The Record of Unusual Creatures - Chapter 681

Chapter 681: The 10,000-Year-Old Conspiracy

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

“Every intelligent creature.”

As if to emphasise this point, the giant gritted its teeth and repeated the sentence.

“Of the entire universe?” It was unbelievable and Hao Ren sincerely found the accusation illogical. “Including those from primitive planets that never even possessed space technology? They were part of the conspirators?”

“No one is clean. They’re all involved whether it’s directly or indirectly,” the giant replied with a rumbling voice. Then, he stared at Hao Ren and the rest for a long time. “Since you’re so keen to know, listen carefully to how your forefathers committed the sin.”

“I told you I’m from Earth…” Hao Ren forced a smile, and then sighed. “Well, as you say, I really want to know.”

Just as Hao Ren expected, the giant was easier to talk to than the mute brain monsters.

Although the giant had a great deal of hatred towards the ordinary races, it was obviously rational, controllable, or in other words, its anger had a “human” side to it. The anger of the brain-monsters was more like the natural impulse of a beast whose fury was uncontrollable and devoid of human nature, their hatred towards the mortals was unconditional and uncompromising; hence, the attempts of Hao Ren to talk to the brain-monsters were futile.

The reasons for this change were unclear, but it must be relative to the changes in their forms of existence. It was safe to say that individual giants that had mutated into brain-monsters had turned into another different species. Hao Ren had no clue if the giant in front of him was still treating its own race that had mutated into brain-monsters as his own kind. Of course, Hao Ren could not ask now.

The giant sat back down in the centre of the container, leg-crossed and expressionless as it told the memory of the world’s oldest period in a low and strange voice. “In the beginning, the world was desolate, and only a few planets had produced primitive life. The stars were silent and lifeless. Our mother first appeared in this world, she settled in the centre of the universe, and created the lifeblood—a substance that could make life. It was the extension of her strength and body, and could be seen as part of her.

“Many years later, mother gradually became curious about the universe and began to explore the entire world. She quickly became dissatisfied with the desolation of the universe, so she created the first batch of seeds as an extension of her senses, and element of life for the universe. She sent them into the space.

“The elder brothers, who were born from the seed, were the First Guardians. They quickly had sent back knowledge of the stars. Mother was satisfied and happy with the development. In order to store more information, she had created us out of the depth of lifeblood during the incubation of the Seed of Origin.

“We are the second batch of the First Guardians and living with our mother since the beginning. Our job was to collect and sort out all intelligence obtained from the stars and to protect the safety of our mother. At that time, all we needed to guard against were just some wandering objects in the universe.”

Y’zaks said in a low voice, “But then there was a rebellion?”

“A race, talented race, had lost control in the course of their development,” the giants clenched its fists. “Mother had never interfered with the development of those children; she did not let us interfere as well. She paid all her attention in the novelty and mysteries of the universe itself, so those little creatures that hatched from the seeds multiplied unimpededly. Some of them had grown so powerful that they even started to eye the origin of the universe. When they realised they already was the most powerful species in the universe, they began to challenge those above the mortals, and there was only one such target… mother.”

Lily’s eyes widened. “So they revolted against the Goddess of Creation just for this?”

“They thought that as long as the old god of the universe was destroyed, they could take her place. They had proposed a ridiculous theory of life hierarchy, and thought that all lives in the universe were predetermined on the hierarchy, and that each level of the hierarchy was not expandable nor shrinkable. Whenever life on one level died, a new one from the lower hierarchy would step up the ladder and replace the dying one. New life would be born at the lowest hierarchy to supplement this cycle. They plucked this stupid theory out of thin air and firmly believed in it. So when they became the most powerful mortal species, they decided to make themselves God.”

Hao Ren’s eyebrows pulled together. “So the way to become God is to kill the existing one. Didn’t they know who created them?”

“They did know, because they were once one of the closest mortal species to mother,” said the giant with a deeply sarcastic tone of voice. “It was because they had known so much that they became so powerful. They knew more about the mother’s secret than anyone else did. They had once disguised themselves as mother’s most loyal children and fooled everyone else…including us. After that, they became even stronger with the knowledge and power they had stolen. When the obtuse guardians like us finally realised that something had gone wrong, they already possessed the ability to destroy everything.”

Lily still felt it a bit inconceivable. “Were the mortals really capable of killing the true God?”

“What if the power of these mortals was derived from the true God?” The giant looked at her emotionlessly. “They could do anything for the sake of power then.”

