The Mysterious World Under Steampunk

"Does any of you know the origin of this thing?" In the big tent in the center of the pioneer camp, Baron Bernando, the head of the pioneer group, placed a snake-shaped gold statue on the conference table, and then was surrounded by All the consultants of the pioneering group called over asked.

Although Joe's proposal yesterday was very tempting, the cautious Bernando did not immediately agree, mainly because he knew nothing about the indigenous tribal civilization that Joe mentioned.

Bernando has worked hard in the New World for many years. He is very clear that the indigenous tribes of the New World are definitely not as wild and primitive as other people who have just come into contact with the New World say. These indigenous tribes often have some incredible things, and these things are often Deadly, like the man with the parasite in Horsehead Bay not long ago.

Because of this, any new and unknown indigenous tribe is like a gamble involving life for those explorers. If you win the gamble, everything will be fine. In the jungle, after all, there are hundreds of pioneering groups and adventure teams who died mysteriously in the past because of exploring new indigenous tribes.

In addition, the expedition team organized by the Nature Association is also very famous in the New World, but now the Nature Association did not use its own expedition team to explore the indigenous tribe, but found him through cooperation, which made Bernando feel that it must exist He didn't know about the secrets, so after confirming that he had never heard of the indigenous tribe that Joe was talking about, Bernando temporarily refused to agree to Joe's proposal, but found all the consultants in the pioneering group the next day and asked about the situation .

There are 34 consultants in the entire pioneering group. Except for the consultants like Leo who are captives, there are 31 other consultants, and 23 of these 31 people are assisted by the Lute royal family. Bernando found consultants, while the remaining eight were recruited in Matou Bay.

All the consultants that Bernando recruited this time were not academic consultants who specialize in research, but adventurous consultants who had rich experience in exploring the New World and had a good understanding of various indigenous tribes in the New World. Although adventurous consultants are far from being able to compare with those academic scholars in terms of writing papers and immersing themselves in research, but when it comes to being well-informed and able to survive in the jungle of the New World, those academic scholars may be flattering. Can't catch up.

So when Bernando took out the golden statue, these consultants quickly judged from the various details on the statue which area's indigenous tribe the statue probably belonged to. As for why they couldn't confirm which tribe it was, it was That area is located deep in the jungle of the New World. There are very few people who can enter and come out alive. There is no detailed information at all. Only some words and phrases have been preserved, and these words and phrases have been passed on by word of mouth. , has become the basis for these consultants to judge the origin of the statue.

Hearing the consultants talking about the origin of the golden statue, Bernando frowned slightly. From his expression, it was not difficult to see that what these consultants said did not satisfy him, and his heart was related to nature. The balance of cooperation is also gradually tilting in the direction of giving up. In his opinion, it is too dangerous to cooperate with an organization that has never cooperated to explore an unknown indigenous tribe, and his purpose is to open up a colonial area. Although the two They do not conflict, but they still influence each other, and this influence is unpredictable. Bernando doesn't like anything unpredictable.

Just when Bernando was about to decide to abandon Joe's proposal and not cooperate with the Natural Society, a not particularly loud voice passed through the noisy environment of the tent and passed to Bernando's ears, saying: "This statue comes from An indigenous tribe called the Mumu."

Bernando looked over where the voice came from, and soon saw Leo standing on the edge of the consultant crowd, and Leo's strange face made him hesitate a little, but he still quickly remembered Leo Who is Ou, and at the same time he feels something different.

In his memory, Leo was a captured captive of the Kingdom of Berente. This was the first time that Leo came to the New World. There are so many people, it is reasonable to say that they should not know about the indigenous tribes of the New World, and it is impossible to judge which indigenous tribe they belong to and know the name of the indigenous tribe just by a certain statue, which is obviously unreasonable.

However, just when Bernando was about to ask Leo why he knew about this indigenous tribe called the Mum, Leo continued to talk about the customs, culture, etc. When he was talking about the content, the other consultants around who were talking about the origin of the golden statue gradually stopped talking, but turned to look at Leo. Everyone was curious why Leo would treat such a native The Horde knows so well.

In this way, only Leo's voice was left in the tent, and the rest of the people were listening to what Leo said carefully, just like students in class.

Although there is a full notebook for the records of the Shepherds, it didn't take too much time to tell them all, and soon all the content was finished by Leo.

After Leo stopped talking, the people in the tent also realized that they didn't speak after Leo finished speaking, but seriously recalled what Leo said just now. For them, this was the first time they heard such A complete study on an indigenous tribe in the New World, which contains too many research methods that can be used for reference.

After Bernando recovered from his surprise, he couldn't wait to ask Leo: "Your Excellency Leo, how did you know about the Shepherds? I remember that you came to the New World for the first time? What did you say?" Is everything true?"

Faced with this series of questions, Leo just smiled, and then, under the watchful eyes of Bernando, he took out the notebook about the shepherds that Joe gave him, handed it over, and said, "What I said The contents are all in this notebook. This notebook was given to me by Joe Matthew. He hoped that I could help him prove the origin of this golden statue. After all, his reputation is not very good, and I think you will not believe his words. As for whether the content here is true or not, I personally think it should be true.”

Hearing Leo's words, Bernando was stunned, and didn't know what to say for a while, because this was also the first time he met someone like Leo, directly exposing another person's commission, it felt like an informer.

Everyone else felt puzzled at the moment, because from Leo's words, they heard that Joe Matthew and Baron Bernando seemed to have reached a deal, and the deal involved the native tribe where the gold statue came from.

