In the daylight hours beneath the ancient city of Bastis, shadowy figures moved throughout the vast underground archive. Male and female alike, they wore long robes of North Ufigan style, differing only in minor detail. Some dusted thick layers of grime from old scrolls; others gathered around a broad stone table, carefully reading through various aged manuscripts and deciphering their archaic script.
These were all Dorothy’s corpse marionettes. After deciding to temporarily set aside the plague crisis instigated by the Longevity Church, Dorothy had shifted her primary focus to uncovering the secret of Heopolis. With little concrete information in hand, her only clue came from Shadi: “Heopolis exists only in history.”
...
“Heopolis exists only in history…”
With only that vague, cryptic line to go on, Dorothy had come to the underground archive of Bastis—the location believed to hold the most mundane historical records in all of Busalet. Utilizing her corpse marionettes, she combed through the documents, searching for any relevant information.
Dorothy herself sat cross-legged in her tent outside the city, eyes closed in meditation, absorbing the stream of knowledge flowing from her marionettes’ senses.
...
“My countrymen, I have today entered Bastis and conquered all of Busalet—and it is thanks to your unwavering dedication over the decades. The Santo Tribe was born from hardship, surviving in the chaos of bandits and warlords. But today, we have defeated every enemy and united Busalet. It is by the grace of the Savior, the will of the people, and the aid of you all. To that, I offer a toast.
“Though the war is over and victory ours, do not let your guard down. The history of Busalet is one of endless chaos—no dynasty has ever ruled this land for long. But I believe… we can defy that fate. For I have found the root of our destiny’s curse.
“Listen, my countrymen: the tragedy of Busalet lies in its people—in its history!
“The tribes of this land have always been divided, warring amongst themselves. We’ve never shared a unified sense of identity. We never thought of ourselves as one people. We’ve always fought as ‘tribes,’ not as ‘Busalet.’ That is why we’ve been trapped in war for centuries. And now—I will change that!
“We need a shared name, a shared understanding, a shared culture—and that begins with a shared history. History shapes culture, and culture shapes identity. Though we all speak the same language, we are not one people—because we have never had a common history!
“Until now, Busalet had no history. No one cared for anything beyond blades and blood. But I will change that. I will write Busalet’s history—and from now on, every child born in this land shall remember it.
“These tribes claim descent from fallen dynasties, clinging to the myth that they are the rightful rulers of Busalet—that those dynasties still live. I will show them: those kingdoms are dead, gone! In the place of ashes, a new dynasty shall rise!”
“Busalet shall be unified—by sword and by history!”
...
One of Dorothy’s corpse marionettes sat on a stone bench, carefully reading this speech scrawled across a parchment scroll. The moment its content entered Dorothy’s mind, she couldn’t help but sigh softly.
“This… was from the founder of Busalet’s last unified dynasty, the Santo Dynasty—King Santik. A victory toast. He tried to unify Busalet’s fractured culture by compiling its history. But alas, the history was never completed. His son died from a so-called ‘hunting accident’—courtesy of ‘well-trained doctors’—and the dynasty collapsed soon after. The historical project died with it. Thankfully, the documents they collected survived and are stored here…”
Dorothy reflected as she reread the quote from Santis. She had already browsed a fair portion of the archive’s holdings and was familiar with the cause of the Santo Dynasty’s demise.
Though the archive was large, her extraordinary information processing ability allowed her to absorb most of its contents quickly. In doing so, she gained a broad understanding of Busalet’s chaotic history.
“Due to centuries of unrest, most factions in Busalet never maintained proper historical records. The documents Santis collected were mostly oral traditions from various tribes—fragmented, conflicting, and riddled with contradictions. Trying to compile them into a single, coherent historical narrative is no easy task.”
“But thankfully, among all this confusion, there are recurring patterns. If I extract the common threads, I should be able to piece together a rough outline of Busalet’s thousand-year history…”
With that, Dorothy began analyzing the timeline of events and attempting to reconstruct a chronology.
