Chapter 763: Act 117 – Eternity XVIII
Medisa laughed until she couldn’t stand up, and Brendel could only shake his head helplessly. However, he was more concerned about Xi and Shi Do’s situation, so he turned to the little princess and said, “Forget about this for now, let’s go check on Shi Do and Xi.”
The Silver Elf Princess nodded, dropping her smile.
The sudden ambush caught everyone off guard. Brendel was worried that there might be more chaotic creatures (Duskgazer Dragon) lurking beneath the interwoven ice layers, but he quickly dismissed that concern.
Xi sat against the ice wall, her face slightly flushed because the Lord was very close to her, making her afraid to breathe too loud. In fact, her shoulder bruise wasn’t a big deal, but Brendel’s actions made her heart race.
Brendel checked the red-haired girl’s shoulder injury and let out a slight sigh of relief. “Fortunately, it’s not serious.”
The mountain girl kept her head down and also sighed softly, but her sense of relief was clearly different from Brendel’s.
“I’m sorry, Xi, I’m sorry, Mister Earl…” Shi Do stood beside them, her hands crossed over her thick notebook, apologizing with a somewhat regretful look.
“So, what exactly happened?” Veronika turned her head and interrupted her to ask. She stood beside Mephistopheles, by the landslide—while a little further away, Haruz, Phillas, Charles, and the Crown Prince of the Crusian had cleared the shattered ice, gradually revealing a silver-white corpse beneath the snow.
Brendel glanced at the creature, which clearly hadn’t died because of the ice collapse. Its skin was nowhere near as shiny as it had been when alive, but dull and grey, as if a layer of frost had covered a metal surface.
He suddenly felt a stir in his heart.
This creature had died due to the depletion of the magical power within its body—
No, saying “died” was somewhat inaccurate; to be precise, it had merely fallen into a sort of dormant state. Once it absorbed new magical power, it might very well come back to life again.
Brendel frowned slightly. He looked back at the puddle of silver liquid not far away. He had never heard of such a magical creature in the game—nothing even remotely similar. This ability was truly terrifying, sending shivers down his spine.
At that moment, Phillas whistled from a distance. This fortunate young man looked at the corpse in amazement and could not help but say, “Haruz, Your Highness, have you noticed? This thing is somewhat like the Nameless Ones?”
“Nameless Ones?” Rainwright Aurelius looked at him in confusion.
“Ah, I forgot, Your Highness the Crown Prince, you must not have encountered these things when you entered the forest from Varlanden. In any case, they’re some kind of nightmare, but they do bear a surprising resemblance to this monster,” Phillas replied, having been momentarily stunned before responding.
Laurena nodded in agreement, “There is a bit of a resemblance.” However, she glanced at her fiancé oddly, as she truly couldn’t understand how Phillas could remain so calm in front of a Crown Prince he had ‘defeated’ in his dreams.
“It seems the Nameless Ones wandering in the Frosted Forest are related to these creatures,” Brendel replied, feeling somewhat surprised himself. The texts in the Amber Sword regarding the origins of the Nameless Ones only discussed their emergence, but the temptation leading them to fall had always been a mystery.
Yet, it appeared that this answer was seemingly just within reach.
The corpse was slowly melting, like ice melting under the hot sun in summer. Streams of silver liquid flowed down, soon forming a puddle beneath its body, confirming Brendel’s earlier conjecture.
He lifted his head, as if he had finally completed his thought process, and asked Shi Do, “Where did you encounter this creature, Miss Shi Do?”
“I’m sorry…” the scholar’s face turned slightly red as she sheepishly replied, “I didn’t encounter it anywhere specific; I also don’t know how to describe it… To be honest, it should have been dead.”
“Dead?” Phillas turned back in surprise, looking at the monster’s corpse that was turning into a pool of mercury at his feet. He pointed at it and asked, “Are you saying this thing can come back to life?”
But Brendel interrupted him, bypassing that question. “How does it come back to life?”
“I was a bit curious… so I placed a magic moonstone inside…” Shi Do blushed as she responded, “I’m sorry, it was my reckless action that caused Xi to get hurt.”
As she spoke, she cast a grateful glance at Xi. Had it not been for the half-dragon girl’s timely reaction, that monster would have likely taken her life with its first counterattack.
She was a scholar, not a warrior.
Brendel finally understood the origin of this creature. No wonder a lively Duskgazer had sprung from a pile of corpses that were over ten thousand years old; it was probably weak because it had only absorbed the power of a single magic moonstone.
