Chapter 978: Act 151 – The Song of the Mortal World I
“Miss Nemeses!” The Silver Elf Princess Medisa pushed open the door, holding a spear, and saw the black-haired Lady Knight turn her head, raising a finger to her lips in a shushing gesture. Medisa paused slightly, her eyes revealing a questioning expression: “What’s wrong?” She had encountered an attack from several witches outside, and after dealing with the battle, she found the sky over Fatan Port darkened. Fearing the enemy had infiltrated the house, she rushed in only to see the current scene. Nemeses did not speak; a strange buzzing sound echoed in the silent library as their gazes shifted to the pouch at the Lady Knight’s waist.
The pouch trembled slightly, something inside it seeming to come alive, emitting a faint humming noise. Medisa showed a wary expression, her eyes asking Nemeses if she needed assistance, but Nemeses shook her head. She seemed to remember something, hesitated slightly, and then placed her hand on the pouch, flicking open the clasp. ‘Bzzz—’ The vibrating sound suddenly amplified as a silver light source slowly rose from the Lady Knight’s pouch, illuminating the surroundings with dazzling brilliance.
“War Tablet!” Medisa recognized it at once; it was the War Tablet they had previously found in Valgris: “What’s happening…?”
“Eternal night descends… the War Tablet… has been awakened.” Nemeses murmured, a hint of panic flashing across her face as she instinctively stepped back, but the silver disk had already shot a beam of light, striking her forehead. “Miss Nemeses—!” Medisa shouted in alarm as the Lady Knight’s head tilted back slightly, her entire body lifting off the ground as if the beam had made her float. She leaned back, her long black hair swirling without wind, eyes tightly shut, brows furrowed in pain.
‘Code Arcane 100729401B Shelf, Knowledge, Preface D, Regal Spell System, String Magic Inheritance—’
‘Heir, Black Iron Bloodline—bloodline matches.’
‘Inheritance begins…’
‘From: The Arbiter Council.’
……
Everything fell into darkness.
Brendel looked up to the sky.
It was a pitch-black sky, like a black hole swallowing everything, devoid of stars or the moon, without a glimmer of light. Heaven and earth seemed to merge into one, vast and boundless, with no up or down, like the scene before the creation of the world. However, upon the vast expanse of land, the lights of civilization still flickered; cities, towns, and villages near Fatan Port ignited dots of fire, one by one lighting up from near to far. It was like a string of sparks connecting intelligent beings from different places, different races, and speaking different languages, scattered across the land, lighting up along the long coastline of the Inner Sea.
That was civilization.
A solitary yet proud civilization.
Brendel said nothing; the Merchant Miss also remained silent for once, and Kehua said nothing either. When she saw many nobles appear in the yard, she quietly retreated back into the darkness. In that vast courtyard, for a time, no one made a sound. In everyone’s eyes, this scene was reflected, as if the firelight of fallen stars mirrored in either black, brown, or blue depths, the desolation and darkness of the earth—seemingly a lifeless wilderness. Yet the firelight above the wilderness comforted every person’s soul.
It must have been many, many years ago when civilization emerged from savagery, when thunder first brought the spark, allowing it to blaze in the wilderness, that the eyes of the ancestors reflected such firelight.
That fire destroys all but brings warmth and light.
Though only a moment passed, to those present it felt like a lifetime had passed. Suddenly, someone’s eyes reflected a different light: “Look, look at the sky!” People screamed. The pitch-black sky, once empty, seemed to transform into a mirror, reflecting the scattered light points on the ground. These points started sparse, then became dense, eventually merging into a sheet, as if stars were falling, shining brightly in the dark night sky.
But people soon realized it was not a reflection, but rather the actual fallen stars; they flowed together, as if a shattered star field was moving in mid-air, trailing long tails, illuminating the entire sky in an instant.
At that moment, many witnessed an unforgettable spectacle in their lives.
Everyone held their breath, mouths agape, eyes fixated on this incredible scene. But only Brendel appeared unmoved, an indescribable expression upon his face, because he had seen this scene before.