“Roughly 500 years ago… the Kida Dynasty was established, founded by King Zabibe…
Around 450 years ago, the Saba Tribe formed the Saba Dynasty, founded by Queen Basna… “
“380 years ago, Chief Dibu of the Hamiyat Tribe defeated the Hut Tribe at the Battle of Black Basalt and established the Hamiyat Dynasty. The Hut Tribe claimed descent from the Kida line…”
“310 years ago, Chief Kando of the Najid Tribe led 3,000 cavalry to strike Bastis, defeating the desert raider king who held the city and founded the Najid Dynasty. He claimed to be descended from the Saba line, the ‘true heir of Busalet.’ Kando ruled for 12 years before dying while suppressing a rebellion. His son Todd succeeded him…”
Dorothy sifted through volumes of materials, reconstructing the pattern of dynasty after dynasty in Busalet’s fractured history. But soon, something strange caught her attention.
“Every one of these recorded dynasties… only has a beginning and a middle. None have an end.”
Seated on the floor of her tent, Dorothy pondered this anomaly. In just a few hours, she had reconstructed the rise and peak of several short-lived kingdoms. But when it came to their fall—there was nothing. No ending. No closure. The historical records simply… stopped.
The historical materials here were sourced from oral traditions passed down among the tribes of Busalet. But these stories consistently only recorded the founding of dynasties—never their downfalls. No matter how thoroughly Dorothy combed through the archive, she could not find any records describing how these dynasties ended.
Every dynasty, logically, should go through three stages: founding, flourishing, and collapse. Yet in the entirety of Busalet’s preserved records, dynasties were only described in terms of their founding. A few extended into their early development, but none detailed their decline or demise.
A typical pattern repeated again and again: a new kingdom would rise—then, for unclear reasons, collapse soon after. Then Busalet would fall back into prolonged tribal division, until the next unifier appeared.
“So many short-lived dynasties, and while their founding stories are mostly clear, not a single one explains how they ended. Do Busalet’s tribes just prefer tales of rise and glory, and avoid stories of collapse? Do they have some taboo against recording the fall of kings?”
Dorothy frowned as she considered this oddity. At first, she assumed the missing records were the result of cultural tradition. But when she came across the notes left behind by the royal historians of the Santo Dynasty, compiled during that dynasty’s brief golden age, she realized something didn’t add up.
“From the collected historical narratives across various tribes, it is astonishing how consistently the endings of Busalet’s dynasties are missing. This absence makes the task of compiling a coherent national history extremely difficult. We must collect more details about the fall of these kingdoms.”
“But the scribes sent to gather stories say that the tribal accounts simply don’t include the endings. It isn’t out of taboo or suppression. It’s as if the endings were... forgotten over time.”
“This explanation makes no sense. Yes, stories fade over time, but forgetting only one specific part—just the endings—is too selective to be natural. Something is off…”
On the far side of the stone table, one of Dorothy’s corpse marionettes held a yellowed historian’s notebook. Its contents made it clear: the absence of downfall records was not the result of Busalet’s cultural habits.
“Interesting… So this massive historical gap isn’t just tradition. Then what force is erasing these records?”
Dorothy tapped her chin, a glint of excitement in her thoughts. She had found it: the anomaly in Busalet’s history. Now the question was whether this thread could lead to something about Heopolis.
“All of Busalet’s ancient dynasties have missing collapse records. Then what about the most recent one—the Santo Dynasty? If I recall correctly, it only fell around forty years ago. That’s recent enough… Maybe I can find something here.”
She remembered asking Arima and other locals about the fall of the Santo Dynasty. But none of them could give a clear answer. They only vaguely recalled that the dynasty lasted two generations and collapsed during some tribal revolt. In theory, this happened just sixty years ago—too recent to be so poorly remembered. But now that Dorothy was inside the Santo-built archive, she hoped to find more.
