Night World Players

Chapter 259 Ophelia: The Infernal Affairs Section

Amys and Rust stayed on the cliff behind the mountain for a very long time.

They didn't set off down the mountain until the stars in the night sky gradually became sparse.

I heard soft breathing nearby.

Perhaps because she felt safe by Rust's side, the string that had been taut for thousands of years finally relaxed, and the girl fell into a deep sleep in his arms.

Of course, as the master of the mental world, Amys had the ability to create a luxurious palace out of thin air and then teleport the two of them directly into it.

But clearly, compared to the creator's wish fulfillment, "I don't eat beef"... she obviously cherished this warm embrace more.

"Waiting for an entire era, persevering for thousands of years... You've truly worked hard."

Looking at the blonde girl sleeping soundly in his arms, Last's gaze softened.

"So, Xiao Ai..."

"You should get some sleep first."

He picked up Amys in a princess carry and carried her down the winding path.

We passed through the forest and crossed the clear stream.

Soon, the town of Canaan came into view again.

No longer the ruins shrouded in thick smoke and flames, the burning town is now slowly shedding its scorch marks—

The flames transformed into countless orange-red specks of light, rising up and then quietly dissipating. The charred beams sprouted new buds, the collapsed brick walls automatically rebuilt, and the ruined houses were restored once again...

And so Rust walked through the newly formed town.

Beside me, the aroma of freshly baked cinnamon wafted from the bakery's chimney, as if the bakery owner was always ready to open the doors to customers.

The so-called "world of the mind" is essentially a reflection of the mental landscape of its owner.

Originally, the girl whose soul had been largely corrupted by the Judgment Star Cup and who was desperately struggling to stay afloat naturally had a desolate and broken mental landscape, just like the dilapidated ruins from before.

At this moment, as the will of the Star Cup fades, Amys and Rast reunite and pour out their hearts to each other… Her heart, the shattered landscape of her mind, is also rebuilt—

From ruins, it was transformed once again into the vibrant Canaan.

What was reborn was not only Amys's own mental world.

As long as he calms his mind and closes his eyes, Raste can see his own mental world... a red wasteland, and a magnificent tower rising from the ground on the wasteland.

This is what Last has been striving for over the past two years—to rebuild the tower known as the "Library of Fools".

At this moment, upon encountering Amys, the seed that had been dormant for so long finally sprouted again, like a new spring growing on a wasteland burned by wildfire.

This tower is no longer a product of external forces that provided benefits without effort, like a cheat code; rather, it was completely deconstructed and reshaped after its collapse...

Ultimately, it transformed into a power deep within Rust's soul, a power that truly belonged solely to him.

In the library, besides the high-ranking characters like "Chariot," "Destiny," and "Death," who had already been freed and reached extremely high bond levels—

The long staircase called Judgment was now shining so brightly that it overshadowed all other sequences.

At the end of the long staircase, a glass-like card was slowly rotating.

Unlike all the other cards in the Fool's Library, its surface is crystal clear, reflecting prismatic colors like crystal.

The prismatic color is a symbol of its status as the only card with maxed-out bonds.

"Judgment: Amys"

A tarot card whose bond level is "MAX" from the moment it is unlocked, with all the steps of the sequence fully opened.

"In other words... at this moment, I am equivalent to having all the powers and authority of Xiao Ai as the Angel of Judgment."

"I feel like I'm going further and further down the road to omniscience and omnipotence by collecting all twenty-three sequence lengths."

Last smiled as he felt the radiant staircase of the Fool's Library.

"I wonder if God will ever ask me for copyright fees."

He pulled his mind away from the world of his imagination, and paused slightly in his steps.

What appeared before them was the wooden house that Amys and Rust had lived in Canaan, which had now been rebuilt and looked just as Rust remembered it.

Last carried Amys through the door, gently placed her on the bed in the bedroom, and covered her with a blanket.

After doing all this, Last sat down by the bed and looked at the sleeping girl in the cold moonlight from the window.

When Amys was asleep, she looked very quiet and well-behaved, like a docile cat... Her long, pale golden hair was spread out on the white bed, reflecting a slight light.

"She always says she's just an ordinary village girl..."

"Now it seems that you are more like a real princess."

Looking at the girl's peaceful sleeping face, Last felt his heart calm down and let out a long breath.

Erasing the impurities from Amys's inner world—as the embodiment of divine justice, the process may seem easy, but it is actually a huge drain on Raste.

Later, he even separated a portion of his spiritual essence to help Amys continue her soul fire, which was on the verge of breaking... The price of this action was that it caused irreversible damage to Rust's own soul fire.

With both factors combined, he had already reached his limit.

However, Rast had long been accustomed to enduring and to using various masks to conceal his weakness... so neither the Angel of Judgment himself nor Amys had ever had the opportunity to notice this weakness.

"However, although the process was somewhat tortuous, the ending was ultimately satisfactory."

Last closed his eyes, taking stock of the gains and losses of this operation.

"They rescued Aiolos from the Night World and completed the reconstruction of the 'Library of Fools,' exceeding all the set goals."

What he needs to do next.

Together with Xiao Ai, they quietly hibernated in the night world, recuperating their bodies and minds, replenishing their previously depleted spiritual energy, and returning to their peak state.

Then, quietly wait for a suitable opportunity to return to reality...

As soon as this thought arose.

The next moment, however, he felt something long buried in his heart being gently touched.

From the spirit world, a faint call seemed to emanate, transcending the barrier between the night world and reality, connecting Rast to somewhere in the real world.

He paused for a moment, his thoughts racing as he searched through his memory bank for clues.

A moment later, Last completed the investigation to trace the source of the inexplicable calling.

