Sword of Daybreaker

As Lady Ye got up from the throne, Gawain clearly felt that the surrounding "atmosphere" had changed. The change was centered on the throne and spread rapidly throughout the gray-white desert. The originally chaotic but still bright sky suddenly darkened. Down, as if night was falling, the invisible wind in the desert also stagnated, all the fine sand and dust were crawling on the ground, and the "city of night" in the distance gradually disappeared in the darkness. In just a few seconds, only the purest and most monotonous scenery is left in this vast shadow kingdom.

The desert, the throne, and the ancient gods and visitors in front of the throne.

Madam Ye stood next to the throne, and Gawain's eyes were involuntarily attracted to the throne. A stream of light quickly caught his attention. He saw that the towering back of the throne suddenly rippled slightly, and immediately after that, it was only carved out of boulders. The surface of Cheng Cheng suddenly became as dark as night, and turned into a darkness that seemed to swallow and contain everything. Considering the scale of this throne, the darkness was just blowing in the face!

Immediately afterwards, Gawain saw the brilliance of the stars emerging from the darkness... Not only on the throne, but even the sky of the Kingdom of Shadows began to show the same radiance as on the throne!

The star map, an astonishingly large star map, began to spread to the entire Shadow Kingdom centered on Lady Night's Throne. This desert that was originally shrouded in a gray-white sky suddenly seemed to be floating in the boundless space. Covering the four fields, the stars filled the line of sight, and between the stars in the sky and the bright brilliance on the throne, you can see a line jumping between the stars, and countless signs emerge around the celestial bodies, among these signs. Occasionally, you can see tiny flashes moving slowly, light on and off, and everything changes.

Under this splendid star screen, even Amber, who danced the most often, couldn't help holding her breath. She stared up at the sky with wide eyes. After several seconds, she took a deep breath as if she had just reacted. Although Gawain was not so startled, he was stunned for a moment before he realized that this was the star map that the sailor gave to Lady Ye for safekeeping, and it was the complete form of the star map!

Moreover, this star map changes in real time. It is not only a historical data, but also a monitoring image sent back in real time by countless data sites in the universe set up by the navigator!

"This is the star map left by the sailor," Gawain finally said softly to himself after a long time, "The star map keeper... I originally imagined what the star map you kept would look like, but I didn't expect it. It would be so amazing..."

"When the first star map was handed over to me, the scale was not so large," Ms. Ye's calm and indifferent voice came from the night, "but in the past one million years, new data has been coming, It has also gradually expanded from the initial size to the current scale. The sailors are constantly sailing in the universe. Every time they go to a place, they will leave outposts of varying sizes. These automatic outposts transmit data to the 'star map keeper' in real time. It outlines the picture of the known universe. At the same time, there will be some wandering machines that automatically explore the stars, expanding outward with the star map keeper as the center, and finally forming the 'star map' that you see.

"To this day, the voyager fleet has left this space, the signal from the mother fleet is no longer updated hundreds of thousands of years ago, and the automatic exploration fleet also ended its mission about 100,000 years ago. Today The scale of the star map has no longer expanded, but more than 90% of the nodes on it are still sending back local data in real time, so what you see...is the true state of the starry sky every minute and every second."

Gawain quietly stared at the starry sky above his head. After a long silence, he suddenly said: "For a civilization that has just stepped into the universe or is about to enter the universe, the value of this star map is simply incalculable..."

"Yes, an immeasurable legacy. Civilizations crawling in the gravitational field cannot understand the value of the stars, but as long as they start to look up at the stars, they will naturally understand the meaning of this thing," Ms. Ye said in a deep voice, "and this is not only A star map is also a navigation authorization... The navigator can't help the primitive civilization too much, but just this little help is enough to make a toddler civilization leave the cradle relatively smoothly."

"...So the civilization that accepts this inheritance must be carefully selected," Gawain seemed to understand something, "that's why it needs many tests, and there can be no external help before adulthood..."

"External help will lead to the abnormal development of civilization, and in this world, the abnormal development of a civilization is the most terrifying thing," Ms. Ye's eyes fell on Gawain, "A civilization that developed abnormally gave birth to gods that developed abnormally. At the same time, this **** has come into contact with the knowledge saved in the star map. You can imagine what a terrible disaster this will lead to. You must know that gods born during the process of civilization adulthood are not restricted by the cage of 'the closed loop of information on the mother star' ."

