Deep Sea Embers

In the wreckage area of ​​the World Tree covered in ashes and black slag, Morris, Nina, and Taran El's group have successfully found several knowledge guards who have awakened from the phantom.

As Morris judged, these knowledge guards who were equivalent to "first dreams" were dispersed to random locations in the wreckage area of ​​​​Silantis, but fortunately, most of them were not scattered too far, and Nina's A fireball was very eye-catching after it took off. These scattered knowledge guards came to check the situation at the same time, which quickly brought them together.

Except for the last person.

"Still no trace of Lord Ted Leal," a knowledge guard wearing a short robe, holding a scroll and a revolver returned to the temporary settlement, and told Taran El, Morris and others who were waiting here. Said, "I didn't see the sign of the promise, and there was no response to my spiritual call."

"Did he not 'wake up' yet?" Taran El frowned subconsciously, "That shouldn't be the case... The dose of medicine given to him was quite large, even if he had the physique of the Keeper of the Truth, it would take effect smoothly... …”

Nina looked at the slightly uneasy knowledge guard opposite, and then at Taran El, who was frowning and thinking. After a moment of hesitation, she couldn't help but speak: "Could it be that the dose of medicine is too large..."

Taran El was stunned for a moment, then waved his hands repeatedly after he came to his senses: "It's impossible, it's impossible, I'm a rigorous scholar, how could I make such a dosage mistake, and Mr. Ted Leal is proficient in pharmacy, he's The amount of medicine taken is also certain..."

The more he spoke, the softer his voice became, and finally hesitantly added: "...Probably."

Nina \u0026 Morris: "...?"

"How much Blood Crow mixture did you prepare for Ted Leal?" Morris couldn't help but ask.

Taran Ayre thought for a while, raised his hand and gestured: "A bottle is about this high..."

Morris was stunned: "...you asked him to use a beer bottle to drink a bottle of mixture?! Ordinary people use a dropper for this thing!"

"Please, that's the Keeper of the Truth." Tallan Ayre spread his hands. "It would be too difficult to make him suffer from 'suspended death' at the level of mental dissociation. For an ordinary person, the dose is enough to cause ten sudden deaths." His biggest function is to quench his thirst. What can I do? Mr. Ted Leal even purified the potion, otherwise he really wouldn’t be able to drink so much..."

Morris listened blankly, and after a long time he muttered with a strange expression: "I remember that the Keeper of the Truth was not so exaggerated when I was in school..."

"Taught by the graduating class," Taran El waved his hand, "First he used alcohol to relieve his sorrow, then he used neurotoxins to relieve his sorrow. Now I don't know what's in the cup he drank from after class. I dare to think... Anyway, it is definitely not the 'dose' of the Blood Crow Mixture that is the problem."

"Sir Ted Leal may be trapped deeper in this dream, a place that even spiritual calls cannot reach," a knowledge guard next to him saw that the topic was getting more and more crooked, and quickly found an opportunity to speak, "This place gives people a very weird feeling. Just now we searched the nearby ruins in groups and found that as long as you walk beyond a certain distance, you will have a trance, a blank mind and even temporary amnesia. The psychic induction between each other will also become temporary. On and off…”

"That's true," another knowledge guard nodded immediately. "Selanie even said that she completely forgot who she was and things in the real world for a few seconds. She just felt that she was born here and wanted to be here. Stay forever..."

Nina looked at the two knowledge guards who spoke, thought for a moment, and said, "Isn't it really because the dose of medicine is too large?"

"The dosage I gave is absolutely fine!" Before the two guards could speak, Taran El was the first to hold back, "Miss, please believe in the value of a first-class pharmacist license - not to mention that I am a No one knows the inventor of the 'sudden death method' better than me..."

"Just because you invented such a 'sudden death method', the Institute of Truth should revoke your pharmacist license." Morris couldn't help but muttered, but he still shook his head after thinking carefully, "It should be related to the side effects of the medicine. It has nothing to do with it, the situation mentioned by the two knowledge guards is more like the 'Dream of the Nameless One' itself affecting them."

Nina blinked when she heard this: "But the two of us have been operating here for such a long time, and we don't feel this way..."

Morris thought for a moment, then raised his head and looked at the majestic tree canopy wreckage in the distance and the phantoms wandering confusedly among the wreckage: "Maybe... because we are not elves after all."

