Volume One: Dust

Chapter 1: Unread Messages

God once gazed upon this sea of stars; here he slumbers, and here he awakens. —Aest, "Neverland"

This black pine forest had been barely hanging on for quite some time. The needles were withered, drooping in dejection, yet, miraculously, there was no trace of the sour bitterness of rotting wood.

The familiar woody scent that lingered in the forest year-round still floated quietly, concealing twenty-five single-person cryo-capsules deep within the pines.

The cryo-capsules were arranged in a neat square formation, their sealed glass covers frosted over.

One of them emitted a shrill alarm, sharp enough to set one's nerves on edge, shattering the silence of the deep woods:

"Insufficient energy, malfunction detected."

"Warning: Cryo-capsule will cease operation soon. Please replenish energy within five seconds."

"Countdown: 5."

"4"

"3"

"2"

"1"

"No new energy detected, cryo-capsule shut——"

The word "down" hadn't even finished when the flat electronic voice abruptly cut off.

Pssst——

The sound of the metal base shutting down was like a leak of air. The frost on the glass cover, under the emergency heating system, receded at a speed visible to the naked eye, revealing a handsome yet pale face inside the capsule.

The thin frost clinging to his brow ridge made him look chillingly cold, utterly lifeless, as if he had been slumbering here for ages and would never wake again.

Yet almost the instant the frost faded, those beautifully shaped eyes suddenly opened without warning.

To be honest, these metal lumps used for freezing people were called capsules, but they bore no resemblance to actual capsules.

They were not at all pleasing to the eye—wide at the top, narrow at the bottom, a hexagon with a face longer than a horse's. Once a person lay inside, it was a standard, well-crafted coffin.

When the design blueprints first came out, Scott Harris was busy handling a riot at the space prison, having barely slept for three days, his face clouded with exhaustion.

The unlucky designer knocked on his office door and placed a thick stack of blueprints on his desk.

According to regulations, all documents related to the cryo-capsules had to be reviewed and approved by the Chief Officer of Office 5 at the Security Tower, with a signature before proceeding—including the appearance design.

And Scott Harris just happened to be the Chief Officer stationed at Office 5.

He glanced at the thickness of the blueprints and closed his eyes for a moment, then, amid the designer's flowery descriptions, simply flipped to the last page and signed his name.

When the finished product was unveiled, he was wearing a finely tailored shirt, sitting elegantly and composed in the top-floor conference room of the Security Tower, listening to the old men curse the design.

They ranted for a full two hours, but this bastard listened with an unchanged expression, showing not a hint of self-reflection. He even tapped the table lightly and said with a smile, "The planet's got a long life ahead. There's no way you or I will ever have to use these cryo-capsules. Ugly is as ugly does."

That nearly drove the old men mad.

Yet less than five years after those words, the planet exploded.

And he really did end up lying in that ugly cryo-coffin. Goes to show, do enough rotten things and even the heavens can't stand it—call it karma.

Scott Harris coughed dully under the glass cover for a while, hacking out all the cold from his lungs. Only then did he move his fingers and pry open the safety lock inside the capsule.

His muscles and bones were still stiff all over; just pushing open the hatch took him quite a bit of effort.

The feeling of his feet on solid ground was so unfamiliar that he staggered backward, finally sitting down against the side of the cryo-capsule.

Half a step away, another cryo-capsule was still operating normally, its glass cover displaying two lines:

Galo Time 13:20:07

Internal temperature: New Celsius -206°

At 13:00, the afternoon sun should have been at its brightest, yet overhead was a sea of stars, and the surroundings were as desolate as midnight.

Scott Harris looked around, taking a deep breath.

The air was stifling. Even though he had emerged from the cryo-capsule, it still felt as if something was pressing down on him, making it hard to breathe. He wondered if his lungs had been frozen.

Crack—

Suddenly, the sound of pine needles snapping came from behind him, as if something had stepped on them.

"Who?!" Scott Harris whipped his head around.

Having not spoken for so long, his voice was a bit hoarse.

As he spoke, his fingers instinctively reached for his waist.

Thank goodness, in the rush to enter the cryo-capsule, he hadn't removed his gun.

He flicked off the safety, the "click" sounding especially crisp in the silence.