Sword of Dawn

Chapter 1262 Behind the Curtain

Hidden in the cracks of the real world, the truth that cannot be observed by the naked eye.

When Gawain saw those jumping shadows, he didn't think about it so deeply at first. He only thought that it was some kind of optical occlusion effect, some kind of illusion covering some real situation in the tower, but this The simple thought only lasted for less than a tenth of a second, and he suddenly realized one thing——

The three people on the scene, he is a legendary knight, Mordir is a legendary mage, and the last Amber, although not strong in combat, is a suspected shadow god, a person who has the ability to steal power from Lady Ye's divine kingdom The "Shadow Grandmaster" - this level of exploration team configuration, what degree of optical occlusion or illusion spells can simultaneously hide from their eyes? !

This is not an optical illusion, at least the power of the Miracle Domain is entrenched here!Some research results of the Theological Council and the knowledge he got from several retired gods quickly emerged in Gao Wen's mind, and he immediately judged that something that could almost interfere with reality was hiding in this tower. reality.

Amber reacted in an instant, and suddenly raised her head to look at the sky. Her eyes did not penetrate the hidden curtains in a "flash of inspiration" like the protagonists of the bard's stories, but some kind of vague Intuition still rose from the bottom of her heart, and along with the quick thinking in her mind, she subconsciously raised her hands, hesitating whether she should summon the power that might point to the gods.

This is the Tower Against the Tide, rashly using power beyond the realm of mortals might attract unexpected changes.

But isn't the situation in front of him already an unexpected change?

Amber quickly shook her heart, raised her hands high, and an invisible gust of wind swept through the center of the hall in an instant. In the swift gray-white airflow, shadowy dust emerged out of thin air, and was engulfed by the gust of wind and spread wantonly throughout the hall.

Gawain looked at the shadowy dust that suddenly appeared and expanded rapidly, and looked at Amber in astonishment: "When did your ability become so powerful?"

"I... I don't know..." Amber also looked a little confused, and said quickly while controlling the shadow dust flying in the sky, "I just want to summon a dust to send it up, look at those dust Can the 'infection' nature of the dust break through to see some invisible things... I don't know why so many suddenly come out!"

While speaking, Amber has quickly closed the "channel" for summoning the shadow dust, but the dust that has gushed out still forms a huge gray-white "dust storm" above the hall. She tries her best to control the flow of the dust, Guided them to hover in the upper part of the hall, Gawain widened his eyes at the same time, watching those gray-white sand streams rampant in the sky - the next second, he and Mordir took a breath of cold air at the same time.

The gray-white wind and sand swept across the roof of the hall, cutting the hidden "curtains" like a rough and unreasonable sharp blade storm. Severe corrosion, pollution, and even the scars left by some kind of parasitic structure penetration were exposed to the three of them. Black spots spread from the highest wall to the center of the roof, and many withered and dead animals were unknown. Something that is still a plant structure is entwined and adsorbed above the transportation channel. The traces of corruption are shocking, but what is even more shocking is another thing:

A huge crack that runs through the roof of the entire hall.

The crack was not printed on the walls or the roof of the hall, but floated abruptly in mid-air, as if the space itself had opened a wound; its two ends penetrated the outer wall of the tower, but did not damage the structure of the outer wall, and It pierced through like a phantom, its top touched the roof of the hall, and its bottom showed a crooked, jagged and hideous shape!

And in the depths of this hideous and huge crack, one can see the azure light continuously surging like water waves. Although he can't feel any power escaping, he only sees the bright and pure light, Gao Wen It was as if he could feel how pure and powerful magical energy filled the "world" on the other side of the rift.

The shadowy dust began to recede gradually, and the invisible wind in the hall also gradually subsided. However, the "curtain" that had been destroyed did not regenerate, and the disturbing real scene presented on the roof of the hall was still clearly presented. In the eyes of everyone, the traces of erosion and the huge cracks stretching across the sky occupy almost one-third of the height of the entire hall, but below them... other areas in the hall are still in a normal state.

Apparently, near the roof was where "something" had once occupied.

