Chapter 403.

Chapter 403 Diffuse
After a period of acclimatization on the ship, Nina had become accustomed to facing the minor difficulties in the process of reading and learning – including and not limited to the shadows that surfaced in the Spirit Realm, the demons that appeared in the Profound Deep Sea, and the mutations in the books themselves – and, coupled with the hard training that she had been doing, she was now making great strides in her control of her own powers.

The specific manifestation of this was that even if she lifted her leg in a 6000°C flying kick, she could ensure that she wouldn’t set the bedding on the bed next to her on fire.

With a sudden burst of blinding light, the demons from the depths of the world were instantly reduced to ashes under the sun’s power, and the air didn’t even have time to leave behind any burning stench – only the warmth of the midday sun after it had warmed up the bedding.

The last of the books attracted to the Hound was left alone in the center of the room, and even though he was a chaotic, unintelligent demon that acted only on instinct, the ghastly creature seemed to be in a state of bewilderment for a short time, seemingly unable to comprehend why it had suddenly lost two of its companions – and now, in front of it, was Dog, who was being held by Shirley by his chains, leaning down and snarling. Now, in front of it was Dog, who was being held by Shirley’s chains, bending down and snarling, and behind it was Nina, who was coming up step by step, shrouded in light like a blazing sun.

The terrifying pressure from behind was far greater than that of the “kind” in front of him, who didn’t look normal.

The Profound Demon subconsciously turned his head and met a line of sight as hot as the sun.

Nina slightly lowered her head, her hair had been completely dyed with a layer of golden radiance, piercing light escaped from her seven orifices, the human body was burning with the power of the ancient blazing sun, and as she gazed at the demon, the skeleton of the demon burned up directly in her gaze.

Shirley was shocked, she hadn’t seen Nina angry before, she even thought that this usually sunny and cheerful friend had never been angry at all, but now she knew how wrong she was – Nina was obviously very angry right now.

Her anger was rising like the sun’s rays, and even after she had restrained the heat that escaped, the rays of light still seemed to be able to burn people’s souls.

As Sherry grew more and more nervous, finally unable to hold her tongue, Nina finally spoke – she opened her mouth, and burning flames of plasma light escaped from the corners of her mouth, sounding like a boom:
“My homework!” Her voice was even tinged with grief, “My papers! My reference books! And Sherry’s homework! All scratched to pieces by these dogs!”

The sun’s wrath caused the demons to be incapacitated, and Shirley was even more shocked at hearing this, and even almost burst out in joy, “Really? My homework is gone too?”

But the next second she reacted, hurriedly stopping Nina who was about to avenge her homework with a flying kick, “Ah wait! Let’s save this demon’s life first! Dog has something to ask!”

Nina’s feet were up, but after hearing her best friend’s shout, she subconsciously stopped and looked at Sherry out of the corner of her eye, “What else is there to ask–isn’t it just a Profound Demon that comes over to mess with people while they’re reading? Got several of them killed on the ship ……”

“But it’s daytime!” Shirley exclaimed.

Nina froze for a moment, suddenly reacting.

It was daytime, and even though it was very foggy outside and the sky had become as dim as evening, chronologically, it was daytime – the time when Vision 001 still enveloped the world.

The city-state was safe at this time of day, and reading didn’t attract invasions from the darkness – why had these Profound Demons appeared?

Nina’s gaze (6000°C) immediately fell dead center on that last Psi Hound.

Bathed in stellar light at extremely close range, the demon’s bones began to smolder – it struggled instinctively, and seemed to be trying to open a rift to return to the Phantom Deep, but this instinctive flight was cut short in an instant.

Dog interfered with the rift that had just appeared around the demon and had yet to take shape.

“Can you ask anything?” Nina gathered some of her own power and looked curiously at Dog, “Didn’t you say that normal Phantom Demons have little intelligence and can’t communicate at all?”

“Brainless is brainless, but you can find something out if you really investigate – they have memories, and there are occasional fragments of continuity in their chaotic minds,” Dog shook his head, seemingly because he was slightly buzzed after spamming a headbutt with another Phantom Hound just now. Slightly brain buzzing, “Don’t worry, Phantom Demons have Phantom Demon means of ‘communication’.”

“What means of communication?” Nina and Sherry asked in unison.

“…… Not very aesthetically pleasing,” Dog grunted, slowly walking towards the Phantom Hound that had gradually stopped struggling under the scorching sun, then it looked up at Sherry, “Close your eyes, Sherry. ”

Shirley was stunned for a moment and obediently closed her eyes.

A short low growl, a grapple, followed by the sound of bone fragments being torn, crushed, and chewed, a toothsome creak as a demon’s violent struggle lasted only a few moments.

