Chapter 671

Chapter 671: News of the Gathering

Morris’s guess pointed to a dark future where all things were silent forever. The chill it brought was far worse than any strange, shocking prophecy of destruction, far worse than the Doomsday calamity muttered by madmen.

It was a dark and icy extinction. The last firelight would slowly go out in civilization’s Embers. The afterglow of civilization would be choked bit by bit in wave after wave of deadly shrinking, like a ship that was slowly sinking. In despair, people would throw weight off the ship again and again to try to delay its fate, but in the end, every plank of the ship would still fall into that endless dark abyss of sea.

What was even harder to accept was that, judging from the information they had, the chance of this future was very high. It might even be the best of all the possibilities.

Because at least “civilization” would still have a chance to cling to life for a while after the fourth and fifth Long Nights. At least it could still enjoy a little last, false peace in that Sanctuary World that kept shrinking and collapsing.

In a worse case, there might not be that many later Long Nights at all. The third Long Night had already been a once-only “sacred miracle” and “stroke of luck”. The coming dusk would be the day of the true end of all things.

[…Maybe that would be a better outcome?]

All kinds of thoughts rose and fell in his mind. At last, Duncan shook his head and pushed these messy ideas aside for now: “We’ve fallen into pessimism, Morris.”

“We have. Making these guesses when we still don’t know when or in what form the fourth Long Night will come… is a bit early,” Morris said. He rubbed his brow and finally pulled himself free from that gloomy mood. “My mentor is putting together a ‘gathering’ that will span the four great churches. You will be invited to that gathering. At least by then, we should be able to exchange more and better information. The popes of the Four Gods also need the truths we have.”

Duncan gave a small nod. He was not surprised by this news, because it was one of the “agreements” he had already made with Pope Rune of Truth.

If anything, he was a little curious how that elven old man had persuaded the popes of the other Three Gods to accept this “proposal”. Pope Helena of the Deep Sea was easier to talk about. Duncan had dealt with her in Pland, and he also had a link through Vanna, the “secret envoy”. That pope was more or less a leader who was neutral but leaned friendly. But the other two…

Frem, the head of the Flamebearer Church, might be interested in the “Chronicle Pillar” in Vanna’s hand. And what about Banster of the Church of Death?

Duncan’s expression shifted subtly a few times. Then he raised his hand and tapped the pocket mirror on the coffee table: “Agatha.”

Agatha’s figure almost instantly appeared in the mirror: “I’m here.”

“…Are you close with Banster?”

“In ‘my’ memories, there was a time when I received guidance from His Holiness the pope and trained on the ‘Graveyard Ark’,” Agatha said after thinking for a moment, not sounding very sure. “But that is far from really being familiar. There are many Saints on the Boundless Sea. I’m not as ‘special’ as Miss Vanna.”

Duncan rubbed his chin, thoughtful: “…Then you probably don’t really know whether Banster cares a lot about that frigate from back then…”

“He cares a lot.”

Duncan: “…”

He had not even finished his sentence!

“He cares a lot,” Agatha repeated. Then, as if she was afraid Duncan would not believe her, she carefully explained: “Even someone as obscure as me would hear him sigh over that beautiful frigate every now and then.”

Duncan: “…”

“Of course, His Holiness the pope sometimes tries to seem more generous,” Agatha went on, recalling. “He usually starts by saying ‘Actually, I don’t mind that much’, then sighs for a while, and in the end he finishes with ‘It’s just a pity. I designed it myself… Of course I don’t really mind.’”

Duncan almost lost his straight face: “…Isn’t that exactly really minding it?!”

“Ahem.” At this point, Morris suddenly coughed twice at the side, cutting off the increasingly odd rhythm of Duncan and Agatha’s talk. “I think that compared to that famous frigate the Ephemeral, the Viseran Thirteen Isles will be an even more sensitive topic at the gathering.”

“In fact… the Viseran Thirteen Isles may not be that sensitive,” Agatha shook her head instead. “Even though it was a greater loss, inside the Church of Death there are some priests who tend to treat it as a ‘Subspace disaster’. They think that what caused that disaster was the Dimensional Collapse Phenomenon rather than the Vanished. The Vanished only fell into Subspace together with the thirteen isles. It’s like a big fire where two people are dragged into the flames together. We can’t say that the person who climbed back out of the fire is the arsonist.

“This explanation did not appear out of thin air. Many academic studies on the ‘Border Collapse Phenomenon’ support it.