Amber raised her head, her eyes slowly opened wide, and after a daze for an unknown amount of time, the Shadow Assault Goose, whose reaction was delayed by half a beat, finally squeezed out an exclamation from her throat: "Oh my mother... this is a big deal Ah!!"

"What is that?!" Modil's eyes fell on the crack filled with blue light. He had never seen anything similar to it, but his instinct as a mage made him feel it. What happened, "That crack..."

"...Deep Blue Web Road, probably," Gawain's unusually serious voice sounded from the side, "It's also the first time I've seen it, but I don't think there's anything wrong with it."

"Dark Blue Webway?" Another layer of confusion appeared on Modil's face, "What is that?"

"It's very complicated to explain. You can think of it as the energy circulation system inside this planet. It overlaps with the material world like the projection of the planet. It runs through all the layers of our world, and it has an exposed You should be familiar with the 'Yongyuan' in the real world... It used to be called the Deep Blue Well," Gao Wen said slowly, with a deep and serious voice, and he sighed slightly at the end, "It seems that we There is trouble..."

As if to prove the "trouble" in Gao Wen's mouth, as soon as his voice fell, the magic network terminal carried by Amber suddenly emitted a series of rapid buzzing sounds. As soon as the communication was connected, Gao Wen listened. Byron's voice sounded from the opposite side of the terminal: "Your Majesty, is there anything wrong with you?"

"People are safe, but we found something disturbing," Gao Wen said in a deep voice, and then frowned, "How do you know? What happened to you?"

While speaking, he vaguely heard some noisy movements on the opposite side of the communication device, mixed with the voices of Melita and Noretta, as well as the rumbling movements of the young dragons. Many people seemed to be in a hurry.

"The two young dragons suddenly made a big fuss just now," Azalena's voice broke in abruptly before Byron was on the other side of the communicator, "They shouted in the direction of the tower like crazy, and thumped hard It seemed as if they wanted to fly over, we took a lot of effort to barely stop them, but they still kept making trouble..."

The young dragon suddenly made a fuss?

Gao Wen frowned, and then heard another voice from the other side of the communication device. Melita and Noretta seemed to be nearby, and their hurried conversation came through the magic network terminal: "...Noretta Leta, they look very anxious, they don't listen to me at all!" "They don't listen to me either! Nolei just bit me!" "Would you like to use the spirit soothing spell, but they are still young, so they don't understand magic. Resistance to side effects..." "Don't worry, don't worry, their health is fine, I'll comfort you." "Wait, Noretta... I suddenly thought of a possibility... tell me, could it be Can they see what we can't?!"

……

"Could it be that they can see things we can't?"

On the edge of the deck of the Winter, the two young dragons were still shouting restlessly. The two novice mothers and the accompanying dragon compatriots were trying to appease the two little guys who had become anxious for some reason. Melita turned her head and looked at her. Noretta next to her said with her eyes wide open.

"Something we can't see?" Noretta was putting her hand on the head of one of the young dragons, trying to make the obviously anxious little guy feel more secure, while slowly opening her eyes wide, "Are you Say……"

"I'm guessing—the dark blue magic marks didn't just affect the color of their scales, do you remember? Speaker Andal and Ms. Enya said that the magic marks may have affected their nervous system and affected their perception ability……"

"Gah!!" "Gah!!" The two baby dragons yelled again one after another. They suddenly broke free from Noretta's hand, and rushed into the air, circling restlessly above the deck while watching In the direction of the Tower Against the Tide, the still immature roar was mixed with obvious uneasiness and some kind of...excitement.

Noretta came to her senses, she glanced at Melita, the two raised their fingers at the two young dragons circling in the night sky at the same time, the invisible magic force forcibly dragged the two little guys back to the deck, the young dragons struggled subconsciously Get up, but before that, Melita and Noretta have already put their hands on top of their heads.

"Hey, don't be afraid," Melita firmly controlled the neck of the extremely powerful young dragon with one arm, and pressed the little guy's head with the other hand. She moved closer to the latter's ear and whispered in a gentle voice. , "Did you see something scary? Mom knows, don't be afraid, relax... Let Mom see what you have seen..."