They almost all know the reputation of the big talker Joe. Now after hearing what Leo said, they subconsciously had some associations, and they regarded Baron Bernando as the unlucky guy who was confused by his lies in the stories of Joe. This also made them I have doubts about what Leo just said about the shepherds. I suspect that these contents are fabricated by Joe. After all, Joe's behavior of entrusting Leo to testify is too suspicious.

As a result, some people immediately persuaded Bernando not to cooperate with Joe, and even suggested that Joe, who was also a consultant, should be driven away.

When the tent became lively again, Leo suddenly said again: "What I said before was all provided by Joe Matthew, I don't know whether it is true or not, but what I want to say next The golden statue is my own research and has nothing to do with Joe Matthew." He paused for a while, and waited for the voices in the tent to disappear before continuing: "This snake-shaped golden statue is called the Abyss Serpent. Because of an out-of-world species called Abyss, it possesses powerful power beyond imagination and knows how to confuse people. As long as one indigenous tribe is bewitched by him and regards it as a spiritual totem, then other indigenous tribes in the New World will be extremely powerful. It is possible that they will all become its believers.”

"Faith? Spiritual totem? Are you a supporter of the doctrine of supremacy?" Someone quickly revealed a few words from Leo's words, thinking that Leo believed in the doctrine of supremacy.

Hearing this person's words, some of the consultants around were very calm, but some of them seemed to feel that Leo's body was covered with filth, and avoided a few steps away.

However, Bernando didn't seem to care whether Leo was a believer in the supremacy theory. He was very interested in Leo's statement about the abyssal serpent and the species outside the world, so he asked Leo directly about two Related questions.

After listening to Bernando's inquiry, Leo quickly responded: "The extraterrestrial species is easy to explain. Everyone should know about ghost ships, right?"

"Ghost ship?" Everyone looked at each other and couldn't understand why Leo was suddenly pulled from the abyss snake to the ghost ship.

When everyone looked puzzled, Leo said something surprising: "The ghost ship and the abyss snake both come from a world other than this world, that is, a world outside the gray mist."

Everyone was stunned when they heard Leo's words, because Leo's words were beyond their common sense. The world was shrouded in gray fog. In their cognition, it was the same as breathing air, eating and sleeping. They are used to the existence of the gray fog, and they also think that the edge of the world should be the gray fog, and in the past, many people were curious about what was in the gray fog, and they went to explore, but no one came back. It's all ignorant.

But now, Leo is telling everyone with such certainty that there is a world beyond the gray fog, and the mysterious ghost ship and the abyss snake corresponding to this golden statue are both from the world outside the gray fog, which makes them feel uncomfortable. I believe that many of them even think that Leo may be another liar like Joe Matthew.

However, Bernando did not think that Leo was a liar like everyone else. Instead, he looked at Leo with a look of surprise, and before the others attacked Leo, he asked in a deep voice, "How do you know about the ghost ship?" From the world outside the gray mist?"

Hearing Bernando's question, Leo was also taken aback, looked at Bernando thoughtfully, and said, "You know that too?"

Bernando didn't answer when he heard the words, but just nodded slightly.

Speaking of it, this should be a secret of Bernando. When Bernando, who had just grown up, joined the Navy of the Kingdom of Root as a naval officer more than 20 years ago, the ship he was serving encountered a storm and he had no experience. He was knocked down into the sea by the mast, drifted on the sea for three days, and ended up on a deserted island.

On that desert island, he was not alone, there was also an old man who was also in trouble, but he had never heard the language spoken by this old man, so he couldn't communicate.

However, even if there was no way to communicate, the two still supported each other to survive on this deserted island, and the old man seemed to be very good at learning, and soon spent a year learning some daily Lute through various methods. Able to have simple communication with Bernando.

When communicating with the old man, he learned that the old man came from a sea kingdom called Sigma, and was a captain. He was mainly engaged in marine trade and traveled around the world, so his language learning ability is very strong.

After listening to the old man's description of his own origin, Bernando felt very puzzled, because he had never heard of the Sigma Kingdom mentioned by the old man and the continents and countries mentioned in his experience, as if he was describing a continent in another world Same as country.

Afterwards, the old man mentioned why he ended up living on a deserted island. It turned out that when he was conducting a normal maritime trade, he encountered pirates. In a panic, he drove the ship into a sea of ​​fog, and then got lost in the fog. , Later, the crew on the ship rioted because of food supplies, he was injured and fell into the water, and then drifted in the sea for a period of time, and ended up on this deserted island, where he lived for forty years.

Bernando was even more confused when he heard this, because in his memory, it had only been more than ten years since the sea fog disappeared. Before the sea fog was still there, no ships could sail in the deep sea, let alone He came to the island deep in the ocean, so he questioned the old man's words, wondering if the old man remembered it wrong.

The old man thought that he remembered correctly, and said that the ocean around the deserted island was indeed shrouded in gray mist in the past, until it suddenly dissipated one day, and he couldn't remember exactly which day it dissipated.

Although Bernando still thinks the old man's words are nonsense, but because there is nothing else to do on the desert island, he often asks the old man about things related to the fabricated world, and even learns what the old man said That sigma language.

Until a few years later, on a stormy night, Bernando suddenly saw a ghost ship appearing on the sea, and the ghost ship did not float away from the coast, but seemed to be pulled by some kind of force. He sailed to the desert island where he was, and docked on the sea near the desert island from the shore.

After seeing the ghost ship, the old man became ecstatic, shouted loudly that it was his ship, then rushed into the sea, swam to the ship, and climbed onto the ship under the watchful eyes of Bernando. ship.

After the old man got on board, the ghost ship quickly left the coast under the beating of the waves. Bernando had no chance to get close at all. In the end, dense clouds that could not be blown away by the wind and rain suddenly appeared around the ghost ship. The gray fog disappeared on the sea surface along with the gray fog in his eyes.