Mystery: Big Alarm Clock Ghroth Path

Chapter 320 Abandoned Human City-State

As Roger had predicted, Cattleya, dressed in a bulky black robe, was clearly anxious and uneasy.

As the captain of the "Future," Gadriya has always had her own private space, but now that she's with the joint exploration team to explore the "Forsaken Land," being with dozens of people makes her feel somewhat uncomfortable.

Especially in the current situation, it is not very convenient for Cattleya to hold a sacrificial ceremony for Mr. Fool.

After the scheduled rest time and routine roll call, the group, led by Roger, Bernadette, and Leomaster, embarked on their exploration again. Taking advantage of the slight chaos, Cattleya quickly approached Bernadette and whispered something in her ear.

Bernadette made no comment at the time, or even took any other action.

A little while later, one of the crew members on board the Dawn suddenly said that he had a stomachache and needed to go to the toilet.

This made things a bit awkward. Although the "forsaken land" was very dangerous, it was still inappropriate for everyone to use the toilet together, as it seemed rather unseemly.

In the end, Roger took the initiative to make arrangements, having a male Beyonder of Sequence 5 from the "Dawn" lead a group of male exploration team members, and Bernadette lead a group of female exploration team members to the restroom, while he himself stayed in place to keep an eye on "Black Saint" Leomaster, to prevent him from suddenly kneeling down to pray or listen to something.

Roger knew that Cattleya was looking for an opportunity to sacrifice the "True Star Map" to Mr. Fool, since she claimed that this Sequence 5 sealed artifact was in her possession. If this matter dragged on for too long, it would inevitably seem very abnormal.

Bernadette can provide her with protection, preventing her from being ambushed by monsters in the darkness during the ritual. As for the male extraordinary who suddenly wanted to go to the toilet, it was clearly a decoy created by Cattleya.

This plan is too simple, but for ordinary extraordinary individuals who do not possess "source matter," it is indeed a good way to solve the problem.

Sure enough, Cattleya and her group left quickly and returned just as quickly.

Roger kept his eyes down, not looking at them, because he knew that this was Cattleya's way of creating a time gap to prevent Roger from receiving the "True Star Map" immediately after she left.

In fact, when Roger participated in the Tarot meeting earlier, he had almost revealed his cards to Cattleya. His words clearly implied that he knew she was in the group.

However, there must be a very important reason why Gadriya used this trick instead of directly handing the item to Roger.

That is, she wanted to observe how Roger received the "True Star Chart" from Mr. Fool. As His favorite, Cattleya guessed that Roger and Mr. Fool must have communicated differently.

Roger wasn't angry about Cattleya's ideas; instead, he felt somewhat helpless.

Because in fact, he was not a follower of Mr. Fool. Rather than saying he was a follower of Klein, it would be more appropriate to say that Bandit was a follower of Klein.

Therefore, Roger's method of receiving items from Mr. Fool has always been exactly the same as that of Cattleya and the others, with no difference whatsoever.

"In that case..."

Roger considered the situation in his mind. He didn't rush to collect the "True Star Map." He remained calm and even pretended not to hear the message from Mr. Fool, who had just arrived.

For the average person, they might think that a deity's follower needs to respond to the deity's communication immediately. However, on the other hand, the deity may not necessarily hand over the "sacrifice" to its follower as it would to other members of the "Tarot Society."

It is possible that Mr. Fool is the great being who solved the problems of "true star map" and "timekeeping", so it is not impossible that He will make some modifications to the "true star map".

After everyone returned, Roger watched as Bandit urinated on the spot before ordering everyone to set off again.

It must be said that the "forsaken land" does indeed possess a kind of magic that makes people feel extremely uncomfortable.

There is no sun here, and no light other than lightning; there is only boundless darkness.

Roger could only see things within a two- or three-meter radius around him through the light provided by the "Explorer's Lantern." Apart from that, he could only see the figures of the people traveling with him, as well as the eerie growls, groans, and cries that occasionally emanated from the darkness, creating a unique sense of terror.

Occasionally, when Roger stared into the darkness for too long, he would see some twisted monster figures flash by. It seemed that these things were spying on him and his companions, making Roger feel extremely uneasy.

Even though Roger took the initiative to attack several times and killed a number of those monsters, this feeling did not subside significantly.

If he felt so uncomfortable, the other members of the joint exploration team must have felt even worse.

After walking for about two days, some team members began to show obvious anxiety and irritability. Some extraordinary individuals with lower sequence levels and poorer mentality even became extremely pessimistic and began to fear that they would die on this dark continent like the team members who had died before them, and lose the chance to go home forever.

