Abandoned Factory

[The Viscount]

"Ah, speak of the devil... It's Erald himself!"

"I only have one thing to ask of you. Why did I not bleed?"

[The City [EclipseZwolf]]

Stocke, is your word against Erald's and Erald as you said has been here much longer. Why should I trust you over him?"

[Ravan]

"I've never lied to you, but neither has Erald. I'm willing to share what I know, but Erald clearly isn't. He's just standing over there and yawning as I drone on and on. I suppose it must be boring to watch someone fumble with pieces of information when you already have the whole picture painted out. But he most likely will not contribute more unless we force him to by stumbling onto something important. When it comes to the origin of DICE, though, allow me to ask you this Erald. How did you reach X? When he's all the way up in the heavens? And why did he spare both you and Barin?"

[Ravan]

"Speaking of which... where is Barin? Did you... did you finally kill him, Erald?"

[Daedalus]

"I doubt he did, Stocke. After all, if Barin survived the last confrontation, it would be strange that he didn't now. It might even be possible that Barin is the one we know as X. That might be a long shot though. As for the others and why they died, well, it was because they weren't needed anymore to be our training partners, our friends, our rivals, our goals. I wonder if any of them ever existed to begin with."

[Ravan]

"I spoke with Barin, merely hours before we were taken here. He said that he was preparing for an inevitable attack from A ranked Dicers. He even said that he was expecting Erald to show up at any time. He did not have confidence in his victory, he merely believed that he may have been able to hold his ground against him. But over time, Erald surely would have prevailed. Erald was the one to specifically analyse DICE amongst the group of researchers that Barin had assembled. Perhaps he knew some method of nullifying DICE. Barin was only aware of how to reset the points you had, but nothing about destroying them. That is why I believe that you killed him, Erald. You were the only one capable of it to the extent of my knowledge."

[Ravan]

-Stocke paces around the factory, trying to gather his thoughts aloud-

"Where is X? Is he here on Earth, or is he in space? There's a difference in one constellation in space, and one of the stars has been replaced with a blue light. It fits with the meteorite that fell down to Earth two years ago according to Emna, as this is a wasteland. Nobody would think of coming here willingly, and Emna definitely has this place under lockdown. Is that cube the meteorite? It doesn't look very hidden, but I suppose this wasteland is a hidden location in and of itself, so... Where is X? Does it change anything if we know who X is? Ayame was onto something when it came to a fake X, and a true X. Maybe I'll just call them X and Y respectively. Barin could have impersonated Y and called himself X. Barin told me that he himself was the first one to stumble upon DICE, and it fits the time seeing as that was... fifteen months ago, 9 months after the meteorite hit Earth. It fits with the notebook, Barin was the first one to research and find DICE, he was the one to recruit other researchers. That fits with the notebook."

-Stocke pauses for a bit before continuing-

"In which case... Does that mean that the 6 A rankers from before have merely been revived and killed as they repeat this cycle of competing to challenge God? The only way to fix that fatal flaw of DICE was to select a champion out of the 6 A rankers, and the aforementioned champion would challenge "God".

"Does that make any sense so far?"

[The City [EclipseZwolf]]

"So if I go along with this, I get to fight a God? Sounds like a good time!"

[Ravan]

"I don't know about that, Adell. This might be something that deviates from the norm, we aren't a part of this cycle normally speaking. Though, having spoken with Wane, he brought up how Erald was an outsider to these games, so to speak. A fourth wheel on a tricycle. He lost the previous round that he participated in, and he was attempting to gain entry into our round. This means that he wasn't the one to meet X. Barin was. It has to have been this way."

[Daedalus]

"It does, Stocke. Especially since I am almost certain that that notebook looks to be over two years old, and if Barin says he found the meteorite only 15 months ago, then the timeline is certainly off."

"However, at the moment, we are left with the conundrum of what to do about it. I, for one, do not trust Emna with my Dice, any more than I trust myself to have dice. Therefore, I propose a third option. We eliminate those who wish to tell us to give them our dice, and we remove them ourselves. Currently, I see Erald there, and I'm almost certain that he wants my dice. I propose we do not let him take ours. When we are not immediately under threat, we can decide what to do then."

[Ravan]

"Barin did not find the meteorite. Emna did. Emna found the meteorite two years ago, and Barin stumbled upon DICE 15 months ago. There's a 9 month gap here."

[Daedalus]

"Either way, it is over 2 years old."

[The City [EclipseZwolf]]

We are talking nonsense about Gods, let me throw in something then.

I was the first of us to achieve A rank and when I did I had a conversation with X. What god is even being referenced here, in that case its Abelvion who is considered the source of the DICE's power. X said while I was speaking with him that Abelvion can see this happening but can't DO anything about it. How the game was entirely under his control and the entire world would know the power of DICE.

Abelvion, Nir, Cranaskous. Think those are important to this discussion?

[The Viscount]

"As a follower of Abelvion myself, I am inclined to agree. In fact, perhaps Abelvion is the true X. The X we all know did say to me that they were not the only one able to create DICE."

"In my crusades, I destroyed everything relating to that 'Nir,' but Cranaskous... Not only were their followers troublesome and cowardly, but their scripture was insane. Perhaps given time, I could recall, but there was a way to summon Cranaskous using approximately one thousand DICE."

[Daedalus]

"I don't believe so. Perhaps they are simply names given to additional dice powers, or former A or higher rankers that for some reason are still less powerful than X."

"However, thinking back on it, the others mentioned that their time was up, before they disintegrated. Do I not recall a blue hourglass upon the desk of the mayor? Perhaps the sand has run out, and now is the chance to change things before it is flipped again."