Chapter 73: The Truth
Seawater, measured in tons, crashed down. In an instant, sand and stones rolled, trees were uprooted, and silt piled up on the ground.
As the salty smell of the seawater gradually spread, the residential buildings by the sea also began to be submerged. Vehicles were overturned, shops were washed away, and all sorts of miscellaneous goods were scattered about.
The manor was inevitably attacked. The high surrounding walls swayed the moment they hit the waves.
Just as humans cannot resist the natural laws of birth, aging, sickness, and death, the power of nature is the most irresistible.
If the streets before were gloomy and deathly still, and staying there for a long time would make one depressed, the scene now was violent and grand, making one feel awe.
It was unknown how many cataclysmic beings were swept into the abyss by this wave. Even if they were not afraid of death, their physical strength made it impossible for them to remain standing.
They were lifeless walking dead, completely controlled by Lan’s spiritual power. It was already mentally taxing to use his spiritual power in so many ways at once. To suddenly be faced with a wave was an operation of a much higher difficulty.
“Pfft—cough, cough, even if you flood the whole town, you can’t kill any of us,” Lan was, after all, a life form with mature logic and self-awareness. It was impossible for him to perform multiple fine controls in a short time, but it was still possible for him to struggle up. “If you dare to use your power like this, you won’t last long…”
Before he could finish, another wave crashed over. His figure swayed, and he once again fell headfirst into the seawater.
Xu Xunyue paid no attention to Lan.
In fact, unless he could get information from Lan’s mouth, he had no other reason to talk to him.
His target this time was not Lan, nor the cataclysmic beings surrounding him, but the manor.
The manor was the final destination of the previous clues, and also a place he and Zhu Hui had been preparing to go to but had not had time to investigate. Before he was exposed, Lan had also said something about the “core” being in the manor’s basement…
Of course, the last point was yet to be verified. In short, this place was worth exploring.
Water was fluid, water was detailed. Spiritual feelers, as if they were substantial, invaded the manor along with the surging seawater, brushing past every corner, every crevice, washing away the dust and musty smell accumulated over many years in the real world, and extinguishing the warm hearth fire that was burning in the re-enacted old shadow within the core.
It passed through the garden, through the long corridor, through the sculptures, through the fountain, through the large and small rooms on the ground floor, the living room, the guest room, the master bedroom, the study, the storage room… and also soaked the paintings on the walls and the withered dried flowers in the vases.
The seawater swept through, leaving an invisible spiritual mark. The spiritual feelers transmitted the obtained information into his mind. Xu Xunyue’s mind swayed, and he saw a scene from fourteen years ago, a vibrant manor with people coming and going.
On the garden lawn, three teenagers in their early teens were competing with their mini-aircrafts, laughing and joking continuously. The three mini-aircrafts were flying dangerously at a height of five or six meters, wobbling, as if they were about to crash in the next moment.
“Hey, hey, hey, lean to the left a little, we’re about to crash!”
“Why should I let you? Why not you let me?”
Not far away, a well-dressed middle-aged man stood in the long corridor. He had a proper appearance and a scholarly temperament, looking like the owner of this manor. At this time, he was looking at the three juniors bickering with a gentle gaze.
“How can you be so unreasonable? Let’s just call it a day. I’m not playing with you anymore.”
“Tch, if you don’t want to play, then don’t. It’s not like I’m begging you.”
The youths had a messy argument and soon dispersed.
The garden, without the noise and the mini-aircrafts, seemed a little empty. The middle-aged man was still standing under the eaves. With the figures he could subconsciously capture gone from his field of vision, his gaze began to wander with his thoughts.
Gradually, his expression went from relaxed to tense, and his eyebrows also slightly furrowed.
At this time, a person dressed as a butler passed by. His footsteps suddenly paused, and he changed direction and walked toward him.
“My lord, you’ve been standing here for a long time. Are you still considering the experiment?”
The middle-aged man nodded.
“I’m thinking… whether I should do this kind of experiment or not,” he looked a little absent-minded. “If the experiment is successful, the Empire’s combat power will increase exponentially.”
The butler looked at him, wanting to say something but hesitating.
“What do you want to say?” the man said directly.
“I… my lord, I was thinking, the entire land seems to be in a state of peace now. Combat ability might not be necessary?”
“That’s right, but the conditions are really rare. I’m almost forty, and this is the first time I’ve encountered such a policy. The peace outside has given us a chance to develop steadily. If we were to develop it during a war, it would be too late… I just don’t know if the Emperor will approve it if I report it.”
The middle-aged man’s expression and tone were always gentle, but his words revealed a certain determination.
The butler knew what he was alluding to. A hundred years ago, a huge crisis had broken out on this land. It was at that time that the Empire had established the White Tower, using it to protect the kindling of human survival.
The White Tower had indeed protected the people and led them out of the disaster. In the following days, the Imperial Capital was rebuilt, and the Empire’s territory expanded. The White Tower was no longer the only and absolute safe zone, but it was still a symbol of peace and hope.
