologize for showing you historical recordings from the past, but this is our standard protocol. Rather than offering verbal explanations, it is better to show you directly what transpired in this world and why we are here today," Irena said.
Not a single person responded to Irena’s words; everyone seemed dazed, caught between belief and disbelief, considering they had been living in a completely normal simulation until recently. Whispers and anxious murmurs began to spread through the crowd. Yet out of everyone in the room, only Clyde and Casca remained fixated on the final image displayed on the screen. Without turning her head, Casca leaned closer to Clyde,
"Big Brother... that picture... that hospital-like building... for some reason... I know that building... and the crater underneath it," Casca whispered in a trembling voice.
"Yeah... I recognize that building too... In fact... I feel like I used to live there... far away from human civilization... with... you... the others... and... Celes," Clyde whispered, his voice shaking.
"W... what really happened to us, Big Brother?" Casca whispered.
"I... I don’t know myself... but for some reason, I feel a wave of nostalgia looking at that picture," Clyde replied in a whisper.
"Me too... I do too... I’m scared, Big Brother," Casca whispered back.
"I feel the exact same way," Clyde whispered in reply.
The two lapsed back into silence, their eyes glued to the final image on the screen and the conclusion of the 100-Year War that had just ended its broadcast. Their trembling hands interlocked tightly, completely unaware that Julia by the exit and Irena at the front were watching them closely.