In those final monts, a sharp glint of cold light appeared deep within the boundless void and chaos, the flood of fragnted information nearly drowning the tiny fla that had infiltrated "the specin."
In a slight daze, Duncan heard Sherry beside him exclaim, "Be careful!"
The dazed consciousness and reality overlapped once more, and Duncan instinctively stepped back. The next second, he saw a sword tip flickering with silver light appear before him.
The sword tip halted just ten centiters from his nose, slowly continuing to extend forward.
"Attack behavior!" Ted Riel, who had been closely monitoring the specin, reacted instantly. He uttered a low cry, then quickly slapped a large book in his hand, as a misty light emanated from the pages, swiftly covering the surface of the specin, and quickly solidifying and thickening into layer upon layer of barriers.
At the sa ti, Duncan also withdrew the fla that had infiltrated the specin, his consciousness swiftly clearing as he once again directed his gaze toward the "specin" in front of him.
On the containnt platform, the iron-grey tal mass that had already solidified suddenly changed shape. Part of its "shell" bulged out instantaneously, solidifying into a form resembling a sharp sword.
But the suddenly solidified "sword" did not injure anyone. It only protruded halfway as if held back by so imnse force, still slowly extending bit by bit. This scene seed less like a "stab" and more like a sword being gradually "ejected" from the specin.
Lucricia, who had sohow produced a small "baton" in her hand, swiftly stepped forward. While Ted Riel controlled the specin with Divine Arts, she directly tapped the baton on the midsection of the "longsword," but just as she was about to further destroy the structure, Duncan suddenly stopped her, "Wait."
Lucricia abruptly halted the spell she was about to cast, turning her head in so confusion to look at her father. Ted Riel, who was poised to take the next step, and Nina, whose flas were nearly alight, also stopped and cast puzzled glances.
Duncan waved at them, then carefully circumvented the blade that was still slowly extending outward. He moved to the side of the grey "living tal," staring intently at its "shell."
It had not truly "co to life"; only the segnt of the blade that extended outward had changed, while other parts of the specin remained stagnant and solidified as before.
Chaotic, shattered information still swirled in his mind like soone’s mories had been completely torn to pieces, randomly mixed, and then "poured" in front of him. Duncan repeatedly sorted through these fragnted mories, trying to reassemble them into useful intelligence.
He saw many things—a sinister "deep red," scars traversing the sky, departing warriors, fallen companions one by one, a world becoming gradually distorted and rotten, a journey without aning, imnse confusion, anger, fear, ensuing death and calmness, along with various bizarre visions erging amidst ntal chaos.
Duncan suspected that if it were any ordinary person seeing these things—even just a part of them—they would likely be thoroughly contaminated by the dangerous knowledge carried in those pieces of information.
But for him, this contaminating "knowledge" was rely chaotic fragnts. Through repeated sorting and recalling, he was already beginning to piece them together into a continuous mory.
Then he raised his head, his eyes focusing on the longsword that had now extended more than halfway out. After hesitating for a mont, he extended his finger to touch its surface.
A cold, hard tallic sensation ca from his fingertip.
Duncan slowly closed his eyes. He could feel that as he touched this longsword, the chaotic and fragnted mories in his mind beca clearer and more coherent, though still incomplete. Yet, it was enough for him to understand everything that had happened.
He opened his eyes, looking at the last fragnt of that distant and ancient world, witnessing the naless warrior’s last counterattack against the apocalypse—he gently pinched this fragnt, feeling the connection it transmitted to him, then slowly pulled it outwards.
The fla had endowed the longsword, which had failed to fly through the skies, with a bit of extra strength, allowing it to completely separate from the mass of living tal.
Well-crafted with a sleek blade, the hilt was wrapped in dense canvas, and the handguard was inlaid with sparkling crystals of unknown purpose and material. Now, it transcended the long stretches of ti, arriving in this—Era of the Deep Sea—with its original and "correct" posture.
Including Ted Riel, everyone in the room widened their eyes in astonishnt at the scene unfolding before them. Lucricia finally couldn’t help but speak, "Dad, what is this?"
Duncan lowered his head, looking at the naless sword in his hand, pondering for a long ti before he slowly spoke, "This is the weapon they had planned to use against the apocalypse."
"Against the apocalypse?" Sherry instantly widened her eyes, "With a sword? Is this thing like those legendary artifacts from stories that could split seas? The kind blessed by the Four Gods?"