The first falling star finally landed. It was a shimmering arc of light that fell from the sky, its bright rays carving a straight silver line across the dark night, pointing towards the mountains east of Metz. Yet the second, the third; in an instant, half the sky seemed to rain down silver light, enveloping the entire world under the endless silver lines. They illuminated the night sky, dazzlingly shining, then gradually fading away, only to be reignited by another falling star.
The age of swords had arrived, thus the stars fell, returning knowledge to the wise—
It was the year of starlight in history, and Brendel remembered this year, as the game entered its third chapter—The War of Tablets. It was ten years before Echis’s revival, the year the eternal darkness descended, and the tablets surfaced in the world.
……
Kruz Empire, the imperial capital, in the White Rose Garden, Constance’s eyes reflected the bright starlight as the empress laughed heartily in the rain of light.
“The curtain has risen; our era has arrived, Esmeralda—”
……
Valhalla, World Tree Fortress, Freya stared blankly at the tablet Brendel had given her—this tablet had once saved her life in the Frozen Death Woods and granted her some miraculous powers. However, after that, it had fallen silent again, failing to show any powers no matter how she studied it, as if it were just an ordinary tablet. Yet at that moment, the tablet suddenly lifted off her desk, one golden character after another flashing from it. These words seemed to embody some kind of pattern, appearing twenty-four times. After the twenty-four characters emerged, with a sudden ‘crack,’ a large gap split open in the tablet.
“Ah—!” Freya exclaimed. Although this tablet hadn’t manifested any power since then, it was still a gift from Brendel, one that had saved her life. She had intended to cherish it well, but didn’t expect it to crack open on its own. She panicked and hurried to press down on the tablet, fearing it would further shatter into pieces—this was Brendel’s most precious gift to her!
But her hands had yet to touch the tablet; amid her frantic movements, it shattered into several pieces with a ‘crack,’ and a golden light shot from the tablet, striking her forehead.
Freya only remembered seeing a golden disk flying out of the tablet before she fell unconscious.
Then she felt herself descending into a world of darkness.
Then a voice echoed in her mind:
‘Code Battle 000000032A Shelf, Bloodline, Preface V, Armament System, Battle Skill Inheritance—’
‘Heir, Black Iron Bloodline—bloodline matches.’
‘Inheritance begins…’
‘From: The War Goddess’s Guard.’
……
Northern Erluin, Lion’s High Plateau, Wolfhowl Forest, Brensen Habuc struggled to drag his unconscious comrades from the pile of black wolf corpses, wiping the blood off his white lion armor. Then he glanced curiously at the silver triangular shard floating not far away. Not long ago, when the sky turned completely black, he and his comrades were on patrol in the forest. Suddenly, they were ambushed by a pack of black wolves, almost wiped out. It was thanks to this silver shard that descended from the sky, which released a brilliant light that killed all the black wolves. It just stayed there, motionless, suspended in mid-air.
“Anyway, I still want to thank you,” Brensen looked up: “But what exactly are you? What has happened to the outside world? You must be related to the earlier changes, right?”
He muttered to himself, not expecting this thing to answer him. But just as he finished speaking, a beam of light suddenly shot out from the triangular shard, projecting a semi-transparent image onto the snow.
“Hello, mortal, I am Luxis, or as you are used to calling me—you may call me Crystal.”
……
“Mortal, I permit you to call me Alphons—”
“Before you stands the end of all, the Azure Blue.”
“I am the Blazing One.”
“We shall obey the covenant, returning the lost knowledge to the inheritors of civilization…”
“A new cycle has begun…”
“You will ultimately face the moment of end; please receive my knowledge, mortal.”
From the mechanical city of Autuster, to the Tower of Stars, from the Lion’s Holy Palace to the Hall of Ten Saints, from the boundless plains of Nazhe to the vast mountains of Saint Ausoor, from the shores of Silver Bay where starlight converges, to the howling winds of the Ten City Alliance, at this moment, countless such scenes were being played repeatedly. Beams of starlight descended from the sky, knowledge from the ancients, the inheritance scattered across the land since the destruction of Babel Fortress, finally returned to the world at this moment.
