Night World Players

Chapter 209 It's You, Gray (Two in One)

"That was the cry of a girl who had fallen into the abyss, bursting out in the most desperate and helpless moment."

"Calling for the hero in her past life who would come to her rescue whenever she cried out."

Gray's voice echoed once again in the watchtower.

"I thought that as long as I fulfilled this wish."

"Then, guided by fate, Brother Luster, who has rescued me from danger countless times in the past, will appear before me again and redeem me."

"After all, you were always like this before. When I needed you most, you appeared in my life like the wind, and then left like the wind. No matter how hard I searched later, I could never find your trace again."

The girl's voice was like the melodious wind chimes at midnight.

"I don't even need Brother Luster to provide any substantial help... I just need to be able to see you and have you by my side—"

"Then I will be able to regain the courage to face the inevitable end, the tragic ending where the entire meaning of life is denied."

"That was my only wish at that time—to meet you again."

"However, it wasn't until after the wish was fulfilled that I realized I was wrong."

"Big mistake."

Gray's voice stopped from then on.

At the same time, hazy light and shadows were surging in the crystal light curtain.

The red and blue dots of light that had originally interlaced on the light screen and the map of the Western Continent where human civilization was rapidly expanding disappeared.

Instead, there is a clear picture.

Towns ablaze, walls crumbling, floors falling.

Hot air blew up with smoke and dust, metal pipes twisted and deformed in the heat, steam and flames filled every direction...

There was also the sky, burned black and red by thick smoke and fire.

This is a dilapidated, desolate ruin.

At the same time, Last's gaze completely froze.

The image on the light screen was reflected in his eyes, like an old dream coming again and reflecting into reality.

In the light curtain, everything in the dilapidated ruins was so familiar.

Every collapsed wall, crumbling floor, street burned black by the fire... every building, every detail, matched the memory in Last's mind one by one, without any error.

He slowly closed his eyes.

He felt the nightmare in his mind, which had been lingering in the depths of his soul and made him unable to tell whether it was an illusion, gradually reflected into reality and perfectly matched the picture on the light screen before his eyes.

Until this moment, the vague premonitions and guesses that Last had in his heart in the past were finally confirmed as reality.

This is a burning border town, with the black and red sky reflecting the bloody earth.

The ruins of Canaan.

And the experience of struggling to survive buried in the ruins in his memory was not an illusion caused by being trapped in Deep Blue Harbor for more than three hundred years...

That was a scene that actually happened.

Rast looked up at the dome of the watchtower, the dark steel sky.

He recalled the scene that had flashed back countless times in his dreams at midnight.

Under the sky that was illuminated black and red by the fire, the woman who found herself still alive in the burning ruins smiled sincerely and hugged herself tightly.

A woman who calls herself "Shore Keeper".

To this day, those distant memories have long since faded with time, and even the woman's face has become blurred...

But Rast still remembers that smile, perhaps the most beautiful smile he has ever seen in his life.

At this moment, the female figure in the memory slowly overlapped with the gray-haired girl named Gray, exactly the same.

"Grey."

He whispered, "So it's you..."

All the memories of the past are finally connected.

Including the heart-wrenching pain and the ideals that have been eroded by three hundred years and still exist even though they are broken.

The entire library fell into a long silence. Even Dean Yin, who was usually the most active and impatient, did not speak.

It just squatted silently on Rast's shoulder, feeling the boy who was like a machine, and for the first time, he showed a look of hesitation and fragility.

……

"I thought that after making a wish, I would be able to see Brother Rast immediately."

After a long time, Gray's voice was heard again along with the burning ruins in the light curtain.

"However, what I saw was the burning ruins of a small town engulfed in flames."

"Actually...I should have discovered it earlier."

Gray's words were also filled with an undisguised hesitation.

"Brother Luster, the knowledge you passed down to me through the 'Library of Fools', everything about it is so advanced...it's like it came from the future."

"So when you disappeared, Brother Last, no matter how hard I tried, I couldn't find any trace of you... because you don't exist in the Sixth Epoch's timeline, and you don't exist in this era."

"And at this moment, I made a wish to fate to see you again... Under the influence of the great power of fate, this wish was distorted—"

"It means to summon you, Brother Last, along with the entire town you will live in in the future, through time and space, to the Sixth Epoch, which is the past history for you."

Her voice paused for a moment.

"And in that timeline that belongs to you, you have not yet traveled through time and space to meet me, and you have never known the ideals of the shore guardians—"

"Back then, you were just a child living in a small town called Canaan, leading a simple but happy life." "However, your life, Brother Last, was destroyed by my own hands—leaving only the burning fire and the collapsed ruins, tearing your peaceful daily life to pieces."

"After discovering the truth of everything and what kind of stupid thing I had done... I tried desperately to make amends, but to no avail."

Gray's main perspective was presented on the light screen.

She kept walking among the burning town, the collapsed ruins filled with smoke and hot wind, trying to rescue the trapped residents from the ruins.

However, beneath the collapsed ruins, all that responded to Gray were bloody and mutilated human figures.

