Chapter 8: The Decisive Battle
MechaGodzilla.
That was the name of the ultimate anti-Godzilla weapon planned and constructed by Bilusaludo.
It was supposed to be the last hope for humanity.
In 2042, Godzilla reappeared and easily destroyed the new alien-supplied weapons, reminding humanity of the despair they had forgotten.
The plan to construct the final weapon capable of decisively defeating Godzilla was announced in Rio de Janeiro, the new capital of the Earth Defense Force after the devastation of New York.
Using Bilusaludo’s boasted ultimate material, Nanometal, they would build a 50-meter tall, 30,000-ton mechanical Godzilla to defeat the original.
This grandiose, even absurd plan, of course, did not immediately gain full understanding. But Godzilla withstood several nuclear attacks and easily repelled the Kaiju hordes infesting Europe. There was no one who could propose another way to counter this living being that had survived even the thermonuclear attacks from the Exif and Bilusaludo’s interstellar spacecraft reactors.
And so, all of humanity’s resources (except for the secret construction of two interstellar migration ships) were poured into Project MechaGodzilla. Just to buy time for the construction of MechaGodzilla, the European Expeditionary Force nearly exhausted its forces luring Godzilla deep into the Eurasian continent, even going so far as to carry out Operation Great Wall – destroying the Eurasian plate and collapsing the Himalayas, leaving a massive scar on the continent.
Unfortunately, like many Earthlings, I know very little about Mechagodzilla. Most of it is shrouded in secrecy, and it represents the pinnacle of Bilusaludo—technology beyond the comprehension of Earthlings. Our civilization has yet to fully understand Mechagodzilla, and all I can say is that (as for materials related to Mechagodzilla, there is the [Mechagodzilla Construction Project Overview] created by the Bilusaludo to gain understanding from Earthlings for the construction of Mechagodzilla, but even this would be very rare for Earthlings to comprehend).
The crew of the Aratrum, especially their descendants, who will deepen their exchange and integration with the Exif and Bilusaludo, will probably have a more accurate understanding of the essence of MechaGodzilla. So I will not delve too deeply into that here.
All I can do is record the significance that MechaGodzilla held for humanity.
MechaGodzilla.
It was humanity’s last hope.
Now, as an earthling who has lost many comrades in Operation Longmarch, Operation Great Wall, and the Battle at the Foot of Mount Fuji, I must write of it in the past tense, which fills me with regret…
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Bernardo Mendes
Resident of the Barra da Tijuca neighborhood, Rio de Janeiro (at the time)
The government PR for MechaGodzilla? Oh, you must mean that movie, right? I watched it so many times. There wasn’t much else to enjoy on the front lines, so everyone looked forward to the new releases. “Soaring through space, firing missiles!” “The ultimate combat machine is here!” Even the cynics who called it low-quality propaganda couldn’t help but sit in the front row.
A 50-meter tall, 30,000-ton mechanical Godzilla. Hopping and leaping, even flying! Deflecting Godzilla’s atomic breath with its Nanometal particle field and layered heat-resistant armor, then firing back with its converging neutron cannon! Using its blade launchers to distract, then striking with its deadly Hyper Lance when Godzilla flinched! The supersonic spear of the plasma-boosted flying MechaGodzilla impaling Godzilla – I can still recall the lines, “The Birth of the Supreme King of the New Century” and all of it.
Wait, was all of that just a lie? Just a fabrication?
No? It was based on Bilusaludo’s combat simulations?
I see. I see.
That’s good then. Everyone believed in it. Believed and fought.
Hey, you’re from the intelligence corps, right? You must know a lot of things I don’t. So tell me, why didn’t MechaGodzilla activate? Why didn’t it go like that movie? Everyone believed in it. Everyone believed and gave their lives. If we could just delay Godzilla for one more second here, surely MechaGodzilla would come flying in from beyond those mountains to save the world, that’s what we believed… but…
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Egerton-Overly
Member of the Earth Union Public Relations Center – Human History Recording Support Project, film director (at the time)
When I was in my teens, the entertainment industry had already started to decline. Movies are only good when you don’t have to worry about being killed tomorrow, when you have a way to have food, clothes, and a place to live. Even Hollywood bragged that movies could give the world hope. But then in 2030, Godzilla appeared and immediately burned down San Francisco. As for me, I was on location in the Chinese interior, following the Japanese military. I was trying to get to the truth of the Hedorah operation. So I survived, but I also felt frustrated. If I had been there, I definitely would have filmed Godzilla. Of course, I probably would have been crushed, and the cameras back then couldn’t have handled the electromagnetic pulse anyway.