Like a bell ringing in his heart, all the clues were connected at once. At this time, Gawain realized that Ms. Ye had to work so hard to avoid becoming the "God of the Starry Sky", and even went off to accompany him to complete half of the mission. What was the purpose of the visionary journey of the century, and realized what terrifying fate he had met, and at the same time, he heard the voice of the ancient **** continue to come from the sky

"The last word of entrustment left by the sailors is about the entrustment of the star map. They told me that if the star map is to be handed over to the civilization that is about to come of age, the 'representative' who accepts the inheritance must not be a god, and will always be Not God..."

Gawain blinked, and he had already reacted at this time: "So if I failed the binding test of the anchor generator before..."

Ms. Ye was silent for a moment, her voice low: "Unfortunately, if you really can't pass, then I can only let you stay here, because you have already been exposed to some core 'knowledge' at that time, and your probability of becoming a **** is very high. Still, keeping you in Shadow Kingdom is my only option to keep things under control after my plan fails."

Gao Wen thought about it seriously, and a smile appeared on his face: "Although it is not a good method, it is indeed reasonable."

"Yeah, it's reasonable, but it's not a good idea, but... Actually, I knew from the beginning that this preparation would not work," Ms. Ye seemed to laugh, "I believe you, my neighbor, of course you can Passing that so-called 'test' was more successful than I expected, but even in my worst predictions, I never really thought you would fail..."

This time, it was Gawain's turn to be a little surprised. He looked up at the pair of eyes overlooking the sky: "You have so much confidence in me? This sounds like unconditional trust..."

As soon as he finished speaking, Madam Ye didn't say anything, when he heard Amber next to him say something of course: "Is there any reason to doubt it, you are strong-willed. I didn't see you blinking when the tide hit the ground..."

Gawain turned her head in surprise and glanced at the Shadow Assault Goose next to her, but saw the other side's amber eyes shining brightly at her under the night, with an inexplicable pride and trust on her face, as if clearly It was Gawain who was talking about her, but she was proud of herself.

Gawain blinked, and just as he was about to say something, he heard Madam Ye's voice again: "In any case, this has been successfully completed. Although the current situation is not consistent with the plan of the sailors back then, after all, there is A civilization has grown to the heights it is today."

"...What do the sailors want?" Gao Wen's thoughts quickly converged, and he asked something that he had cared about a long time ago, "I mean, they made so many arrangements and left so many As a gift, they also set up a star map keeper like you... This must have a purpose, right? But now that their fleet has permanently left this space, then... "

"The voyagers... I hope there can be another 'sailers' in this starry sky," Ms. Ye said softly, "one who has grown up by his own strength, one who truly stepped out of the cradle independently, and one who can set sail from the mother star like them. civilization."

Gao Wen was stunned.

"Another 'Navigator'...is that all they wish for?" he said in astonishment, "they leave so many arrangements, just hoping that a civilization can set sail from the home planet like them? Wait, then that's the case. Don't they already have a lot of..."

"The civilizations taken away by the sailor's fleet will never truly reach adulthood, they are just embarking on a journey in a larger 'cradle of eternity'," Lady Ye said calmly, "the sailors will not give up and seek help. but the civilizations they took away, even after thousands of years, can only be 'passengers' in the fleet, they may become advanced, civilized, and able to be like sailors Controlling warships and galloping across the galaxy, but their ethnic thoughts will always leave a shackle that is not completely cut off.

"The existence of this ideological shackle is like an eternal shadow, constantly chasing these 'boat passengers'. This shadow makes it impossible for them to live alone without the fleet for a long time, and the boat passengers who are chased by this shadow...impossible Be the sailor."

Gawain listened to Ms. Ye's words, but did not speak for a while. He already had a clear understanding in his heart, but at the same time, deep in his heart, the one called "The Sailor", who left a deep legacy in the hearts of the world. The ancient group of mysterious shadows finally had a little clear outline at this time, and after this moment of silence, he suddenly heard Lady Ye's voice coming again, the ancient **** softly reciting a short poem

"...don't indulge in this illusory quiet night...the night will be broken eventually...

"...don't indulge in your warm cradle...the cradle will one day overturn...

"...don't sleep in the shelter of the mind...the shelter of the mind will become an unbreakable shackle sooner or later...

"Let's go, before the stars twinkle, go, before the long night ends...

"If you don't start soon, the day will come..."

Gawain raised his head suddenly: "I have heard this poem, it is in the debris left by the sailor..."

