Apocalypse Zero Chapter 1 (The World Starts With Zero)

This strange piece-of-shit story ends with bodies all over the place on a barren wasteland, with a sole man is seen lying there, showered by rain that appears to be red, as if the sky is raining blood.

The man’s brown skin soon turns red as he refuses to step away from there. He just left his face being enveloped by the putrid liquid.

He then stands up, looking around the place as he sees buildings fell on the ground, with the sky is nothing but pure black. He can also see dead bodies of various sizes as he slowly stands up, pulling a small knife with him.

The man drags his feet on the ground, slowly found himself standing at the edge of the world. There he sees the land been cut off cleanly with nothing else but pure black around the land.

One different thing he sees is a blue hole right below the land, shimmering and act as a light for him to see his surroundings.

The man lazily stares at the hole, not doing anything till he cracks a faint smile.

CHAK!

Right after he smiles, the knife he holds are quickly being put right through his skull with his own hand as he closes his eyes and fall down onto the hole, slowly disappears from their sight.

And this is how the story ends.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

But this is how the story starts.

It starts with a large group of archaeologists working on a marble ruin.

Days ago, it has been reported that a new ancient civilization has been found in Malaysia somewhere in Borneo. This new civilization is been backed by a proof of not having any similarities whatsoever with any other civilization that was recorded within the same century; it has a technology of its own far predates any other kingdoms.

From artefacts that were found in the span of one year, it can be concluded that this newly-discovered empire has been using some form of infrastructure quite similar to what the empires long after them used. There are even proofs of how it is possible for them to be having something similar to what modern people have been using nowadays; cell phone.

Yes, one of the scientists found a cell phone made of marbles and from the radiation experimented on it, it can be said that it was dated around 5000 BC.

Following this discovery, a lot of archaeologists all over the world goes around the world, searching for any proof of such civilization exist, and they did. The empire they found was all over the world, but one most prominent place those artefacts were found were mostly in Southeast Asia, more specifically within Malaysia.

Currently in the south of Borneo, various types of people are researching on this new kingdom dubbed as Sakura Civilization, dubbed for the numerous times an insignia similar to a cherry blossom can be seen around the artefacts related to it. Each humans in there are trying their best to uncover the mystery of this out-of-the-world empire.

This of course including a group of adults checking out the expedition from afar, watching them closely.

A blonde-haired in a ponytail female sighs as she starts looking away from the expedition and starts checking out a scroll of scribbles inside her hands, “This is too much! Why would we even bother with these people? Why can’t we just join them all and act like normal?”

“Because, Kira, we can’t just show up and act normal if we have something everybody will be willing to kill just to get, right?” a blonde short-haired male chuckles, glaring at her as he turns toward a huge undestroyed castle made of white marbles, seeing another group of people scattered all over the castle, “Now, what the hell are they doing?”

A silver-haired female who is sitting beside him mutters coldly, “They are checking for traps.”

At the middle of the yard of the castle, two human, a raven messy-haired male and a black short-haired-till-the-shoulder-length-haired female are looking at a different scroll, which shows a drawing of a castle.

The male mutters, “This is too much. The great Saito himself should have conveyed a message on which one is a trap and which one is not. In fact, why the hell would he put so many traps in a freaking castle!?”

“Calm down, Shraffe,” the female chuckles, trying to calm him down by tapping his back, “Aren’t all ruins are like this?”

“Here is the thing, when did he even have any time to set up all of this trap? Is it even he who set up all of this trap? We have no idea! The record is pretty much stops here. The Saito Family’s ancient scrolls just stop there.”

“Maybe something happened after his death?” the female, Sarah, wonders, “I mean, this empire has been a mystery even to us, his descendants. We have most of his precious artefacts but not much about the story. Maybe there is something he would not want people to know of?”

“Not helpful. I mean, at least somebody within the kingdom should just tell us the lore about this kingdom. I mean, whoever wrote this only care to start from the War of Two Worlds till the War of Traitors and that’s it. The span of years finished in that epic is only like, 10 years and that is nothing much in there.”

“Em… hi?”

The group quickly turns around, shocked to see a man with a camera in his hands and a huge bag pack behind him appears climbing on the entrance. His face seems scarred at the middle of it. Despite that, he seems cheerful as he calls them out, “Is this the entrance to the Sakura Empire’s main castle?”

“Who the fuck are you? How are you able to see this place?” Shraffe is shocked to see him, and so is everyone.

He and Sarah approaches him as he just mutters with a smile on his face, “I just… well… saw you guys climbing here earlier and I have been wondering what are you guys doing up there when everyone is down there. But then I was surprised by how I can see a castle up there when nobody seems to have no idea what I just told them.”

The blonde male, Ryo stands up and walks toward the two, “Could he be… a direct descendant like us too?”

“Another one?” Sarah turns toward him, “How many are the direct descendants in this world?”

Ryo just shrugs.

“Direct… descendants?”

Shraffe sighs as he asks, “What’s your name? Which group are you with?”

“I’m Hansap. Hansap Killabick from the New Straits Times. I’m a junior reporter and I’m pretty much here to get something for the paper.”

The group look at each other, discussing of something before Shraffe turns to look at him, “First of, it’s not Sakura Empire. It’s called Saito Family.”

“Saito- what? But it’s called Sakura Empire,” Hansap seems confused, “That’s what the news said.”

