Chapter 576

Chapter 576: Acting Separately

Vanna’s words left everyone present stunned.

They even shattered many of the guesses Duncan had just formed about the Dream of the Nameless One.

Vanna had not entered that “forest” at all—she had not even seen any forest. She had been trapped the whole time in a desert… What was that desert?!

After a brief, shocked silence, Duncan suddenly spoke: “Did you see any signs of humans moving about in the desert? Any strange terrain worth noting, or anything that left a deep impression on you?”

“There were many strange-looking boulders, tall and twisted, as if something moving had suddenly frozen and turned into stone. In the far distance I could see stretches of shadows, but I couldn’t tell if they were rocky ground or clusters of buildings—it was too far,” Vanna recalled her experience on the other side of the dream and described what she had seen: “Also, the most striking thing was a faint red rift in the sky. It was extremely, extremely large.”

“A red rift?” Duncan’s eyes changed at once and he straightened, suddenly alert: “What exactly did it look like? Besides that red rift, what else did you see in the sky?”

“I still remember how it looked…” Vanna said as she got up, took pen and paper from the low table, and quickly began to sketch: “Its color was dark red. Its edges were blurry, as if they were wrapped in clouds and mist. Deep inside it glowed faintly, and there were vague shapes within…”

Everyone’s gaze focused on the tip of Vanna’s pen. Duncan also leaned forward, watching the “crack” she drew on the paper with those messy lines. As the lines slowly matched the red glow in his memory, his expression grew more and more grim.

A moment later, Vanna stopped and pushed the paper forward: “This is more or less it. My drawing skills are limited, but I did my best. Other than this rift, I didn’t see anything else in the sky.”

“Nothing else?” Duncan was startled when he heard this. He asked without thinking: “What about the Sun? What did the Sun look like?”

To him, this was a question he had to ask—if Vanna had seen the Sun in that desert, then the form of that Sun would be crucial.

However, Vanna still shook her head: “There was no Sun—though it looked like daytime there, and the sky was filled with light besides the red glow, I didn’t see the Sun.”

Everyone looked at one another. Even Duncan was dazed for a moment, until Vanna’s voice sounded again and pulled them back: “That’s all the information I have.”

At last, everyone’s gaze settled on Duncan.

Nina blinked curiously: “Uncle Duncan, what did you see over there?”

“…Alice and I saw a distorted, mutated district in the Mortal Realm,” Duncan thought for a moment, then spoke slowly: “Tall trees and countless vines covered the streets, as if the forest from the Dream of the Nameless One had spread into the Mortal Realm. But we didn’t see any scenes related to a desert. And at the deepest part of that mutated district, we found an especially huge vine…”

With one more person came another line of thought, so Duncan did not hide what he had seen when he tried to probe that vine—the eerie Vanished sailing through dark mist, the familiar yet strange Goathead on the Vanished, the enchanted sea chart that had changed, and the many pieces of information Goathead had revealed in something like a sleep-talking state.

When he finished speaking, the room became even quieter than after Vanna had finished.

“What you saw… was even more unbelievable than that desert I saw…” Vanna muttered.

Dog, beside her, also mumbled in a low voice: “Well… that is the captain, after all…”

Duncan glanced at the Abyssal Hound and ignored its comment. Instead, he added: “That ‘Goathead’ mentioned Atlantis at the end. That really caught my attention.”

“If I remember right… that’s the name of the ‘World Tree’ from ancient elven legends,” Vanna said with a slight nod. “It was also called the tree of life and the primordial giant tree. It was the first life created in this world by the Great Demon God Saslokar, whom the elves worship…”

Everyone present fell into their own thoughts. Even Alice, who usually could not keep up, now wore a look of serious thinking. After a short silence, Lucretia finally raised her head. She looked at Duncan with a hint of hesitation: “Dad, about the current ‘First Mate’ of the Vanished… you never really told me where it came from. That Goathead is actually…”

“It came from Subspace. That’s all I can tell you,” Duncan said. Then he shifted the topic: “But this time… I may have to go find it and confirm a few things.”

Now all the clues were finally laid out on the table. Everyone who had been scattered last night across the Mortal Realm and the different parts of the dream had gathered all the information they held and placed it before Duncan.