“They finally revolted against the Goddess of Creation and succeeded,” Vivian frowned. “But as you said, they were doing it alone as a race. What does it have to do with civilisations on other planets?”

The giant appeared angry, and stomped its fist on the floor. “When the mother needed strength, those… those treacherous children all turned a blind eye!”

Hao Ren immediately realised this was the key to the reason why the First Borns and the guardian-giants hated all civilisations so much. “What happened?”

“Mother had never expected she would be attacked by her own children. She had never done anything to hurt them. So before she realised it, she was already down. In her last breath, she sent a distress call to all seeds in the universe. Those little creatures hatched from the seeds could hear her voice and respond as long as they knew the name of the Goddess of Creation. The response was enough to allow mother to breathe. But mother had been waiting and waiting and yet no one had responded…”

The giant lowered its head, its voice low. “That was the darkest day of the universe. All the stars should be dimming I shame. The creator of sentient beings were calling for help in the centre of the universe but the things she created were keeping silent in the shadow, drinking the blood of the Creator… They don’t deserve to live.”

There was a moment of silence. Then Y’zaks suddenly asked, “Why didn’t those races respond?”

“Because the treacherous children had made an arrogant pledge,” the giant gritted its teeth again. “Those traitors had been planning everything many years ago. They secretly called themselves God and promised to other races that when the old god of the universe fell, the first mortal who surrendered to them would receive the same God-like immortality. They also used the power from the lifeblood as bait, making use of knowledge, power, wealth, and other things that could corrupt the mortals to strengthen their bewitchment. When mother were finally in danger, those greedy mortals were all silent—because by doing nothing, they would get what their desires fulfilled. In their own logic, this silence was not a sin.”

Hao Ren suddenly thought of the forbidden technology of the ancient Magical Empire and those perfect species that were created with The Sacred Relic of Origins. When he first learned that the Goddess of Creation was from the deep universe and that Holletta was just a planetary civilisation, he once thought that the forbidden technology had nothing to do with the end of day catastrophe. Now he suddenly realised that those things might be the cause of the planet’s destruction.

Because this technology was most likely to come from those treacherous children.

The Magical Emperors of the ancient civilisations might not be able to pose a threat to the Goddess in the deep universe, but they had still made a big mistake—that was when their creator needed help, they turned a blind eye.

They did not know whether what this giant said was hundred-percent truthful, but when they thought of it, there was no reason the giant would want to fool them. No matter how much incredible the story was, at least one thing was for sure:

What happened ten thousand years ago was indeed a sinister conspiracy. No races in this universe could really get off the hook.

Chapter 682: The Truth of the Mass Extinction

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Things were progressing more smoothly than expected. Hao Ren found the information he had obtained in just half an hour was more than what he had collected for the past few months in the Plane of Dreams. However, the truth that the intelligence revealed was not so pleasant.

Thousands and thousands of years ago, a terrible conspiracy led the world to its current state today. Without listening to it with one’s own ears, no one would have thought that there would be a race so daring to commit such treachery; murdering the creator of all sentient beings and even conspiring to steal the religions of the entire universe. There were probably many ways for the mortals to pursue their divine power, but one thing was sure, the mad murderers of 10,000 years ago had chosen the worst method.

After listening to this piece of history, Lily lowered her head and thought for a long time before suddenly finding something suspicious. “Wait a minute, if the goddess had really called for help and the mortals had refused to do so, then there must be some records. When he went to the Ark Planet and Tannagost, there seemed to be no such information, neither Io.”

“Siren is a naturally occurred species, not a creation of the goddess,” said Hao Ren as he had also thought of this. “But the other two places you have mentioned are indeed … not only there is no record of the event but also the religion of the goddess!”

Hao Ren had already all the information about Tannagost and the Ark planet, so he was familiar with the history of these two civilisations. He knew that Tannagost had only hallow and ancient legend about the creator of life. The ark planet had no religion in the conventional sense after it entered the interstellar era. The databases of the two planets did not mention anything about the murder that took place ten thousand years ago. Although this was indeed not something glamourous enough to be recorded in history books, at least there should be some clues.

Upon hearing the conversations between Lily and Hao Ren, the giant said in a deadpan voice, “Indeed, some races had not heard mother’s distress call because they had forgotten who created them, and they even dismissed their own creator as an absurd story. These people has lost the ability to listen to their mother’s voice.”

Something suddenly crossed Hao Ren’s mind. He remembered an extremely important phrase in the sacred book of the Disciples of Glory: Those who forget God will lose their rights to revelation.