Faced with the natural disaster of a hundred years ago, humans could not resist. Then what about a hundred years later? If they were stronger, would they have the power to contend with nature? Could they in turn master it, domesticate it?
This was a question the middle-aged man had been thinking about for more than thirty years.
“If the Emperor doesn’t approve, the experiment certainly can’t be carried out. But can all the funds given by the higher-ups be used to develop high-tech daily necessities?… My research philosophy always urges me to make some bolder attempts.”
The butler thought for a moment and said, “If you really want to try, perhaps you can conduct a small-scale preliminary experiment. I can help you write a recruitment notice, saying that the manor needs some volunteers.”
“But not everyone can be an experimental subject. They have to be physically strong…”
The butler said, “Then we’ll find physically strong volunteers. We can write in the recruitment that there will be a bonus for successful recruitment.”
“Your suggestion is not bad.”
The man’s brows relaxed, as if the butler’s words had settled a matter on his mind, allowing him to see the light and put down the heavy stone in his heart.
But the details he inadvertently revealed showed that he had actually already thought of it, but had a little unease in his heart—perhaps it was an unease about violating the rules, or perhaps it was some kind of premonition.
In short, this unease made him hesitate. It wasn’t until the butler had spoken his mind that he had gone along with the original plan.
“I’ve wanted to do this experiment for a long time. The theoretical data is very mature. It has been calculated thousands of times, but it has not been corrected and practiced in the laboratory…”
Another wave of the sea came, and Xu Xunyue saw more things.
It didn’t take him long to confirm that this seemingly gentle but very stubborn middle-aged man was Huang Shao.
This person was a descendant of a minor noble, but he had no interest in the prosperous life of the Imperial Capital and had run to a small town at a young age to promote science.
At that time, Ghost Town was not called Ghost Town, and no manor had been built in the town.
Although he had left his family, a starved camel was still bigger than a horse. Huang Shao’s knowledge, temperament, and the property he had brought with him when he left home were enough for him to establish himself in the town.
As the years passed, Huang Shao received more and more respect. He had someone build this extremely spacious manor, and he also made friends, got married, and had children here.
The scenery in the manor changed with the four seasons, and people came and went in the manor. The sky above the manor began to have more and more strange flying objects. His children grew up, and he was no longer young.
He had achieved a certain degree of success, but constantly challenging new problems was his way of life. Huang Shao always wanted to develop something that would amaze the entire Empire.
At this stage, he had encountered the Empire’s lifestyle-oriented scientific research encouragement project.
Xu Xunyue had heard of the lifestyle-oriented scientific research encouragement project.
It had started fifteen years ago and was one of the major policies after the Empire had entered a period of peace and stability. It encouraged the research centers in all cities to integrate technology into the lives of the citizens.
Before this, the Emperor had many restrictions on the development of cities outside the Imperial Capital, and the scientific research development in other cities was not free. This policy had liberated a large part of the autonomous research and development authority, and had also issued a huge amount of funds and data samples for scientific research.
Ghost Town was not large, and originally had no research center. When Huang Shao went there, he had only set up a small laboratory in the basement of his manor.
However, after the policy, Ghost Town had the qualification to establish a research center, and Huang Shao became the person in charge of the new research center.
This had greatly helped Huang Shao’s experiments, and Huang Shao naturally wanted to show off his skills. He had an ordinary physique, so he began to privately develop a potion that could tap into human potential.
A continuous sound of shattering was heard. The water current washed away the stones, bricks, and steel. The manor’s surrounding walls collapsed with a crash, and the fountain sculptures were swept into a vortex.
More seawater rushed into the long corridors, into the houses with the characteristics of the previous era.
Countless black shadows were mixed in, seeping into deeper places along with the water current.
Huang Shao’s private laboratory was within the manor, while the new research center of Ghost Town was in another direction of the town. The two were not adjacent. The research that complied with the policy was carried out in the new research center, while his own preliminary experiments were carried out in the manor.
Most of the townspeople were ordinary people living their own lives. Even if they were Guides or Sentinels, their combat ability was not very strong.
They didn’t know what Huang Shao was up to, and even if they did, they didn’t think it was a big deal.
—Anyway, they’re giving money. Whoever wants money can go. Lord Huang Shao is a big shot in the town. You have to give him some face, right?
The buildings in the real world were destroyed, but the image reflected by Xu Xunyue’s spiritual feelers was still changing.
A young man with an ordinary appearance came here and walked out with a slightly pale face. A middle-aged man who wanted to earn extra money came in and left with a spring in his step a day later. A half-grown youth was peeking around the edge of the manor, looking sneaky but not coming in, probably very curious about the “volunteers.”
It didn’t seem like a big deal. It seemed that it was fine to be a volunteer. The townspeople’s acceptance was getting higher and higher.
Then the experiment failed.
