Chapter twenty six: unforseen development
'All the huts seem to be made of hard mud, Hmmm.'
Caelum unhurriedly floated through the sky, lazily as the wind passed through him without resistance.
In this world, the laws of gravity, air friction, or pressure were more like suggestions than rules for him.
'They figured out structure and layering through the use of mud..... And leaf roofing's probably for protection from rains.' His eyes roamed over the tiny village like area expanding out from the central path. 'But no chimneys though, I wonder how they vent out the smoke, as it seemed like they figured out fire.' caelum tried to figure out the settlement, thinking about the smoke he saw earlier from a distance away.
Just then, as the cluster of huts became clearer, a loud and panicked scream pierced the air from somewhere below.
"AHHH!"
"...?"
Caelum's brows twitched as he glanced down and spotted a young man sprawled on the dirt, eyes wide like he'd just seen a ghost descend from the sky. The guy looked barely twenty.
'Did that guy shout because of me?' Caelum floated slightly lower, feeling highly amused, a laughter threatened to escape his lips, but he held it back.
As he looked around, he noticed something odd—every cow and sheep nearby had also stopped moving, their heads tilted upward, staring directly at him.
Caelum almost couldn't control his amusement this time. 'Okay, yeah… if I were a prehistoric person and saw someone soaring through the clouds in weird clothes, I'd scream too.' He exhaled sharply through his nose, smiling to himself.
The boy was still staring, lips trembling, like he wasn't sure whether to scream again.
A moment later, Caelum's shoes touched down on the ground without a sound. He landed smoothly right in front of the young man, whose mouth was still open like his brain had yet to comprehend what happened.
Caelum looked down at him, trying to figure out his identity.
"... Maybe he is a descendant of the humans i created?"
The boy's eyes twitched hearing those unrecognisable words, He opened his mouth, and a few words out came—
"Zhhhal… v'jshgh, ahggg-h zzhhal v'jhh."
Hearing those, Caelum facial expression twisted.
"Huh?"
It wasn't just incomprehensible, it was painful to his ears.
His ears throbbed the moment the boy's voice hit them, almost like nails scraping glass submerged in water. The syllables felt very unnatural, like a language not meant for his ears.
A sharp sting pulsed through his temples.
He flinched slightly, squinting. 'That…some weird combination of words, did they already develop a form of language? But this is a bit too early and their should be using vocal cords similar to mine, so what the hell are these?' caelum couldn't understand why the words spoken by the boy sounded so painful.
The boy stammered again, clearly trying to repeat himself, but Caelum raised a hand.
"Stop—just, don't say anything," he muttered, knowing very well the boy couldn't understand him.
pinching the bridge of his nose he said. "Damn that really hurts, maybe because they developed a primitive form of language way too early? Their vocal and words seems a bit too unnatural."
The young man fell silent, not understanding what was happening, but his eyes never left Caelum. There was hint of fear in them.
Caelum exhaled and looked around, taking in the rest of the village again.
He was about to head toward the huts when a voice stopped him—it was an old man's thick voice, filled with absolute shock.
"Zhaala?"
Hearing the unfamiliar word, Caelum turned his head toward the sound.
From the hut closest to him, a old man looking to be in his eighties slowly walked out, a woman of the same age supporting herself beside him.
Their bodies were thin and but not entirely frail, covered in simple layers of long leaves tied together crudely, but their eyes were sharp, filled with a surreal disbelief.
'Oh, here they are.'
Caelum's expression softened as he recognized the old man and woman, they were his creations, part of the first humans he had created in this world.
The old couple stood still staring at Caelum, as if they were seeing their own parents. The old man's lips trembled slightly, trying to say something more but no words came out.
Caelum didn't notice the changes in the old couples expressions, his focus was entirely on the two elderly figures inner structure.
As he activated his willpower, the inner biological structures of the old couple lay bare before Caelum's eyes.
'It seems most of their organs are still working fine.' Caelum scanned their bodies with ease, letting out a dry chuckle.
"Irony. They were supposed to have the same illness as me, but..."
He couldn't help but wonder—how the humans, who were meant to inherit his life-threatening disease, could stand here with such healthy bodies, even at such an old age.
Their frames were thin, but there was no sign of the slow decay Caelum had expected.
Hearing his voice, the boy who had been sitting on the ground scrambled to his feet and rushed toward the old couple. His fearful eyes darted between them and Caelum as he cried out in words Caelum couldn't understand, "Zalllha, zhum zlahha!"