“Okay, they indeed did not hear it. This might be regarded as forgetting one’s root. But is forgetting one’s root a sin worthy of genocide?” Nangong Wudi, who was silent all this while, could not help questioning. He looked up at the giant. “At least it’s not a crime worthy of death, right? They didn’t even know what happened in the deep universe. Why did they have to be killed?”

The giant looked down at the little creature in front, suddenly lifting its finger to point to its own head. “Have you not found that I am different from my other siblings?”

“Oh yeah, I almost forgot to ask you about this!” said Hao Ren as the thought suddenly came to mind. “You know that you have some compatriots that have turned into… that thing, don’t you?”

The voice of the giant was rather calm this time. “Do you think how many more guardians could retain the humanity like me? Anger and despair have caused my brothers and sisters abandoning all human nature and reasoning, even the body mother has endowed us in order to correct this cosmic mistake. In the eyes of my fellow compatriots, the birth of the mortals is the greatest sin; they are greedy, short sighted, cunning and deceitful. They would slay their own mother for just a little enticement. They would wash their dirty linens in public. This virus-like phenomenon must be corrected. My compatriots believe that all mortal races must perish before they commit their second evil deed.”

“You mean that your compatriots have gone mad, including the First Borns and the brain-monsters, so they are only bringing destruction to all species indiscriminately.” Hao Ren looked into the giant’s eyes. “But you’re different from them, right?”

The giant said nothing. It seemed to have agreed in silence.

“No wonder I’ve never succeeded trying to communicate with the First Borns, I mean the First Guardians as you call them,” said Hao Ren, sighing. “I knew they were completely mad. I’m very lucky to have met you—one that has not gone mad… but do you still want to destroy Holletta?”

The giant was agitated hearing this. “The mortals on this planet are guilty; they should be put to death! They are one of the treacherous children who watched mother killed and yet did nothing!”

Everyone suddenly recalled what the soul of the pope had said. Those words sounded inexplicable, but they now seemed to make sense.

The pope must have discovered something before he died!

“But why did you let them live at last?” Vivian’s brows knit together. “Why? Because of the self-sacrifice of a human?”

The giant dropped its shoulders. “I don’t have to answer you.”

“Feeling embarrassed to answer it, isn’t it? I can see that. You do have feelings. It’s a good thing. At least you’re not a monster like your siblings,” Vivian suddenly laughed. “You are different from the First Borns and brain-monsters. You actually know that such blind revenge makes no sense, especially since the early treacherous children have died. Now the rest are either their offspring or simply passers-by who have nothing to do with them. Vengeance has made no sense now. I guess the Pope must have spoken with you before he died. Did you stop the massacre because of his advice?”

The giant stared deadly at Vivian, face angry. “How dare you judge the belief of a First Guardian?”

“I didn’t say you were disloyal to the goddess of creation. I just said that you are more like a sensible living person,” Vivian shook her head and continued. “Isn’t it good to have reason ability and feelings? Although they always produce unexpected changes when the two mixed, they are precisely the characteristics of a spiritual person. To be honest, I can understand the physical transmutation of the First Borns and brain-monsters, and even admire and sympathise with their current condition, but I could never agree with them. Extremism and uncontrollability are no good.”

The giant giggled. “It is these two things that let those damned treacherous children murder their mother.”

“Anyway, you shouldn’t hate all mortals because of this.” Hao Ren smiled. “Well, I know you don’t want to talk about this. Can I ask what happen to the treacherous guys now? Are they really God now?”

At this time, a sense of comfort finally appeared on the giant’s face. “Heck, they got their due retribution. Their stupid life hierarchy theory is simply the product of nightmare, and their minds are not worthy of carrying the power of the mother. When the creator of life died, the treacherous children would die by way of genocide as punishment, and the entire species would disappear instantaneously no matter where they hide in the universe.”

“If so, the murderer-race has all died?” Y’zaks appeared surprised. “What about the Planet of the goddess?”

The giant threw him a glance and then smiled. “Don’t you even think about it. Nobody can get to that place. Mother’s place is in a location you can’t never understand. If it wasn’t for the treacherous children stealing mother’s secret, they could not never approach the space. After mother died, the battlefield had been forever banished to the deepest chaos of the universe. No one can find it.”

Lily was quick to ask, “In other words, even you couldn’t go back?”

Once again, the giant chose to remain silent. That was an admission by the default, again.

After a moment of silence, Hao Ren looked up. “I have another question.”

“You seem to have a lot of questions,” the giant looked at him, emotionlessly. “I couldn’t believe that I have answered you so many questions… All right, ask while I still have patience.”