That was an unintentional act performed before he fell into slumber, amidst the lingering echoes of history in the Sixth Epoch.

During the technological age of the Sixth epoch, Last entered a virtual reality game called "The Poems of the Shore Keeper".

Furthermore, in the Deep Blue Harbor instance of that virtual reality game, he even used deception and trickery to fool the entire cult and even the Deep Blue Harbor evil god himself.

The evil god of Deep Blue Harbor completed a divine descent, sending down his half-body, which carried a wisp of his divine will.

Then, that wisp of the evil god's divine thought from Deep Blue Harbor was dragged directly into the dark room of his own mental world by Raster, and was ruthlessly devoured.

Although The Poems of the Shore Guardians is nominally just a fully immersive virtual reality online game.

But in reality, as Gray's third wish, an attempt to create the Night World using the Eternal Night Stone as a vessel... in a sense, "The Guardian's Poem" is the prototype and experiment of the Night World.

Therefore, the wisp of the Deep Blue Harbor evil god's divine thought that Rast absorbed in the game instance also truly exists.

After he had completely devoured that wisp of divine thought and read all the memories and information about the divine era contained within it, he...

After the self-will of the Deep Blue Harbor Evil God was crushed, the remaining traces of unclaimed divinity were casually sealed away by Rast in a corner of his own mental world.

He had thought that the only value of these remaining unclaimed divinities was to be studied during his idle moments after he fell into slumber, so that he could explore the true nature of the gods' power.

Unexpectedly, these unclaimed divine beings suddenly became active.

Seemingly sensing a call from another world, it established a faint connection between the night world and the present world.

"The true form of the Evil God of Deep Blue Harbor is still bound to the Blazing Sky Barrier."

"After being fooled by me back then, resulting in the direct loss of a divine demigod... He has remained silent for many years, probably choosing to accept defeat and continue to isolate himself on the Threshold of the Blazing Heaven."

"In other words, this divine essence is being invoked in the present world right now..."

"Are they the cultists on the Western Continent who were abandoned by the evil god of Deep Blue Harbor?"

After reasoning and arriving at this conclusion, Lastton became interested.

He got up and left in an extremely gentle motion, without waking the sleeping girl in the bed, and then closed the bedroom door.

A few dozen seconds later, Last appeared in the second-floor washroom.

"I don't know why..."

"But it seems that, according to the tradition of the time-traveling predecessors, they must perform their best in the washroom whenever they hold such mystical rituals."

Last muttered a complaint to himself before closing his eyes again.

The next moment, his mental world suddenly boiled over.

The once calm sea of ​​the mind suddenly surged with raging waves.

Last's mental power was fully unleashed—

Then, following that wisp of unclaimed divinity from the evil god of Deep Blue Harbor, that subtle yet palpable connection to the present world…

He freed his will from the night world and arrived at some place in the present world.

However, immediately afterwards...

In the washroom, Last's gaze flickered slightly.

A rare hint of surprise flickered in those dark eyes.

"Ophelia?"

……

In the present world, on the western continent, somewhere on the border between the Granville Empire and the Holy Kingdom of Fran.

Ophelia controlled a mechanical android made of immortal metal, slowly opened its eyes, and completed the mental connection.

As a true genius in the field of mechanics, Ophelia, a mechanic, possesses the ability to create multiple mechanical dolls and remotely control these metal dolls across thousands of kilometers using a long-distance mental connection.

For example, at this very moment, Ophelia herself is still in the capital of the Granville Empire, accompanying her elder sister and assisting Hiltina in handling government affairs.

However, through the connection of the wide area network, Ophelia was able to manipulate this metal doll thousands of miles away, as if it were her own substitute.

Of course, on the surface, these metal dolls she created all had their own identities, and their backgrounds and resumes had been fabricated... These were Ophelia's mobs planted throughout the Western Continent, and they were not usually used easily.

The reason Ophelia activated this mechanical doll at this moment was because this long-buried mole had successfully obtained certain intelligence—

Clues have been found regarding the cult and the tomb keepers, who are plotting a conspiracy against the Empire and Hiltina.

However, at this moment, Ophelia's mole encountered considerable obstacles in the process of gathering intelligence.

"Damn it! Those high and mighty religious sects!"

"This is clearly a major operation targeting the Granville Empire and the Star Sword Wielder—Princess Hiltina, yet those people completely excluded us from the meeting to discuss the details of the plan, only telling us to follow their orders!"

“If the Lord hadn’t stopped answering our prayers two years ago, how could we, the Iron Cross, be in this situation! How could we be so looked down upon by other denominations!”

Across from them, a figure with an iron-colored cross brand on his arm spoke in a sinister tone, his words filled with anger and dissatisfaction.

His entire body was shrouded in a black cloak, obscuring his facial features. Even the voice he emitted seemed to be masked by extraordinary abilities, making it impossible to discern his gender or age.

Of course, opposite this figure who called himself the Patriarch of the Iron Cross, the mechanical android controlled by Ophelia... was not much better looking either.

This mechanical doll also wore a black cloak that obscured its features, and spoke in a hoarse, mechanical voice that was neither male nor female.

“That’s right. Although our Mechanicus has only been established for a few years, it is the cult that is most in line with the rapidly changing technological age.”

"Those people look down on us because they don't take the power of technological progress seriously."

"Flesh and blood are weak and feeble, while machinery soars to new heights."

As she spoke, Ophelia manipulated the mechanical doll to make the sign of the cross on her chest and devoutly recited the prayer.

This is her persona as a hidden agent: the leader of the "Mechanical Flesh Cult," a newly emerging cult in the Western Continent in recent years.

(End of this chapter)