After that, filmmaking was no longer an option. The youngs were getting drafted, and as for working in video production, we could only do documentary footage or inescapable propaganda stuff…well, but if we were told to film something, we filmmakers would do it seriously. Did you see “Godzilla Appears”? That was our masterpiece. It was entirely made with CGI, but I guess we overdid it…the military accused us of using classified footage without permission…we nearly got charged with sedition. So when I was called in by the military right after New York got wrecked by Godzilla, I worried they’d give me trouble again. But then the Bilusaludo people told me to make a promotional video for their secret weapon project. Apparently it was a direct request from the Bilusaludo higher-ups themselves, so I was thrilled…Yeah, they showed me whatever I asked to see. They even let me into the Mecha-Godzilla development factory. There can’t be many people on Earth who’ve been allowed in there. I’d heard talk of them building a mechanical Godzilla, but at first I thought it was just a metaphor. Like calling a new tank the “Tiger” or a fighter jet the “Eagle.” But what they showed me was a literal, honest-to-goodness mechanical Godzilla. Head, tail, legs, arms – the whole shebang. A 50-meter tall machine Godzilla, which they planned to have wrestle the real Godzilla. I was dumbfounded when I heard that, but I said yes right away. More than anything, I wanted to see this thing fight Godzilla.
At first, the budget and staff were limited. The first film used old-school suits and miniatures – special effects, you know. But it was surprisingly popular, I guess because people were hungry for movies and wanted to know about Mechagodzilla. They demanded more right away. In the end, I made about 5 films. On the 5th one, we even filmed in Tokyo, and I said it would be fun to destroy a building. I almost got arrested by the military police for that one.
It was the best job I could have as a filmmaker. Mechagodzilla was everyone’s hero – kids and adults all cheered for it to beat Godzilla. I just wished the real events had gone the way the movies did.
Yes. I’ve been berated face to face by soldiers returning from the front lines. “You big liar, believing in your movies, we all fought, we all believed and died,” they said. But you know, I believed too. Otherwise, I couldn’t have made the movie. I was at Mount Fuji too, as one of the recording crew. After seeing Mechagodzilla defeat Godzilla just like in the movies… I thought, why not make a documentary next time? Yes. I was inside the development facility. So when the Bilusaludo started talking about withdrawing, I couldn’t believe it. Mechagodzilla, just like we filmed, was actually completed, but they said it wouldn’t move. One of the Bilusaludo kept shouting until the end, “I won’t leave this place”… until he was restrained by the others… It must have been frustrating, having created something to that extent… It was probably just a couple of buttons pressed wrong… If only they had one more week… No, one day, no, one hour… It would surely have moved… They could have surely defeated Godzilla…
You know, they say the Aratrum and Oratio ships are taking my Mechagodzilla movies. Please show them to your son. And when they settle in on that other world, make Mechagodzilla again and come back for revenge. Doesn’t matter how long it takes. That movie wasn’t a lie – I need to prove Mechagodzilla could have beaten Godzilla.
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Rick Tyson
Rear Admiral, 2nd Fleet, United Earth Navy
Commanding Officer, Carrier Matthias Jackson (At the time)
Before telling you about the Battle of Suruga Gulf, may I share with you the story of Operation Renaissance, the great Atlantic campaign 42 years ago?
It was the battle where our main naval forces were decimated, along with the entire convoy heading to Europe, when Godzilla reappeared. Without that battle, you wouldn’t understand why we fought the way we did in the Suruga Gulf.
I see. Thank you.
