Ceres Chaos [Exosuit Progression]

“Where are we heading?” Halyon meekly asked as he trailed behind Ceres. The pair stepped walked back the same path Ceres and Oswa took to the town. Ceres too noticed that there were not many mawsies as before.

The few that spotted him quickly ran away as fast as they could, not daring to attack him.

Ceres felt as though the mawsies did possess a decent level of sentience through this action, proving further that they could be domesticated. He was more interested in cracking open the Keeper’s exosuit and finding out what made it tick inside.

“We’re heading to the nearby town. Don’t call anyone a rebel or outer scum. Knowing your type, you’re probably going to say something offensive to the townspeople later.” Ceres warned.

“I’m a changed man now. You can count on me.” Halyon desperately nodded his head in agreement.

He was especially timid after seeing Ceres’s devastating punch that looked like it was going to cause the entire underground system to collapse. It was comparable to a large explosion more than a punch.

Thinking about how Ceres could literally throw multiple of those punches without tiring out, Halyon’s previous defiant demeanour quickly receded.

Ceres didn’t reply to Halyon, instead walking on quietly. In his head, he was quickly summarizing everything he knew so far.

He had received an unknown ‘upgrade’ to his body.

He had superhuman strength and speed.

He had a defensive black-scale armour made of black goo that could appear on command.

He had H.T. mode that allowed him to see emotions.

His main energy source somehow (hypothetically) is emotions.

To say that he was an exosuit in himself was not a stretch at all – with the capabilities he had right now, he had overpowering advantages over the normal unmodified human.

He previously thought that he had received great power at the cost of losing everything he knew, but that was starting to change. This ‘great power’ may just facilitate Ceres’s quest to find his friends and the true story of what happened.

Luckily, through his conversations with Halyon, Ceres found out that he was considered the largest martyr for the riots.

Seeing that Braton, Erik, Ardan, Lisa and Trissa were not being labelled as a martyr helped keep hope alive in his heart. Halyon had limited information that was essentially pro-inner media, but at least none of them mentioned anything about his friends being vilified too.

“So you’re saying you’ve been set up by someone else?” Halyon tried to understand when Ceres explained his part of the story. “That doesn’t make sense, the Athen Family is known as one of the most upright and righteous families in the city. Oliver Athen even personally sent multiple of his grandchildren to jail for colluding with foreign criminal groups.”

Ceres didn’t really care. There only was a simple line of reasoning in his mind: whoever benefitted the most also had the motive. It was natural that Oliver Athen who overthrew Cardenia Hawthorn was now the main suspect to him.

“You can’t look at this from just one side, especially when the outers are known to be vile and dirty, using every underhanded trick in the book… I mean some, some outers. Not all of them of course. Indeed some outers are very generous.” Halyon quickly backtracked when he saw Ceres staring at him.

How did it even reach this point? Ceres didn’t recall outers and inners having this much blatant discrimination. What were the specifics of being a second-class citizen?

He personally hated him and his friends being labelled as second-class citizens, especially after they had worked so hard for the competition. How many others have they beaten to get into the main stage? Wasn’t the entire Loeric Empire based on meritocracy?

“I myself don’t know much about the outers and how they are treated, but I do know inners receive favoured treatment in the inner zones.” Halyon recounted his current experience.

Ceres frowned. That was already a given even five years before when he had to fight an uphill battle. Did the battle just get progressively worse? Prizing rational thinking first, he decided to wait until he got a clear picture of the rights that the outers had lost before deciding to be angry or not.

Should he not be angry regardless of what rights outers have lost? Ceres could imagine Lisa shouting in his head. “As long as outers and inners remain unequal, we shall always fight against it!” Maybe some of his friends were already in the rebellion.

He had to work things out here first. Going to the surface right now without figuring out how his main source of energy was emotions was too dangerous. With the Keepers and the entire enforcement department putting him on a watchlist, he was not ready to get into a fight and potentially be re-captured.

If he was being hunted down because he was the only human in the whole wide empire to have the sole solution to a planet-wide plague, then he might have turned himself in. However, judging from the intense reaction he felt from the Keeper’s exosuit, Ceres doubted that it was that benign.

Most likely his body was being used as a source of whatever powered the Keeper’s ability to control up to five autonomous exosuits. Ceres wondered if he could potentially achieve the same effect, but he knew he was already far behind the Keepers.

They probably had a five-year head start on him. Ceres would not be surprised to find out that maybe they knew more about his body than he himself.

However, Halyon apparently has been left in the dark regarding ‘Drone C’ and its abilities, only knowing what it looks like. This left Ceres slightly confused as to whether they really wanted to catch him, or were the Keepers simply just testing him.

He stared at Halyon, who was dumbly staring at a glowing mushroom on the ceiling as they walked. “Yea, no way this guy is faking it.” Ceres also had the ability to see emotions directly, confirming that Halyon was not harbouring any ill intentions at all.

