Deep Sea Embers

Frame's eyes were instantly attracted to the huge "cane". He stared at it for a long time, and after a long time, he squeezed out some words from his lips: "...Eternally burning fire..."

After a few seconds of silence, he raised his head and his eyes fell on Vanna and Duncan: "Take it out, it's..."

"This is what Vanna means," Duncan shook his head and took half a step back. "She thinks this cane should be given to the Church of the Fire Bearer."

Frame opened his eyes slightly and looked at Miss Inquisitor in astonishment.

"Tarijin left this cane to me as a souvenir before leaving, but at that time, He didn't know the existence of the Deep Sea Age," Vanna sighed softly and said in a calm tone, "Maybe I The Tarijin I saw was just a shadow. Perhaps the Sen'jin in the Deep Sea Age were just 'replicas' re-created after the third long night, but some things... belong to whomever they belong, and the heritage of civilization should not change. As a personal collection, it should be more meaningful to give it to the Firebringer Church than to keep it in my hands."

There was silence at the table for a while. Helena, Rune and Banster exchanged glances with each other, and then wisely closed their mouths. Frame slowly stretched out his hand, and rubbed it carefully with his rock-like fingers. The rough surface of that cane.

The dense carvings on the cane seem to be engraved with frozen time, silently telling a period of civilization that has been forgotten by all living beings. In that memory that has long faded and disappeared, a race stumbled from the wilderness, moved to glory, and then came to an end.

But Frame couldn't even identify any of the words on it - he only felt that every mark on it was extremely kind, even so kind that it seemed to be engraved in his soul, but also extremely strange, so strange that it seemed like Text from another dimension.

A complex emotion welled up from the bottom of my heart.

"The elves had the same feeling as you when they first dug out those books from the Dark Islands," Rune suddenly broke the silence beside him. The old elf looked at the change in expression on Frame's face and said quietly, "We have experienced Go through it again, I understand."

"...There is a complete evolution of the words on it, and we can always decipher their meanings," Frame said softly, "The Firebringer is an expert in this field."

He suddenly raised his head and looked into Vanna's eyes with a particularly solemn expression.

"I will rub all the traces on it and use them to study the writing and history of the Senjin people - we can only take these with us."

Fanna was stunned for a moment, confused and surprised: "Of course...but you mean, the cane..."

"This is a gift from our Lord to you. It is the Lord's will to keep it in your hands." Frame slowly shook his head, "Moreover, Miss Vanna, the legacy of civilization is not this one brought from dreams. The canes that come out – the real heritage is here, it’s the history recorded in these carvings.”

The fire-bringer pope's fingers gently brushed the surface of the cane. Among the indentations of different depths, his fingertips seemed to have touched those ancient lost years.

"To this day, whether we are willing to admit it or not, the contents recorded in the "Book of Blasphemy" of those cultists cannot be denied. The true history of our world began in the third long night, and everything in this world is A 'replica' is born from the ashes, and for a world that is replicated from the ashes... the significance of digging out 'memory' and 'history' has far exceeded the pursuit of the 'relic' itself - Miss Vanna, we Just take the words on this with you.”

Vanna blinked. This situation seemed to be a bit unexpected. She subconsciously looked up at Duncan, who nodded slightly to her.

"...I understand," Vanna breathed out softly, "Then I will keep it well and treat it as equal to glory and life."

"Very good, then this problem is solved," Duncan broke the silence. He took a half step forward with a smile on his face, but soon he seemed to think of something again and couldn't help but speak, "...but the words Then again, after Vanna brought this 'Chronicle' to the real world, did your Firebringer Church not receive any 'feedback' or 'revelation' from Tarijin?"

"No," Frame shook his head and admitted frankly, "As we just mentioned in the meeting, the connection between the earth and the gods has become extremely difficult now, not only the 'voice' itself It is getting weaker, and even the information that is barely transmitted... is also mixed with more and more interference and noise. The only good news now is that the 'power' sent by the gods can still take effect on the boundless sea, but other than that Besides, even the four of us haven’t heard their clear voices for many years.”

"I can only come into contact with the goddess's vague revelations and occasional guidance," Vanna immediately added after hearing this, "Although the goddess will still respond to my call quickly, the 'response' has always been vague. of."