Duncan shook his head, "It’s just a sword—their finest sword. It’s very sharp, but even at its best, it’s only capable of slaying sowhat larger beasts or ard humans... that was the limit of what they could achieve."
Lucricia and Ted Riel looked at each other, unable to comprehend for a mont, while Nina, who seed to vaguely understand, imdiately asked, "What did you see?"
Duncan was still sorting through the chaotic and incomplete mories in his mind. After a brief period of thought, he broke the silence, "Just so fragnts, of things that happened a very long ti ago..."
He described what he had seen—in the simplest way possible.
He didn’t speak quickly because there were too many fragnted pieces, too much information that even he couldn’t fully grasp. He had to find ways to fill in the incoherent parts or to explain concepts that were difficult for Nina and others to understand.
For the first ti, he tried to explain to the people of this world what a "planet" was—after a previous conversation with Alice, he finally decided to give it a try.
But explaining an unfamiliar concept required ten more fundantal pieces of knowledge, and each unfamiliar piece of knowledge required even more to supplent it. There were countless things in this explanation that were completely counterintuitive to the people of this world. Even if he could explain all these ideas clearly, no one could imagine and reassemble them in their minds.
Ted Riel and Lucresia struggled to comprehend, and the continuous questions they raised lengthened the explanation ti—eventually, Duncan realized that if he wanted to clarify all the basic concepts, he would probably need at least half a year of full-ti teaching to manage it.
So he could only gloss over many things or temporarily fill in the gaps in knowledge and concepts with taphors.
In the end, despite his efforts, Nina and the others were obviously only able to understand so of it, but at least, this ti, they generally understood what had happened.
Sherry was still imrsed in the shock of the long "story," Nina was still pondering the strange terms Duncan had ntioned, and the two scholars present... Lucresia and Ted Riel looked grave, clearly having already thought of many things.
"End of the world..." Ted Riel muttered to himself in a low voice. "If what you saw really points to an apocalypse, then the ti it happens..."
"Before the Great Obliteration," Duncan confird the other’s unspoken concern and then lifted the longsword, "the ’black wall’ that had lood before historians for a long ti has now cracked open. This sword... might be the first identifiable ’relic’ passed down from before the ti of the Great Obliteration to this deep-sea era."
"A historic mont... just happened," Ted Riel sighed complexly. In the face of this news that could shake the entire academic world, he only felt his mind in chaos, the sudden influx of information impacting the knowledge structure he had built over ti and even his understanding of the world, so much so that he internally prayed to Rahm, added ntal defenses, and ntal suggestions to himself to prevent his rationality from being damaged.
Lucresia, after a long period of silent contemplation, suddenly looked up into Duncan’s eyes, "The strange concepts you just ntioned... are those the things you previously ntioned that were difficult to explain to ?"
"Just a very, very small part of them," Duncan said softly, "I should have told you about these things sooner."
Lucresia rely shook her head gently. She neither complained nor asked why her father was now willing to explain those things—her father had his reasons for doing so, and when he was ready to speak, he would naturally do so.
She was just curious as to why her father knew these incredible things.
Were those pieces of knowledge... originating from Subspace?
On the other hand, after so ti of contemplation, Ted Riel suddenly realized a problem.
"According to what you ’saw,’ under the influence of that ’red light,’ the world was engulfed in lava, the earth was torn apart, and everyone died... then how did this deep-sea era begin?"
He lifted his hand, making a chopping motion with his palm, mimicking a fault line.
"There’s a disconnect, Captain Duncan—to have the world destroyed and then the deep-sea era start, sothing must have changed in between. The world you saw doesn’t correspond with any races, locations, or legends in today’s deep-sea era..."
"Indeed, it doesn’t correspond," Duncan nodded slightly, his gaze landing on the "sample" on the platform. After a long ti, he finally voiced a speculation that had been in his mind long ago, "So... that world didn’t pass down much information like the worlds of humans, elves, and the Senkin people. What we are seeing now is everything that remains from that world."
"That ’world’..." Ted Riel and Lucresia looked at each other in that mont, finally understanding Duncan’s aning.
And in Duncan’s mind, the image of the "Moon" from his holand once again surfaced before his eyes.
Along with it ca the phrase Alice had once said to him with a smile—
"Captain, is this a riddle?"
Duncan’s expression subtly changed, the muscles around his mouth trembling slightly, finally settling into a smile that neither Nina nor Lucresia could understand.
"Yes, it really is a riddle..."
He murmured in a voice only he could hear.
Reviews
All reviews (0)