The little guy calmed down a bit, and taking advantage of this moment, layers of blue rune rings suddenly floated on Melita's hands, and her eyes also turned into dark golden vertical pupils in a single breath. , Under the night, this pair of eyes full of magic power directly linked to the vision of the young dragon, and then she controlled the young dragon in her arms, and slowly turned her gaze to the direction of the high tower.

A shocking... Huge crack that could even make the dragon tremble filled her field of vision!

That crack was suspended in the sky, filled with eye-catching blue radiance, piercing through the clouds in the night like a solidified lightning bolt, and "splitting" towards the sea below. However, the crack did not destroy the main body of the tower. Instead, it passed through the outer wall of the tower like a phantom, and passed over the island of steel—then the crack continued to the direction of the west coast of Tarrond. Extending, winding all the way forward, crossing the sea surface with floating ice and fragmented coast, and sinking all the way into the depths of the earth.

It was like a wound, tearing apart the sky and the earth—but no one had seen it before, except for the two wyrmlings.

"Oh my God……"

Noretta's exclamation came from the side, which made Melita wake up suddenly, and with the interruption of the magic connection between her and the young dragon, the crack that stretched across the sky and penetrated the tower also followed. It disappears from view as if it never existed.

Melita and Noretta looked at each other, and they saw the same astonishment and... anxiety in each other's eyes.

The next second, Melita suddenly stood up and rushed towards Byron who was holding a communicator not far away: "Gao Wen! We may be in trouble!"

……

Gao Wen looked gloomy, and while listening to Melita's report, he looked up at the roof of the hall. The shocking crack was still floating in the sky, and the erosion and corrosion marks around the crack were shocking.

When did that crack appear?When did the traces of pollution and corruption appear?When Mordir Wilde came here 600 years ago...were they there?

Gawain couldn't help but have such a chilling scene in his mind - a great adventurer who knew nothing stepped into the tower, but he couldn't see the real scene in the tower. He explored, recorded, and studied in the hall. , However, just above his head, an indescribable corrupted thing is hidden in the depths of the invisible curtain, countless eyes are watching him, and countless mouthpieces are whispering to him...

He suddenly realized what the words and phrases mentioned in Mordir's confused speech just now meant—although this great adventurer was unable to see the "truth" in this hall back then, certain influences still directly interfered with the His mind allowed him to "remember" everything subconsciously.

"What shall we do now?" Amber's voice came from the side. This half-elf was full of nervousness, but at such a critical moment, she showed no sign of running away, but she just stood there as if facing an enemy. Looking at the terrifying scene above the hall, he waited for Gao Wen's next instruction.

Gao Wen didn't respond to Amber immediately, but first took out a small metal amulet of guiding magic from his arms. In addition to the very distinctive deep sea runes engraved on the amulet, another set of symbols in the core area could be seen. Precise rune array—it is roughly hexagonal in shape, and the whole is covered by a transparent crystal-like substance, and fine crystals can also be seen embedded in each node.

This is a "detection device" used to perceive divine power. It is the brainchild of the think tanks and technical monks of the Theological Council. Its principle is not complicated. Its core mechanism is actually a general-purpose inverter array. If a certain range If there is divine power inside, the inverter array will react, the energy balance inside will be shifted, and the crystal structure of the device will also heat up and generate a flash signal.

At least in all the tests so far, this detection device can produce a sensitive response to any known divine power, and therefore, it has become the "contact level" and "confrontation level" operators of the Theocracy Council Standard items in daily tasks.

Looking at the silent metal amulet, Gao Wen's face sank like water.

At first, the talisman didn't respond, and he thought it was because the "reverse tide" was too special, so it failed to trigger the talisman's alarm.

But now...he had an even worse answer.

"The leak has already happened," Gawain slowly raised his head, his eyes sweeping across the roof, "We are late, I don't know how many years late."

Chapter 1263 Remnants of History

Those traces of corruption and pollution cannot be formed overnight, they are most likely to be the "nursery" when the "Back Tide" was first conceived in this tower, or the traces left after the "Back Tide" activities, if According to the information provided by Tallond, the appearance of those traces can most likely be traced back to the ancient times - back to millions of years ago, the eve of the destruction of the Reverse Tide Empire by the giant dragon.