The pair soon reached the town gate, where Mercer was on guard duty. Seeing Ceres return, he happily ran forward. “Teacher, thank god you’re back!”

He spotted Halyon behind following Ceres closely. “Who are you? You’re not Oswa!” Mercer asked warily.

“How the fuck do I look like that old man, you twat. I’m a bonafide Keeper from the enforcers!” Halyon proudly announced, puffing his chest up.

“Enforcers? What’s that? Never mind that Ceres, thank God you’re back in time! Quickly!”

“What? Has there been an attack?” Ceres dropped the trolley handle and left the injured mawsies outside the town gate. He hastily followed Mercer in, who opened the town gate. Ceres did not spot any damage or blood on the exterior of the town gate, and the barrier shield seemed to be functioning normally as well.

Was there an attack within the town? Had the mawsie somehow managed to burrow below their defences? Ceres could not believe it, especially when he had only been away for not more than three days.

He dropped the trolley handle and left the injured mawsies outside the town gate.

As they reached the cliff right after the town gate overlooking the town, Ceres did not spot anything particularly unique or different about the town. It seemed like nothing much had happened – no mawsie attacks, no building destruction.

But when he switched to his H.T. mode he was shocked. Previously there used to be at least a third of the town in despair, but now everyone seemed jubilant. Ceres focused a bit more but suddenly realized that something large was missing from the town.

The large rock golem statue was completely gone. Instead, it was now a statue of a heavy exosuit, glistening in the light like a diamond.

“What the hell?” It was made out of diamond fruit shells that glistened like diamonds in the artificial light of the town. It had its right arm raised up in a victorious posture and in its right hand, he held a diamond fruit.

Ceres couldn’t understand what was happening and followed Mercer to the town square.

As they reached the town square, Ceres watched as the entire town was gathered, sitting on the floor watching a play. On the stage, a six-year-old girl walked up, reciting her memorized script. Ceres found the girl to be familiar, but could not figure out when he met her in the town.

“In a land far above us, there was a hero. He lived his days righteously and with honour, beating every evil person and saving the weak. However, he did not do it for fame and fortune, but rather for the sake of it. For he was a true hero! And his name was…”

“CERES!” The kids cheered, stunning Ceres.

“The hero travelled the towns, saving lives and defeating vile monsters as he crossed. He has seen the highest tunnels and the deepest caverns, exploring ancient ruins and protecting all. One day, his hero sensor picked up a signal! A tremor that rumbled through his entire being!” The little narrator girl motioned for the next scene to occur.

“Widdly diddly doodly doo, what a fine day it is to be a fucking hero!” The next actor came on stage, dressed in ridiculous armour made out of diamond fruit shells, similar to that of the statue. It was at this moment Ceres realized that the statue was supposed to be him.

He couldn’t see who it was through the armour but he felt an uncanny recognition from the outline through his H.T. mode. “No..no way he’ll do this sort of thing.”

The little girl threw a book at the actor, hitting his head. “LISTEN TO AN! FOLLOW THE SCRIPT! NO SWEARING!” An yelled, before meekly smiling again at the audience, who cheered as the actor fell over.

“Stupid kids, why are you cheering when she attacked the fucking hero? And this script is stupid.” The actor swore again, this time earning the wrath of the audience as well as they threw anything they could get their hands on. Shells of the diamond fruit and certain figurines were flung at the besieged actor.

“Okay okay, STOP!” The actor finally yelled, taking off his helmet.

“Elder Zhang!” Ceres gasped softly. Why was he acting as the hero?

“Widdly diddly doodly doo, what a fine day it is to be a hero! Oh look a town! I wonder if the people need help!” Zhang acted as the hero, acting in an exaggerated pose.

“YES WE NEED HELP!” The kids in the audience yelled.

“Well, that’s great, because I found just the thing to help you!” Zhang smiled awkwardly as he paused for a few moments, his eyes darting to the little girl who was also motioning with her eyes to someone behind the stage.

“…. do I really have to do this? Fuck me…. oh shit my mic’s on…. “ A large mawsie costume actor came running out from behind the stage, positioning its ‘claws’ in a human fighting stance. Ceres almost let out a hearty laugh, seeing the flimsy mawsie costume. “ROAR! I’M THE BIG BAD MAWSIE AND I’LL NEVER LET YOU HELP THIS TOWN WHEN I’M AROUND!”

“Oh no kids! What do we do when we encounter a mawsie?” Zhang asked the audience.

“KILL THEM! BUTCHER THEM!” The kids roared with anger, some already throwing things at the mawsie actor. Ceres stared dumbfounded as he truly felt and saw the bloodlust on the kids. What the hell happened in the last three days that he was gone?

Zhang and the mawsie actor began to act out a very poorly choreographed fight, but the kids lapped it up anyway. Ceres cringed while Halyon couldn’t hold in his laughter, seeing Ceres being so badly represented.

An continued to narrate: “After battling with the big bad mawsie for three months, he finally defeated it!”