Upon witnessing this scene, Roger realized the seriousness of the problem.

He stood up, moved closer to Bernadette, sat down beside her, and whispered:

“Bernarde, I see that everyone’s mood is a bit off… I’m going back to the ‘Star Lord’ to get a batch of spirit-boosting potions. You stay here and keep an eye on Leomaster.”

"it is good."

Bernadette nodded. The "mysterious queen" realized that Roger was probably going back to the ship to receive a message from Mr. Fool, and getting the potion was just a convenient thing to do.

However, because the other party's reasons were too legitimate, she couldn't ask any further questions and had no choice but to let Roger leave.

Roger, along with Bendit, used the "Traveler's Dice" to return to the "Star Lord".

He had previously brought the "Traveler's Dice" into the "Primal Core," borrowed this source-material blessing using ritual magic, and imbued this sealed object corresponding to the extraordinary characteristics of the "Traveler."

Therefore, even if there are anomalies in the spirit world of the "Forsaken Land," Roger can find a normal spirit world correspondence in the spiritual sky of the "Primal Core" and thus use "teleportation" normally.

After returning to the "Star Lord", he first apologized to Mr. "Fool" and explained his situation in the "Forsaken Land". Only then did he tell Mr. "Fool" that he could now receive item teleportation.

Roger then waited quietly. About 10 minutes later, a new batch of potions provided by "Mr. Moon" and the "True Star Map" provided by "Ms. Hermit" were delivered to Roger.

Roger quickly thanked Mr. Fool, then offered 8000 gold pounds in cash as a sacrifice before severing all contact with Source Castle.

Roger then entered the "Original Core" and began to modify the sealed artifact as quickly as possible.

He spread the parchment scroll out on his workbench and saw many ink-colored stars flickering on and off. However, at this moment, they were not moving; their positions remained the same as before Roger and the others entered the "Forsaken Land."

Roger closed his eyes, stroking the star map as he simultaneously connected his spirituality to both the scroll and the spiritual sky of the "Primal Core," linking the two together.

Soon, the celestial bodies on the "real star map" began to move rapidly, much faster than normal celestial movements, as if trying to make up for the two days that had already been lost.

After about a minute, the starry sky in the "True Star Map" finally returned to normal, and at the very top of the scroll, a rust-colored star, flickering on and off, appeared.

This star wasn't on it before; it only appeared after this contract was made. So, without a doubt, this is the mark of the "Original Heavenly Core".

"Right, this still doesn't seem enough..."

After a moment's thought, Roger came up with a plan.

He decided to return temporarily while leaving the "True Star Map" within the "Original Celestial Core".

Before leaving the "Star Lord", Roger took some more supplies from the ship to replenish what he had consumed over the past two days, and put them, along with the large basket of potions, into the "Original Dynamic Core".

When Roger used Philemon's Bell to bring Bandit back to Bernadette and the others, only about half an hour had passed since he left.

Bernadette breathed a slight sigh of relief when she saw him reappear.

She said:

“While you were away, your men and my men got into an argument and almost came to blows, but Leomaster stopped it.”

Bernadette didn't say how Leomaster stopped them, but judging from the way both sides had backed down, Roger knew it must have been some extremely horrifying rhetoric, the kind that shouldn't be thought about too closely.

"It's alright, I brought the medicine."

Immediately afterwards, as if by magic, Roger threw dozens of packaged test tubes, each sealed with a cork, onto the ground.

Bernadette's eyes widened; she was utterly astonished.

Roger didn't use any of his baggage or jewelry as sealing materials; he simply waved his hand and these things appeared on the ground.

Bernadette knew that Roger possessed the "Old Box," a sealed artifact that could be used for storage, but at this moment, he clearly wasn't using it; instead, he was using other methods.

This process, which Cattleya had been observing silently from the sidelines, also gave her a jolt; it was indeed beyond her expectations.

"Everyone, form pairs and come to me to collect the potion, then take it in front of me."

Roger shouted:
“I know everyone is in a bad mood right now, which may be due to the influence of the supernatural forces of the ‘Forsaken Land’, and not your intention.”

"This medicine can help everyone gain strong mental and spiritual resistance within five days, thereby avoiding negative mental states to the greatest extent possible."

After hearing Roger's words, the members of the exploration team finally realized what was happening. They stood up one after another, began to collect the potion, and took it in front of Roger.

