Chapter 453: Chapter 454 Information Flow Chapter 453: Chapter 454 Information Flow A faint green firelight rose in the captain’s quarters, engulfing a skeletal bird wrapped in Spiritual Fire as it flew out from the flas. Behind it, the spinning flas ford a swirling door, through which Fenna, Alice, and Morris stepped into the cabin.
The disorientation from the shifting lights had barely faded when they turned toward the nearby navigation table and bowed to Duncan, who sat studying navigational charts, “Captain.”
“First, find a place to sit and rest. It’s easy to trip after teleportation,” Duncan said without looking up. After pinpointing a few locations on the map, he exhaled softly and, straightening up, looked at Morris, “Did you bring the book?”
“Yes,” Morris hastily nodded, then pulled out the unmarked, pitch-black “Book of Desecration” from his cloak and stood up to hand it to Duncan, “Here it is.”
Duncan took the book, while Fenna couldn’t help but speak up, “Now that Morris, Alice, and I are back on the ship and only your avatar remains at the City-State… is that okay?”
“There shouldn’t be any more troubles in the city. Moreover, Terrian will beco the new Governor of Frost, and with him and Agatha maintaining the order of Frost City-State, there’s nothing to worry about,” Duncan said with a smile, “As far as you are concerned, your work in Frost City-State is done. Any remaining loose ends can be handled by my avatar.”
As he spoke, Duncan sat back down at the navigation table with the thick black book, his expression turning serious as he placed it beside the chart.
This was the “Book of Desecration” that Morris and Fenna had acquired from a minor Heretic leader, which contained information regarding the enigmatic Saint and hinted at so secrets predating the Creation of the gods and the Great Obliteration.
At first glance, apart from its black, unmarked cover, the book seed ordinary and emitted no Transcendent aura.
Fenna, Morris, and Alice had already gathered curiously, except that the carefree Alice, unlike the others, maintained a safe distance, not daring to look directly at the book.
The goat-headed wood carving at the edge of the navigation table squeaked and turned its head curiously towards the book in front of Duncan. After a long observation, it finally couldn’t resist asking, “What is this? A book? Worthy of such solemnity?”
“In theory, it’s the Heretics’ missionary manuscript,” Duncan said casually, “It seems to contain sothing about the gods’ Creation, though it’s just those mad cultists’ insane theories. Yet, there’s a part… that concerns .”
“Records of the gods’ Creation?” The goat head was montarily stunned, then its tone subtly shifted, “That crazy ‘Genesis of the Saint’ by those lunatics? Forgive my bluntness, but I find their theories completely unreliable—any drunken playwright could concoct a creation myth without any solid evidence or reasoning. There’s even an absurd play claiming our world was stewed from a mishmash pot…”
“But Morris encountered ntal contamination while reading this book, even drawing the attention of the Four Gods,” Duncan lifted his eyelids leisurely, “You should know what that implies.”
A snapping sound ca from beneath the goat’s neck, and it was silent for a while.
After an indeterminate ti, it managed to say, “The closer to the truth, the further from sanity…”
“Yes, the first rule of anomalies and phenona—The closer to the truth, the further from sanity,” Morris nodded seriously, “The more likely to cause severe ntal contamination the items are, the more likely they have recorded the true nature of the world. Thus, sotis scholars even asure the credibility of ancient texts by the degree of ntal damage they incurred after reading them.”
The goat head swayed its head in place, pondering for a long while before it couldn’t resist saying, “However, great distortion and pure upper Transcendent forces can also cause ntal contamination. In such cases, the opposite is often true—the more the sanity is damaged, the more deceived one is.”
Pausing, it then added, “I an it, Morris. There are many unfortunate souls in your line of work who have died over this, and those who didn’t die at the Madness Threshold thought they knew the truth. Now, most are listed in the heresy warrants of the major churches—of course, now that you’re on this ship, you’d technically be on that warrant list too…”
The goat head’s style was eccentric, but clearly, after spending so much ti together, it did care about the ship’s crew. This understanding alleviated any drive to take offense, and so, Morris earnestly said, “Thank you for your concern. You’re right, this world excels at fooling mortals, and curiosity often leads us in the opposite direction—hence, we now need the Captain for the final control.”