Though a mid-quality magical crystal, a magic moonstone only provided power equivalent to a newly initiated gold-tier wizard at their peak.
He felt somewhat helpless; while he didn’t know how the scholar had realized this creature could extract magic for self-regeneration, it was reckless indeed. In the Black Forest, especially in such places, any careless action could be lethal.
“Miss Shi Do, you should now understand that we are at the periphery of the Temple of the Hibernators. The monster you encountered before was very likely a Duskgazer that invaded this world with the Duskgazer Dragon over ten thousand years ago, and it was an upper chaos creature. Their power is beyond our comprehension, so please be extremely careful,” Brendel sighed and reminded.
“I’m sorry, Mister Earl, I understand now…”
Brendel looked at her and felt sorry to continue scolding; after all, she was just a child on her first adventure. He knew that during his first adventure, he had made much worse mistakes than this.
“Brendel, what exactly are these things?” Veronika finally spoke up after listening to the young people’s dialogue.
“I don’t know,” Brendel shook his head, “I have never heard of similar creatures, but they are definitely Duskgazers. They are somewhat strange; they don’t seem to truly die but enter a dormant state. They absorb external magic and slowly regenerate…”
“Immortal?” Everyone present gasped in shock.
The undead of Madara pursued eternity, but the eternity they sought was merely a fleeting form of immortality. There is only one thing in this world that is eternal, and that is chaos.
The followers of the Everything Returns Society fervently believed in this; they thought that worshiping chaos and merging with the Duskgazer Dragon was the only way to attain eternal life.
The Four Great Temples had always deemed this as nonsense, but at this moment it seemed like a ready-made example.
Immortal Duskgazers.
A momentary silence fell over the ice cavern.
“This violates…” Veronika found it hard to continue speaking.
“No need to be superstitious, it’s just a speculation,” Brendel said, staring at those monsters, unable to believe himself. These Duskgazers had battled the Frost Giants in the past; after death, they merely slumbered. The Frost Giants were the mightiest of the golden folk; if they couldn’t kill these monsters, it was hard to imagine that anyone in this era could completely eliminate them.
He shook his head and asked in the mental world, “Saint Ausoor, I know you’re there. Have you seen anything similar?”
“I haven’t seen it, but I feel like I’ve heard of something similar there,” the elven senior sister’s voice immediately responded.
“Can you be sure?”
“If I could be sure, it wouldn’t feel ‘like’ that—you’re an idiot, aren’t you?”
Brendel shrugged.
He could only comfort the others, “At least we have some good news; it seems they are not lurking beneath this glacier but were defeated in that brutal battle over ten thousand years ago. As long as we don’t disturb them, we should be fine.”
“Over ten thousand years, Mister Brendel, are you sure they won’t slowly gather ambient magical power to revive?” Laurena questioned, puzzled.
“Do you feel magic in the air?” Brendel countered.
Everyone fell silent for a moment, then realized that the space in this ice cavern seemed frighteningly clean; the magic that was omnipresent in the Vaunte world was completely absent here. Veronika and Mephistopheles immediately changed their expressions, while only Brendel appeared somewhat calm—he had learned this from Charles long ago.
Wizards are far more sensitive to magic than warriors.
“What’s going on?” Phillas asked first.
“Sealing,” Veronika glanced at Brendel, her expression grave, “This is the seal of the Temple of the Hibernators. It turns out that below this temple are sealed these creatures. Once the magic is cut off, they can never revive again—”
“Impossible!” Shi Do widened her eyes as soon as she heard this, unable to contain her shock. “Commander, this is Milos’ temple, does that mean even the gods cannot eradicate these monsters?”
As she spoke, her expression suddenly changed, and she instinctively shut her mouth, feeling a shiver of fear.
The others seemed similarly stunned—
Brendel glanced at Phillas and Laurena; both wore solemn expressions as well. Veronika’s face mirrored this, and the Crusian goddess of war suddenly thought of a possibility:
“Brendel.”
“I’m here…”
“Do you think Anlek might want to open a portal here, connecting the lower parts of the River of Sulfur to the Sea of Magic with this place…”
“If that’s the case…” The scholar’s expression turned pale.
If that were the case, once these terrifying monsters were fully released and re-entered the Vaunte world, they would forever break free from the shackles imposed on them by the Temple of the Hibernators.
Brendel imagined this scene and couldn’t help but swallow hard.
He could only think of one phrase:
The returning Duskgazer Legion—
……(To be continued. If you like this work, please support it by voting on qidian.com, your support is my greatest motivation.)