It’s too late now, no matter what I say. But that operation was an utterly reckless plan – the largest transport mission in human history, to rebuild Europe. But it had not been conceived on such a grandiose scale from the start. Somewhere along the way, it had spiraled out of control, becoming a mere political demonstration. If only Godzilla had been spotted in the Arctic just a week earlier… no, we should have suspended the plan the moment Godzilla was confirmed to have reappeared. But it’s too late for any of that now. We had grown complacent back then. We knew there was a possibility of Godzilla attacking the convoy. We even thought it might be advantageous, using the convoy as bait to finally take down Godzilla. How foolish. In reality, we not only failed to repel Godzilla, we couldn’t even detect his approach.
I was in an anti-submarine patrol aircraft, looking down at the convoy crossing the Atlantic, almost a thousand ships great and small, protected by the fleet led by the ship Matthias Jackson. The sea looked tranquil enough. Until the lookout on one of the large tankers reported seeing what looked like a massive dorsal fin… At first, I thought it was just a mistake. But that “fin” sliced the tanker in two, and it sank in an instant. And then, in the next moment, we heard that unforgettable, bestial roar.
It was… well, imagine a man-eating shark suddenly appearing in the middle of a crowded beach. The convoy was thrown into utter chaos. The thousand-odd ships tried to flee the suddenly appeared Godzilla, colliding with each other everywhere. The escorting warships could do almost nothing but watch.
The large tanker capsized, taking several smaller vessels with it. Many people were thrown into the freezing winter sea, their hearts seized by the icy water as they sank. And then the spilled oil caught fire, engulfing the surface in searing flames. Godzilla’s dorsal fin calmly swam through this hellish scene. A destroyer rushed in to help, firing its megaser, but in the next instant, a torpedo exploded right underneath it, and the ship was gone in a flash – likely a friendly fire incident, the crew mistaking the megaser for Godzilla’s beam. Similar incidents occurred all around, until a massive explosion rocked the surface – likely a panicked ship having dropped a nuclear depth charge.
Thus, the fleet and the convoy were decimated, almost self-destructing.
The agonized screams of those freezing and burning in the icy sea
It still haunt my ears.
A hell of ice and fire.
Cries for help, fighting over lifeboats, prayers…
But… we could only abandon most of them.
It was a choice between retreat or total annihilation in a final stand.
The latter was not an option.
If we stayed, both the warships and the transports would be wiped out. That, we had to prevent.
We fled, abandoning those sinking into the flaming sea.
Afterward… Godzilla decimated New York, and humanity pinned its hope on the sole option of Mechagodzilla. Operations Long March and Great Wall… but the Navy’s role in those was woefully minor – merely escorting supply lines and providing coastal fire support, which grew ever more difficult as Godzilla was lured inland. We could only watch helplessly as our comrades literally bled themselves dry drawing Godzilla in, when we bore some responsibility for their suffering. Ah, if only we had proposed scaling down and dividing the convoy… if only we had not bent to political demands…
We had to atone, somehow.
For those freezing and burning in the winter sea…
For the soldiers who had bled to guide Godzilla, with scarcely any supplies…
The chance came at last in the Suruga Gulf…
…It was likely the patrolling Titanosaurus that first detected Godzilla.
Ah, yes.
A marine kaiju detected in the Pacific, with an electromagnetic nature, studied around the Ogasawara Islands, tasked with reconnaissance in the waters near Japan since the early 40s. After the Godzilla attack in ’42, it was expected to help make up for the heavy losses the submarine fleet had sustained, and Godzilla was known to have a strong animosity towards other kaiju, making it potentially useful as bait.
The fact is, the Titanosaurus fulfilled its purpose. Two Titanosaurus had disappeared one after the other, so the Shin-ten, the second submarine of the Rōten class, rushed to the scene. The Rōten, the flagship, had probably encountered Godzilla, as it had gone missing in the Indian Ocean a month earlier, and it was the last remaining Rōten-class submarine. Along with the Godzilla sighting team, they requested that the anti-submarine helicopter patrolling overhead and the carrier-based Super X (a converted Super X fighter-bomber with improved STOL and VTOL capabilities, also known as the Super X III) drop thermonuclear depth charges.
Ah, yes. Doing that would mean they wouldn’t get off scot-free either. But… they were willing to take drastic measures, even ramming Godzilla head-on, to stop it.
