RE: Reality Smuggler (R-18)

A mile away from the walled settlement...

Two 3-meter-tall armored men looked at each other... Well, at least Grayham was a man. The other was a Kin Lord clad in golden armor.

It was the second time Grayham met a Kin Lord and the first time facing an armored one... and one that didn't want to eat him. At least, not openly. For the first time, the Kin came to them diplomatically, requesting their surrender.

And there was another first for Grayham. The Kin Lord communicated by writing words in fluent English, overcoming their inability to speak.

However, the one communicating wasn't the Kin Lord. It was just a puppet. The speaker was some creature claiming to be an Ascended, a transhuman specially engineered to replace the old humanity. He never knew about that.

And more ridiculously, the ones who did it were Apex Technologies, and they did it to counter an incoming alien threat. Several days ago, a special Ascended, Primrose Goodman, was born, claiming to be the queen of the Ascended of the entire world, under the blessing of some deity named the True Sun. Under the True Sun's gift, all the Spore Spreaders evolved, growing in influence in real time.

However, she claimed the True Sun was pro-human and wanted to give a chance to the survivors to surrender and be converted into Ascended. She promised safety, good food, comfortable homes, longevity, good health, undoing mutations, and more. And all that just because her god was magnanimous.

It was so ridiculous and good it almost sounded believable in Grayham's ears.

"And what makes you think I would believe it? I want proof! If you can't back up your claims, they are as good as being empty!" - Grayham demanded.

The Kin Lord nodded, washing his board using water the Kin Soldiers around him brought and used a brush dipped in a dark-colored mixture to write something else. A minute later, the Kin Lord showed the answer.

[Understood. We will set up an idol here, so please don't shoot it down. When the shrine is complete, send volunteers so we can prove our claim.] - The message read.

"... Fine. But don't let it be within a mile of my settlement, or I am blowing it up." - Grayham relented.

And so, three days later...

Under the quick and tireless construction of the Kin, they built a large wooden obelisk, easily 20m tall and a dozen meters wide.

And, under the astonished eyes of the survivors, the Kin sacrificed a large number of Minion crystals to the idol, turning into black flames that entered it.

When they finished building the idol, a young child arrived in a flash of black flames, claiming to be a priestess of the True Sun. She had black hair, eyes, and crystal on her forehead and claimed she was an evolved form of the Ascended, called a Polymath, a high-tier Ascended. She said she would perform the conversion.

Grayham fulfilled his promise, sending out the most disfigured and mutated men he had in the base, the only ones desperate enough to volunteer to this madness. And, under everyone's astonished eyes, the men went up in black flames.

However, they didn't open fire at them, as they were informed this would happen.

Several hours later, the flames cleared, revealing unblemished humans, all regressing to their 18-year-old bodies. However, the operation didn't stop there. The men went up in flames again, and after some time, the fire extinguished, revealing humans with perfect bodies. And then they went up in flames again. This time, it took much longer, 30 hours.

However, the survivors had nothing but time as they looked at the miracle before them.

30 hours later...

The flames subsided, revealing the men and women. However, they all had green-platinum hair, golden eyes, and a black Kin crystal on their foreheads.

"Holy shit, they didn't lie..." - Grayham and the other survivors were shocked.

Word by word, Primrose fulfilled her promise. Everyone became Ascended.

Grayham knew what this meant.

"Maybe... we can live after all! And with honor!" - He hopefully thought.

How long has it been? When his happiness was snatched away? When he had to abandon his bar, wife, and young daughter like a coward to survive? When he had to risk his life daily to eat and grow stronger? When he had to watch his back for backstabbing scum who wanted his weapons and rations.

He wanted it back, that happiness. All the survivors did. Especially the children, who heard stories of the old world, yearned for it.

However, his mind, used to human trickery, quickly sobered up.

"No! I must continue to observe! She might have an ulterior motive!"

With that in mind, he brought back the newly evolved survivors and interrogated them to see if they were themselves. After several rounds of questioning along with the people closest to them, everyone was convinced that they were the once-mutated citizens of this settlement.

Becoming more convinced, Grayham requested these men to go to the Ascended Kin Field and test the waters. He wanted to see if they could survive inside and its conditions.

And so, a group of ten drove to the Kin Field to test things out. Several hours later, they returned with positive news. Not only could they breathe the air, but it was also comfortable to live inside, and there was plenty of food, water, and shelter. It was a haven for humanity.

With that, Grayham felt more comfortable with the idea, gradually sending more and more men to convert into Ascended. And after several days, everyone, old to young, weak to strong, from the believing to the skeptical, got converted, including Grayham.

This didn't only happen in this settlement but in all the other human colonies.

And so, the Human survivors have been disarmed and integrated into Kin society, no longer an obstacle to the expansion of the Ascended empire. Everywhere around the world, new Spore Spreaders continued to sprout, covering the land with new Kin Fields.

The mutated animals, driven into a corner, either integrated into the ecology or were pushed to extinction.

As for what happened to Apex Technology?

The scattered recon teams, surprisingly or not, directly surrendered and converted into Ascended.

Only Apex Technologie's main bases were left, being the last human forces on the planet, partially because they were on island bases and because after Iver heard of the atrocities they committed from the surrendered Recon Teams, he considered whether they were human enough to take in.

And so, three weeks quickly flashed by...