Unless they adapted, there was no way their previous tech would be useful. In another few months, the world would be unrecognizable and science would have to restart from square one.

Things began to click into place for Sylas one after another.

He had wondered ever since he learned that there was more of a connection between themselves and those that fell during the Sixth Extinction event. If the governments from back then could still organize themselves so well, and ancient families like the Browns managed to make it through…

Why was technology basically identical to what it had been in the 21st century? In fact, it seemed that they had only just finally been able to make up for the losses.

But this explained everything. If you had to restart from the very beginning every time a Summoning was failed, then it was impossible for science to progress quickly. In fact, if an entire civilization was wiped out, it would only be worse. The reason they still had this technology at all was because humans managed to survive the Sixth Summoning.

If not, they would have been knocked back even further.

'If that's the case, it shouldn't just be that the Aether appears and changes the fundamental laws of the world and then everything goes back to normal afterward. It's more likely that there are subtle changes to technology every time, or else the Browns would have long since been ready to put out technology that would actually work in this new era…'

Sylas was entirely lost in his thoughts when he felt like he had suddenly stumbled into something big.

'No… that's just speculation, I can't say for certain. I need more information…'

Just now, Sylas' mind had wandered to the System Cities and the Judgment. His question was simple… if the Judgments that later cities faced were a barrier to suppress them, who was to say that this was the only way to suppress them?

His System Breaker Title was the perfect example that the system wasn't infallible. Who was to say that it couldn't be tweaked around the edges?

If after every failure, they were given time to adjust their technology to the new laws of the world and could continue advancing, what level of technology would they have now?

It had been less than 200 years since the Sixth Extinction, but according to what he understood about the 21st Century, technology back then was taking large leaps every decade. AI was just starting to become huge, and it seemed that every moment that passed, a new resounding breakthrough would be made.

Who was to say what they could have done if they kept up that pace for 200 years?

But what if instead of being allowed to keep up such a pace, they were thrust back to a state where they had to relearn all the fundamental laws of the world, a state where the shoulders they had once stood upon to progress became useless?

Sylas' gaze couldn't help but narrow.

He knew that he was speculating too much. He couldn't draw such overarching conclusions based on a few jammed guns.

'And maybe, they're not as helpless as I think they are…'

His thoughts drifted to the special steel alloy that made up the handheld chainsaws and the javelins. Maybe they were more prepared than he thought… at least in some respects.

Time would tell.

…

It took the trio three days to reach Lone Star on foot. By this point, they were out of the range of the denser patches of Aether and were able to hop into a car directly for the rest of the way.

A city like Lone Star should have had large amounts of traffic moving in and out, but it had nothing of the sort. In fact, the car they had taken was abandoned. They were unsure of what happened to it, and they didn't particularly care.

Well, Bloom didn't care since she was the one that hotwired it. As for Mark, he followed anything his elder sister did, and Sylas just didn't feel there was a need to mince their actions when the world was already in a state like this one.

As they got closer, though, Sylas felt impressed for no other reason than the fact there weren't any signs of rioting and looting on the streets. Or, if there had been, they had long since been suppressed by the government.

Soon, though, they rolled up to a checkpoint and were blocked by some soldiers.

'Soldiers, not policemen,' Sylas thought to himself.

They were dressed in heavy armor, the bulletproof vest type rather than the medieval type that Trial-goers had gotten used to seeing. They wore black armored caps on their heads and all of them held rifles.

"State your purpose," a gruff-looking man said in an even tone.

His gaze couldn't hide his training. The trio was too odd. Bloom and Mark wore leather while Sylas wore a tracksuit, one of the windows of the car was blasted out, and they didn't look nearly as nervous as they should have been.

He almost immediately pegged them as the worst of the lot: Trial Takers.

In the last few days, there had been more than one instance of fools with god complexes thinking that it was their turn to rule the world, establishing themselves as kings and queens of their regions.

They had managed to suppress these people, and the situation had stabilized, but news of towns across the United Coalition of Terranova losing contact with the outside world was quickly spreading. The more this continued, the harder it would be to control the situation.

That said, just being a Trial Taker wasn't enough to be a death sentence. Though, they would surely be detained if anything of the sort was confirmed. Such existences should be under the control of the government and they should lend their services for the betterment of society, not for their own petty gain.

Bloom put on an annoyed expression.

"What the hell do you mean: 'state our purpose'? The government isn't doing anything to protect its people, but it has time to harass them? Fuck you!"