They were determined to fight to the bitter end.
That was the unanimous decision of the United Earth Defense Force Navy.
Meanwhile, reports had already come in that the construction of Mechagodzilla on Bilusaludo’s side was complete, and it was now in the activation preparation stage. If only Mechagodzilla could be activated, humanity would be saved. But if Godzilla’s heat beam were to strike the still-inoperative unit at the development factory on the slopes of Mount Fuji, all would be in vain. Operation Long March, Operation Great Wall, and countless other sacrifices would have been for naught. To buy even a minute, even a second, for Mechagodzilla’s activation, the entire naval force was deployed here. As a result, the navy might be annihilated, all their weapons and ammunition expended, and next year’s budget zeroed out – but so be it. If Mechagodzilla didn’t activate, there would be no next year anyway…that was their resolve.
The thermonuclear depth charges were dropped into the sea, and a massive water column rose up. The charges had swallowed Godzilla, along with the Shin-ten. It seemed that just before impact, the Shin-ten had also launched its tactical nuclear torpedo.
The concentrated forces opened fire on the Godzilla that had surfaced. Countless missiles were launched from the VLS of the destroyers and cruisers, and from the carrier-based aircraft overhead, painting the sky white with their trails. Ground-based anti-ship missiles followed suit.
A literal saturation attack.
Intense enough to obscure Godzilla’s form in the flames.
And among them, of course, were thermonuclear weapons. Even though over 10 million citizens still lived in Tokyo, 200 kilometers away, with inadequate evacuation, it was as if some switch had been flipped.
…And then, we witnessed the sight we had seen many times before.
Godzilla shrugged off the firepower that could have reduced a major city to rubble. Soon, it let out an especially loud roar, and then…
[Godzilla’s dorsal fins were glowing!]
The message from the bridge made my spine freeze. I desperately suppressed the urge to just abandon everything and flee. That terror is something only those who have experienced it can understand. The dorsal fins glowing meant that in the next instant, death would surely reach someone. All one could do was pray for one’s own luck and someone else’s misfortune.
The bridge and CIC of the ship that had survived the confrontation with Godzilla were always filled with the stench of ammonia. No one was laughing. Just being able to keep one’s sanity in the face of that Kaiju and its heat ray was a great feat.
The electronic equipment in the CIC became noisy due to the electromagnetic pulse during the heat ray’s firing.
“Report the damage situation!”
Hiding the relief that it wasn’t my ship that was targeted, I said, and then…
The report that came back instilled an even greater terror than before.
READ THE ORIGINAL TRANSLATION AT GADGETIZEDPANDA.COM
“The heat ray hit near the Mechagodzilla development factory on the slopes of Mount Fuji!”
Godzilla’s heat ray had not targeted the naval fleet or the carrier-based aircraft, but the still-dormant Mechagodzilla, far in the distance, on Mount Fuji.
Ah. You’ve probably heard similar accounts. That Godzilla was different from the others. Instead of indiscriminately incinerating the human civilization before it, he clearly targeted Mechagodzilla…and Mechagodzilla alone. Probably he had realized, just like with Gorath,
that Mechagodzilla was a threat to him.
“All forces, make Godzilla stop targeting Mechagodzilla immediately!”
the fleet commander ordered. But without waiting for that, the deployed ships and aircraft had already resorted to a desperate, literally suicidal…and reckless attack.
Destroyers and cruisers that had exhausted their missiles charged towards Godzilla, firing their bow guns, railguns, and maser cannons. They were trying to ram it…modern ships were not built for that kind of combat. But they could no longer afford to hold back. Many ships were sunk by Godzilla’s heat ray before they could even approach. But that was fine with them. As long as they were targeted, Mechagodzilla would be safe. The aircraft did the same. Fighter jets that had depleted even their cannons flew straight at Godzilla…even transport helicopters took off, loaded with as many bombs as they could carry.