After sorting his thoughts, Duncan let out a quiet breath, set aside the tangled questions in his mind for now, and let his gaze sweep over everyone in the living room.

“Now, we can be sure of a few things—

“First, the Dream of the Nameless One is growing larger. Its influence is getting stronger, and it has already reached the point where it can interfere with the Mortal Realm. For now we can’t tell what caused this change, but it is most likely linked to the coming so-called fourth Long Night and the changes of the Sun.

“Second, the ordinary people in the city-state seem completely unaware of the Dream of the Nameless One. When the anomaly happens, everyone within the dream’s affected area disappears. When the dream ends, they return to the Mortal Realm and go on with their daily lives. We still don’t know where they go while the dream is happening, and we don’t know if this phenomenon is limited to elves. There are also many merchants and adventurers of other races in Lightwind Harbor. Next we have to find a way to confirm what happened to those people last night.

“Third, when the anomaly happens, we are scattered to different places—some stay in the Mortal Realm, some enter the great forest in the Dreamwalking state, and some end up in that mysterious desert. We still don’t know if this ‘scattering’ is random or follows some rule.

“Fourth, the Annihilators and the Suntists, and the Ender who feeds them information behind the scenes—these cultists clearly know much more…”

He summed up all the known information point by point, then finally looked up at the others: “Is there anything to add?”

“I can’t think of anything else for now,” Lucretia said with a shake of her head. “What I care about now is whether that kind of anomaly from last night will happen again, and how we should respond if it does.”

“Most likely it will,” Morris sighed. “The influence of the Dream of the Nameless One is clearly still growing stronger. The anomalies it causes will only increase. But looking at the bright side—the more it appears, the more chances we have to figure out its patterns. Right now we have many guesses we can’t confirm, but many of those questions can be answered as soon as there’s a second large-scale anomaly.”

Listening to the old scholar’s analysis, Duncan nodded in agreement: “That’s not blind optimism. We really do need more anomalies to work out the rules of the Dream of the Nameless One.”

“But the Dream of the Nameless One will scatter us and cut off our connection to the captain,” Vanna added from the side. “That’s a big problem.”

“I already have a rough idea about that,” Duncan said thoughtfully, recalling last night—especially the vague information he had sensed after linking with that huge vine and stepping onto that eerie version of the Vanished. “If the Dream of the Nameless One expands again, I should have a chance to test this idea.”

Shirley lifted her head and looked at Duncan, then at the others: “Then… what about this period? What are we going to do next?”

“We don’t know when the Dream of the Nameless One will change again,” Duncan said, turning his gaze to Lucretia. “Right now we have to find out whether other parts of the city-state were also affected last night. The fastest way is to contact the Governor of Lightwind Harbor.”

“Leave that to me,” Lucretia said at once. “I’ll go find Sara Mell in a bit and see if he noticed what happened last night.”

Duncan made a sound of agreement, then looked at Morris and Vanna: “We also need to investigate the nearby districts. We have to see whether, besides the elves, the other nonhuman folk living around Crown Street were affected by the dream, and whether they had any unusual experiences last night.”

“Understood,” Vanna nodded right away. “This is something I’m good at.”

Morris also nodded: “I know some old friends at Truth Academy. When we investigate, I can ask them to help make things easier.”

Duncan’s gaze finally turned to Nina and Shirley.

“You two stay home for now,” Duncan said after a short pause. “We don’t need you to do anything yet. But if we find any clues about Suntists or Annihilators, we might need your help.”

Nina looked a little disappointed, but still answered obediently: “Oh…”

Shirley, beside her, asked curiously: “What about you?”

“I’m going back to the ship,” Duncan said as he rose from the sofa. “I’ll leave now.”

Alice stood up without thinking: “Then I’ll go too!”

Duncan stopped and gave the doll a puzzled look: “Why are you coming along?”

Alice thought for a moment, glanced at the others in the living room, then scratched her hair and said, perfectly justified: “I don’t know either!”

Duncan was speechless.

After a brief silence, he suddenly laughed and sighed.

“Fine. If you want to come, then come along. I don’t feel at ease leaving you in the city anyway.”

Alice brightened at once: “Hehe…”

A short while later, everyone set out according to the plan.