In the Forsaken Land of the Gods, the City of Silver's exploration team once again arrived at Afternoon Town. This time, the exploration team was accompanied by two elders from the Council of Six, led personally by Chief Colin Iliad, the former "Demon Hunter" and now "Silver Knight."
Afternoon Town was on the edge of the Giant King's Court's radiation range, and a spreading twilight could already be seen in the western sky.
Derrick stood at the edge of the encampment, his eyes flowing with brilliant golden light, outlining one mysterious three-dimensional symbol after another.
This was a secret technique taught by Leyton, which allowed him to project his gaze to very distant places through the interaction of information, similar to a mystic version of a telescope.
Beneath the twilight in the west, where dusk solidified and shrouded, he saw numerous palaces, high towers, and majestically constructed building complexes.
Even though it was just a corner of the Giant King's Court, they were still magnificent and grand, like miracles only found in myths and legends, frozen in the long flow of time.
If this exploration could succeed, the City of Silver, everyone, would be redeemed and escape the darkness. As these thoughts flickered, Derrick clasped his hands together and softly prayed to Mr. Fool.
In the Southern Continent, at Oleston Port along the Paz River Valley, inside the captain's cabin of the Dawn, which was docked at the pier.
Streams of information penetrated the deck and walls, rapidly surging into the captain's cabin, converging and reassembling Bernadette's body.
She held a rather peculiar grey-white stone slab, etched with many strange and mystic symbols, exuding a strong sense of majesty and power. Just looking at it made one uncomfortable, wanting to prostrate themselves in worship from the depths of their being.
Roselle, who was sitting in the armchair by the window, immediately stood up and beckoned to Bernadette. The grey-white stone slab in her hand automatically flew into Roselle's hand.
The next moment, the stone slab suddenly became ethereal, and continuous dark shadows flowed out from it, surging into Roselle's mechanical puppet body, attempting to transform and integrate into it.
Roselle's expression changed. His consciousness was uncontrollably rising, and the aura around him grew stronger, as if he could burst out of the Dawn at any moment, enter the Astral World, and begin the Black Emperor's resurrection process.
The surrounding light suddenly dimmed, and one star after another emerged, densely packed and dazzling.
The brilliant starlight intertwined into a vast Cosmos, scattering rays of light that fell into the grey-white stone slab in Roselle's hand, sealing it.
The tendency of the Uniqueness to return to his body was stopped, and only then did Roselle breathe a sigh of relief and exclaim:
"Is this Uniqueness stimulated by something? It's so eager to merge with me?"
Leyton's figure was outlined in the flickering starlight. He looked at Roselle and said expressionlessly:
"This is the instinct of Convergence. Even if you are just a puppet now, you still possess some essence of the Black Emperor. Isn't it normal for it to be attracted to you? Why did you dare to directly touch it?"
"This is beyond my control. It's an instinctive reaction of this body after seeing and feeling a High-Sequence item from the same Pathway."
Roselle defended himself, then, as if thinking of something or wanting to change the subject, he said:
"Did you get the last wish Zaratul promised you?"
"Although I secretly left some information near his spired church before, I didn't expect you to find him so quickly. It seems your control over information is much stronger than I imagined."
"The True Creator provided some assistance."
As he spoke, Leyton magically pulled out a dark, square talisman from thin air, saying in a relaxed tone:
"As you predicted, Zaratul indeed intended to break the agreement. After all, he is an Attendant of Mysteries skilled in fooling and deceiving others, and the consequences of breaking the agreement are relatively less severe for him."
"I pulled out some Worms of Spirit and characteristics from him; it's a bit of a gain. However, he decisively committed suicide."
Roselle looked at Leyton in surprise, saying with an unsettled tone:
"To force an Attendant of Mysteries to commit suicide so easily, I'm very curious what exactly you did? Even if he can revive, it's not infinite, and each life is equally precious."
He paused, then casually asked, "What do you plan to do next?"
"Go to the Forsaken Land of the Gods."
As soon as he finished speaking, a silver-white glint flashed in Leyton's eyes. He saw some of the future: dark storms and lightning intertwined, full of Fallen and tyrannical aura. In the depths of the dark storm, crimson, brass, and golden light spots flickered continuously, outlining distorted, strange eyes.
Below the dark storm, Steam was rising, and starlight was floating, indistinguishable from each other.