“Of course, this explanation is quite controversial inside the Church. For obvious reasons, the bishops don’t like this interpretation that ‘defends the Vanished’. But since His Holiness the pope has already accepted the invitation to the gathering, I believe he is ready to use this explanation to define what happened back then… or at least to steady the bishops’ attitude.

“By comparison, the ‘Ephemeral incident’ really was a… direct, undeniable attack. The Vanished took that ship away right in front of the fleet.”

Morris suddenly understood: “So that’s how it is…”

Duncan then reacted: “Wait, that ship really was called ‘the Ephemeral’? That wasn’t just a nickname people gave it after the incident?”

Agatha and Morris both nodded quietly.

Duncan’s expression turned strange: “…Why would you give a ship such an unlucky name?”

“…It’s the Church of Death’s naming tradition for warships. In fact, it’s our tradition when we name many things. For example, the main battleship called ‘Wrongful Death’, and the long-barreled cannon model ‘Sudden Passing’,” Agatha said with a calm face. “We see death and passing as a necessary part of the workings of the mortal world. Words related to them are not really taboo for us. And strictly speaking, the name ‘the Vanished’ isn’t very ‘lucky’ either, is it?”

Duncan thought about it and felt that the Gatekeeper was right.

Just then, Alice suddenly looked up, cutting off the exchange between Duncan and Agatha: “Captain, I finished my drawing!”

Even Agatha in the mirror was startled by the sudden noise. Duncan could not help looking at the doll with a rather odd expression.

Alice had had her head down drawing this whole time, as if all the talk and discussion happening around her belonged to another world. Now that she had finished her “creation”, she wanted to show her work to the captain without any worry or second thought.

For a moment, Duncan even felt a little jealous of the doll’s good mood.

Alice happily pushed the drawing over to Duncan.

It was a… clumsy piece of art.

At a glance you could see how unpracticed the artist was. You could even see that the artist was not even used to holding a pencil. There was no talk of any technique at all, let alone beauty or composition.

On it was a very big and very abstract ship. Dark pencil marks outlined the sails and ripples of the water. A few little stick figures with arms stretched out were standing on the deck. The strokes were a mess, but you could still barely tell the people of the Vanished apart—

Vanna was very tall. Morris had a pipe in his mouth. Shirley and Dog were together. Nina had little flames on her head. Agatha was a dark shadow. Ai perched on the mast. Goathead was sticking his head out of the captain’s cabin window…

Duncan stood on the highest spot wearing a captain’s hat. He was clearly drawn with more care, but was still crooked.

Other than Duncan, each “person” on the ship had lines trailing off from their bodies, drifting and curling in the air.

Morris leaned over curiously for a look, and his expression turned a bit odd: “Uh… As a first ‘drawing’ it’s actually… not that bad. But in general, you can’t see lines on people… At least you don’t need to show them when you draw.”

The old mister’s comment was very gentle, but Alice clearly had her own view: “But they’re really there.”

Morris looked a bit helpless. He raised his head to look at Duncan, and Duncan just started laughing.

“They are there,” Duncan said with a smile. His gaze rested on Alice’s first “masterpiece”, and slowly, a thoughtful look appeared in his eyes. “…This is the world in her eyes.”

“Right?” Alice said at once in pride. “So I didn’t draw it wrong!”

“But…” Duncan noticed another problem. “Why aren’t you in the picture?”

Alice froze at that. She looked down at the Vanished she had drawn and answered: “Because I’m the one drawing.”

Duncan thought it over and finally understood the doll’s logic.

He did not know whether to laugh or cry, and also found it a bit funny.

“The person drawing can still draw themselves into the picture—I’ll help you add you.”

As he spoke, he picked up the pencil Alice had left at the side. With a few swift strokes he drew Alice’s simple figure onto the Vanished, putting her beside himself.

Alice watched with wide eyes and gave a happy cry: “Wow! Captain, you draw much better than me!”

Duncan only smiled at that. He set the pencil down and carefully rolled up the drawing, then put it into Alice’s hands.

“Keep it safe. This is your first ‘work’.”

Alice looked especially happy: “Okay!”

Duncan then turned his head and looked toward an empty spot in the living room: “Is everything taken care of?”

Almost as soon as he finished speaking, Lucretia’s figure suddenly appeared in the air amid a burst of fluttering colorful paper pieces.

“Don’t worry, Dad, it’s all handled.”