She ordered her marionettes to search specifically for materials on the Santo Dynasty. Since this dynasty had built the archive, it was the most thoroughly documented.
Soon, she uncovered numerous records about the Santo Dynasty—but almost all of them focused on the reign of King Santik, the founder. Materials concerning the later years were sparse. Many documents had suffered severe degradation from insects and moisture, making them fragile and incomplete.
“Strange… This level of deterioration doesn’t seem natural for a few decades of aging. And the damage is concentrated entirely on the records of the dynasty’s final years. If I’d come here thirty years later, I bet none of it would be left. Just what kind of force is erasing this?”
Even so, some fragments remained legible. From them, Dorothy managed to piece together a rough account of the Santo Dynasty’s decline.
“A series of relentless sandstorms and natural disasters devastated the already fragile agriculture and livestock sectors… The second king’s queen, feeling neglected, conspired with her family to seize more power, allying with disgruntled tribes… Criminals exiled by King Santik rose again in the borderlands…
“Eventually, with both internal strife and external threats, a palace coup erupted in Bastis. The second king died during the coup. The queen installed her son as a puppet ruler. This ignited a national crisis. The exiled rebels returned, leading an army that recaptured Bastis. Thus, the Santo Dynasty perished in flames.”
Dorothy stared at the reconstructed narrative. Though it was fragmented, it painted a complete enough picture. And yet…
“That… wasn’t unusual at all. Just a textbook case of dynastic decline. Civil unrest, betrayal, rebellion, downfall. Not even much ‘mysticism’ in it. So why… why would some unknown force erase records like this?”
Frowning deeply, Dorothy felt a new wave of confusion. She had expected the dynasty’s fall to be wrapped in occult secrets—something worth hiding. But the truth, at least as far as she could reconstruct, was painfully mundane.
“Could these records be fake? Could the narrative I’ve assembled be false? But then—where is the real version hidden? How would I even know?”
Her thoughts grew increasingly frustrated. Still, she ordered her marionettes to continue combing through the archive in hopes of finding anything of greater value.
And just as she was about to give up—having nearly exhausted the entire collection—one of her marionettes discovered a set of handwritten manuscripts stored inside a finely crafted ornamental box.
Upon inspection, Dorothy realized they were the incomplete drafts of the Santo historians themselves. The very books that were meant to be compiled using this archive. Due to the chaotic state of Busalet’s historical materials, almost none of the pre-Santo dynasties had complete entries.
“Hah… Based on what’s here, the only somewhat complete historical account is of the Santo Dynasty itself.”
As Dorothy reviewed the historians’ drafts, an idea struck her.
“Wait… the erasure of the Santo Dynasty’s ending matches the pattern from older dynasties. What if I tried compiling the dynasty’s history myself—including its fall? Would the force that erases records act against something I wrote?”
The thought took hold in her mind. She didn’t hesitate.
There were no more clues to chase—so she might as well try. If she could provoke the mysterious force that erased history… she might finally observe it directly.
With resolve, Dorothy sprang into action. She had her marionettes gather the paper and ink left behind by Jemal, and then transformed them into a team of scribes. They took their seats around the ancient stone table and began writing—carefully compiling the history of Busalet’s final dynasty: the Santo Dynasty.
Under Dorothy’s control, the marionettes worked tirelessly, pens scratching across parchment. They documented everything—births of kings, the rise of tribes, wars, turning points, moments of crisis, conquest, the founding of a dynasty…
It was structured as a chronicle, beginning from the dynasty’s founding and progressing through its reign.
And just as Dorothy reached the portion covering the dynasty’s final days, a strange and sudden voice echoed in her mind.
"Warning... The following action will trigger divine interference with this region’s history and fate..."
Startled, Dorothy’s eyes widened at the system message she hadn’t heard in some time.
“What the hell? Divine interference... in the region’s history?”
"Correct. Based on preliminary scan, this region’s history is cursed. No formal written histories may exist here. No strong jurisprudence forces may take root."