This scene did not last long, less than two seconds, and Leyton's eyes became clear again, though still slightly lost, as if he was still immersed in the scene he had just witnessed.
A moment later, Leyton let out a long breath and said:
"The war is escalating. The war might happen faster than you and I expected. You can't continue lying in the grave."
"Do you think I want to?" Roselle grumbled with a dark expression.
Before he could finish speaking, an exaggerated mist, tinged with scarlet, had already spread across the Berserk Sea, looking as if stained with blood. Just looking at it inexplicably made one feel restless, wanting to engage in a fistfight to vent their emotions.
After feeling the high-level power pervading the mist, Leyton calmly said:
"This belongs to a certain high-level power of 'War.' At present, only the Red Angel Evil Spirit or 0-01, sealed by the Church of the God of Knowledge and Wisdom, can achieve this."
"Of course, it's also possible it's a creation of 'Steam.' He participated in the Pale Disaster and saw the Red Priest's power, so it would be easy to create items with similar effects."
Roselle crossed his arms over his chest, gazing out the window, and calmly said:
"I'll bet that this was done by the stewed Red Angel Evil Spirit. As a former colleague, his being drawn in by the Eternal Blazing Sun is not surprising."
As they conversed, the clergy responsible for guarding this area had already reacted and began to pray to the deities they believed in.
Soon, a thick curtain of shadows descended from the sky, stretching over the Berserk Sea like a towering, ethereal city wall.
The mist, tinged with scarlet, passed through the illusory "wall" unaffected, becoming tinged with dark red, acquiring a sense of Fallen and sacrifice.
A thick, brilliant golden pillar of light pierced through the dark red mist, falling straight towards Oleston Port's pier.
The golden light pillar distorted strangely in mid-air, making a turn, and plunged into the sea below.
Boom!
Accompanied by an explosive sound and brilliant golden sunlight, a wave tens of meters high was stirred up on the Berserk Sea.
After the wave, brilliant golden specks emerged one after another, instantly breaking through the wave and flying to various parts of the port.
"The Church of the God of Steam and Machinery has made some progress in these past few centuries. This Purification cannon can actually be widely mounted on fleets as a powerful strike method."
In the captain's cabin of the Dawn, Roselle subconsciously exclaimed. Beside him, Leyton's figure had already vanished.
At the same time, starlight continuously flew out from various parts of Oleston Port, constructing in mid-air gates covered with mystic patterns and symbols, connecting to an unknown place in the Spirit World.
These gates happened to be in the trajectory of the Purification cannons fired by the Intis fleet, successfully intercepting all of them.
Having just intercepted a wave of attacks from the Intis fleet, Leyton hadn't had time to breathe a sigh of relief when he noticed some changes around him.
The original Southern Continent-style houses and buildings all disappeared, replaced by a steel city made of various machines, with rising Steam everywhere, rotating gears and chains, and neatly laid tracks, as exquisite as a painting, rather than a truly existing city.
Has my position been swapped? No, it should be that the area I'm in has been displaced, and I've been transferred along with it.
Not many could do such a thing. The first person he thought of was Zaratul, whom he had just tricked into committing suicide once. Is this revenge served immediately?
Joking to himself, he looked around, a deep pale purple color appearing in his eyes.
In the Eyes of Mystery Prying's vision, the scene he was in became an illusory book composed of pure information, and he himself was knowledge, text, and information loaded into the book.
It's Steam's doing again. Do they always have to put me in a cage before fighting the Hidden Sage?
As thoughts flickered, he saw a somewhat familiar figure appear before him.
He wore black armor splattered with blood, had bright, fiery red hair, and two deep scars on his young and handsome face, extending from his earlobes to the corners of his mouth, like two tightly closed lips growing on his face.
"My dear, we meet again."
"I'm very sorry to meet you this way, but they offered too much, so I reluctantly have to play with you here for a while."
Medici smiled provocatively at Leyton, his tone flat, but always inadvertently stirring up deep-seated disgust in others, making them want to punch him.
Leyton frowned slightly, controlling the emotions surging in his heart, and calmly said:
"What should I call you? Red Angel Evil Spirit? Sauron Einhorn Medici? Or, a puppet of the City of Calamity?"
"A very low-level provocation. You can call me whatever you want. I have no intention of arguing about these things with you. It's just that the reward they offered was too generous; I found it a bit hard to refuse."
Medici sat cross-legged on the ground, completely disregarding his image, looking genuinely uninterested in Leyton.