“I can’t help it, it’s not like I can always find someone who can talk with,” Hao Ren shook his head and continued. “How did you manage to stay awake and not mutate?”

The giant was silent for a moment and finally spoke in a nearly grievous voice. “Maybe there are other First Guardians who maintain their sanity as I do because mother has given us a mission at the last moment before she fell!”

They all spoke in unison. “Mission?”

“She asked us to activate the security protocol of the seeds of life. Before the big crash, she had seen the guardians starting to mutate. She hurried us to start the security lock to prevent a larger-scale ecological extinction,” said the giant. Suddenly, with all his strength, he punched on the crystal floor with his fist; it almost uttered the last few words in a fury. “I still remember that her last words: ‘Go and save them’!”

Chapter 683: Origins of the Cult of Origination

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

At the final moment of the mass extinction 10,000 years ago, the safety protocols in some of the Seeds of Origin suddenly began to force the out-of-control First Borns into sleep. Hence, a small part of the races in the universe survived. The residents of Holletta were one of those survivors. Although Hao Ren had not seen more survivors yet, he thought there had to be more planets that survived the First Born like Holletta. They could be hiding somewhere in the universe, waiting to be discovered.

However, the security protocol was not an inbuilt mechanism, or homemade, self-help measure created by the mage emperors. Instead, the giant and some of its siblings were the safety protocol. These guardians—who watched as their mother was killed by the mortals, and whose hearts were still filled with hatred—were the ones to initiate the safety switch at the core of the Seeds of Origin in the centre of the universe. This safety protocol managed to protect a small part of the mortal civilisation from extinction.

In the eyes of the guardians, the phenomenon of the ‘mortal race’ was the culprit that caused the death of their mother. They could no longer believe in the loyalty and morality of any mortal species, nor were they willing to distinguish between the good people and the bad ones. This was the reason that caused all guardians to fall into madness and transmutation. But the last commandment of the Goddess had forced some of the guardians to remain in their sanity—even though they were filled with anger and grief, they still took the mother’s order as first priority. So there was it, the sane giant that had survived before Hao Ren.

This was the truth of ten thousands of years ago. The truth was unexpectedly astounding despite all the wild guesses earlier.

“No mortal races deserve to be saved,” the giant lowered its head and its voice seemed to be coming from his chest. “But this was the last instruction before mother’s death. We must carry it out without question. So we started the security protocol. After the Star of Creation was pushed into the darkness by the big bang, all Seeds of Origin and their first generation of offspring entered into sealed status. Our mad brothers remained in sleep since then. But at that time, there was not many lives left in the universe.”

Hao Ren speculated that the Star of Creation that was pushed into the darkness by the Big Bang was supposed to be the red nova. It was the instant when the treacherous children killed the Goddess of Creation. All event timelines had now perfectly aligned.

“After that?” Vivian looked at the giant curiously. “How did the sane guardians survive all this while?”

“We were all separated,” the giant shook its head. “Some of the guardians wanted to find mother’s body. They set out to search in the darkness but there had been no news from them ever since. Some of them were sleeping in various corners of the universe, as a mean to burying themselves. Mother is gone, most of my compatriots have also mutated, and the rest of the guardians have realised that they have lost their purpose of existence, so we all fall apart…”

The giant slowly recounted the last days of those guardians and mentioned the reason they came to Holletta. After bidding farewell to its siblings, it drove its spaceship, which had been badly damaged in the war, drifting aimlessly in the universe for thousands of years. It had originally thought that it would die in the aimless drift. It would wait for the spaceship to lose its control before he would find a star and end its own life. He believed that many guardians who were as clear as it must have chosen the same route. But just before he was about to reach the end of the drift, he discovered a planet: Holletta.

The giant had realised that when the safety protocol of the Seeds of Origin was started, not only the ‘innocent’ who did not know what had happened but also the treacherous aficionados who refused to help the mother had survived. So, it changed its plan.

Since the enemies of the day had not all died, it was necessary to continue the revenge.

“When I first discovered this planet, the entire world had not recovered from the blood-tide catastrophe,” recounted the giant whose mood seemed to be calmer. It told of its story of its first arrival in Holletta, in an emotionless voice. “There were tentacles of the First Guardians and the ruins of human kingdoms everywhere. Even so, there were still many mortals surviving in the world. They survived in the ruins and the wilderness. The civilisation had fallen back to the primitive era. Anyway, they were still alive and shamelessly covering up their sins of the past. I had been observing in the orbit for several years, watching them burning down their religious scriptures, teaching the new-borns with a twisted version of history, and constantly killing the remnants of the introspectionists in the society, even completely burying the memory about the Goddess of Creation, as if they would be able to wash away their sins this way. They were living in fear and guilt. I lurked on the planet by the cover of a meteorite impact. I needed time to repair the weapons on the spacecraft and I needed to recover from my injuries…”

“So you have waited it out for thousands of years,” Hao Ren could not help but say, “You have witnessed the reconstruction of the Hollettan civilisation.”

