Heaven's Falling Down [Ch. XVI, Nine]

Quote of the Day: "I'm not throwing away my shot” – Alexander Hamilton as he throws away his shot, probably.

Hey there, Demonic Alejandro Wiskosin Jameson III! It’s been quite a long day with a ton of crazy stuff that happened after I wrote to you about 3 hours ago when everyone else was busy having tea and discussing stuff. I am in my own room (of sorts) with Nine and so I can talk more freely here as Nine’s asleep right now. I have a long list of events to narrate to you and a lotta stuff to elaborate and think about.

But, before all that, let me talk about a more crucial matter at hand. Something’s really, really, REALLY off with Nine. My Nine-kun was semi-okay throughout the day, but a bit after he started writing his diary journal tonight, I saw him crying and weeping with his hands covering his face. I was kinda startled, usually it’s the other way around with me breaking down mentally all the time.

Anyway so, after I managed to snap myself out of the shock of seeing him cry, I called him over and gave him some headpats while he sobbed his heart out on my lap. I didn’t ask anything, as I probably wouldn’t even be able to comprehend what’s going on in his head, much less understand it.

I am not a good big sis, am I? Sigh.

After a good 10 minutes of that, he thanked me for some reason and went back to writing to his Jesse. Then, after like 10-15 minutes, he went to sleep with the most pained and horrified expression I have ever seen on his face. After I was 100% sure that he’d gone to sleep, I went over to get a blanket over him. After that, I kept giving him headpats in his sleep till, I dunno how, his pain vanished and he started smiling in his sleep.

I dunno how or if headpats in sleep calms people down. Even my P-AI isn’t really giving me helpful responses in that matter because universal internet doesn’t really exist here, so eh, who knows? I tried my best and it worked, I guess?

Anyway, as he’s asleep, I have time to write my diary – shh, Alejandro, he doesn’t know that I am writing diary journals now. I haven’t told him yet, I will tell him after I am done mastering the art, as they say.

Also, hey, speaking of Nine… I gained points in the Flex War today! At the end of the day when we were going to bed, we decided that he gets 10 points for… uh, stuff… and I get 50 POINTS for the whole Saber action figure thing! But… I am kinda sure it’s just pity points at this point, he’s at 719 and I am 359 – he has over twice the score I have!

Damn you, Kyu-kun! You are too good at almost everything compared to me!

Alright, that’s enough talk about Nine. Let me spill some tea about what happened for the rest of the day. Shall I, Alejandro?

During that little tea party and after I’d finished writing to you back then (…the grammar smells kinda wrong, but I think you get what I mean), we got more info on the status of Canta’s world or SAMAverse-α as Nine and Sherlock like to call it. Canta, Tumble-chan and Calendar-chan (yeah, their names are weird for a reason, I will tell you soon, Alejandro) told us all about it.

So, on 28 August 2025 (this timeline is ahead of ours by about 6 years and 2 months, it’s currently 20th December 2025 over here), all hell broke lose in this world (or should it be ‘loose’?) because something called a ‘universal wavefunction’ collapsed due to an external influence or ‘observation’ (or something like that) done by Miaokuran, a cat who is the Tertiary Infinite Being of Space. We don't know much about her except for the fact that she has some sinister syllogism of sorts. Yeah, it's a ‘she’, apparently.

All sorts of weird stuff happened in the last 4 months. People and places from the two ‘SAMAverses’ started fusing into hideous versions of themselves – apparently something called the mode or ‘expectation value’ of their two different versions from the two different timelines. Even Canta's elder sister Tumble-chan (her real name was erased from the timeline during the shenanigans) and her bestie and vice-president of the school council Calendar-chan (same for her) had the same fate.

Stuff all around the world turned into completely hideous and ridiculous things, things and false memories glitched in and out of existence – even the continents and oceans almost metamorphosed into something else entirely.

Thankfully, by the time the chaos rose to that level, Field Wielders had arisen from the depths of the abyssal chaos to save the day. For some reason, the wave function collapse led to the awakening of Field Wielding abilities in about 1 in 10 million people.

However, around the same time, the gods of Takamagahara or the Japanese heaven started showing up in front of humans. They always existed, however, just a little while after every interaction with mortals – they were always forgotten by the people due to some inherent law of the world. However, this contrasted with the rather ubiquitous nature of the gods of the Chinese heaven, as people in China have interacted with them throughout history and they aren’t made by people’s wishes unlike the SAMAverse-α version of the Japanese gods – as conjectured by Sherlock (I hope I am using that big word correctly) - and the wavefunction collapse made the Japanese gods’ ‘system’ become a little closer to that of the Chinese from the other ‘SAMAverse-ß’, which made stuff even more complicated and stuff.