Strangely enough, after taking the medicine, everyone felt that their mental state had improved a lot, and the previous anxiety, irritability and pessimism were swept away.

Just then, Roger also pulled out "Demon Slayer," and then he separated "Fallen Shadow" from his own body and threw the silver-white rune-inscribed broken sword to it.

"Fallen Shadow" understood and immediately led "Demon Slayer" into the darkness.

As the light of dawn flickered in the darkness, the sounds of people falling to the ground with thuds and screams echoed one after another.

After about a minute, the darkness returned to calm. After this operation, the morale of the explorers' team was greatly boosted. They clapped and cheered, seemingly very relieved.

However, Roger was not in a hurry to call back the "Shadow of Corruption".

The black figure wielding the Dawnlight Sword stood in the depths of darkness, its pitch-black gaze fixed on the even deeper darkness.

"This is……"

Roger, connected to the vision of "Fallen Shadow," used his "Secret Insight" to see what appeared to be some buildings ahead!
Judging from their general outlines, the style of those buildings was vastly different from that of the countries of the Northern Continent and even the colonies of the Southern Continent. Most importantly, their shapes were incomplete, as if they had been destroyed by some external force.

Due to the distance, "Secret Insight" could not obtain enough information. Roger could only confirm that there was some danger there, but he could not determine how great the danger was.

After confirming this, he brought back the "shadow of depravity".

"what happened?"

Bernadette also noticed Roger's unusual behavior and asked him a question.

“Bernarde, my summoned creatures have discovered the ruins of what appears to be a human settlement in that direction.”

Roger spoke somewhat uncertainly:
"This is just a rough judgment based on its appearance. I'm wondering if we should explore it further? What do you think?"

The “Forsaken Land” is heavily polluted, and it would be unwise to venture into the ruins of a destroyed human settlement.

Roger said this partly because he hoped Bernadette could offer some advice, and partly because he hoped that her ability as a "prophet" could help him assess the level of danger in this exploration.

In the "Land Forsaken by God," because the spirit world and the starry sky are severed, any astrology or divination will not be effective.

Even if Roger used the "Primal Core" to perform divination, the result would only be slightly better.

The fundamental reason is not that the "Primal Core" itself is problematic, but that the vast majority of objective entities in the "Forsaken Land" do not have a spirit world projection in a strict sense.

At the same time, they are greatly distorted by the influence of celestial phenomena. Therefore, even if the "Primal Core" can penetrate the darkness of the "Forsaken Land" and reach the Spirit Realm and the Astral Realm, it has no good way to influence the actual existence here in return. This is a problem of the connection path. That is, the Spirit Realm and the starry sky are visible to Roger and the "Primal Core," but these two worlds have almost no connection with the people and things that originally existed in the "Forsaken Land." This is like a large fog of war that only affects the original inhabitants of the "Forsaken Land."

From this perspective, although the inhabitants of the “forsaken land” all have their own destinies, these destinies are similar to narrow-frequency vibrations, are more independent, and are more dependent on the collective consciousness of the various survivor city-states. They are almost unrelated to the fate of outsiders, and therefore are more difficult to predict by outsiders.

Unless the "Lord of the Source Castle," who is roughly equivalent to the spirit world in a mystical sense, personally comes to the "Forsaken Land," normal divination will not be very effective. Or, unless it is someone like Derrick Berg who has established a direct connection with the "Source Castle," most people and things in the "Forsaken Land" are in a similar situation.

However, for demigods who use the "secret seer" method, they can directly observe fate itself. This is the biggest difference between "prophecy" and "divination," because prophecy is a perception in the sense of mysticism. In the current environment of the "forsaken land," Bernadette's "foresight" is more trustworthy.

"Do you need me to make a 'prophecy'?"

Bernadette also saw through Roger's intentions.

"Yes, you don't need to worry about potential contamination. I will take care of your purification task, so you can rest assured."

"However, my purification methods will change your mystical identity. When you make a 'prophecy,' if you see any choices that are not part of your own personality, just ignore them and focus the prophecy on the choices that you would make yourself."

After confirming that Bernadette understood his meaning, Roger gave her a false identity as a form of protection.

Bernadette's eyes sparkled as she looked toward the side of the ruins Roger had pointed to.

This is also a protective measure often used by Bernadette, namely, "playing it close to the edge" prophecy. She starts by making prophetic deductions from the periphery of an event or place and slowly moves towards the core area. If there is any danger, Bernadette will stop making prophecies.

In Roger's notes, Bernadette's gaze slowly moved from left to right, much faster than Roger had anticipated.