After a few more moments, Sherry tentatively opened her eyes to see that all that was left on the floor in the center of the room was a small pile of black dust that was dissipating rapidly, Dog was standing next to the pile of dust, and Nina was standing across from it in a bit of a daze, and it took a few moments for the blazing sunlight to dissipate from her and for her to gasp out a, “Woahhhh- -“

Shirley guessed what had just happened after she closed her eyes, and she gave Dog a slightly complicated expression, “Actually …… I didn’t ……”

“You’re going to have nightmares, I know you,” Dog shook his head, then ground his teeth and spat somewhat disgustedly to the side, “Yuck.”

“You’re choking your teeth?”

“This kind of demon that doesn’t even recognize words gnaws like a rock, can’t even squeeze a complete sentence out of it – it’s a shame this guy ran after knowledge too.” Dog spat disgustingly at his illiterate counterpart, demonstrating his confidence and pride as a cultured dog, and then lowered his head, seemingly sensing the information he had just “exchanged” very carefully. A few moments later, it raised its head in some confusion and looked at Sherry and Nina: “Strange …… The remaining memories of this Profound Hound show …… that it has never felt the suppression of Vision 001! ……”

Sherry and Nina looked at each other in dismay.

“But now …… it’s clearly daytime ……”

Sherry subconsciously muttered, slowly coming to the window and probing to look out.

The increasingly dense fog had already shrouded all the streets, the thick fog and high altitude clouds were like layers and layers of curtains shrouding the frost, and in this thick curtain, the light of the sky had already darkened like dusk, and in the distance, the facades of the buildings on the opposite side of the street couldn’t even be seen.

But there was still a glow in the sky, and that was where the sun was-it was indeed daytime, it was indeed Vision 001.

“Nina, look,” Shirley raised her hand and pointed to the sky, “the sun is right there ……”

She stopped abruptly.

Deep within the thick layer of fog and clouds, the bright glow shivered silently for a few moments, and then immediately haloed out in all directions as if it were a reflection in water.

It seemed that from the very beginning that hadn’t been any sun – it was just a visual remnant of a scene that had lingered over the city-state as the curtain rose.

Over the Frost, the sun disappeared.

……

At the same time, in the center area of the city-state, deep underground in the ancient, dusty Second Waterway, located directly below the Boiling Gold Mine.

The fog in the city did not spread underground, and the slightest difference on the surface would not affect the actions of the exploring party – in the deep and deserted underworld, the Church’s Guardian forces were intensely and orderly fortifying their newly established advancement stronghold.

Spider-like steam walkers glided through the wide sewer corridors, high-powered searchlights swept through every dark corner of the corridors, multi-barreled cannons on the turrets on both sides of the Spider’s armor were slightly adjusted to be on the lookout for shadows that might be lurking in the dark corridors, and monks of the Silence, dressed in black robes, were silent in the bunkers at the crossroads. The Monks of Silence in their dark robes prayed in silence in the bunkers at the crossroads, building up their strength for the subsequent advance, while the elite Senior Guardsmen guarded the posts and gates at the crossroads with lanterns around their waists, canes in one hand, and specially adapted shotguns or large caliber revolvers in the other.

The Second Waterway had been ruled by darkness for far too long – an exploratory mission in this dimly lit place was not so much an “investigation” as it was a declaration of war against a horrific realm that had become progressively more distorted and deformed.

The enemy could be anything; the enemy is darkness itself.

An eerie hissing sound came from a distant fork in the road, interspersed with the crawling and writhing sounds of some kind of massive limb. The two Steam Walkers on guard duty at the intersection immediately reacted, four powerful flashbangs were fired from the front of the spiders’ bodies, and then the guards on the Walkers fired a volley of rounds from their rotary-tube cannons in the direction of the strange sound! -Deafening roar, the darkness swelled violently, as if something had been injured and was about to emerge from the darkness.

Twelve black-robed Silent monks rose from behind their bunkers, simultaneously raising their canons in their hands, their bandaged arms pointing toward the darkness, and letting out a unanimous cry of fury.

In the darkness, there were pale flames that burned up, matching the barrage of bullets fired from the steam walking machine, burning the invisible darkness birthed into ashes.

The restless darkness regained its composure, and the fork in the road gradually shifted from pitch black to dim and back to light – the light spreading normally to that intersection, illuminating what was there.

There was nothing there but craters, large and small, in the walls.

And a vague, rapidly dissipating stench in the air.

Agatha withdrew her eyes from looking off into the distance at the fork in the road.

A fork in the road had been reclaimed, the Guardian forces dispersing yet another piece of darkness from this subterranean world – and this was just a tiny corner of it to the whole vast Second Waterway.

She was not here to deal with the “forks in the road”.

“Lead me to that door.”

The Gatekeeper turned her head slightly and said to the subordinate beside her.

(Push the book time, the book name “The Sword of Sanctuary”, bias traditional medieval history text, the story and the bandwagon is worth looking forward to, you can check it out if you are interested.)
(The end of this chapter)