Chapter 735

Chapter 735: Quiet Changes

The cold, frozen projections of the cluster of Starry Sky caves swept quickly past the edge of their vision. Navigation Mainframe-Alice calculated the route home. Shirley, who had returned to human form, stared in a daze with Dog at the shifting lights beyond the flames and stayed silent for a long time.

After a very long while, Duncan’s voice suddenly reached her ears. “What are you thinking about?”

Shirley jumped in fright. Then she blinked her eyes, those Abyssal demon eyes filled with a blood-red glow, and muttered softly, “I just suddenly thought of something… I always thought the Abyssal Lord was a terrifying Eldritch God, in a runaway state, really, really bad…”

Duncan looked at her for a few seconds, then drew his gaze back. “If you had faced Him alone today, things would have been exactly as you say. Your mind would not have been able to understand or handle His voice, and you would only have seen His runaway state madness. It is the same for the other deities. In the end, what you ‘saw’ of the Abyssal Lord today was actually from my point of view.”

“Mm, I know. Dog explained this to me before, after you met with the Pope of the Four Gods. Cognitive Shift… right?”

Duncan nodded and said nothing for a moment. Ten-odd seconds passed before he suddenly spoke again. “Do you think I should have accepted the Abyssal Lord’s invitation?”

Shirley froze, as if she had not kept up. “…Huh?”

Duncan still looked at her gently. “If I had accepted, then all the things you hope for could come true almost at once. No more demons would run out to hurt people. No more people would vanish in the corners. The Sun would rise and set every day. The thick fog would not eat people.

“The world you long for, where many more people can live in safety and peace, would be there as soon as I took over the Sanctuary World.

“Maybe it would last a thousand years, maybe ten thousand, or even longer. After I take control of this world, every city-state will be as safe as Pland and Frostholm are now. Even the nights will quiet down. As long as my flames keep burning, this Boundless Sea can keep its peaceful look, until all resources are used up and the Sanctuary World reaches the limit of the lifespan it was designed for. That is the true lifespan the Abyssal Lord once planned, but never reached.”

Shirley was quiet for a moment, then spoke softly. “And then… everyone would still die, right?”

Duncan looked at her calmly. “Yes. But that would be after a very long time. Even if you remained immortal like a normal Abyssal demon, by then you should have no regrets left.”

This time Shirley stayed quiet even longer. She seemed to be trying hard to think it through. Dog stayed peacefully at her side, and it was hard to tell what he was thinking.

“Actually…” After a long time, Shirley finally broke the silence. “Actually, I really don’t understand it all. I think the Abyssal Lord’s plan is already very good. A safe Sanctuary World. It might not be eternal, but at least it is safe. I… don’t have such high hopes. Being able to live the last stretch of time in peace like that, isn’t that enough? After all… there is nowhere else to go.”

“Yes, there is nowhere else to go,” Duncan said softly. “Because this world is forever only this one Boundless Sea, forever only these city-states floating on the ocean, forever only this little patch of living space in the mist…

“But Shirley, the real ‘world’ shouldn’t be like this. This is just… a narrow cardboard box.”

Shirley listened on the side, only half understanding. Chains clinked softly as Dog shifted and finally broke the silence. “Just like you said, this little box cannot bear any more ‘possibility’, can it?”

“It is too narrow. The Boundless Sea locked in fog is very narrow. Even a few thousand or ten thousand years of ‘service life’ is very narrow. For the countless civilizations destroyed in the Great Annihilation, this little box is only big enough to cram in a small part of their replicas. And the limited life of the Sanctuary World is not even enough time for them to patch together their lost history once…

“This is not a ‘new home’, do you understand? If the ‘world’ before the Great Annihilation was made of many lush forests, then the Boundless Sea now is only a small potted plant. The result of the first three Long Nights was only to take a few flowers and grasses that survived in the forest, plant them in the pot, and pretend the forest still exists.

“But in truth, no matter how you water and fertilize it, it will never become a forest. Never. And it would only take one small mistake for even the flower pot to be lost as well.”

“So you refused His plan because you can already see it has no future,” Dog said slowly. “You already know another way to solve this, don’t you?”

Duncan did not answer. He only lowered his head and quietly looked at his own hands.

He blinked. In the instant his eyelids closed, in the first 0.002 seconds of darkness, he saw clusters of stars flicker. Magnificent rivers of stars shone in the deep sky. Huge star-forming clouds stretched between them like splendid curtains.