But when did that crack appear?

Gao Wen didn't know, maybe everyone didn't know, that crack clearly showed a state of "non-interference" with the entire hall, penetrating the material world like a phantom, piercing through steel and air, Gao Wen couldn't help it at all. Judging from the surrounding traces how long the crack has lasted here, it may have existed here long before the tower was built, or it may not have formed until an hour ago... as a crack that cannot be observed by conventional means , the "phantom" that will not interact with the surrounding material environment after it appears, it may appear at any time.

But Gawain had an instinctive guess, he believed that the thing should have been in the air above the hall for many years, and... it became a gap to escape.

There is no divine reaction in the tower, and no trace of spiritual pollution has been found so far, which is a disturbing signal in itself.

You must know that Modil back then was polluted by the reverse tide shortly after entering this hall, and began to immerse himself in the fanatical absorption and worship of ancient knowledge. Protection", he probably won't wake up until he is completely transformed into a believer against the tide.

However, they have been exploring this hall for so long now, and there is still no sign of spiritual pollution—of course, Gawain and Amber have special physiques, and Mordir carries protective runes with him, so they are indeed not easy to be polluted , but the current situation is that even the highly sensitive protective device has not issued any alarm.

"Melita said that she saw a huge crack outside... Although she didn't have your shadow dust, she shared the vision of the young dragon," Gawain said casually, "The young born under the influence of the dark blue webway The dragon can see the 'dark blue rifts' that ordinary people can't see... It's quite reasonable. The key now is how these rifts come from."

He did not continue to stare at the floating cracks and the blue light stream above the hall, but looked at a certain alloy gate on the side of the hall. After a short thought, he walked over there: "We should go to the upper floor to have a look. .”

In the "structural diagram" that emerged in his mind, the structure behind the gate was marked as a "personnel elevator". The equipment lines for are extremely rarely marked in green.

Seeing Gao Wen's actions that seemed to be very familiar with the surrounding environment, Hu Po and Modil did not show any doubts, they just followed immediately and came to the silver-white alloy gate.

After briefly understanding the operation instructions of this thing, Gao Wen raised his hand and pressed it on the wall next to the gate. A series of irregular colored light spots appeared on the originally blank wall. The system was reactivated. During a series of unsteady and smooth start-up processes, the light spots gradually formed images. A few simple buttons and characters flickered in front of Gao Wen like lights with poor contact, and finally stabilized.

After Gao Wen operated the panel a few times, he heard a "ding" system notification sound in his ears, and then the locked alloy gates slid silently to both sides, revealing the spacious elevator car inside.

A group of three people stepped into the car, and the alloy gate closed. With the slight vibration from the feet, a sudden mechanical sound suddenly sounded when the car started to rise—it was a series of weird and short sounds , is a language that no one in this world can understand. Amber and Modil were taken aback by the sudden voice, but in Gawain's mind, the voice was directly converted into a message he could understand: " Elevator up."

"Don't worry, it's just the notification sound of the elevator." Gao Wen casually comforted the a little fuzzy Amber, and then nodded slightly to the serious-looking old mage next to him.

As soon as he finished speaking, a clear image suddenly appeared on the wall opposite the elevator car. In the image, there was an endless and wide plain, a city filled with a large number of silver-white domes and tall buildings, which looked extremely advanced and prosperous. Cities are set like huge jewels on the plain, and at the end of the plain are rising celestial bodies - planets with rings, luminous orbs like moons, and distant and strange galaxies.

Amber and Modil were taken aback for a moment, but this time they had gotten used to the various weird ancient devices in the tower, and they quickly realized that this should be a very normal, The interface used to transmit and record information, so I was a little surprised and then calmed down. Instead, I looked at the scenery presented on the screen with serious and curious eyes.

At this moment, the picture began to change again, and it began to show cities with different styles, pieces of spectacular or magnificent or mysterious alien scenes, skies with different scenery, strange and vast sea of ​​stars, standing on the ground Some kind of launching device, passing the transportation between the sky and the earth...

