At this time, TV stations around the world have begun to broadcast the battle between Great Han and Britannia simultaneously.
At first, viewers from all over the world thought it was just ordinary war news, until the first batch of death lists appeared on the screen.
Britannia's channel retains the consistent style of the empire, Royal Scots Dragoon Guards, Coldstream Guards, Black Watch, Fourth Armored Group, Ninth Royal Mobile Corps... the names that always appeared in colonial war victory announcements are now starting to scroll together with strange and common names.
The same is true for Great Han's broadcast. The two systems use different languages, and even the death notice formats are different.
But the numbers are increasing at a similar rate. Imperial Area 18 Air Assault Cluster dispatched 792 aircraft in the first round, 96 of which failed to return, and 147 were seriously injured. The casualties of Asabasca Home Theater are still being recalculated. Some legions did not even have time to submit a complete list before they had already received the next round of counterattack orders.
Great Han Persia Eastern Theater disclosed the confirmed 4,721 killed, 1,904 missing, and 6,280 seriously wounded.
The program did not cover these numbers with a piece of grand music, the screen just continued to scroll down, new names were continuously added, and some personnel originally marked as missing were confirmed to have been killed.
Some viewers have been sitting in front of the TV, waiting for their familiar names to appear.
Others repeatedly called the military affairs department, asking to confirm whether a certain unit number had been evacuated.
When an E. U. local councilor was interviewed, he still insisted that Britannia's colonial policy was an important reason for the E. U.'s long-term war. As soon as he mentioned how the empire relied on violence to control the colonies in the past, the photographer reminded him that a royal armored group of Asabasca had just reopened the evacuation channel in the industrial area.
"I know, of course I know!" The congressman was obviously annoyed. "They have protected human beings today, so what they did in the past can be ignored?"
An engineer who had evacuated from Madrid asked directly, "Sir, my wife and two children are still at the evacuation station outside the city. The armored groups of Britannia and Great Han are still maintaining a huge offensive. When will our army set off?"
The congressman opened his mouth. The news host wanted to change the topic, but found that he had no answer.
This embarrassment is spreading everywhere. People who criticized Britannia for relying on violence to conquer the world in the past have not suddenly changed their political evaluation of the empire.
But people are beginning to be forced to admit another thing. Those huge recruiting agencies, military-industrial enterprises, strict military chain of command, and state power that can freeze the civilian economy of an entire region within a few hours can really send thousands of soldiers and equipment into the battlefield at this moment.
Britannia is very bad, and he is the kind of bad guy who is well-trained and well-organized and can make a whole set of huge state machines operate according to military orders.
Before, it used this system to conquer other countries. Now, it is using the same system to protect its own country.
However, for the few people who really grasp the world situation, this war also has a meaning that ordinary people cannot understand at all.
The names on the screen continue to refresh. The two empires that were hostile to each other in the past are sending the industry and military accumulated over decades to the battlefield at an almost cruel speed.
But the same string of numbers has a completely different meaning for Egghead.
V. V. sat on the stone steps, looking through the latest statistical reports of Asabasca and Persia Theater. Every time a group of humans died of BETA, the ancient facilities would send back new abnormal records.
"Brother, you should read the report sent by Schneizel." He finally became impatient, "Although the empire's army is fighting well, the number of those things is increasing every time. At this rate, how long will it take for us to complete the plan?"
"So we can't wait any longer."
Charles looked at the stone wall, and a deep voice echoed in the underground space.
"In the past, we thought that as long as we completed Sword of Akasha and took the final step towards Ragnarök, everyone would truly understand each other. Lies, suspicions, betrayals, and all the pain caused by human beings' inability to see each other through would disappear in the same consciousness. There will no longer be an insurmountable boundary between the living and the dead, and Marianne will no longer be separated from me by death."
In the past, Ragnarök Plan wanted to change the entire way in which human consciousness exists.
In that world, no one can hide their true thoughts behind a mask, and no one can be forever separated from those who are still alive because of death.
In a sense, this is more complete than eternal life in the ordinary sense, but the price is equally complete.
When everyone can directly see each other's hearts, personal independent boundaries will no longer have current meaning, and future choices, misunderstandings, conflicts, and the process of re-establishing relationships from the unknown may all lose the basis of existence.
Charles believes that is the answer to end human tragedy, and if Lelouch truly faces this plan one day, he will most likely regard it as a stagnant world with only the past and no future.
But now, Lelouch still doesn't know what his father is preparing underground, and Charles has no interest in letting him know.
"What if the boundary between life and death shouldn't exist in the first place?"
V. V. suddenly smiled. He stood up from the stone steps and looked up at the flickering Thought Elevator, as if he had suddenly grasped an answer from the disaster in front of him that made him feel absurd but could not give up.
"Brother, we have always regarded Ragnarök as the final liberation - eliminating masks, eliminating barriers, allowing the dead and the living to stand in the same world again. But what if we look at it from another direction now? The reason why BETA is scary is because they can Destroy the body, and even make the consciousness that should return to World of C disappear. But what if we complete the plan first? If humans no longer regard the body as their only form of existence, if everyone's consciousness has truly crossed the boundary between life and death--"
He turned around, and for the first time an almost fanatical look appeared on his childish face.
"So what else can they kill?"
Charles suddenly turned around. Those eyes that usually seemed to look down at others across the entire empire were really shaken at this moment. Ragnarök was no longer just an end to lies, but might even become the only answer that could bypass death itself when humans face BETA.
He stared at V. V. for a long time.
"You want me to bet all of humanity right now?"
V. V. did not give in at all.
"Isn't this what we originally did?"
Charles's expression turned cold instantly.
"Brother! This is not the same thing. In the past, we knew that World of C existed, we knew the connection between Code, Thought Elevator and Collective Unconscious, and we also knew what Ragnarök would eventually do. Now we are facing an alien creature that we have never seen before."