Ethereal Ascendance: A Journey of Transformation

After being beaten down by reality over and over, Camille wasn't as naive as before. Thanks to her natural succubus charm, she'd always done okay in City Wal.

No doubt her luck was still pretty good. After that time when she spotted me and Selene sneaking into City Wal, even though she didn't catch us, Camille used that chance to get Michelle's attention.

The memories I saw showed that while things were still hot with the "Fire God", Camille tried more than once to subtly convince Michelle to stop the pointless war against humans. But every time, she failed. Eventually Michelle got fed up. In a fit of anger, she stuck this "support staff" who wasn't even level 6 into the team fighting for the Cycle of Rebirth, leading them into Ilandra Dominion.

The next part was harder to see. Maybe because her brain was damaged, most of what I could read was old memories. Just as the magic was about to wear off, I finally got to some bits from more recent times.

"I saw the order sent to each nuke control unit. You increased the 'Level 1 attack status' countdown to over 10 minutes. What's your game? That'll put us at a huge disadvantage if humans notice and try to hit back. Don't you know that?"

This was some time after they took over M-country's leadership. Rasambla came storming in to confront Camille. He slammed his hand on Camille's desk, smashing it to bits, and got in her face, yelling: "You better get this straight! There's only us two left now. If we can't wipe out the humans on Earth, how are we gonna fight our way back into H-country and take control of the space portal anytime soon?"

"We only know about these world-destroying weapons from humans. We don't really know what they'll do. So I decided to be more careful when using them," Camille explained.

She quickly caught the laptop before it hit the floor. She didn't seem angry. Instead, she walked up to Rasambla very sweetly, wrapped her arms around his neck and said in a soft voice:

"Plus, this world's international situation is totally different from what we thought. Earth humans aren't nearly as united as you imagine! And you know H-country's space portal seems to have big problems, right? We might be stuck in this world for a long time. If that's the case, carelessly firing off nukes will only cut off our own path. At least in the future, none of us want to live in a world where nothing can grow, right?"

"Uh... I guess that makes some sense..."

For a moment, Rasambla seemed enchanted by her sweetness. His attitude softened right away. Then he eagerly grabbed Camille's waist, picked her up and headed for the bedroom. What happened next was cut off completely...

"How'd it go? Did you find the nuke cancel password?" Adrian asked anxiously when my mind came back to reality. Even though it felt like I spent a long time in Camille's memories, less than a minute had passed in the real world.

"No..." I shook my head and sighed a little, looking at the body in front of me.

The memory magic probably ate away a lot of the monster's brain tissue. There probably wasn't much left of Camille's brain by now.

But I'd picked up on that tiny bit of key info left in her last memories.

"Even though I didn't get the cancel password, I know where all the nuke launch silos are. Combined with each team's targets for this mission, we can pretty much be sure the only nukes ready to launch are the one Number 11 Feliciana didn't destroy, and one in that abandoned base where the rescue team is!"

In that last memory fragment, the laptop screen Camille caught showed the whole nuke layout plan for M-country. The basic info matched what Wayne Peng got from Senator Morrison, but it was way more detailed. It even clearly showed all the preset targets!

"So there are only these two left?" Adrian perked up when he heard that. Honestly, this was pretty good luck. Only one nuke in launch mode at each of the two bases - way better than we'd guessed before.

"No, there should be one more!" I suddenly remembered something Cyra mentioned at the start, which Wayne Peng also confirmed after we rescued him. "There was a nuclear sub docked at the port in Cyra's base!"

According to the original mission plan, Number 14 Feliciana was supposed to handle all the nuclear subs by herself. But sadly, the initial intel missed this sub that was already docked at the abandoned base. Now we had to pass this important info to the rescue team through Luke Channing!

"The nuke in the rescue team's base is aimed at W-country's capital? And the missile launch base where Number 11 Feliciana's team was before is targeting H-country's Shine Metropolitan area? Both of these are carrying megaton-level strategic nuclear warheads!" Luke Channing repeated to confirm after getting my report, then immediately passed it up to command.

Since it's pretty complicated to change targets for missiles in fixed launch sites, we can be pretty sure the intel from Camille's brain is accurate. But nuclear subs are more flexible. We don't know if that missed sub is carrying nukes, how powerful they might be, or what the target is.

"How's the password cracking going?" I couldn't help asking worriedly. We now knew Camille had set the nuke countdown to over 10 minutes on her own, and there probably wasn't much time left.

"Looks like it's not gonna happen! Seems like there was an argument at command center just now. M-country's password tech isn't that easy to crack. Some experts suggested just blowing up the control units - that might stop the countdown. But others were totally against it. They said M-country set up safeguards for that kind of thing way back in the Cold War. Trying to force it might make them launch right away. It'd be safer to just blow up the missiles!"

Luke Channing hesitated for a while, but still told me the truth. Actually, H-country experts had already guided Raydwin to get the exact time left through the comms - it showed on a gauge on the control panel. Less than 5 minutes left.

But finding the exact location of the underground missile silo was still too hard for Raydwin, a soldier who'd only just learned about this stuff. Not knowing the base layout, he'd already checked several possible places but hadn't found any sign of the missile.

Meanwhile, H-country's top brass were urgently meeting with ambassadors from other countries...

In other words, H-country really had no options left. The leadership was already preparing for the nukes to finally launch, trying to minimize the damage. Of course, they had to try to delay the missile launch as much as possible.

"Is this really all we can do?" I still wasn't satisfied. At least two strategic nukes launching! And both targets were big cities packed with people! Even if they could work together internationally to avoid all-out nuclear war, it would still cause countless deaths. This definitely wasn't what Adrian and I wanted to see.

On Raydwin's side, the remote monitoring system was still working. We could clearly see him and Cyra's situation.

But after learning there was pretty much no hope of cracking the cancel password, these two seemed even more down than me. In their free time, they'd started talking about what happens after death.

"You're an angel, so does that mean God really exists? So after people die, can they really go to heaven? Is that how it works for humans in your world?" Of course Raydwin wouldn't pass up the chance to ask this super classic question, with a legendary creature right in front of him.

"I don't know... The 'Lord' never mentioned any of this to me. Actually, I have a lot of questions too, but the 'Lord' hardly ever answers," Cyra shook her head.

Problem was, Cyra was pretty religious, the really passionate kind.

"No way! You're an angel! I heard angels can talk to God directly. Don't tell me it's just you who can't?" Raydwin was really surprised and started questioning her.

"What do you mean 'can't'! I'm one of the few angels who can receive Divine Revelation! I've gotten instructions from the Lord more than once. Other angels haven't had that experience!" Cyra got upset right away. This was questioning her faith - she had to clear things up! But her injuries were so bad she couldn't even stand up. She could only spread out her six wings, trying hard to prove who she was.

"Calm down, calm down! I was just saying. You can do it, you're good!" Raydwin quickly tried to calm her down. But right at that moment, I saw through the camera that Cyra's expression seemed to pause for a second. Then she grabbed Raydwin's shoulders and blurted out:

"Quick! The password is 34517511754356!"

"Huh?" Raydwin was totally confused, not understanding what she was on about all of a sudden.