Damn, this shit reminds me of Noragami. Damn-square, it was so good – so bad that it never got fully adapted.

Speaking of good, the Seven Gods of Fortune and Amaterasu have been foundational in helping the remaining human population in SAMAverse-α. Apparently Bishamon/Vaisravana and Amaterasu are Unary Infinite Beings of Rules and Shine respectively, and Izanagi – the creator god of Japan (alongside his sis-wife) – is the Binary Infinite Being of Birth.

Don’t blame me if this gets too boring, Alejandro, I am just reciting what I got to know today.

Speaking of getting to know, after Plume (whom I talked about previously), I got to know another wonderful person. She has powers enough to-

Wait, let me just tell you a little conversation Sherlock and I had to illustrate how crazy she is:

“So,” I said, trying to tease Sherlock, “She just reverted your time-stop by just extending her hands? Are you getting old or something?”

“That… is not quite to the point, Miss Six,” Sherlock said as he pulled down his deerstalker in semi-embarrassment. “She simply redefined time itself.”

“So, that’s the power of Concept?” I asked. “To define and re-define anything and everything?”

“That’s quite a succinct summary, however that’s not entirely precise,” He replied. “Her Realm consists of every idea and thought ever and never imagined or conceived of – hers is the most absolute Proximus I have ever had the honour of analysing. She could, in theory, rewrite all of knowable Existence to her own will. She is the Song of Existence, the voice that gives meaning to ‘Being’ itself – as her Italian given name implies.”

“A’ight, yada yada, enough yapping,” I got bored and asked the real question that was bugging me, “Is she stronger than you, Sherlock?”

“That’s… a good question,” Sherlock said, with a strange intonation, before continuing, “If she were to become a Binary Infinite Being, it might give me a little trouble.”

“But, would you lose?” I asked.

Then, from nowhere, a genki Japanese girl answered me, “Nah, I’d win.”

Canta Koto hopped in after finishing having weird discussions with Nine that were beyond my understanding. My Kyu-kun looked extremely confused during that conversation, and she got a bit too loud and bizarrely melancholic at the end by the looks of it – but anyway, she continued to smile nevertheless.

Sherlock chuckled and said, “Even in my current condition as a Tertiary Infinite Being who mayhaps be able to extend their Realm beyond their Natura and perchance extend the Time Proximus beyond the Proximus of Concept itself, I would most certainly be unable to defeat Miss Koto and eventually be defeated once she learns the true way of wielding her Realm. But, well, it would take over a million years for the battle to end.”

He added that last line with a strange competitive snide of sorts. Speaking of competition, Alejandro, he is THE Sherlock Holmes after all – competition is in his blood. Ask Moriarty if you don’t believe me.

Speaking of blood (don’t ask me why I am using ‘speaking of’ so many times, I have no idea), Canta and her gang have apparently put up a conceptual barrier against the collapsing universe.

“What does that even mean?”

“Well, Miss Six,” Sherlock said. “A ‘conceptual barrier’ is a loanword from fiction referring to an embodiment of a concept itself defending against a physical or conceptual entity.”

“I know THAT, that’s not what I am asking about-”

“Let me finish,” He said before taking a sip of his tea. “In this case, Miss Koto and her friends are using their Proximi to cease the metaphysical fusion of the two different timelines-”

“But, how does that work??? THAT’S what I have been trying to ask all the time!”

“Ah,” He said, with his eyebrows quirked up. “Patience seems to be a virtue that keeps attempting to keep up with you, Miss Six, but since you can move faster than the speed of causality itself – it seems to elude you.”

“Wait, was that a compliment or a jab?”

“Regardless,” He ignored me. “To explain in an extremely simplified metaphor – assume that every point in a timeline or a universe or a reality has a thread or string extending from it. Now, the Quadrilateral Existence encompasses the absolutely infinite number of these ‘threads’ extending from every one of the infinitely many universes or realities. One could imagine these infinitely many ‘threads’ to be ‘sewn’ into an infinitely large blanket. The individual designs and patterns created by these ‘threads’ are the various Proximi, and every individual reality the ‘design’ encompasses make up the Realms of every Infinite Being. Now-”

“In English, please, sir private detective – and in ‘finite’ terms, please.”