Not a single plane that took off from my ship returned. They were all either shot down or committed suicide attacks…
I had intended to follow them. The nuclear fusion reactor on my ship, the Mathias-Jackson, was basically the same as the ones used on Bilusaludo’s spacecraft, and with the proper procedure, it could become a nuclear fusion warhead. I ordered the fleet commander to evacuate, then I aimed the bow of the Mathias-Jackson towards Godzilla. But… he was heading with full force towards MechaGodzilla at the foot of Mount Fuji, having already destroyed most of the intercepting fleet.
Godzilla… he had already lost interest in us
My ship was quickly pulled away from Godzilla… The nuclear fusion reactor, pushed to its limits to pursue Godzilla, went into emergency shutdown… All I could do was watch his back and order the rescue of the survivors floating in the sea.
… I had survived again.
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Otto Heinkel, Maintenance Crew, Aircraft Carrier Saratoga (at the time)
Everyone was rushing to their deaths, as if that was the purpose itself. Not a single plane from the Saratoga’s attack squadron came back. Some were shot down by Godzilla, but that wasn’t all. The planes that had expended all their missiles and ammunition just rammed Godzilla head-on.
Before the sortie, the Exif priest had spoken to the pilots. He said this was the time for their devotion to be tested. Listening to that, I was horrified. It was as if he was telling them to go die.
Maybe everyone was just exhausted. They just wanted it to be over, whether MechaGodzilla was completed or not…
But… Damn it. If even half the planes had come back, we could have done something, even if MechaGodzilla didn’t activate.
You can’t just die. As long as you’re alive, there has to be a way.
Listen to me.
I just passed the pilot’s test the other day.
They must have been so short on people that they even made a failure like me a pilot… Now there’s not a single aircraft left here…
But I’m going to survive, no matter what.
As long as I can fly, pilot a fighter, I won’t die.
I still have so much I want to do.
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Koh Ikeda, Commander, 13th Combined Volunteer Regiment, 2nd Armored Division, Earth Defense Force (at the time)
This was during Operation Longmarch. Godzilla’s beam just barely missed us, only costing me a leg.
Even so, I managed to survive Operation Longmarch, and Operation Great Wall was at least somewhat successful. After that, I was reassigned to Japan.
I was told to be an instructor for the newly formed tank forces.
When I arrived at the garrison near Mount Fuji, I was shocked. There were rows of Masers and G-HEDs, the very tanks that had been wiped out on the continent. And on top of that, there were even brand new models I’d never seen before. Japan had gathered practically all of the Bilusaludo personnel who had come to Earth to build MechaGodzilla. Developing new tanks must have been a piece of cake for them in their spare time… but it just made me so angry. If they had that kind of leeway, they could have at least sent some Bilusaludo engineers to the front lines, then maybe some of those who didn’t have to die would still be alive.
But the truth is, I was also relieved.
Compared to the front lines of Operation Longmarch, Japan was like a paradise. Plenty of food, fuel, and the new tanks. We could actually wage a proper war here, without having to strap child soldiers onto suicide bikes and send them out.
…But the school I was sent to as an instructor was right near Mount Fuji. Yes, that’s right. I was ordered to turn middle schoolers – kids who had barely even hit puberty – into tank crew. Junior officer candidates? Call it whatever you want, they were still just kids. Gather up these brats from all over Japan and turn them into tank crew in half a year…
Ah yes, I understand. All the real adult soldiers had already been sent to the continent to die. We had the tanks, but no one to crew them. So the only option was to make soldiers out of children. Just do on the home front what we did on the continent. That’s all there was to it.
With the limited time, I couldn’t teach them anything. Against Godzilla, tank armor is basically useless. Ideally, they should have learned to use the tanks’ mobility as their main defense – shoot, retreat, hide, counterattack when the opportunity arises. But there was no time for them to learn that kind of warfare. If I sent them out like this, they’d just be cannon fodder, standing their ground and getting gunned down. I knew that, so I kept telling them – just hide, run away. But of course, they weren’t going to listen to that.
Even the kids who weren’t old enough had that look on their faces, like they were ready to die fighting Godzilla.
Boys and girls alike.
That’s not the face kids should have.
Kids have nothing to protect. They don’t know the value of life. They don’t realize that death is the end. Just tell them that dying in battle makes you a hero, and they’ll believe it right away.