As Bernadette's gaze drew closer to the core area, her breathing became noticeably heavier, and beads of sweat began to appear on her fair forehead.

As Bernadette abruptly closed her eyes, Roger immediately stripped away the false identity he had given her, thus eliminating the mystical influence Bernadette had received in the "prophecy."

Cattleya looked at her mother with some tension until she opened her eyes again. Only then did Cattleya finally breathe a sigh of relief.

"How about it?"

Only after Bernadette opened her eyes again and her expression returned to normal did Roger tentatively ask a question.

"If I'm not mistaken, that city should have been destroyed."

Bernadette began by saying:

"There is some kind of pollution lurking in that darkness. This pollution should contain a certain degree of divinity and will have a strong lethal effect on all the extraordinary individuals below Sequence 5 in this expedition team. However, I also see that there is information in the ruins that is very valuable to our exploration."

"Information that is highly valuable to this exploration?"

Roger Wenyan narrowed his eyes slightly, thought for a moment, and then asked:
"Can you tell what type of divinity it is?"

"It's not very clear from the specifics, but I can be sure that it's related to darkness and shadows."

Darkness and shadow... are they beings influenced by a true creator?
Roger thought for a moment, then spoke to Bernadette:

“I want to go in and explore. You keep a close eye on Leomaster here for me, and stop him immediately if he behaves strangely.”

"Of course, I will also leave a clone here... He is more obedient to me. If all else fails, then you can go in."

Although Roger has been saying this ever since entering the "Forsaken Land," Leomaster's behavior has been relatively normal so far. Apart from occasionally spouting crazy things like praising the "original creator," he has not posed any real threat.

However, as for the place ahead, which could potentially be contaminated by the "true creator," Roger still did not intend to bring Leomaster in, lest it cause more trouble.

In a sense, Roger is now like a doctor treating a mental patient; he can't kill Leomaster, and he has to monitor his mental state at all times.

After saying this, Roger led his "fallen shadow" into the depths of darkness. Along the way, he used the "dream weaver" ability of the "invisible bracelet" to separate his identity as the former "Galactic Admiral," thus creating a clone, and gave "him" a package.

After the clone returned to the group, "he" spoke:

"The monsters around here have all been cleared out. After discussing it with Her Majesty the Mysterious Queen, we decided not to leave yet and to let everyone rest properly."

"Everyone, prepare to set up camp. Mealtime is earlier than usual. You can eat something, take turns resting, and wait for the order to depart at any time."

After Roger's clone finished speaking, he placed a package on the ground, which contained snacks and tobacco.

With the help of Zeus and others, the supplies were distributed to the members of the explorer team present, an act that immediately drew cheers.

After confirming that the team had stabilized, Roger finally felt relieved.

He had now arrived at the foot of the abandoned city-state, which, as he had observed earlier, had become a ruin, devoid of any light.

In the “forsaken land,” life is always accompanied by light.

Without light, there is no life, because in the darkness, all normal people of average strength will be dragged away and devoured by the monsters lurking there.

Just as Bernadette had predicted, the closer Roger got to the city-state, the more he sensed its strangeness.

Suddenly, Roger stopped in his tracks.

He squatted down and began to examine the decaying, barren soil on the ground.

"There seem to be traces of cultivation, but it has been a very long time."

The decaying ground before us has many homogeneous parallel textures, which look exactly like the result of agricultural activities.

This surprised Roger, because according to "The Sun" Derrick, it was almost impossible to grow any crops in Silver City, except for a plant called "Blackface Grass" which could be used as a daily food source.

Roger knew very well that the reason why the "Black-faced Grass" appeared around the "Silver City" was actually due to the influence of Omibella's legacy left in the "Silver City" and the divine seal artifact "Gift of the Earth".

The growth of "black grass" is a passive effect of "the earth's bounty." From this perspective, the ordinary residents of "Silver City" can be seen as a group of people who rely on the weather for their livelihood. However, the ruins in front of us show signs of human cultivation, which means that the agricultural development here once surpassed that of "Silver City" in some respects, or at least the residents had greater autonomy.

Although these traces are clearly very old, Roger could roughly judge that they had been abandoned no more than 20 years ago.

"In other words, about 20 years ago, there was a human city-state here that was able to cultivate the land on its own... Hey, in the 'Forsaken Land,' that's quite a novelty."

Roger immediately became very interested, because this anomaly was very likely the result of a high-level sealed artifact.

Considering that these lands have now become barren again, Roger guessed that it might be because the divine sealed artifact had been moved to another location.