"Under the mighty force of fate, the entire town of Canaan suffered the aftermath of 'spacetime annihilation' and 'spacetime collapse'."

"That's traveling from the future back to the past, thousands or even tens of thousands of years ago, spanning an entire epoch... Traveling through time and space over such a vast distance, even an angel like me, whose destiny is in the order, would put a considerable strain on my body when traveling back in time."

"And what about those ordinary people in Canaan, who were helpless and lived peaceful lives? The vast majority of them didn't die in the fire, but from the aftereffects of 'time travel'."

"I traveled all over the ruins of Canaan, but in the end, I only found two living survivors."

"The first one is you, Brother Luster, when you were little..."

"Although you were much younger and more immature than the boy I remember, the moment I found you from the rubble of the fire, I knew it was you... No matter what you looked like or what age you were, I would never mistake you."

"Perhaps it's because you, Brother Rust, are the subject of the wish I made... or perhaps it's because you, Brother Rust, will become the heir to the 'Library of Fools' in the future. This fate transcends time and space, and does not distinguish between past and future."

"Anyway, Brother Luster, your body is fine and you haven't suffered any aftereffects from the 'space-time collapse'."

"And the other survivor of Canaan—"

Her voice paused slightly. "It was a little girl named Amys."

"That is, what you, Brother Last, said..."

"Xiao Ai."

……

Hearing the name "Amis" from Gray's mouth, even Dean Yin couldn't help but glance at Last under him.

It had heard the name "Amis", or "Xiao Ai" for short, from Hiltina a long time ago.

That person seemed to be very important to Last. It was precisely because of his reliance on the other person that even though Last had been trapped in the Deep Blue Harbor for more than three hundred years, his mind had never wavered or collapsed, and he had never fallen into the abyss of self-destruction.

But even if it was Hiltina, even if it was Dean Yin, these people who were very close to Last in this world and knew many of his secrets...

My understanding of "Amis" is just hearing her name.

This seems to be the most secret and most important thing in Rast's heart. He has never told anyone the meaning of this name.

And under Dean Yin, the moment he heard the name, Last subconsciously closed his eyes.

The truth about Canaan and the woman in her memory who rescued her from the ruins of the fire is Grey's business... In fact, hints have been given from various clues from the very beginning.

After all, there have only been a handful of people throughout history who have earned the title of "Shore Keeper" and possessed the "Library of Fools," and even fewer of them are women.

Last had already made guesses and inferences about these things in his mind a long time ago.

Hearing Gray's statement just now only proved my own guess, and it was not a groundbreaking cognition.

This time he entered the night world and came to the Mechanical Research Institute in the Watchtower.

What I really want to explore is actually something about Xiao Ai.

It can even be said that the reason why Last chose to join Star University and become a Night Traveler in the first place was to find the truth of this secret.

And at this moment, the truth that he had been searching for was finally within reach.

Rast closed his eyes, feeling the timidity and nervousness that rose up involuntarily in his heart due to the homesickness.

He was a little worried that the answer he heard was not what he expected.

But in the end, Rast opened his eyes again.

At the same time, Gray's voice finally rang out again.

"When I found Amis, barely breathing, in the ruins, I couldn't believe my eyes."

"No one knows how that fragile little girl named Amys managed to endure the severe strain of space-time collapse, something even adults, or even low-level transcendents, would find unbearable."

"However, even so, Amy's physical condition is extremely grim."

For some reason, there was a strange feeling in Gray's voice.

"Even though she relied on some extraordinary perseverance and persistence to avoid immediate death in the disaster... she was ultimately just an ordinary little girl—"

"Caught in the aftermath of the time distortion, she experienced a time travel spanning tens of thousands of years in an instant. How could she not pay a price for such a huge burden?"

"The burden of traveling through time and space, the condition known as 'space-time collapse syndrome', is still taking its toll on Amis."

"Her entire body, every inch of flesh and blood, every cell... was distorted during the process of 'space-time collapse,' her DNA was broken, and she could not heal, let alone repair herself."

"This is a truly terminal illness, far more deadly than cancer... With the technology of the Sixth Epoch, even the most severe cancers have treatments, enough to prolong life for decades—but with Amis's condition, even the best hospitals and doctors in the Federation are powerless."

"Even my 'time reversal' is ineffective. No matter how serious a common illness is, as long as I can reverse it and return the body's condition to the state before the illness, everything will be fine."

"But Amys is different. Her condition is the aftereffect of experiencing 'space-time collapse'. If I were to use replay on her, not only would it not improve her condition, it might even worsen it."

The scene on the light screen changed.

This seemed to be a room somewhat similar to the ICU in Rast's previous life, the highest level intensive care unit in the hospital.

Countless medical instruments are densely placed in the intensive care unit.

In the center of the intensive care unit, a small body lay on a clean white bed, its frail arms plugged with all sorts of infusion needles and life-support equipment.

Last recognized the name of the thin blond girl on the hospital bed—

She is Amys.

(End of this chapter)