"This is also a legacy left by the sailors to the world, but not as 'official' as a star map," Ms. Night said slowly, "this is the last time a poet among the sailors looked back before evacuating from the sky station. I did this when I was on this planet. This poem was recorded by the Sky Station and passed into my database. You can think of it as a poet's sentimental expression, or it can be seen as a poem about this world. Hope and Reminder.”

Amber's eyes widened in surprise: "Poets? There are also poets among the sailors?"

"Why not?" Ms. Ye laughed, "Poets, singers, painters... Culture and art are available to every civilization, and the navigator is just a civilization roaming in the sea of ​​stars. They are mortals. Please keep that in mind at all times."

Gao Wen was brooding on the side. In the past many years, he has reminisced about this short poem more than once. He has understood this poem from various angles, but with the development of this world As his understanding continued to deepen, his cognition of the magic tide and divine disaster gradually became clearer. His cognition of this poem was very different from the original one.

"I thought at first that what this poem mentioned was just a metaphor for the division and division of the world or the wrong line of some dark sects, but now it seems... every sentence in this poem is pointing to the whole of civilization, And among the stars," he said suddenly in thought, "the illusory quiet night actually refers to the intermittent quiet period of the magic tide, right?"

Behind the mist, Lady Ye nodded slightly.

"That warm cradle... actually refers to the parent star with a suitable environment," Gawain continued, "Although the parent star is comfortable and habitable, how fragile a planet is in the universe, forever trapped in the civilization of the parent star, It will be overturned in the blink of an eye in the face of a natural disaster from the depths of the universe, right?

"As for the sanctuary of the soul... I once thought it was referring to the wrong line of some kind of mental anesthesia to avoid reality, but after I learned the secrets of the gods, I realized that this sentence actually refers to the 'ideological trend' itself Mortals rely on their belief in the gods to seek shelter, and the gods were born in the mortal thoughts to shelter the world. This is the real 'sanctuary born from the soul', and sooner or later this shelter will become a mental seal, right? ?"

Madam Ye sighed softly: "Everything is as you said."

"The calm period of the magic tide, the necessity of adulthood, the hidden dangers of ideological trends... The ultimate answer, in fact, was already in front of us from the very beginning," Gawain finally exhaled softly, although he got these answers at the moment. For him, there is no "guidance", but an inexplicable sense of ease arises in his heart, and at the same time, he also expresses a lot of emotion, "It's just that we can't learn from these sentences until today. read out what they really mean..."

"The sailor left this poem, not in itself to warn the world that the truth comes down to the bottom line, this is just the emotion of a poet looking back on a long journey."

Gawain nodded lightly, and then asked again: "Then what does the last part of this poem mean? This is the only thing I can't be sure of at the moment... I guess the twinkling of the stars refers to the moment when the magic tide comes, but Why describe it that way?"

Lady Ye was silent for a moment, then replied softly: "The magic tide itself is invisible and intangible, but when the magic tide passes around a star or a gas giant planet, the change in visible light produced will be the last scene seen by mortals before they die. The 'virtual celestial body' formed by the condensed air mass and the magic surge will 'map' the shadow of the magic tide in the process, and the shadow is usually bright red or orange, and this process will be accompanied by a violent release of magic.

銆歭帹効孪叅锛屽錭鍜阒呰勔嶔︾湡镄勫ソ鐢锛岃岃岃屼屼鬅劃徶у迺幓鹇鍙浠ヨ嘯雞惂銆 Umbrella

"These light and shadow changes on the surface of stars or gas giant planets can only be observed at a relatively close distance, while the violent release of magic can be clearly observed from a few light-years, or even hundreds of thousands of light-years away, so if the magic tide is heading for With an observer coming straight, he will first observe with the naked eye that the surface of the 'sun' closest to him is covered in blood, and now if he uses the magic vision to observe the sky, he will see every star in the sky They are all flickering violently. When the magic tide reaches its peak, these drastic changes will even make the entire night sky 'brighten'. Of course, this is a view that can only be seen in the magic field of vision.

"Considering that the speed of the magic tide traveling in the universe is actually slightly slower than the speed of light, and it also has structures such as 'pre-shake', 'after-wave', and 'boundary disturbance', the above scene will actually happen sometime before the end of the world. moment.

"That's what 'the stars twinkle' and 'day's coming' are the last sights that mortals who are powerless against the tide will see before extinction."