"Hmm... If the sealed artifact was moved, there are two possibilities. The first is that the human city-state initiated a voluntary migration for some reason, and the other is that their city-state was attacked and the core sealed artifact was taken away, which led to the destruction of the city and the land becoming barren again."

Unable to determine which situation it was, Roger decided to venture further into the city to explore.

Under the light of the "Explorer's Lantern," Roger strolled along the stone paths of the city ruins.

Judging from the road layout and the dilapidated buildings on both sides, Roger judged that this was at least once a medium-sized settlement of human survivors, and that it had a certain degree of development in handicrafts and culture.

These are all advantages of agrarian civilization. The more people a city can support, the more people there will be who engage in abstract thinking.

Of course, this could also be the reason for their eventual demise—in a place like the “Forsaken Land,” city-states with stronger organization and discipline and stricter rules, such as the “Silver City,” were clearly able to survive longer.

On the other hand, although this city's soft power is better than that of "Silver City", it is still far from being comparable to the countries of the Northern Continent.

Even the empires of the Fourth Age far surpassed this place in terms of development. This was partly due to the scarcity of resources, and partly because the perilous state of the "Forsaken Land" limited the evolution of civilization towards higher and deeper levels.

As Roger walked, he suddenly saw a series of engravings on the ground.

"This...Giants?"

Roger squatted down with great interest and began to decipher the obviously worn inscription.

Roger knew some Old Fursak, a branch of Gigantic, so he was also able to deduce some Gigantic semantics from shared word roots.

"The two characters below seem to mean 'main street'... and the one above must be the name of the city?"

Just as Roger was trying to make out the details, he suddenly heard the "fallen shadow" behind him let out a twisted cry.

The "Shadow of Corruption" suddenly enveloped Roger, and the next second, Roger, now a pitch-black mass, flew straight forward!

The "Shadow of Corruption" was directly impacted, quickly shattering into fragments, which were then "spit out" by Roger, who was well-protected within it.

Roger suppressed the metallic taste in his throat and looked at the writhing shadows on the other side of the road.

As the shadows spread downwards, Roger was able to see more details about their true forms.

It was a kind of shadow monster, whose main body was made of constantly peeling, charred black flesh, and whose surface was covered with a viscous darkness with an asphalt-like texture, flowing like a liquid shadow.

When the monster is still, the darkness solidifies into a chitinous substance, completely concealing it. Only when it moves will these chitinous shells crack, revealing the pulsating, bright red fleshy growths beneath. Human teeth and finger bones are embedded in the gaps between the growths, opening and closing with each breath.

This is a kind of ability similar to that of a "hermit," and it is precisely because of this characteristic that they were able to hide themselves well on this main street and blend in perfectly with the surrounding darkness, which is why Roger was not discovered immediately.

As for the heads of these monsters, they were shaped like inverted skinned cow skulls, with no eyeballs in the eye sockets, only two flickering eerie green phosphorescent flames.

The mandible, which should have been located below but is now located above, is missing. In its place is a fleshy throat that hangs down to the chest. The end of this fleshy throat is split into four sucker-like mouthparts, which drip corrosive mucus continuously, making it look particularly gruesome.

"Good heavens, what the hell is this?"

Roger clicked his tongue repeatedly; even as the "Rose Bishop," he felt intense nausea.

Through "Secret Insight," Roger was able to clearly sense the divinity that was evident in these monsters.

This divinity is the same thing as the "Black Knight" power he possesses, only with a more pronounced madness.

"It seems I have to kill you all before I can properly investigate this place."

Roger sighed, and the "Black Knight" armor quickly covered his entire body, and the straight, dark greatsword with rust-colored marks reappeared in his hand.

As for the "shadow of depravity," it has also resurfaced once again.

The figure, about the same height as Roger and wielding the "Demon Slayer," had fully unleashed the sword.

"Finally, we can have a proper fight... I've been so tired of having to consider Leomaster's feelings all this time."

The shadow monsters seemed to sense a threat; they all let out nauseating roars and charged towards Roger and the "Fallen Shadow"!
In an instant, rust-colored, black, and dawn-colored light intertwined on the main street, and the whole city echoed with Roger's roar and the monster's screams.

At that moment, in the shadows at the corner of the main street, a figure dressed in a classic black robe appeared, seemingly observing Roger's battle with great interest.

"I didn't expect this guy to find this place as soon as he entered the 'Forsaken Lands,' how interesting..."

The figure chuckled softly, a hint of surprise in his voice.

(End of this chapter)