Chapter 746

Chapter 746: The Phantom That Passed By

The backward-flying shooting star slowly went farther away and finally vanished.

On the wide shoreline, only Tyrian, Aiden, and Agatha remained.

The ancient Lost Star still floated quietly above the sand. Slow clouds drifted across its surface as it let out a faint, almost sobbing howl. A dozen meters away lay the calm sea. Under the pale golden sunlight, the water looked like a slowly rising and falling mirror, and the tiny waves were much gentler than on other days.

In this long dusk, Tyrian finally broke the silence: “Gatekeeper, do you think that if the Sun really breaks apart completely, the Church will still have enough power to keep order between the city-states?”

Agatha did not answer. Faced with this sharp question, she stayed quiet for a long time. A year ago, she would have given a firm yes without a second thought.

Agatha knew she was no longer as devout and firm as before. That unconditional faith had cracked during the mirror world disaster in Frostholm, and thoughts slipped in through that gap.

But after hesitating, she still nodded lightly: “I believe my Brothers and Sisters will do their best… and so will They.”

“An answer that comes after thinking is not as firm as a believer’s, but in a situation like this it actually feels more reassuring,” Tyrian let out a slow breath, and a faint smile appeared on his face. “No matter what, we will do our best. I believe the other city-states will too.”

Agatha said nothing. She only nodded quietly, then turned around. Her figure faded into a swirling Pale Wind and drifted away.

Aiden had stood quietly to the side the whole time. Only now did he speak, a bit hesitant: “…What are you planning to do next?”

“First, have City Hall do everything it can before sunset. I want every person in the city-state to get through the coming Long Night safely. Second, order the fleet to make full preparations. I want every warship in its best state. No matter how long this night lasts, they must be ready to fight at any moment. Third…”

Tyrian paused for a few seconds and lowered his head to glance at the bag in his hand.

“Third, tell everyone to eat when they should eat, sleep when they should sleep, and live well. Ten thousand years ago, the city-builders raised the city-states in the Dark Age after the old kingdom collapsed. We will also find a way through this crisis… Doomsday is not here yet.”

“Yes, Captain!”

Flames cut across the sunset, leaving a brief bright scar between the clouds, then fell onto the slope before the cemetery. The spirit form flames slowly faded, and Duncan’s figure took shape out of the fire.

Alice had already gone back to the Vanished, while Duncan returned to the cemetery alone. He slowly walked up the slope he had taken many times before. In the slanting, dim evening glow, his shadow stretched long and wavered over the old stone path.

It was very quiet around him. Most people in the city had probably already gone home. There were almost no vehicles on the distant avenue. Only a few steam walkers were strolling down the streets. Workers sent by City Hall were checking the street lamps and gas pipes, and black-clad guards holding consecrated lanterns were making sure all the veil of night Sanctuary Worlds were in the right state. They all looked busy.

Duncan drew back his gaze from the distance and kept walking up.

He stopped at the cemetery gate.

A figure he had not expected yet found familiar stood outside the gate. It was a girl of thirteen or fourteen, wrapped in a thick light gray winter coat. She wore a fluffy knitted hat and gloves, bundled up like a soft ball of yarn. She stood at the gate, sometimes stamping her feet, sometimes walking around the entrance, then looking toward the slope.

It was Annie. She looked as if she had been waiting here for a long time.

Duncan frowned and walked quickly toward the cemetery gate. Annie saw him too. The young lady’s face lit up, and she ran down the slope toward him.

“Uncle Caretaker!” Annie called out happily and stopped at the edge of the open space before the gate. “I came just now and saw there was no one in the warden’s cabin. The black-clothed guards said you had gone out…”

“Curfew is about to start. City Hall told all residents to go home. Why did you run here?” Duncan frowned. His voice, muffled under the bandages, sounded low and a bit frightening. “It is not safe outside.”

“I know. I was just about to go home,” Annie nodded at once. She was not afraid of Duncan in his all-black clothes, wrapped in bandages, gloomy and stern. Instead, she reached into her coat, took out a small packet, and pushed it into Duncan’s hand. “This is herbal tea… please take it. And then… I probably won’t be coming for a long time.”

Duncan looked at the paper packet in his hand, a bit surprised. He stayed silent for a few seconds before softening his tone: “Do you know what is going to happen?”