The language had sharp syllable, utterly incomprehensible to Caelum.
The old man and woman turned briefly toward the boy, then exchanged a quick glance before stepping forward with hesitant steps, But before they could say anything, Caelum pulled the quill from his pocket and pointed it toward them..
'That boy... he's definitely their child or descendant. Since he wasn't directly created by me, I can't redefine him,' Caelum mused.
He had always been able to redefine his own creations, he had done it many times already, especially with the World Stabilizer. But the quill couldn't touch anything that had formed naturally, it was beyond the quill's direct influence.
"Let's make you understand me first," Caelum said in a low voice.
With a swift motion of the quill, a bright light burst forth from the old couple. wrapping them in a thin veil of shimmering white.
"Zlmmah?!" The young boy gasped, stumbling two steps back in shock. His wide eyes stared at the strange sight.
As the light faded, the old man's eyes widened. He stared at Caelum with confusion and then, with clear understandable words, he spoke: "This... this is..."
---
"Now, you can definitely understand me," Caelum said, glancing at the old man and woman.
The young boy however, still stood frozen, confusion clouding his face.
Unlike the old couple, he still couldn't understand Caelum's words. He was starting to feel worried as he hurried closer to the old couple, trying to say something in his own language. But the old woman gently raised a hand to stop him.
She turned toward Caelum, looking at him with her eyes sharp. She spoke in the same harsh-sounding language as before, but this time, Caelum understood every word.
"What did you do to us? No..." She paused before speaking again, her voice quieter this time. "Who are you—"
Before she could finish, the old man interrupted with his trembling voice. "That being... it looked the same as you, it was the same when we were born... I remember it clearly. You were the first person i saw, when I first opened my eyes." His words cracked with an unseen emotion.
To ease the confusion, caelum gently smiled. "You don't have to think so hard,"
He had no intention of hiding the truth, in fact, he needed to keep a close watch over them.
"I was the one who created you." Caelum said, trying to sound calm.
Failure or not, they were still the first intelligent lifeforms of this world, his creations.
---
The old man shook slightly, his old hands trembling as a soft voice slipped from his mouth, it was like a child finally finding his parents after being lost for too long.
"I knew it," he whispered as tears welled up in his eyes. "I said it to everyone, but no one believed me."
He turned, smiling warmly at the old woman beside him, "See? I told you — he would come to help us one day!" his voice quivered with emotion.
The old woman stared at him in shock, her expression was of disbelief, while the young boy, unable to understand what was happening, stepped forward. His fists clenched tightly as he mustered his strength.
"Father," the young boy called out, voice strained with fear and confusion, "what are you talking about? Are you... are you able to understand this person?"
The old man opened his mouth, but before he could speak, the old woman answered instead.
"It seems, he is the 'being' we have been waiting for," she said with his gentle voice.
The young boy stumbled a step back, his voice hoarse as he looked at Caelum.
"W-What?!"
He had been the first to witness the figure soaring across the sky, he knew it in his gut thay Caelum wasn't an ordinary person, even though he looked almost identical to humans he was familiar with.
"Are you saying," the boy's voice cracked as he looked between the two elders, "that the 'being' you old people kept talking about was real?"
His question hung in the air, but the old man didn't spare him a glance. Instead, His trembling hands were clenched at his sides, his clouded eyes locked solely on Caelum.
Slowly, the old man took a step forward.
"Back then..when we first opened our eyes in this strange place," His voice was raspy, carrying the weight of decades spent surviving. "You soared above us without a word. Back then, we didn't understand anything at all.." the old man's voice grew softer with each word.
He pasued for a second, then took another step again, as if old memories were flooding his heart.
""But after wandering for years... starving, freezing, fighting to stay alive without even knowing we had to eat or seek shelter —" His breath shook but he kept walking, he walked until he stood directly before Caelum, the thin lines of age were deep on his face, but his eyes burning with fierce clarity.
"We had to learn a new thing everyday, a new way to survive everyday." At this point he had a smile on his face.
"Soon, we realised one thing." He had a firmness in his voice, "that the being we saw when we first opened our eyes... that being must be our parent, the one who brought us into this world."
His weak but proud back straightened, his hands hanging open at his sides.
"If you are that same being, then you must be the one" the old woman whispered as if speaking the final piece of puzzle they have been waiting for their entire life, "The one who gave us life."