Nina instantly understood what the teacher meant, and Taran El and the surrounding elven guardians also looked thoughtful.

After a brief silence, Taran El slowly stood up and came to a nearby boulder, looking into the distance with a complex expression.

Stretching blackened remains extended and undulated in his field of vision. The majestic tree crowns collapsed and collapsed, turning into mountains and valleys on the earth. Ash covered the earth, and dead branches were crisscrossed in the ashes.

Like a giant city falling from the sky to the earth, its ruins falling apart, the desolate memory still lingers on this land after destruction, melting into the wind and sand.

Taran El tried his best to imagine what this place must have been like.

There was once a forest here, a lush forest under the shade of the World Tree. The valleys and hills here were once full of life. The roots of giant trees undulated on the earth. Clear streams ran through the valleys, and many creatures lived there. Here - birds, beasts, elves.

Those were "ancestors" that he had never seen before, living in another era.

The lushness and vitality of that era far exceeded the imagination of today's people, but compared to that vitality, what may be more difficult to imagine is order and tranquility.

It is said that the distant Pland and Frost have already ushered in this kind of peace - but the "Captain Duncan" also said that even the "tranquility" of Pland and Frost now is not as good as the world before the Great Annihilation. .

Taran El found that his imagination had hit a wall.

He found that no matter how much he imagined, what emerged in his mind was not a vivid picture - the cold words from the books he had read diffused into his memory, but what was sketched in his mind could only be a superficial and general impression. He finally knew what the "forest" looked like from his dream, but he couldn't imagine how the birds and animals could live in this boundless green ocean, and how the elves could coexist with such a "forest"...

People say that the most complete inheritance is left in the ancient elves’ books and oral stories. If one day, archaeologists can really restore the appearance of the world before the Great Annihilation, it must also look like the world that was sleeping in the world. In Qingfeng Harbor and Moko's library.

But now Taran El realized—that was no longer the case.

One day a long time ago, when the sea swallowed up the world, it withered away with Selendis.

But...what exactly destroyed Silantis? What exactly caused the Great Annihilation to occur?

A scorching wind suddenly blew from nowhere, carrying an unsettling sharp noise - not the intermittent and disorderly breeze in the ruins, but a more intense one that seemed to be filled with panic and disillusionment. , a roar that can directly sweep through the mind.

Taran El suddenly woke up from his reverie.

This fierce whistling wind almost swept him away from the earth. He struggled to stand firm in the wind, but found that the surroundings had been plunged into darkness and chaos at some point, as if the light of the entire world had converged in an instant. When I stood up, the ruins of the giant trees in sight turned into high and low twisted shadows, and huge smoke rose from the sky above those shadows, as if the World Tree began to burn again, and the original gathering here The other knowledge guards at the foothold, as well as Morris and Nina, have disappeared from his sight.

The strong wind began to howl, and the dark sand and dust swept past the burning World Tree. Taran Ayre fell from the boulder in embarrassment, and rolled several times before he hit a huge "branch". He stopped - it was a huge branch that was slightly curved like a spine. He hit its root, and then subconsciously looked up at the sky.

The sky is "sunken".

In the chaos, Taran El saw an unimaginable sight.

The hazy red light penetrated the clouds, and the dim sky collapsed downwards as if it was being squeezed by something. The clouds were twisting, and the light in the clouds was even bending, as if something huge and terrifying was gradually crushing it. Down, he even wanted to "flatten" the whole world. The huge terrifying pressure brought by this scene even made him suffocate instantly, and even his thinking became stagnant. And in this suffocation and fear, he saw the white floating Light.

Dots of white glimmers filled the air from the burning remains of Sirantes, gradually converging into light streams in the air. The glimmers of light flowed between the huge branches and the scorched earth, as if they were sensing something. , gradually gathering in front of Taran El.

Taran El's eyes widened. He felt a warm power in the stream of light, but for some reason, great panic and uneasiness surged into his heart at the same time - he stared at the light until The latter gathered into a hazy ball of light in front of him.

The light group had no form, but it seemed to have intelligence. It slowly rotated around Taran El, seeming to be observing something curiously.

Then, it suddenly stopped.

Taran El heard a sharp whistling sound - the whistling sound seemed to drill directly into his brain and drill a hole out of his brain.

The voice was childish, filled with great fear and a kind of crazy anger.

"No! You are not elves!"