The War Tablet, in Brendel’s understanding, arrived in this world fifty years early.
The order of the world.
Would inevitably begin to waver.
At this moment, in a small private library in Fatan Port, Nemeses let out a piercing scream: “No… no, I refuse!” At that moment, the black-haired Lady Knight seemed to see a stream of light flowing into her mind from a world of darkness, an influx of information, images, characters, and lines of law flooded her memory. As long as she slightly focused her thoughts on this information, she would understand that they were all from the highest civilization of the previous era, the most crucial part of the inheritance lost by order on the earth. But at that moment, Nemeses had no intention of accepting this inheritance. She only felt an overwhelming panic, clenching her teeth in resistance.
But this resistance was futile.
The switching of images quickly accelerated. From these flickering lights, she saw ancient wars, the clash between dusk and order, the creation of this world by the divine beings, the migratory Mata Tania people among the stars, the Mother Martha who created the first light, and then she saw more: the destruction of Babel Fortress, the change of eras, the Black Iron people emerging from the wilderness, the Sage War, the establishment of Erluin. These images overlapped each other, flashing before her eyes almost too quickly to remember.
Then she saw her own birth; that scene seemed to split into two. She saw two worlds: in one world, she was born into a noble family in Erluin, receiving an excellent noble education and knight training from a young age. She practiced tirelessly, growing up as if to break free from a predetermined fate. In the other world, she was born into a strange room, a pure white chamber filled with odd devices, surrounded by a group of people in white robes gazing at her and her frail mother when she was still young. Then she witnessed her growth: childhood, adolescence, the experiences of an era of learning.
Unconsciously, Nemeses began to sob softly, tears sliding down her tightly closed eyes.
“I… don’t want… to be replaced…”
“I am… Nemeses…”
“I’m sorry…”
Medisa’s outstretched hand froze in mid-air, not advancing a single inch.
After a moment, the black-haired Lady Knight slowly opened her eyes, sparkling with a unique—never before seen—light. She lowered her head, remained silent for a moment, then looked up again.
“Sue…”
A name the Silver Elf Princess had never heard before slipped from the Lady Knight’s lips.
……
After the stars fell, in the distant horizon, the skyline remained pitch black.
Brendel gazed in that direction, as if waiting for something to happen. No one in the courtyard spoke; no one knew what had just transpired. They exchanged glances, uncertain why the sky had suddenly darkened or where the sun, moon, and stars had gone. What about the falling meteors? Romaine curiously squeezed Brendel’s hand. Brendel turned back, gently patting her hand, signaling her not to worry.
This was the perpetual darkness before dusk, leading to an eternal night lasting seven years.
The original order of Vaunte would be completely overturned at this moment.
However, he was not too worried.
Because he had personally experienced all of this.
He watched the horizon; after a brief moment, a streak of silver light suddenly rose from that place. The silver light resembled a slowly ascending silver line. As it reached its zenith, a dazzling light spot spread from the tip of the silver line. Then, many such silver beams rose from various distances, quickly forming a connected whole. Lines of shining silver crisscrossed in mid-air, creating intricate patterns with shifting characters.
Flame, fire.
Daes, sacred.
Latton, life.
Vio, light.
As if at the moment of creation, Martha descended from the sea of magic, laying down silver rules, weaving the codex named world. This scene was now unfolding across the skies of the world, the interwoven silver lines connecting with each other, shining forth warm, lasting light.
In the darkness, it seemed a solemn chant arose, a spell and also the soft sound of a holy hymn. Sacred notes dispersed throughout the world, reverberating across the sky above Vaunte. In this song, the darkness above dissolved in the light, and the sun, the azure sky, clouds, and gentle breezes re-emerged in the sky over the entire world after a moment.
This was Martha’s final blessing to her people, the Song of the Mortal World.