Sherlock looked visibly annoyed for a split second before continuing, “During this wavefunction collapse between the two SAMAverses, the various ‘threads’ of the two realities started merging into each other to give rise to a new, singular reality. However, since Miss Koto’s Proximus encompasses every one of those ‘threads’ between the two worlds – she managed to halt the merging of the ‘threads’. If she had more control over her Realm, she could – in theory, at the very least – revert it all back to as it was. However… Well, I don’t need to explain any more, do I?”

I am still trying to process the loredump Sherlock thrusted inside me. Wait, no, that sounds extremely wrong-

Anyway, all that aside, I had a nice conversation with Canta about different stuffs after we finished the little tea break we had, while we headed to the Rescue Camp consisting of the entirety of Japan’s meagre remaining population. Here it is:

I asked her, “Y’all have anime in this world too, right?”

“Yup, my favourites are Dr Stone, FMAB, Attack on Titan, and Sousou no Frieren – what are yours?”

“Um,” I kinda stuttered, “I only recognized Fullmetal Alchemist and AoT, what are the other two?”

“Oh right,” She smiled, “It’s almost the end of 2025 in my timeline and it’s 2019 where you came from. I am sure Dr Stone had already aired back then but perhaps it wasn’t popular enough for you to hear of it. Heh, alrighty then, tell me how far into One Piece have you gone yet?”

“I was last in the middle of Sanji’s arc, still haven’t started Wano yet.”

“Oh, well, I had just wrapped up Ep. 1141 before going to bed on August 27th. It had already been released on Sunday but I was kinda busy with school council things back then-”

“Wait, do you know what the One Piece is?”

“Maybe…?”

“HEY, DON’T MESS WITH ME! TELL ME WHAT THE ONE PIECE IS!!!”

“I was just kidding, girl, tone your sauce – I was just messing around. We still don’t know what the One Piece is… and… I guess we might never know… at least, in this timeline.”

“Anyway, tell me about Dr Stone-”

So, yeah, weeb stuff. Don’t worry about it too much, Alejandro III. Nothing too serious.

Speaking of serious, I do find it kinda sad that no one remembers literally anything about Tumble or Calendar except for the fact that Tumble is Canta’s elder sister and that Calendar was once a topper of their school as well as Canta’s bff.

Realities collapsing is both weird and sad, Alejandro, more so because I don’t even comprehend what’s going on.

Sigh, anyway, then a Japanese god appeared out of nowhere, apparently for conversation. It was Bishamon. Riding a lion with a pistol in her pocket, she wore a black top, a black jacket, sunglasses, and jeans.

She looked like she’d popped right off of Noragami.

“Oh,” Sherlock smiled, “Reverend Goddess of Justice and Order, I am Sherlock Holmes, private detective.”

“Greetings, human,” Bishamon said in perfect English as she dismounted, “Though you don’t seem to be a mere human in my eyes.”

Canta chuckled, “Heh. Don’t be so humble, Sherlock, she is an Infinite Being too – remember? She can sense your Proximus.”

“Ah, I am well aware of that phenomenon, Miss Koto,” Sherlock replied calmly.

“Then,” Bishamon continued in perfect English (apparently, as Sherlock told me later, gods in this world always speak in a way understandable to the listener), “May I presume you’re Time, Mr. Holmes? The Lord of Causality? And perhaps even-”

*Swoop*

Out of nowhere, I saw an old metallic and rusty human-sized statue appear in front of us and say, “You may consider that old fart to be so. Although his record in the Hujubuju Expedition might make him seem otherwise-”

Sherlock interrupted sardonically, “Lady Liberty, how glad am I to espy on your countenance.”

The Statue of Liberty was here.

“Hold on, hold on, hold on,” Nine held his head before pointing his fingers at Liberty. “What’s she doing here? How can she get past Miaokuran’s ‘conceptual Spatial barrier’ while you, Time himself, had to manipulate quantum physics to get even one person in?”

“It’s elementary, my dear Mr Nine,” Sherlock said, taking out another pipe and puffing it. “She is Liberty. She has Infinite Liberty. She can do quite a lot by herself.”

Both Nine and I said out loud, “Huh?”

“She controls the Realm of Liberty and has absolute control over it,” Canta explained. “By wielding Liberty itself, she can do almost anything that the concept of Liberty allows.”

“Wait a minute,” Nine replied, “Doesn’t that mean that she’s basically omnipotent?”