The bottles and jars in the small laboratory were shattered, and the poisonous drugs overflowed, contaminating the town’s air, water, and every inch of land.
The chemical reagents purchased and refined with a huge amount of funds caused the temperature here to drop sharply, and a strange rain began to fall from the sky.
The people walking on the land, drinking the local water, and breathing the air here began to fall, and then “resurrected” after they fell.
Some of them wandered in the town, while others went out, bringing the contamination to other cities. The harmful substances were upgraded, and the speed of their spread became faster and faster, and more and more difficult to eliminate.
And so, more and more places became strange. Torrential rain and snow poured down, and countless plains were swallowed.
Huang Shao had died the moment the experiment failed, and everyone in the entire manor had died on that day. He had originally wanted to create a more powerful species and force to fight against nature, but he was the first to die under the nature he had catalyzed. The serious consequences of the experiment had affected the ecological environment of this land, and everyone was living under the influence of the Cataclysm.
Displaced, separated from their flesh and blood.
Ghost Town, a once ordinary but livable and prosperous small town, had become the most dangerous cataclysm zone after the Cataclysm.
Because it was the source of the contamination.
Later, one team after another of Guides and Sentinels entered here, but not many had truly found what they were looking for and returned safely.
Splash…
Finally, the seawater seeped into the basement through the cracks in the ground.
Xu Xunyue’s vision followed his spiritual feelers, taking in the entire basement, that is, the small laboratory.
Experimental equipment, tables and chairs, a folding bed, simple daily necessities, a mirror… the owner of the basement had practically turned this place into his second bedroom. It was clear that he was indeed very passionate about research.
In the center of the basement, there was a black sphere a circle larger than a human fist.
It was floating in the air and slowly rotating, emitting a kind of black light—yes, Xu Xunyue could only describe it this way. It wasn’t black because there was no light, but a truly black light.
It looked like a solid object, but also like a phantom. It was filled with many distracting thoughts, which could drive anyone who got close to madness.
That was Lan’s core, and also the contamination core of Ghost Town.
Xu Xunyue thought, his spiritual body was always very similar to the contamination core.
It was unknown whether his spiritual body had existed before the Cataclysm, or if his spiritual body had been affected by the Cataclysm and had become like this after he awakened.
A spiritual body was a materialization of a Guide or Sentinel’s spiritual power. A newly awakened Guide or Sentinel could not release their spiritual body. Only after entering the White Tower and undergoing guidance, learning, and training could they release it for the first time and know what their spiritual body was.
However, even if his spiritual body was similar to these contamination cores, it was ultimately not the same kind of existence.
Xu Xunyue recognized his human identity every moment. His reason had never been lost for a single second—it had nothing to do with his constitution or bloodline.
He had the will and emotions of a human, so he was human, standing on the side of humanity, fighting for the future of humanity and his own future.
Now, the most important thing was to eliminate the enemy.
How to do it? This is where Lan was born. It won’t be as simple as the Endless Snow.
The seawater filled the basement, washing everything to pieces, but the black bead was between tangible and intangible, not shaking in the slightest, nor showing any weakness.
Xu Xunyue’s peripheral vision caught a glimpse of the mirror swaying in the seawater, and his gaze paused slightly.
In the mirror, his spiritual body had become a little unfamiliar.
The black of the shadow was originally pure and dense, but the black in the mirror was turbid and scattered.
The latter emitted an aura that made one subconsciously stay away, subconsciously feel fear, and was somewhat similar to the distracting thoughts on that black bead.
…This was perhaps the price of using power. The more he used it, the more he assimilated.
Xu Xunyue could guarantee his lucidity during the process of using it, but he could not eliminate the combination of power and body when he used it.
After he noticed this, his spiritual body, which was connected to his consciousness, began to become restless. While executing his commands, it frantically attacked the black bead floating in the air.
[This is a disgusting thing.]
[It’s annoying just looking at it.]
[It emits an aura that makes shadows sick.]
[I want to go home.]
[I want to play with the wolf.]
The spiritual body’s rough movements crushed the utensils in the room, but it did not defeat it as it would have with other prey.
“We are of the same origin. We are both the bodies of Guides, and our origins are also similar… As long as you don’t evolve into a complete form, you will never be able to eliminate me,” Lan’s voice came from the shore, across the sea.
At the same time, the side effect of overusing his power finally broke out. A tearing pain came from his spiritual landscape, as if something had suddenly exploded.
This pain was as if everything in his head had been torn apart and melted, giving one the illusion that they were about to die in the next moment.
No previous time had been as painful as this.
Xu Xunyue bit the tip of his tongue hard, letting the relatively insignificant stabbing pain and the sweet taste of blood stimulate his senses.
He didn’t make a sound, just lowered his sense of pain by 10%.
Only 10%.
Choosing to stay meant choosing to face it. Although he could completely block it, pain was also a kind of alarm for the body.
Xu Xunyue would not give up any way of sensing crisis and limits.