“There are a lot of things that I have witnessed with my own eyes,” said the giant with a sense of ambivalence in its voice. “Yes, this is the root cause of my hesitation. I didn’t expect them to regain their faith in the Goddess of Creation; neither did I expect them to be able to recover so many things from the thin inborn memory and historical fragments. The early executioners had died one by one. The psychological pressure and curses from the origin of the world made those who could have lived a very long life died prematurely. After they died, their offspring inherited this world and began to worship the Goddess of Creation. I soon discovered that the world of the mortals was changing faster than I expected, and before I could take the revenge to them, the entire era had passed.”

“So after you have fixed the spacecraft, you became very embarrassed.” Hao Ren could not help but sigh for the giant. He looked up, but he saw endless contradictions, entanglement, and confusion in the massive figure of the giant. The giant was struggling in the countless shadows of its past, judging anything and everything relative to it purely based on right and wrong. It did persist in destroying the civilisation on Planet Holletta, but he had abandoned the idea at the same time. He had spent thousands of years to prepare the weapons and destruction plans, but these actions seemed more driven by pure mania than anything else did:

The giant knew that now revenge had made no sense, but without doing so, it would lose its purpose of existence.

Lily wanted to break this uncomfortable silence. So she raised the question about the Cult of Origination. “Were you the one who set up the cult?”

“I didn’t actively organize any cult,” the giant shook his head. “They spontaneously set it up. I had slept for a short time to recover my energy when I first landed on this planet. It was during that time some humans had discovered the cavern where I was hiding the spacecraft. The thoughts that I leaked out from my mind during my dreams had affected the minds of these humans. They knew about the Goddess of Creation and the treacherous children. Their becoming of Cult of Origination fanatics had even surprised me. I had never expected that even human beings would become as angry as the guardians would after they learned the truth, and they would even be willing to kill their fellow compatriots for this. Anyway, I did feel happy for their action, and I did not stop them. I had even opened up part of the structure in the cavern for them and their descendants, and taught them some knowledge so that they could help maintain my base… This is all.”

There was no need for the giant to lie now. Its words were highly credible. It appeared that the giant was indeed the mastermind of the Cult of Origination, and more like a symbolic spiritual leader. The faith of the Cult of Origination arose spontaneously after they encountered the mind of the giant. This also explained what the Cult of Origination was like in terms of the biological transformation between magic and technology: the giant should have no intention to study the biotech stuff of the tiny mortals; the believers must have sussed it out themselves in the course of thousands of years. Naturally, their technology could never match the one in the giant’s warship and base.

“The Cult of Origination had tried to use a type of scroll to assassinate the pope.” Hao Ren took out the fragment of the divine scroll from his dimensional pocket. “This is it. Did you give them this?”

The giant looked down and said, “Yes, but what I gave was just raw material. This material was created on a satellite of the Star of Creation and blessed by mother. The Cult of Origination used this ancient material and made it into sacred item. I don’t know the specific usage. I don’t pay attention to these things.”

Hao Ren looked at the scroll fragment in his hand. “No wonder this thing has a divine characteristic…”

Chapter 684: Goodbye, Gian

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Hao Ren did not expect to actually extract so much information from the giant. In the beginning, the giant’s attitude made him think that it was acting like a mule—it was obstinate. However, without realising, perhaps he had unwittingly struck a chord with the giant; it decided to divulge everything. Maybe Hao Ren and his companions all just happened to ask questions that the giant was willing to answer. Had he dived rashly into questions about the goddess’ power and whereabouts of the inheritance, Hao Ren believed that he would have hit a wall.

It was precisely because his questions were all about finding out the truth, that the giant became cooperative and trusted him.

“Thank you for your patience, really,” Hao Ren pondered for a moment and could not think of any further questions at the moment, so he sincerely thanked the giant. “I initially thought that you wouldn’t cooperate.”

“I still don’t trust you,” said the giant indifferently. But after a while of interaction, the giant no longer showed obvious hostility. “But this does not prevent me from telling you the truths. You should know what happened; every life in this world should know. Forget will not wash away sins of the past.”

