Trickster Hunter.

Chapter 89 "He"

"Going back in time, the third to last 'eternal night' on the Xiazhou continent occurred during the Ming Dynasty, in the ninth year of Hongzhi, which was the 4185th year of the lunar calendar. That eternal night only lasted for nine years, but it still caused the population from Siming Prefecture to Zhaoqing Prefecture to shrink to less than % of its original level." As Professor Li spoke, the holographic projection on the desktop also changed.

"During the Ming Dynasty?" Sun Hang was slightly startled, nudged Yang Qi with his elbow, and asked in a very low voice, "I suddenly thought of a question."

"What?" Yang Qi gave him a puzzled look.

"If my memory is correct, shouldn't the history of strange things appearing only be about 300 years? The Ming Dynasty is more than 500 years ago, right?"

"'Weird things' is a unified name that was officially proposed after the establishment of the Xiazhou Federation. In the past history, some of them were called natural disasters, some were called ghosts, and some were called evil spirits..." Yang Qi explained to Sun Hang in a low voice, "In ancient history, whether it is official history books or folk history, most of these things are not described in detail. Many records of suspected weird things are difficult to distinguish whether they are real weird things or natural phenomena that the ancients could not explain with the scientific level at that time... Until the last three hundred years, weird things began to invade human living areas with high frequency and large scale, and destroyed countless human countries. Only then did people realize... humans are not the real 'masters' of this planet at all."

Yang Qi paused for a moment and continued, "It is for this reason that the official record of 'strange things' only began in the last three hundred years... But in fact, the evidence of the existence of strange things can be traced back to the pre-Qin period. It's just that at that time, these things were still isolated and did not have much intersection with human society."

"In other words, the gods, monsters and spirits recorded in those mythological stories are actually weird creatures?" Sun Hang couldn't help but think of an ancient book called "Classic of Mountains and Seas" - according to Yang Qi, could it be that the monsters in "Classic of Mountains and Seas" all have real prototypes, rather than being fictionalized by the ancients?
"At least part of it is." Yang Qi nodded. "But for a strange object like 'Eternal Night' with extremely obvious characteristics, it is easy to confirm its existence even if the record only contains one sentence."

"Then why did the monsters and humans have little interaction in the past few thousand years, but suddenly began to invade human territory on a large scale three hundred years ago?" Sun Hang asked again.

"The Tianshu Tower has also been searching for the answer to your question." Yang Qi sighed helplessly, "There are many speculations in the academic community, but no one can provide convincing evidence."

On the other side of the long table, Professor Li waved his hand and a photo appeared on the projection.

The thing in the photo is a copy of an ancient book, written in the official font of the Ming Dynasty, "Tai Ge Style": At noon on the second day of the ninth month of the Bingchen year of the ninth year of the Hongzhi reign, from Siming Prefecture to Zhaoqing Prefecture, there was a roaring sound, black air surged, and the sky was invisible. Among the flying sand and rocks, there were monsters and strange beasts, and the people were all terrified. The governor of Siming Prefecture sent troops to resist, but they collapsed as soon as they were touched, and the defeated soldiers suffered thousands of casualties...

The second half of the rubbing is almost entirely covered with large blocks of ink erasures, and the original content can no longer be seen.

In addition to this rubbing, Professor Li also showed photos of other historical documents, all of which recorded the attacks of "evil beasts" on humans during that "natural disaster."

Among these documents are the official histories of the Ming Dynasty, as well as many unofficial histories compiled by anonymous authors. Even with just a few words of description, it is not difficult to imagine the various horrific scenes that people encountered during those nine years.

"Based on these documents, we inferred that the source of the 'Eternal Night' in the ninth year of the Hongzhi reign was 70 to 90 kilometers north of Siming Prefecture," said Professor Li. "The human armed forces of the Ming Dynasty were not able to compete with the strange creatures, so in the second year of the Eternal Night, the court abandoned this area and left the survivors to fend for themselves."

"Professor, I have a question." Yang Lian suddenly raised his hand. "Go ahead."

"If the breeding source has not been dealt with, the number of monsters in the area will continue to grow until it overflows, right? Or, the monsters born from the breeding source will only move around in the eternal night area? Then after the eternal night is over, where will the breeding source and these monsters go?" Yang Lian asked several questions in a row.

Judging from the looks of others, the questions raised by Yang Lian were obviously also of concern to everyone present.

"After the Eternal Night dissipates, the breeding source and the strange creatures born in it will disappear. As for where they went, no one knows." Professor Li shook his head, "But the key issue is that we don't know how long this Eternal Night will last, because we can't ignore the breeding source that may appear."

"It sounds like the breeding source is a large monster hatchery." Another hunter said, "After locating it, we can just send bombers or use ground-to-ground missiles to blow it up. Isn't that the solution?"

"I also hope to solve the problem this way, but there is one thing I have to tell you." Professor Li sighed, "In the breeding source, there is a high probability that there will be weird things with early serial numbers...even including the original primary weird thing with serial number 'zero'."

"The original primary weirdo?!"

After this name was spoken, there was a sound of gasps among the hunters - only those who had many direct contacts with strange creatures could understand what the concept of a primary strange creature was.

In the circle of monster hunters, and even among a considerable number of monster researchers, the nickname used when referring to the original primary monster is not "it" but "Him".

"In the year 4509 of the lunar calendar, there was an eternal night that lasted for thirteen months in the Amazon River Basin on the other side of the ocean." Professor Li said slowly, "And the strange creature that appeared at the source of reproduction during that eternal night, I believe everyone here has heard of its name."

Everyone couldn't help but hold their breath, and the entire venue was so quiet that you could hear a pin drop.

Sun Hang turned his head and looked at Yang Qi. In the latter's eyes, he saw a mixture of shock and fear.

"The source of the eternal night is located in the deepest part of the Amazon rainforest, where the original primary monster 'Dingling Decayed Mother Tree' is located."

(End of this chapter)