“Captain to…” The goat head paused, only then noticing that Duncan’s hand was already on the cover of the black book, appearing ready to fling it open, “Ah? Are you sure you want to look at it?”
“And why not?” Duncan lifted his head, “Did you think I had Morris bring this thing aboard to use as your pedestal?”
The goat head blinked, its head swaying slightly left and right, “Well, not necessarily…”
Duncan didn’t pay any mind to its obviously playful antics; he had made up his mind, took a deep breath to focus his mind.
A hushed green fla rose from within, transforming his body into a Spectral Form. Once he felt the Transformation was complete, Duncan opened the first page of the black book.
At first glance, there were no words on the page.
At second glance, boundless darkness suddenly gathered from all directions.
In an instant, as lights and shadows shifted, everything happened too swiftly for reaction—just like the first ti using the Spirit Realm Compass, Duncan’s consciousness suddenly “plunged” into an endless darkness.
He looked up in astonishnt, finding that everything familiar in the captain’s quarters had vanished, along with the goat head, Morris, and the others, even the black book he had been looking at a second ago had disappeared.
He stood in the darkness, frowning and thinking for a few seconds.
Sothing was wrong—this was different from what Morris had described.
After he had opened the book, it had caused a completely different reaction from when Morris had opened it!
And at that mont, sothing suddenly appeared in his peripheral vision.
Zhou Ming instinctively looked over and saw a small white shadow erging not far from him in midair. He concentrated and finally realized… it was text.
The text beca clear—
“After he opened the book, a completely different change occurred than when Morris had opened it.”
Zhou Ming suddenly froze.
He stood there motionless, quietly watching the line of text floating in midair, forgetting to breathe and even to think for a mont.
After who knows how long, he suddenly rembered sothing.
He rembered, he had seen a similar place, he had visited a darkness just like this, and in the darkness, he saw text—it was in the Subspace…
“It was in the Subspace, aboard the battered Holoss, pushing open the door to the captain’s cabin, a dark place where text erged in the darkness, depicting…”
The pale text rapidly appeared in midair, but quickly began to fade.
Zhou Ming suddenly stopped—he controlled himself, trying hard not to let his thoughts wander wildly, which was very difficult, but after filling his mind with a ssy collection of numbers, words, and aningless scenery, the text that had erged in the darkness really disappeared.
Then, with great effort, he restrained his thoughts while allowing his pounding heart to calm.
What exactly was happening? What was this darkness? What were these texts that erged from the darkness?
They seed to be describing “himself”… Were they really describing “himself”? What did this “description” an?
Was this so kind of mind-reading process? Or so kind of spiritual “projection” phenonon? The last ti he encountered a similar dark space was on the battered Holoss in the Subspace, but this ti it was after opening that book—why did that book possess such “power”?
His mind again couldn’t help but be filled with various thoughts, and almost at the sa mont, new text erged in the darkness.
But this ti, the text was not describing “himself,” but rather a few disjointed words—
“Manifesting… turning into reality… the real…”
Zhou Ming frowned, unconsciously moved closer to the new line of text, and reached out a finger to try and touch it.
His finger passed through those apparitions, with only a slight ripple forming in the darkness.
And in the trembling ripples, he vaguely saw that there seed to be other texts hidden behind those words!
He hesitated only a second, then reached out his hand again, continuing to stir those reflections in the water-like script, causing the ripples to expand, revealing their true form, and allowing other hidden ssages deep in the darkness to erge into his view—
Suddenly, he saw it, several lines of intermittent text erging in the darkness, trembling and moving downwards.
“Source of transmission—Leviathan Queen—Situation… not optimistic, critical state is accelerating…”
“Source of transmission—King of Fire—Are there new records?”
“Source of transmission—Bartok—Bad news… node feedback is ambiguous… suspecting the cluster controller has begun replicating itself… or has completely lost control…”
“…source—LH02—Have relevant intelligence.”
“…Details?”
“…LH-02—Observed an individual carrying traits of the cluster controller approaching, suspected ntal mutation, suspected capable of communication with .”
“Source of transmission—Leviathan Queen—Astonishing intelligence! What follows?”
“Source of transmission—LH-02—No follow-up.”
“Source of transmission—Bartok—?”
“Source of transmission—LH-02—That suspicious individual sent a dog emoji and left.”
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