On some screens, Gao Wen also saw words that seemed to be slogans-they were constantly refreshed, depicting the route leading to the depths of the stars or the engineering plans developed by some alien stars, and in this constant refreshment , a scene suddenly appeared in front of his eyes, causing his pupils to shrink instantly——

He saw a planet with blue sea and yellow-green land floating quietly in the dark and deep space background. Above the planet's equator was an astonishingly unfinished ring-shaped giant structure, and the unfinished parts of the giant structure seemed to be countless. The bony skeletons stretched in the starry sky, and between those skeletons, countless light spots could be seen shuttling back and forth. A large number of space machines were transporting materials for this giant structure, or installing new structures for it.

Gao Wen looked at the bottom of the screen, and saw the accompanying promotional text——

"The next expedition will start from now on. May this planet that has suffered so much be healed in the years, and may 'Sky' and 'Sentinel' be able to witness the next dawn of this planet."

Gao Wen's gaze was fixed on the scene presented on the screen in front of him, on the space giant structure of the unfinished Sky Station on the screen, and on the line of text at the bottom of the screen, on the most critical part of the text. Two words—"Sky" and "Sentinel"!

At this moment, the picture in front of him suddenly disappeared, a slight vibration came from under his feet, and the synthesized sound of the elevator system entered his ears, interrupting the ups and downs of thoughts in his mind like a storm: "Arrival... On the second floor, the elevator door opens."

The door of the elevator car slid open to both sides, and Amber noticed the strange expression on Gao Wen's face, and couldn't help asking with some concern: "Hey, what's wrong with you? Did you see anything just now?"

Gao Wen collected himself, turned around and walked towards the exit of the car, and said in a very serious tone: "The 'sentry' was mentioned in those pictures just now!"

He didn't hide his discovery, not only did he not want to hide it, but he was ready to tell the Theocracy Council all the discoveries he made here, and all the heads of the member states of the Council—this thing involves the whole world There is no benefit in hiding the safety of the world.

He is Gawain Cecil, one of the main leaders of the alliance, he does not need to consider explaining to anyone how he got clues from these ancient ruins that others cannot understand, and no one in the alliance is qualified to ask He explained the source of the information.

He just needs to let the people who should know these things know all the information, and then let these people do their best.

The clue of the "sentry" points to the sailor—although Gawain still has no evidence to prove that the "sentry" mentioned in the picture just now is the sentry mentioned in the warning that Amber received from Lady Ye's Kingdom , but he could almost be so sure.

And it's not just the Sentinel mentioned in that picture, but also the "sky".

Gawain is [-]% sure of this point. It refers to the orbital space station located in the orbit of this planet, the "Sky Station" - when the founders built this tower, the space station was obviously not yet completed.

But what was shown on that picture was only the space station, and I didn't see anything that might be a "sentinel"... Is it because the elements displayed on the screen are incomplete?Or did Sentinel actually appear on the screen, but he didn't recognize it?

Thoughts in Gao Wen's mind fluctuated, and various speculations kept emerging and being refuted. He sorted out his memory, and he was sure that he had never seen anything marked as "sentinel" in that picture and many pictures before and after. , so I had to temporarily assume that the "sentinel" mentioned in the "promotional slogan" did not officially appear in any of the pictures.

Now he can only confirm one thing - although the monitoring system left by the voyager on this planet contains a large number of satellites and small space stations, its core is obviously composed of two parts, one of which is the ring located above the equator. Orbital space station, the other part... is "Sentry"! !

A strange feeling emerged in his heart, and the corner of Gao Wen's mouth trembled subconsciously.

His current body is a subsidiary satellite of the Sky Station, and due to the lack of authority of the upper system of the space facility group, he used the satellite data link to connect his consciousness to the main system of the Sky Station in this loophole, and successfully obtained Part of the authority certification of this main system, in a sense, he maintains a state of "Trinity" with the satellites in space and the sky station, but unfortunately... this "Trinity" cannot be directly transformed into Means and strength against Sentinels.

Gao Wen felt a toothache.

At this moment, Hu Po's voice sounded from the front, interrupting his already boiling mood: "Look ahead——there is indeed a situation!"

