A swirling, whirlpool-like fog enveloped the Place of the Whirlpool, obscuring any view of the outside world.
Lu Li and Katerina gazed at the spiral-shaped longhouses at the foot of the mountain; they resembled the patterns on a snail's shell, coiling into a vast area that looked like a town.
The situation was more complex than they had anticipated.
The Place of the Whirlpool seed to exist independently of the ruins of Belfast. The outside world was hidden by fog, and within that fog, there was no trace of the previous forest or city districts, as if it were another world entirely.
For instance, having entered the Place of the Whirlpool from a city district, they now found themselves on a mountainside.
The interior of the Place of the Whirlpool was vaster than its exterior suggested, which had only occupied half a forest and a few districts. The spiral town at the foot of the mountain was far larger and more intricate than just a few blocks.
The pendant's one-day countdown was much shorter than they had thought.
"We need to hurry."
Lu Li headed toward the spiral longhouses at the base of the mountain, with Katerina and the rchant following close behind.
After learning from the distorted shadow that "Barry" was targeting Lu Li and couldn't be driven away, the rchant had no choice but to stick with him.
He didn't have a pendant, but the rchant's race had the ability to ignore contamination; the distortion of the Place of the Whirlpool wouldn't affect him.
The whirlpools on the tree trunks resembled the dense eyeballs of anomalies. The withered bushes at their feet twisted inward, and even the stones were covered in spiral patterns, like fossils.
A light breeze, swirling into eddies, stirred the tips of their hair, and the settling dust ford spiral outlines.
Whirlpools were everywhere.
"This stuff is making my head spin..."
Katerina complained quietly.
At that mont, Lu Li raised his dark eyes and looked at Katerina.
Katerina turned her head to et his gaze, only to find that his eyes were looking past her, deep into the forest.
"What is it?"
Lu Li could hear the faint, persistent sound of chopping coming from deep within the woods.
"There might be inhabitants there."
Although the distorted figure had said there was no strife in the Place of the Whirlpool, it was safer to find the locals first and see if they had any ill intentions, rather than walking straight into the spiral town of longhouses at the foot of the mountain.
Following the sound of chopping, Lu Li made his way through the forest and ca upon a terrifying sight.
A distorted, overlapping figure resembled a snail's shell. Its body, stretched out like a noodle, coiled inward like the annual rings of a tree stump, separated into a dozen circles.
It held an axe curved like a sickle and was placing chopped branches into a spirally woven basket on its back.
Not a single human organ could be distinguished on it; it looked like a clump of chaos, a sar of paint. Any ordinary person encountering it would suffer a sharp drop in their Mind Level.
Katerina lowered her gaze, keeping the figure only in her peripheral vision.
"Have you seen any people who look like us?"
Lu Li stopped five or six ters away and questioned the "inhabitant," whose movents were impossible to discern.
"...But..."
A crack appeared in the upper left corner of the seventh circle of the woodcutter's body, and the garbled words that erged were indistinct and difficult to comprehend.
Katerina frowned and clutched her head; she felt as if the inhabitant's voice was twisting her brain into a spiral.
Was even the language spiral-shaped?
"I don't understand."
"...Spike... Crawl..."
Jumbled, incomprehensible syllables emanated from the woodcutter's mouth area. anwhile, Lu Li located a compressed, deford eyeball on the outermost circle of the creature, but there was only one; he couldn't find the other.
After several fruitless attempts at communication, Lu Li and his companions turned and left.
In any case, they had determined the attitude of the Place of the Whirlpool's inhabitants.
"It's not hostile toward us..."
Katerina kept looking back at the woodcutter's figure, which in the distance had picked up its anomalous axe and resud chopping trees.
Not only was there no hostility, Katerina even sensed a friendliness in the voice she couldn't understand.
"That's because they think we'll soon beco new residents," Lu Li replied.
Katerina rubbed the goosebumps on her arms in disgust:
"I'd rather die than beco like that."
They continued on their way. When they were still halfway to the foot of the mountain, they encountered a young man who looked like them, untouched by the contamination.
This thin youth, dressed in worn-out clothes and a few years younger than Katerina, kept his distance, warily observing Lu Li and his companions.
Lu Li, having lost his humanity, no longer possessed an approachable aura, but his noble bearing didn't inspire dislike. Besides, their clothes looked expensive, and the youth relaxed his guard slightly.
"Are you hiding here too?" he asked, his gaze subtly shifting between the huge backpacks worn by Lu Li and the rchant.
"We're here on a job, looking for soone," Lu Li answered.
"Hunters, right? I've heard of your kind."
The youth reined in his greed because of this.
The directness and wildness in his eyes reminded Katerina of her forr life as a hunter. It felt like a lifeti ago, but in reality, less than a month had passed.
Many hunters had that sa look, including her—this was a person like her forr self: soone who put profit above all else, was unscrupulous in their thods, and had little regard for life.
But she had changed, thanks to Lu Li, while no one had intervened in the youth's life.
"Where did you co from?" Lu Li asked calmly.
"From the ruins of Himpfast. They're just over the mountain."
The youth, who called himself Paf, replied.
He was born in the tenth year of the Age of Anomalies, when Himpfast had already fallen to ruin. The youth was lucky to have a responsible father who had tied him up when he was about to beco an 异人 and fed him flesh so he could survive in the Age of Anomalies.
Unfortunately, the Allen Peninsula was too far from Vinnelag and too close to danger. He had wandered between settlents, fleeing just before they were destroyed, and even survived for a ti in an anomaly nest as spare food before escaping.
He was at his wit's end, so when he heard that there was a paradise called the Place of the Whirlpool in the ruins of Belfast, he crossed Sugard Mountain and ca here.
"Do you have any food? I haven't eaten in days..." A pleading look appeared in the youth's wild eyes as he stared at the rchant and his backpack.
He was mistaken, however; there was nothing in the backpack.
Lu Li handed him a can of preserved food, which Paf gladly snatched. He had expected it to be anomaly at or fish, but these self-proclaid hunters were richer than he had imagined.
Katerina didn't object. They had enough food, and the rchant could bring more at any mont, though that ca with the risk of Barry appearing.
After wolfing down the contents, Paf licked the can clean, stowed it away to sharpen into a dagger later, and, grabbing a flask that emitted a strange odor, tilted his head back and drank.
"Do you know what's going on here?" Paf asked, his eyes darting around.
"We know as much as you do," said Lu Li.
"So is this really paradise?"
"Probably."
Once everyone who enters is assimilated by the whirlpool, strife will naturally cease.
But upon leaving the forest and stepping onto the outermost circle of the spiral longhouses, all the youth's beautiful illusions shattered.
"What the hell is this..."
He stared, stunned, at the distorted figures before him, which looked like layers of flesh coiled into rings.
"The inhabitants of the Place of the Whirlpool."
Paf's hope and desire turned to fear.
"I'll never beco a monster like that!" he scread, shoving Katerina aside and running toward the mountaintop.
The youth's screams drew the attention of the nearby inhabitants, but their gazes soon turned away. They were indifferent to his resistance and revulsion.
Because very soon, he would beco one of them.
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