The higher-ups knew that, and they tried to turn those kids into soldiers…
When I heard Godzilla had broken through the Indian defense line after erupting the Himalayas, I knew it was serious. I fought to get the kids one last vacation. The ones I taught were from Tokyo, so they had enough time to go home. “Go see your parents and really think about what you should do,” I said. Don’t come back. That’s what I meant to imply. Rebellion? Desertion? I didn’t care. There was no time to chase after runaway kids anymore. But a week later, those idiots all came back. And the parents who sent them back, they knew it meant death.
I heard the navy fought pretty horribly on the seas, but even that was better than here. Only the adults died.
Ah, everyone knew those kids were just cannon fodder.
Make the kids draw Godzilla’s attention, then the real adult tank crews could flank and distract Godzilla. That’s the kind of fight they went with. Damn it.
My students were stationed on the coast, so they were wiped out in the initial barrage…
I want to believe they didn’t suffer too much.
…Hey, you.
Why did Mechagodzilla fail to activate? Do you know what happened?
They believed in it, you know. Even if they died, as long as Mechagodzilla worked, it would protect their parents, siblings. Mechagodzilla would avenge them. But it wasn’t enough. After all the sacrifices, destroying the Earth, turning the kids into soldiers – and for what?
It would have been better to do nothing…
Maybe doing nothing would have been better…
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Caine-Hilter, former Earth Union military bio-research scientist
Akira-Sakaki Investigation Officer.
I pray this email reaches you.
Now I only await death, but before that, I must confess my sins.
After Mechagodzilla was abandoned, a certain name started spreading rapidly around the world –
Oxygen Destroyer.
An underwater oxygen-destroying weapon.
A terrifying environment-altering weapon capable of artificially triggering ancient global oceanic anoxic events.
The only weapon that succeeded in eliminating Godzilla.
You must have heard the rumors at least once.
Yes, the story goes that humanity once succeeded in eliminating Godzilla.
Likely the story you heard went something like this:
The Godzilla that vanished in ’37 and the one that reappeared in ’42 to destroy the devilish star Gorath were not the same individual. This fact was sealed away, but the truth is that in 1937, humanity succeeded in killing Godzilla off the coast of France. It was thanks to a terrifying weapon developed by the scientist Dr. Serizawa, based on Exif and Bilsaludo science and technology – the Oxygen Destroyer. However, after developing this dreadful superweapon capable of killing even Godzilla, exceeding the power of nuclear weapons…Dr. Serizawa feared that once Godzilla and the other Kaiju were defeated, it could become a new seed of war between humanity and alien races. Therefore, Dr. Serizawa resolved to destroy not only Godzilla, but himself and the Oxygen Destroyer as well. Before using it against Godzilla, he disposed of all the research data, then activated the Oxygen Destroyer on Godzilla with his own hands, disappearing into the sea along with the Kaiju. Dr. Serizawa’s miscalculation was that a second Godzilla appeared years later. But perhaps somewhere in this world, research materials Dr. Serizawa failed to burn still exist. Perhaps even the Oxygen Destroyer itself… If we could find those, we might be able to defeat that Godzilla again.
Or perhaps there were even rumors of the Earth Union developing a new Mechagodzilla using the bones of the Godzilla killed by the Oxygen Destroyer in ’37.
Of course, these are all just urban legends. Fabrications. All lies.
The Oxygen Destroyer and the scientist Serizawa never existed. Even the plausible-sounding profile of Kyohei Yamane, the namer of Godzilla, is completely fake.
How can I say that with certainty?
Because this is a story I’ve concocted myself.
If you’re still have connectivity to the Internet, you might want to compare the photo of Dr. Serizawa and a photo of myself – we have strikingly similar faces. In fact, I just used my own youthful photo for him, naturally.
Yes, I deceived the world. I fabricated a nonexistent hope, the “Oxygen Destroyer”, and a nonexistent hero, Dr. Serizawa. The truth is, I had been researching the revival of Hedorah all along, up in North America, under that charlatan Professor Yang. Fabrication is my specialty, after all. I just recycled plausible-looking data from the Hedorah research we were doing, and voila – an endless supply of “evidence.” Believe me, I was a sincere scientist when I was working on Hedorah, trying to revive it for the sake of humanity’s future. My colleagues felt the same. But Yang trampled all over our life’s work and noble intentions, driven by his own self-righteous crusade.