Gao Wen immediately calmed down, looked up following the sound, and saw that outside the elevator was another wide and spacious hall. The overall structure of this hall was similar to that of the first floor of the tower. The rail transportation system of the entire Tower of Against the Tide, but different from the first floor, in the lobby of this floor, you can also see a large number of columnar structures arranged obliquely around the transportation rails, and they are surrounded to form a huge circle. From time to time, a bright stream of light glides quickly across the surface of those inclined cylinders, as if conveying some information, while a low humming sound is constantly coming from those cylinders, as if some ancient system is still its internal operation.

The "situation" Amber was referring to was between those columns.

A large number of scorched black traces left after erosion and corrosion are scattered at the roots of some of the columns, and withered and necrotic structures that look like biological limbs can be seen entangled near the rail transportation system not far away. Among the traces of uneasiness, the most eye-catching one is a blue crack that runs through the floor and seems to be embedded in the air.

That was the crack that Gao Wen and others had seen in the hall on the first floor before. Part of its structure apparently "penetrated" the thick and solid floors in the tower, and formed a crack about ten meters long and about [-] meters wide on the second floor. The opening of three or four meters is now full of blue light surging through the opening, and the dazzling magic light is particularly eye-catching among a pile of dark corruption marks.

Obviously, the range of influence of Amber's "Shadow Dust" is not limited to the hall on the first floor, its effect of "breaking the curtain" has also spread here.

Gao Wen frowned slightly, and after thinking for a moment, he walked towards the crack.

"Hey! Be careful!" Amber was taken aback when she saw it from behind, and hurriedly reminded her loudly, "This place is very evil at first sight, so don't touch it!"

A half-elf who once pried the coffin board in the 700-year-old grave reminded himself so nervously "don't touch it randomly", which made Gawain couldn't help showing a weird smile on his face, and he looked at it without turning his head. Amber waved her hand, indicating that she knew how to measure, but her footsteps didn't stop, and she soon came to the area entrenched with traces of corruption, standing less than two meters in front of the "Dark Blue Gap".

He crouched down, his eyes carefully scanning the disturbing dark spots on the floor.

The advanced ancient alloy, which is difficult to be damaged by mortal power, is covered with potholes and depressions. The dark color seems to have been immersed in the metal plate, and these depressions are connected into pieces, outlining a more complete and larger outline.

Gawain narrowed his eyes slightly, imagining what had happened here - a huge creature with a bloated and shapeless body, it may have thousands of pairs of eyes and thousands of mouthpieces, and a lot of indescribable things. New limbs or tentacles, it already has a physical body, but its "birth" has not yet been completed, so it still has a form between virtual and real, and can pass through the floors of the tower in this form, but The power from the thoughts imprisoned it in this high tower, so this blind and foolish creature could only wander here all day long, waiting in the chaos that seemed to never end.

And it has some kind of unknown power, which can hide its own existence and traces of its own activities behind an illusory curtain, so...even if there are a few visitors in this tower, there has never been any Intelligent beings are aware of the terrible things above their heads.

"This used to be the main activity area of ​​'that thing'," Gao Wen said in a deep voice, he had already heard the footsteps of Amber and Mordir coming behind him, "Of course, there is nothing here now."

He stood up slowly and turned to look at Amber behind him.

"Contact Cold Winter, let's first send back what we have discovered so far to Agondor."

Chapter 1264 Entering the Kingdom of God

At the same time, the border between Cecil and Typhon, the Fort of Contract.

The huge energy released by the three energy towers rolled up a magic vortex visible to the naked eye in the atmosphere, which is reminiscent of the huge beam of the deep blue well in the past, piercing straight into the sky from the top of the tower, making people feel the thrilling huge magic power It is converged, transformed, transmitted, injected into the hall of the center of the contracting castle, and transformed into an arcane torrent that maintains the stability of the portal.

The huge portal device made a low humming sound, and the mirror-like circular space channel quietly floated in the center of the curved alloy beam, and the clean "mirror surface" was showing the scenery of the "other side"— —That was a scene that ordinary people only dared to describe and imagine in religious stories and sacred ceremonies, but now it has become a world that can be truly reached and explored.

That is the kingdom of the gods.