“Huh? No? Why would I be omnipotent? That’s the opposite of Liberty. That’s Tyranny!” Lady Liberty liberally labelled against the libel (look at me go with the… uh… asyndeton? Or was it alliteration?). “I can do anything I want – but I can’t force others to do my bidding. That’s the definition of Liberty, to protect one’s own rights and respect others’.”

Nine and I looked at each other and nodded. “Makes sense,” I said. “Makes sense,” He repeated. “What’s her limit though? Like, can she just bypass conceptual attacks? Can she make others go through things like conceptual barriers if they are willing to do so? What’s-”

“Oh wait, right. I forgot,” Liberty suddenly yelled, “I forgot to bring Thena along through the barrier! I was supposed to bring her! I am so sorry, Sherlock, I-”

“What is the matter?” Bishamon started. “What’s-”

“Thena is Sherlock’s secretary,” Canta interrupted. “She is a member of Halcyon, she’s a 3-L Three-”

“What’s that?” Tumble interrupted her interruption. “Is it a fruit? Or-”

“What are you talking about?” Calendar interrupted the interruption of the interruption. “Obviously she’s-”

“May I implore everyone to calm down?” Sherlock interrupted the interruption of the interruption of the interruption, “I think we all should-”

I was about to jump the bandwagon too when another *swoop* resounded right behind me and literally everyone, including me (as well as Bishamon’s lion), fell to their knees at once due to the sudden absolute pressure. I felt like something was being ripped out of my soul but my soul was being replenished at the same time, as if someone was digging through my body and mind and doing a surgery and definitely-not-a-surgery at the same time. It was so bizarre that I have no better description, but of course it was that bizarre.

“Salvete amici.” It was that bastard. “This quarrel isn’t Paadruman approved.”

I turned around, barely able to turn my head. I saw him snap his fingers and summon Thena, who fell to her knees (She almost swore, “What the fu-?”) like the rest of us.

“I am not even supposed to be here,” that bastard said while grasping his head with perked up eyebrows. “Sorry for making y’all fall to your knees and almost ceasing your being, but blame Lady Liberty for forgetting such an important plot point.”

Then he looked at the sky painfully and continued, “Also blame the author. He forgets important story beats. I am not even supposed to interfere here, but well, I had to. Anyway, vale.”

*Swoop*

He was gone.

“WHAT THE FUCK WAS THAT?” Liberty and I both yelled out loud.

“That felt…” Canta stuttered, panting as if she was out of breath. “That was the weirdest thing ever… I attempted to discern the identity of that Italian guy and I felt like my eyes were gouged out and kissed at the same time… Heh… This is a new feeling.”

Now that I look back on it, the sentence before the last one (Penultimate? Proultimate? There was a word for that IIRC) and the last one felt like she was slightly ecstatic for some reason. Weird but I didn't ask her at the moment because I was too mad to care.

Sherlock mentioned while manifesting another cigar, “This is truly strange.”

“Yes, truly.” Thena replied, “This… sensation isn't the same as last time.”

Nine spoke up, “What do you mean by that?”

“We are referring to a little scuffle we had with him a month ago when we first arrived,” Thena replied, “Sun Wukong was kidding about him and Leonardo da Vinci which led to his sudden appearance and that led to all the 3-L Threes – yes, all 13 Infinite Beings of the Halcyon Council getting absolutely demolished.”

“When he released his Field Signature,” Sherlock continued, "He overrode ours, appearing to absorb all of us in the process. But he was merely sending us a warning, thus leaving us utterly dumbfounded."

“However,” Sherlock said after a cough. “It is highly unlikely that this pressure stems or emanates from the same being. This was highly dissimilar and distinct from the one before. Stranger and probably peculiar to another entity. There is quite a dirge of clues to the identity, however. For omniscience bears no fruit upon dealing with a ‘Being’ higher than Infinite Beings.”

Hearing all this, Bishamon muttered while slowly healing the bruises on her knees that had come crashing down before, “But… who… or rather what was that… thing? Even the Great Ōmikami herself pales in comparison to that… entity.”

“That quirkful august entity is God, Conqueror, and Ruler from the world we reside in.” Quill/Plume fumed in whispers. “The very incarnation of incredulity, the very manifestation of callous tyranny, the very pupil of one of history's greatest benefactors – the Zeroth Agent who refuses to be responsible for his actions, il Salaino, the little Devil, Salai.”