"The decline and death of gods is a process that is completely different from that of mortals," Rune also said, "We still can't decipher the secret, but it is obvious that they are still rational to this day - it's just this 'Reason' can no longer be accurately transmitted to the minds of mortals, as if there is some kind of 'cognitive deviation' between the two. This 'deviation' makes our minds increasingly unable to understand their voices. '..."

Lu En paused when he said this. After thinking for a moment, he continued with a hint of hesitation: "Frankly speaking, this reminded me of the story of 'Crazy Bird' again."

Helena's expression changed slightly in an instant. She seemed to understand Lu En's meaning immediately: "You mean... the essence of the current 'death state' of the gods is that they are gradually deviating from our world from the 'cognitive' level. ?The increasingly stronger interference and noise we have received from the Ark over the years...is some kind of ever-increasing 'crazy bird effect'?"

"This is a conjecture that I came up with recently - after the Qingfeng Harbor incident," Lu En nodded slightly. "This is also the only conjecture so far that can explain the increasingly intense 'noise'."

Duncan silently listened to the discussion between several popes. When their discussion almost came to an end, he suddenly spoke: "Actually... I just wanted to say that, I can occasionally 'hear' them their voices, or seeing the messages they delivered.”

Helena, Frame and others instantly fell silent.

The four popes slowly turned their heads, and their eyes fell on Duncan. The expressions on their faces were as if they had seen a ghost——

To be fair, with their abilities, they would probably be much calmer than they are now if they really see a ghost.

"Are you telling the truth?!" Helena was the first to speak. "You said you can hear the voices of the gods clearly? They even...send messages to you?!"

Even Frame, who was always calm and peaceful, didn't hold back. The Sen'jin pope, who was like a little giant, walked directly around the table and came to Duncan: "Do you have direct contact with the gods? By what means? ?!”

"Stop, stop, stop, I just said 'occasionally'. Occasionally, you can hear or see the news from them." Duncan quickly waved his hands. He knew that the four people in front of him had obviously misunderstood, "This is nothing. 'Direct contact', but it's... quite clear. In fact I have absolutely no idea what the 'noise' and 'interference' you keep referring to are - I haven't encountered them at all."

The popes looked at each other.

Duncan did not hide his experience of hearing or seeing messages from the gods on several occasions by coincidence - including the messages he had seen, or the messages left by the gods' communication that he had seen in the strange dark space. trace.

Of course, he withheld the specific content of these exchanges.

Then, the hall was quiet for a long time.

After a long time, the first person to break the silence was Frame. This calm Sen'jin man cast his eyes on Rune: "...This seems to at least prove that 'them' are indeed still sane. "

"Yes, stay rational." Lu En woke up from his brief daze and immediately began to think, "If this is true...if the direction of my guess just now is not too problematic..."

He paused and quickly sorted out his thoughts clearly——

"Then the whole thing can be interpreted this way: the gods still have reason, but their 'reason' has deviated from the minds of mortals, and even deviated from the entire world, so it is difficult for us to contact them anymore, and even the world has begun to Contaminated by them, but on the other hand, Captain Duncan is completely unaffected by this 'deviation' due to his own particularity..."

Lu En suddenly stopped again, as if he felt that there were some vague or unexplainable contradictions in his set of 'speculations'. He fell into thinking, but at this moment, Duncan suddenly thought of another thing.

"I remember...according to the conclusions currently recognized by scholars and churches in the world, the 'Holy Lord of the Deep Sea' located in the deep sea is an ancient god who is completely crazy and out of control?"

"Of course," Lu En responded immediately without hesitation, "The Holy Lord of the Deep is as completely irrational as the Black Sun. We have direct evidence for this - although humans cannot enter the Deep Sea alive, they can pass through complex and dangerous processes. Ritual, we can 'observe' the situation at that depth..."

"I have also talked with Holy Lord Netherworld," Duncan shrugged. "Frankly speaking, I think his mental state is actually not bad - although he said he has been having a hard time recently."

Rune: "...?"

Duncan looked at the ghostly expressions on the faces of the several popes, hesitated for a moment and decided to continue talking - after all, the atmosphere was here.

"In addition, regarding the 'Black Sun' mentioned just now, in fact... I have also met him, although we only exchanged a few words - he really couldn't stand it."

Rune, Helena, Banster and Frame all had the same expression: "...?!"