Everyone could see that this giant was actually in a dilemma. It was rational, not as blind as other mutated guardians were, and knew that taking revenge on the offspring of the treacherous children was meaningless; but when it saw that the blood of the traitors still flowing in the mortals, it could not help itself with the guilt in its heart. It could let go the meaningless hatred in its mind, but it could not forget the death of its mother in its heart. It had been living in this contradiction for thousands of years, and it was no surprise for what he had done.

Hao Ren was glad that he had stopped the giant in time before it wiped out Holletta’s civilisation. Otherwise, he and his team would probably not the only one regretting.

“Well, wait a minute. Do you know the problem of the Wall of Reality?” asked Hao Ren as the matter suddenly came to mind. “Do you know about the mass crossing?”

“The Wall of Reality?” the giant frowned. It felt that these people seemed to know a lot more than it knew. “What is that?”

“It is a barrier that separates this universe from another ‘twin universe’.” replied Hao Ren. He saw the giant’s expression and immediately knew that his guess was not quite accurate. “We have come from the other side of the Wall of Reality. In theory, there is no interaction between the two universes, but ten thousand years ago, there was a mass crossing of ‘otherworldlings’ through this barrier…”

Hao Ren briefly explained the Wall of Reality to the giant. But the giant’s brows still knit together; it was confused. “I don’t know this kind of thing. If this phenomenon really exists in the universe, mother would have certainly told us. She knew most of the truths in this world.”

Vivian scratched her chin and said, “Well, let’s not talk about the Wall of Reality, let’s talk about the otherworldlings. From a time point of view, the crossing of otherworldlings, lunacy of the First Borns, fall of the Goddess, massive failure of the Wall of Reality were all happened in the same period and seemed to be interrelated. Do you think this was be the impact of the Goddess’ fall that destroyed the structure of time and space? Some kind of powerful energy … or shock waves and the like.”

The giant could not give an answer, because all the guardians had fallen into great confusion when the Goddess fell, and the Star of Creation in the deep universe was also in great turmoil. At that time, it was impossible to observe the abstract and difficult-to-perceive phenomenon of the Wall of Reality. And there was a more important reason: the giant was not willing to recall that particular moment. Hao Ren knew this. That was why he had stopped Vivian from pursuing the question.

Hao Ren could not think of any more questions now. So he decided to leave; there were many things he needed to deal with in Holletta. But before he left, he looked at the giant in conundrum. “What should I do with you?”

The giant looked at the crystal container around him. He knew it was a cage, but he was calm. “As you wish, I don’t care about anything else.”

“At first, I was trying to lock you up as a prisoner,” said Hao Ren, spreading out his hand predicamentally. “After all, you were too dangerous. But now I feel like you are not so uncontrollable… locking you up seems to be a bit inhumane.”

“Are you letting me go?” the giant asked indifferently.

Hao Ren was silent for a moment and shook his head slightly. Then he fiddled with the holographic panel near him. The crystal wall encaging the giant disappeared silently in the air. At the same time, light barrier popped up at all the passageways around the crystal hall,” I can’t let you go because I can’t control you. But you can move around freely in this hall and rooms next to the hall. Though your space of activity is limited, at least it is better than living in a cage. The arcane colloids and autonomous robots will take care of your needs. If you feel bored, you can also request for something like movies and other entertainment… I can only provide you these things for now, but after things have shown some progress, I will come back again. I hope we can finally find an amiable solution.”

After learning such much truth, he was no longer hostile to this giant.

The giant seemed indifferent to Hao Ren’s arrangements. In fact, its face had been expressionless all this while. Apart from showing some excitement about its ‘mother’, its feelings were almost as good as a zombie. “That’s good enough,” replied the giant.

Hao Ren led the others out of the hall. Before closing the door behind him, he glanced over his shoulder at the centre of the hall. The giant had already sat down in the same spot. Although the encaging barrier had disappeared, he seemed to be not going anywhere.

The huge figure was sitting so motionlessly that there was almost an illusion that it would sit still forever.

Crapple Research Station had a new prisoner, or was it really a prisoner?

“Let’s observe the giant for a while,” Hao Ren sighed. “I have a hunch that it will not be held for too long.”

“Of course, it’s not crazy anymore. It’s just a bit dangerous,” said Lily, pursing her mouth. “How much you think what it said is true, Mr. Landlord?”

Hao Ren replied, “I think they are all true.”

Lily blinked. “You trust him so much?”