“…The Sun is not right, is it?” Annie raised her head and looked into Duncan’s gloomy, sunken eyes. “The sunset has lasted for a long time already, and it still has not gone all the way down… I heard a nun say that if the Sun sets this time, it might take a very, very long time before it rises again… Mom said the temperature might keep falling then, or maybe stop halfway, and the worst will be the farms…”

She stopped. What came after that seemed too complicated for her. It was hard to understand, and harder to repeat.

Duncan stayed quiet for a while, then bent down a little: “Are you afraid?”

Annie shook her head, then stopped, and hesitantly nodded.

She did not really understand what was happening now, and she could not really picture what things would become later. Compared with the simple, obvious threat of the mud monsters that had once spread through the city, a slowly sinking Sun was a disaster much harder to grasp for a thirteen-year-old child.

But she could feel, from the lords’ reactions, the same tense, heavy mood as during the mirror world disaster. She had already been through it once.

“If the Sun never rises again, will we have to carry consecrated lanterns and tattoo runes on our eyelids before we can go outside?” Annie asked. “Like those ascetic monks—they always stand guard in dark places…”

For a moment Duncan did not know how to answer. He thought for a long time before speaking softly: “…The Sun will rise again. If the Sun does not rise, then something else will light up the sky.”

Annie seemed not to understand, yet also seemed to think of something. Her eyes widened in surprise: “Is it you? Will you light up the sky?”

“…Go home,” Duncan said with a smile. The bandages wrapped around his face hid it, leaving only a curve at the corner of his eyes. He brushed some dust off Annie’s clothes, not sure when it had settled there, and then looked up at the dimming glow over the far roofs. “It is getting dark… and thank you for the herbal tea.”

“Mm!”

It was getting dark—though it might still take a while.

Outside the antique shop’s window, the last splendor of the sunset had already begun to fade, yet the world still refused to sink into full darkness.

Duncan drew back the gaze with which he had watched Annie leave on the northern cemetery slope, and his eyes passed through the old shop’s window to look at the Pland streets in the evening.

The streets were already empty. Even the noisiest children had been taken home by the lords of their households. The alleys of the Lower City, which always felt too crowded and lively, now looked cold and deserted, as if the place had become an empty city.

But another steam walker broke the silence outside the window. With the clacking of its steam engine, the huge spider machine walked slowly down the street. Steam hissed from the exhaust port at the back, and the strips of scripture cloth hanging on its armor plates fluttered in the wind. Two guardians in Deep Sea Church uniforms stood on its back, announcing the new veil of night notice that the Grand Cathedral had just issued. It included the new curfew order and changes to the city’s functions during the veil of night.

Even though Pland now had a safe veil of night after the Black Sun incident, the city-state still felt tense.

No one knew whether the city’s “safe veil of night” would stay safe once the night stretched into tens of days. Even fewer knew whether, with sunlight absent for so long, something else might grow in the dark sea and crawl onto the shore under cover of night to invade the city-state.

If even Pland felt like this, what would the other city-states on the Boundless Sea be like now?

As the sunset grew darker and murkier, Duncan’s thoughts drifted. Then he put down the newspaper in his hand and got ready to stand up and switch on the electric lamp by the stairs.

Just then, a figure suddenly appeared at the edge of his vision.

By a shelf in the corner of the antique shop’s first floor, that figure appeared out of nowhere. It looked like a traveler with a hunched back, as if he had been walking on some long journey for who knew how long. He wore a tattered white robe whose original look could no longer be seen, his body leaning forward a little as he took slow steps toward the counter.

Duncan slowly stood up and stared at the figure coming toward him.

Yet the figure seemed not to see Duncan. It was as if he walked in another, parallel layer of time and space, his gaze fixed on some far-off, shapeless place. He walked straight through the shelf and moved on slowly like a ghost.

As this happened, Duncan finally began to see the traveler’s face clearly. He saw an old face, with deep wrinkles and skin that looked almost withered, as if time itself had frozen there. Then, all at once, that old face became young again. It turned into the face of a young man who had just set out on his journey, and the hunched body straightened.

A second later he turned into an old man again. His figure passed through the counter and was about to brush right past Duncan.

But suddenly he stopped.

He seemed to see Duncan—or perhaps only some phantom shape. His whole body went stiff as he stopped. His eyes opened wide, staring straight in this direction.

Duncan found that he could not read any clear emotion from that trembling face. Was it surprise? Fear? Despair? Or the sudden sight of hope?