“YEA!!!!” The kids cheered as Zhang acted like he wound a big punch and hit the mawsie actor, but the mawsie actor didn’t fall down. Instead, the mawsie actor just stood there dumbly, awkwardly waving to the kids who booed at it. “This is the part where you roll over to the backstage!” Zhang whispered angrily.

The mawsie actor immediately dropped and rolled backstage, but not without half of the costume falling off due to flimsy construction and revealing the actor’s face. It was an ashamed Rebecca.

“Wow, I did not know Rebecca was into acting for children.” Ceres muttered to himself, while Halyon stopped laughing completely, staring intently at her face.

Ceres could suddenly feel a surge of emotions from Halyon, something he had not seen so far. “Hey hey hey, what are you thinking about? Isn’t everyone here supposed to be a rebel to you?” Ceres grabbed Halyon by the shoulder, trying to shake him.

“I’m ready to be a rebel for love, baby,” Halyon mumbled.

“And so, the hero retrieve the diamond fruit and saved the town for eternity!” An concluded the play, the kids cheering in celebration. “THANK YOU, THANK YOU ALL! SEASON TWO WILL BE CANCELLED!”

Ceres sighed as the audience dispersed. He took another look at the human statue, carefully inspecting it.

“That doesn’t even look like you, it got to be more fearsome, with four arms and three horns…” Halyon nodded to himself in self-agreement.

The play was not the only event going on, there was a diamond fruit eating contest as well as festival-like games. Ceres smiled as he watched the townspeople truly enjoy themselves for once. He had only been around for a month but he much preferred this atmosphere to when he first arrived.

“Did you enjoy the play, Teacher?” Mercer asked excitedly.

Ceres nodded, not wanting to dampen the town’s mood. “Sorry, but I wanted to check on the injured mawsie I caught previously. I have another five with me left outside the town gate.”

“No need to worry about that.” Captain Kai approached them. “You were right, the mawsie does show signs of growing back its limbs, albeit a bit slower than we would like. Using the diamond fruit to feed them works extremely well, it seems to be their favorite food.”

Ceres frowned. This means that the town might have to expend food in order to obtain mawsie armour shells! It was not a very good exchange, seeing as the town was hurting more on food than metal.

“Wait a minute, how do you guys have so much diamond fruit? I’ve only been away for a while.” Ceres asked.

“That’s the great part – the diamond fruit grows extremely fast! They are like some sort of super plant. I wonder if they were actually planted by the former inhabitants of the planet. Anyway, Xi will show you around the new plantation next to the geothermal power plant.” Captain Kai pointed towards Xi, who waved at Ceres and led him there.

Ceres pondered on what Captain Kai said. Weren’t the slovesa the previous inhabitants of the planet? “I thought they were lithoids, why would they need such a plant? Perhaps they ate the shell instead…” The diamond fruit was fairly hard, but not hard enough to serve as armour.

The cavern was not as big as the town’s main one, but it featured man-made canals that allowed the lava to flow through properly like irrigation channels. There were many diamond fruit trees already sprouting out, though Ceres noticed a few special pipes directly connected to the soil.

“The diamond tree seed you brought back can actually be cultivated really well. We just never had the chance to collect that many seeds in bulk to conduct experiments. I’ve been running a few chemical tests on the seeds to find out which combination works.” Xi motioned towards many of the dead saplings.

“Just yesterday, we nailed it and most likely can grow a diamond tree in a week and have it bearing fruit in another,” Xi explained as she pointed at the largest tree.

Not all the trees were growing properly, only five of them were actually shooting up like a rocket. The specific one that Xi pointed to was growing so fast that it was visible to the human eye if Ceres watched it for a while.

A majority of the seeds were actually dormant in the plantation, but the fact that the town had found a combination to properly accelerate the growth of the tree was definitely a cause for celebration.

“It’s not entirely clear if the combination would not compromise the flavour or edibility of the fruit, so further testing has to be done. But again, thank you Ceres. You’ve given this town hope. Even if the expedition brings back less than 50% of its expected haul, we can most likely achieve self-sustenance with the fruit.” Xi bowed, while Ceres hurriedly tried to get her to stop.

“Don’t worry about him, he’s a real hero with his ‘hero sensor’,” Halyon smirked. “But why do you guys care about the flavour if you’re starving?”

Xi gave Ceres a weird look, while Ceres nodded in silent response.

“Some of us can get….excited about its exotic flavour. Here, I have one for you to try.” Xi passed a plastic packet with the diamond fruit’s flesh in it.

“Exotic flavour?! Like an new type of ice cream? Finally, I get to eat something good!” Halyon snatched a bite before his mouth bulged as though he was going to gag, his face turning green. As he oscillated between chewing and gagging, he grabbed onto Ceres with a disgusted expression, before puking all over Ceres and fainting on the floor.

“Definitely exotic.”

M.G.Driver

Sorry for the delay in posting. I am currently about to bring the latest chapter up to speed with Royal Road, they had a mass release there so will be releasing chapters about every three hours starting tomorrow.