“I was using twenty polygraphs,” Hao Ren waved. “Of course it doesn’t matter. More importantly, my gut feeling tells me that what the super big guy said is credible. After all, all the timelines add up, and all information that we have on hand also add up—this second point is the key: you can tell a perfect lie, but you can’t tell a lie that perfectly match the evidence.”

“Is that your intuition?” asked Lily, sizing up Hao Ren. “Can that thing be trusted?”

Not waiting for Hao Ren to answer, Vivian quickly chimed in. “I think you better believe it. Have you forgot he is a freaking harbinger?”

Hao Ren had wanted to argue that his intuition was not of a harbinger but of God’s spokesperson. However, the argument seemed not very convincing. So he decided to shut up.

After they got back on-board the spacecraft, Lily told her small partners who had been staying on board about all that had taken place in CARS. They needed time to digest such a large volume of information though. Hao Ren knocked on his own forehead. “I only realise I still have so many questions yet to ask after coming back here.”

As Lily had finished sharing her excitement, she turned and asked, “What have you forgot? I think that’s pretty all about it.”

“There are still many more, such as could we still be able to contact the other guardians, what to do if we have contacted the other guardians, how many races were keeping ‘silence’ when the goddess was assassinated, and how many races survived, and the most important thing is… who is visitors from the stars?” Hao Ren shook his head regretfully. “And I have even forgot to ask its name. Maybe I should have a to-do list next time.”

Lily tapped her lip with her finger. “Hmmm, that’s a lot of questions. But I think you should wait until next time. Now we should hurry over to Holletta; the pope is dead, the sacred mountain is blown, and the Cult of Origination is exposed. We don’t know what’s the situation right now.”

Lily was right; Holletta was a real mess now. But all those messes would soon look like a flea on a camel.

Because Hao Ren was bringing them a far more explosive news— the truth about the fall of the Goddess ten thousand years ago.

Chapter 685: A Bloody Mess

Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation

Hodeceus floated silently by the side of the crystal mine, which faced the now drastically changed Sacred Mountain. The seismic “remodelling” had since died down, yet the real chaos was just about to begin. The knights and werewolf cavalry who successfully retreated under Marshal Ophra’s lead had returned to the main camp in Hodeceus. They rendezvoused with the other generals and cardinals who were manning the floating fortress. But as they sought to finalise their next course of action, the various factions fell victim to infighting.

Before Ophra could even take off her cuirass, she, Uruk, and a few other leaders—still drenched in the enemy’s blood—sat at the front of a long table. She appeared like the goddess of war as she sat there and looked on at the rather rowdy atmosphere. The seat next to her belonged to the Pope and it was now empty.

“The Pope has been martyred.” Cardinal Orben looked at the seat beside Ophra. His rune covered face was rather emotionless, but there was a tinge of dignified stiffness. “The Pope could not have possibly survivef that explosion. Plus, there was no trace of his spirit after that.

The meeting hall door was pushed open as a robed figure walked swiftly into the room. He was a cardinal, one of those who had to calm the nerves of the ordinary soldiers and believers with the a few other clergy. The clamour outside was obviously weighing on him. “Things are still a flux outside. The Pope’s martyrdom shook the faith of many, plus the fact tha even with his sacrifice that the evil god had managed to escape without a scratch. We need to come up with an explanation for this.”

“What about the Goddess? Anything from her?” Ophra turned towards Big Beardy who was seated silently on the side of the table. From the moment the Pope had martyred, the pious ascetic was deep in thought, trying to communcate with the Goddess. She was hoping that with the ascetic’s special mental ability to mend the connection with the Goddess and the long prayers would bear some fruit.

Big Beard open his eyes slightly as he looked at the marshal. “Her voice is blurry, but it is certain that the Pope had spoken with her before his martyrdom. His action is probably in line with her will.”

Cardinal Orben immediately nodded. “Alright, we can start from there at least…”

“The explaination can come later. The most pressing matter is how do we tell His Majesty.” Prince Hoffman suddenly interjected. His head was glistening from sweat but this time around, he did not bother wiping it off. “His Majesty needs to know if the kingdom is still safe. That black thing had escaped, unscathed I must add. You can spin it to say that it was the Goddess’ wrath that scared it away, that will only work for the masses. His Majesty needs an even clearer answer. Will the thing come back? And if it does, how do we face it?”

The question Prince Hoffman asked was piercing, a stark contrast of the smiling bald guy character he is known for. This was however the way he operates, and as he finished his sentence Uruk spoke.