“The news people do not live in 5000 BC. The news people are also not the one who got handed down the documents and bedtimes stories generations to generations.”

Hansap becomes shocked, “You mean… all of you are…”

“All of us are from the same branches. All of us have been safekeeping his precious artefacts for generations. That’s how we come to know the story of Saito himself.”

“Saito?”

“It’s a name given to the founding father and the first leader of the Saito Family. That cherry blossom scattered all over the kingdom’s things is just an official insignia used that can also double as a way for people of other kingdoms to recognize their flags. It is also to tell people that he prizes his family the most, especially his beloved first wife, Princess Sakura from the land of Sherize.”

“She-what?”

“It’s obvious that you are in need to learn more of the story within the kingdom. Still, you won’t learn how it started if we have no idea how the first proper civilization even started.”

Sarah mutters, “One of the reason why we are here is to uncover the mystery of such event. What makes Saito created the kingdom in the first place? Why would he unite people from all over the world? Most importantly, what is he hiding in there!?”

Shraffe shouts, pointing toward the castle, “Scratch everything we have been talking about before! WHAT IS IN THAT SHIT!?”

Hansap is now confused, “That’s… not a castle?”

“That is,” Shraffe explains, “But NEVER in his life has he ever live in one! He sleeps in a normal mansion just like everyone else, and we KNOW that very mansion cause every year we spend at least a week there! That’s how we got all of his stuff. That said, what the hell is that thing keeping!?”

“How about we check it out?” Hansap wonder as he runs into the entrance, shocking everyone else as they goes to chase after him, shouting at him, “WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU DOING!?”

To their surprised, they move through the corridors within the building and see no resistance nor dead bodies whatsoever.

Safely, they finally arrived what appears to be a giant dial with four smaller dials at the corner of that room.

All of them turn to look around them now starting to wonder, “Weird.”

Yes, that’s what everybody is saying.

Shraffe notices of the reporter to be spinning the dials as he calls him out, “Hey, be careful with that!”

“What’s wrong?” Hansap turns at him, looking excited as he keeps on spinning the dials.

The group notices how the four dials have five different pictures on it; a shield, a sword, a ball, a goblet and a crown. They also notice how Hansap only spins the dials around in a strange pattern.

The west side has the shield facing the giant dial. The east side has the ball. The north side has the crown and the south side has the sword.

He now goes to spin the giant dial, which as four pictures up there; all four features animals of different images.

Sarah mumbles as she sees the dials, “It’s the Great Four Animals of Death; the excavarn, the harriot, the guruman and the killjin.”

“What are those weird names?” Hansap and Shraffe turns to her, speaking in unison, shocking her as she tries to speak of something.

But the earth starts to shake, with Hansap looks away, looking pissed with him loudly mutters, “Failed again! This is the 673^rd times I have failed this puzzle.”

“Wh-what are you talking about!?” Shraffe turns to him, feeling weird of this man.

Hansap only glares at him as he mutters, “None of your business, kids.”

The giant dial now falls down onto a huge hole created from the quake with the group quickly runs out of there.

Shraffe and Hansap still standing there as the former asks him, “Who are you?”

“Me? I am the Great King of Death; the Last King of Saito Family itself.”

Shraffe seems shocked, “Y-you are… the one in the prophecy… Shinai Desu.”

“It’s Shine Death. Make sure you say my name properly. Now, just stay put and live through this new era. You’ll need to stay alive. I need you to stay alive.”

“What?”

The building starts to crumble as Shraffe found himself being pulled away from the enlarging hole, pulled toward Sarah and his friends as she calls him out, “Wake up, Shraffe!”

He is saved from the ruin, seeing how Shine falls into the hole as it erupts high toward the sky, shooting out a huge beam.

At that moment, beams are shot out from all over the planet; the galaxy; the universe; the worlds; the timelines…

Various beams shot out to the sky, as it slowly turns dark red, with a huge robed figure with skull hands appear towering through the sky, having its head not showing up that the figure, having the face of a skull-shaped Neanderthal-ish face, had to bow down toward the surface of every places it appear to.

“GREETINGS, PEOPLE OF THIS WORLD. I WOULD LIKE TO SAY THANK TO ANYBODY WHO HAS FINALLY RELEASE ME FROM MY SHACKLES. IT HAS BEEN CENTURIES LONG THAT I HAVE BEEN CAGED. TODAY IS FINALLY THE DAY WHERE I WILL RULE EVERYTHING!”

His skull hands shoot out toward the lands, as each of the land have one creatures of different descriptions, appearing and start annihilating every single living things in that world.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxx

Somewhere in a place of both flames and ice, Shine are standing on an altar, looking at floating spheres on top of a podium as he tries moving those spheres close to each other.

“So, Death. You want to rule these worlds? You can try, if you can kill me.”

He then pushes the spheres together, pushing them even after all of them are side by side, smashing them into one giant world as he laughs maniacally, “Unfortunately, Death! You can never do that! You want to know why? Because Ten Saints of Erectile have already been selected! Those tens will defeat you, and we will be doing this all over again! Again and again till I finish off this puzzle!”

He turns to see the fallen dials as he grins at them.

Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx

Through the time and space, every single lives in this small collection of alternate stories met with each other, forced to stay within the same world of different logics as the word begins its countdown to its destruction.

And yes, if anybody is going to ask about that weird title above, it’s this kind of story. You should have known if you found this story in ficwad, not in any other site.

Because this is a smut-filled story.

You have been warned.