Even though he had already left that cavern, he could still see that “different scenery” in the first 0.002 seconds every time he blinked.

Duncan knew he was undergoing some kind of change. Those things that used to be hidden, now appearing in his sight, were only one part of that change. As for when exactly this change had started… he did not know.

But he knew that as long as he kept seeking the truth and tried to uncover the secret of his own existence, this change would keep appearing, keep growing, and keep speeding up…

He did not know if he was ready, but he knew there was no time left to prepare. Just like Navigator One had said, neither he nor this world had any time left.

The phantom of distant starlight reached its end…

A sea of blooming flowers burst open in the illusion. The short Conductor’s Baton in Lucretia’s hand fell lightly. A few crisp notes sprang out, and the Fear Demons buried under the flowers turned, soundless, into drifting ash.

Beside her came the hiss of pressurized pipes and a loud clang of metal. Morris punched away a Abyssal Hound that had leaped at him and shook his head with a helpless look. “These demons have no respect at all for knowledge and wisdom… Good thing I still know a bit of boxing.”

“The number of demons is increasing,” Lucretia said, her face serious as she watched the black gate that was still swelling and writhing. For once, a trace of tiredness showed on her face. “The crack is expanding. More and more demons are noticing this place. The whole island is sinking toward the Deep Sea of the Abyssal Deep.”

“The captain should be back soon,” Morris muttered, his throat giving off the metallic resonance caused by vibrating reeds. “Judging from the noise above, if the captain doesn’t come back soon, Vanna might just smash the whole valley open.”

Lucretia frowned and tilted her head, listening to the heavy booms that kept coming from the dome of the cavern. She shook her head slightly. “That doesn’t sound like Miss Vanna’s doing. It sounds more like the Sacred Island itself… It’s about to be ‘woken up’ again.”

Morris opened his mouth to speak, but before he could say anything, a bright green flame suddenly surged up from the writhing black gate.

In the blink of an eye, the fire spewed out from the portal and formed a spinning gate of flames in the open space of the cavern. A few figures stepped out of it, and the captain’s familiar, solemn voice came with them. “You’re right. This place is about to ‘wake up’ again. Tell everyone to evacuate the Sacred Island. Our work here is done.”

Lucretia was startled for a moment, then reacted at once. She did not even bother with greetings and nodded right away. “Got it, Dad!”

Before her words had even fully fallen, she was already moving quickly to gather up her Toy soldiers. After saluting the captain, Morris at once saw Shirley and Dog standing beside him. He noticed Shirley’s blood-red eyes, just like those of a Abyssal demon, and his eyes widened a little. “Shirley, what is…”

But Shirley’s eyes were even wider than Morris’s. She stared blankly at the Grand Scholar in his current “forged” state and finally squeezed out a line. “Old Gentleman, why did you turn into copper?”

Duncan also looked at Morris with some surprise and gave a small, thoughtful nod. “…A very special form.”

Only then did Morris realize he was still in his forged form. He hurried to focus his mind, silently recited Rahm’s prayer, and cast divine magic to reverse his state.

The feeling of a copper shell faded quickly from his whole body. Living flesh replaced gears, bearings, pumps, and copper tubes in a way that was hard to believe. A pair of ruby focus lenses slipped back out of his eye sockets, and human eyeballs grew there instead. He blinked, pulled the delicate brass mechanism out from inside his body, and finally smiled and nodded. “…The power of knowledge.”

Shirley was completely dumbfounded. “…That’s not what you and the captain meant by ‘the power of knowledge’ when you taught me…”

In such a short time, this young lady had completely relearned what “knowledge changes fate” and “the power of knowledge” could mean. She would probably never forget it for the rest of her life.

At that moment, another wave of strange howls and mutters suddenly rose in the cavern.

The writhing black gate grew restless again. More demons began to push through the crack into the Mortal Realm, their jagged bones and countless hands, feet, and tentacles squeezing out from the moving surface and crawling toward the cavern.

Lucretia raised her short Conductor’s Baton on instinct, but before she could act, Duncan waved a hand at the gate. “Go back.”

The jagged bones and countless hands, feet, and tentacles began to scramble back through the portal in a rush.

“And close the door on your way,” Duncan added from the side.

The swelling, writhing “black gate” slowly grew calm.

Lucretia: “…”

Duncan turned his head, waved to the Sea Witch to bring her back to her senses, and said, “Come on. We still have a lot to do.”