“It’s a mess at our place as well. The collapse of the Sacred Mountain is a massive shock to the tribes, and we also need to explain how an evil god was hiding in the mountains all these while. So, for a time, the tribe nations will be recalling the mercenary companies in Holetta.”

Due to their fierce nature and martial talents, the werewolf tribes were able to export their fine troops and commanders as an important means of revenue. Their mercenaries can be found on all corners across the south of the continent. Furthermore, the tribal nation had excellent relations with the Kingdom of Holetta, even during the time of Kayton the Third’s uprising, he had a loyal band of werewolf warriors with him. As such, even the Holettaen’s standard army had many werewolf bands in it, some of them even hold office in the army.

Ophra frowned. “That’ll affect Holetta’s security, and goes against the previous accord.”

“We will not void the accord, but the situation demands it.” Uruk’s expression stiffened, his voice stern. “We are only reassigning a part of the soldiers, to solve our urgent need for manpower. After the peak had collapsed many towns within the vicinty was affected, and many other places are at risk of avalanches and aftershocks.”

Uruk gave Ophra a glance as he left the last part out: Holetta is mighty kingdom, surely this won’t affect you?

As Uruk finished the generals and cardinals present too started discussing the situation. Some was doubtful of morale, some was worried about doctrines, some was talking about diplomacy, or to amend the map and texts because there was a need to measure the highest peak of the southern continent again…When Lady Ophra heard the last part, she buried her face in her palm as she massaged her temple. If at all possible, she did not want to get involved in this as she only belatedly realised that she had gathered a rabble here at haste and in this situation, it was quite literally too many cooks spoils the broth.

“My word… I’m really b ad at this.” The Lady Marshal shook her head. “Even whe the king died it wasn’t that chaotic…”

The sweatdrops from Prince Hoffman’s bald head really streamed down this time. “Marshal… this… is not the time for that…”

“I know.” Ophra sighed as she looked up and slammed the time. “SILENCE!”

Perhaps the hall was too big and this was the first time her slamming the table was not effective. A few ministers were still having a heated discussion with their fellow generals. Seeing how it was, Lady Ophra took her longsword out, still sheathed as she slammed the table again. “SILE…”

Before she could finished, a crash followed and the table shattered into pieces.

A few of the ministers immediately followed the table and crashed to the ground: They were too engrossed with their arguments and were pretty much on the table already.

Lady Ophra blinked, as she shuffled awkwardly. “The table sure is fragile?”

The old werewolf Elson rolled his eyes. “Oh stop with your excuses. This is not the first time.”

“Well that’s that.” Ophra waved it off. “It doesn’t affect anything anyway, and at least will stop you lot from continuing your crap. Do I need to even remind you lot? This is Hodeceus! The kingdom’s most powerful floating fortress. Even the lowliest of soldiers here are the elites of the country! Elites, hah! Just look at you lot. Panicking over something like this? And you deemed yourself worthy to step foot on here?”

After having their ego bruised by the Lady Marshal’s terse words, the hall fell silent. Lady Ophra gave a nod of satisfaction. “That’s more like it. Lets lay things out, and solve it one by one. We’ll do what we can, what we must and I frankly don’t give two hoots about who’s losing what. Everything won’t matter when that Black Fortress comes back again.”

Having said her piece, she tuirned towards Uruk and Cardinal Orben. “My apologies. I may have overstepped my boundries. I have no control over the church or other nations but let me remind you lot. Before that Black Fortress, your religion or nationality does not matter.”

Cardinal Orben’s expression changed immediately the moment the missing Black Fortress was mentioned. “The key problem is still that evil god’s weapon. It is an awesome weapon, and even the Pope’s martyrdom could not destroy it, only to drive it away. If it was to make a comeback, our efforts are in vain.”

“Didn’t you say that the outsiders have gone to solve this?” Prince Hoffman looked that Ophra. “Why are there no news till now?”

“This…” Ophra was at a loss of words to explain. “They’ll probably be in touch soon. If anyone could do it, it is them. After all, they were the one who took out the First Born.”

Even as she said that, Ophra was not fully confident. She only have a vague knowledge of Hao Ren and his crew’s powers and background, and she had no idea how the ‘ Black Fortress’ even came about. She only relied on her experience with them solving issues in the past to trust them with the job of destroying that monstrosity. She wondered if she should call for Becky, that silly mercenary had spent the most time with the outsiders, and knew more about them than Big Beardy. As she pondered on the idea a flash of light appeared in the middle of the hall.

“Don’t worry about the Black Spaceship.” Hao Ren led his crew out of the white light. “I’ve more important things to tell you all.”