“Thanks for the thesis, flashy guy.” I replied in frustration, trying my best to stay calm. “Y'all, just know that he's a piece of absolute garbage and a complete jerk. He rapes, tortures, sympathises, enjoys, procrastinates and gets bored based on his own whims. He has no real morals, he is obsessed with Leonardo da Vinci, and-”

Then Nine abruptly interrupted me (Is that redundant?) with a hint of desperation, “Hey Six, calm down, look at-”

I felt a hand tug at my arms gently and nervously.

While I was yapping, Limey meanwhile had raised himself up from the ground, dusted his white shirt, and slowly pulled my left arm. When I turned towards him, I saw a five-year-old on the brink of sobbing whimper, “I am scared…”

I had forgotten that he was just a child. And I felt really bad for not considering his feelings and yelling out loud about a guy he is intrinsically paranoid about, even though he had an extremely bad time just around half an hour earlier. I still feel bad, Alejandro, I still do.

I embraced him silently as Nine just watched and smiled while the rest clambered up their asses and settled down.

After that whole ordeal (which we all collectively decided to just shrug it off as an average Salai thing), we continued to walk to the camp – I still don’t know why we were walking instead of just using the Drive (good jogging idea in the apocalypse, I guess) but anyway – when Canta looked at Thena and just said, “Huh, that's weird.”

Thena replied, “What’s wrong?”

Canta continued, “I don’t see your entire past for some reason, only the part from your kidnapping by the Iliokatoikoi for some reason, heh. Really weird, this hasn't ever happened before.”

I have no idea what that big word means, but Nine told me that it probably means ‘Sun-Dwellers’ or something like that in Ancient Greek or a language similar to it.

“Strange.” Thena replied modestly. “Any ideas, Sherlock?”

“None, unfortunately.” Sherlock said. “I can see the past as clear as the solstice sky.”

“Heh, that's really weird.” Canta replied, scratching her head. “I also seem to have a vague feeling that I have seen you before. Uh, have I?”

“Now that you mention it,” Thena held her chin inquisitively (that's a word, right?), “I also have an inkling that I have seen you before somewhere. I can't get why though.”

They talked this over for another couple of minutes without any definitive answer, and we reached the camp in the meantime.

“Over here, over here!” Tumble said enthusiastically before snapping her fingers.

There was a big 4-story tall school in front of us, or at least it looked like it used to be a school before it all came crashing down. And all the area throughout and around it was packed with a lot of people. Even in the late evening, people were gathered up in the playground and chatting. Some were even singing and enjoying themselves in a December bonfire. The moonlight gleaned the smiles and frowns and smells and sounds off of the last Japanese survivors and whispered it into the starry sky. Even in the apocalypse, humans are still trying to find a way to live a happy life.

Damn, that’s too beautiful – isn’t it, Alejandro? Sure, the world is burning, the oceans are churning, and the land is turning into eldritch horrors – but why should that stop a smile?

Nine told me one day that beyond individually observable skills and instincts, humans and all conscious lifeforms across the universe have one thing in common that transcends biology and science – in his opinion, at least. All life wants is to survive, that is its inborn instinct. It will grasp at every straw and every twig it has to, in order to survive. Even if it means nothing in the end, with no cause to live for nor to die for – perhaps being a ‘being’ entails having a will, at least a will to be. As the proverb goes – where there’s a will, there is a way.

Perhaps that’s why we smile, we laugh, we cry and we mourn – to honour the will that has passed throughout generations of life, and to continue it by our own selves, our own beings. Even if the hope is false, the will is true. Even if the truth is a lie, the will is true. Even if the time is wrong, the will is still true. Even if heaven’s falling down or hell’s arising from the shadows or purgatory is the truly eternal state of the world – or even if none of them exist – to live a life happy with your own actions and without regrets that you haven’t forgiven yourself for, what else does one need?

Or maybe not, what do I know? I am just an Agent of Earth, with a number as my name. I am just making up shit as I go along and I am not even an adult yet.

I got too sidetracked lol. I am just venting my thoughts. I now kinda know how Nine feels when he writes to his own Jesse.

But yeah, basically, that’s all that happened today. We all settled down after that. I sang alongside the survivors and basically had another makeshift concert of sorts lol. I guess no matter the world or the timeline, people will always love music.

So, well, I don’t have much else to tell you except for the fact that I feel a little weird inside since Nine went to sleep with a strange face like that. I don’t know what’s up with that, but I am really worried.

Good night, Demonic Alejandro Wiskosin Jameson III! 😁❤

Next Chapter: A Minor Inconvenience