You might say I did the same thing.
Perhaps that’s true.
But I felt it was necessary.
When did you first hear the rumors of the Oxygen Destroyer? When was that?
Spring of 2046, I’d imagine.
In that case, you can understand.
Back then, humanity was on the verge of immediate annihilation. Not by Godzilla, but by despair.
After the defeat at Mt. Fuji, humanity had lost Mechagodzilla, and the Earth Evacuation Plan had begun – to ferry a mere 15,000 people off the planet. The rest were as good as sentenced to death, to be burned by Godzilla’s flames and consumed by the kaiju.
After Mount Fuji’s fall, the global suicide rate skyrocketed. Hopeless and reckless, the populace turned to rioting, and the military, dwindling in numbers, had to resort to heavy-handed crackdowns, causing even more casualties – entire towns sometimes wiped out. With most clerics leaving Earth, people no longer heeded Exif’s teachings of altruism, and the abhorrent Godzilla Cult saw an ominous resurgence in South America. There were even terrorist attacks on ships like the Aratrum and Oratio, and their crews.
We needed hope. Even if it was false. To show that humanity had not yet lost, that there were still ways to fight Godzilla. That was the purpose of the Oxygen Destroyer, and of Dr. Serizawa.
Of course, I didn’t create and spread this fiction alone. I had many accomplices. But… the sheer speed with which this nonsense spread across our shattered communications network was because everyone desperately wanted to believe it. Isn’t that right?
オキシジェン-デストロイヤー.
The Oxygen Destroyer.
Deep down, they must have known. Even a child could tell it was impossible. But still, they couldn’t help but wish it were true. If only it were real…
…In the end, I suppose I did the same thing I so despised in Yang. I deceived the world with my own self-righteous crusade.
My old colleagues only contacted me after the fake I’d created had already spread beyond my control.
They had regathered at the abandoned North American Hedorah research facility and resumed their work – developing biochemical weapons capable of killing Godzilla, especially focusing on the J-M0-7 microbe Ijuin had studied, which could induce abnormal growth, and which I had partly based my Oxygen Destroyer fiction on. Yang had forced them to halt that research, but in hindsight, it must have been their closest approach to Hedorah. And Ijuin believed in the rightness of his cause – he had quietly continued the research. I was ashamed of myself; while I could only scatter false hope, my comrades had never given up.
If only their message had come a little sooner…
…But it was too late, all of it.
The personnel who had regrouped were too few, with too little equipment and resources.
All they could do was thaw and culture the samples they had found.
It was clear they would succumb to the Godzilla-derived radiation raining down on North America before any results could be achieved. But that was fine.
They persisted in their research to defeat Godzilla to the very end.
They never gave up the fight. To be researchers combating Godzilla –
that fact alone was enough for me. I thought so.
…But fate would not forgive the deceiver who deceived the world..
A few days ago, there was some kind of accident at the experimental facility. And then their attack began. A colonial organism with a red exoskeleton, like a crustacean… What are they? Where did they come from? No… could it be that our experiment… no, that’s far too optimistic. They’re probably a subspecies of Ganimes. The species that bred in the Bering Sea must have migrated south. My few remaining companions have all been massacred, and I’m the only one left. The underground shelter I evacuated to has a faulty power system, and it’ll only last a few more days.
I don’t even know if this email will reach you.
There’s a sound. The metal door is being pounded violently. They seem to have noticed me. What’s happening? The door, it’s… melting? No way.
(Cain Hilter was a researcher involved in the Hedorah revival plan, working under Yang Hongtie. I had contacted him a few years ago, before investigating Yang.)
(This document is an email sent to me on December 9, 2047. I’m not sure what happened in North America or what the small monster he encountered was.)
(After the loss of Mechagodzilla, many rumors and legends emerged regarding weapons that could potentially counter Godzilla, including the “Oxygen Destroyer” claimed to have been created by Cain.)
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