Shut up, brave man! I don't want to atone for my sins to you!

——It ate Mula.

Just like sweeping away the snow on the coal slag, the dark background suddenly appears.

Mla disappeared.

What replaced him was a new, thin ghost figure that faded and lost its stable shape.

Now, the number of slender ghosts has become three.

Lacele shuddered.

That's it!

Every tall and thin ghost is transformed from an elf!

But new problems arise:

Where did the original Slender Man come from? Why did it appear in Lentiheim? What is its purpose?

And what does its existence itself symbolize?

Lacele didn't understand.

Charles picked up the holy sword, as if he was planning to go out and investigate using the simplest and most brutal method.

But Lacey stopped him.

"Wait, I want to observe a little more... This is just the mistress' dream. Those elves that have been transformed into thin and long ghosts are not real elves. Don't get excited."

After hearing this, Charles was silent for a moment, and finally nodded and put away the holy sword again.

Lacey continued to pay attention to the three tall and thin figures.

She found that they dispersed after a brief exchange and each went in a different direction.

She guessed that the three tall and thin ghosts wanted to eat more elves and transform into more of their own kind.

This is so weird.

Lacele decided to follow a tall and thin figure to take a look.

She winked at Charles and prepared to leave.

But as soon as they walked out of the wooden house where they were hiding, the whole of Lentiheim suddenly changed.

It was dilapidated and desolate, as if it had been abandoned for many years.

The once prosperous city-state has now become a ruin.

There were weeds and plants growing wildly, and there was no sign of anyone living here. It was as if the elves had fled the city-state overnight. More than ten years later, Lentiheim became like this.

This is how the same thing?

Lacey thought doubtfully.

This time, Ciel reacted before her:

"It's the third mistress' dream!"

Lacie didn't dare to confirm whether what Charles said was true, but at the moment it seemed that this was the only possibility.

but why?

Why did the new dream of the mistress begin before the previous one ended?

Could it be because they are getting closer and closer to the Mistress's true body?

What does this dream indicate?

The city-state was abandoned, and the elves left their homes, and no one knew where they went.

But why did the elves leave?

Lacey was totally bewildered.

But then, the fourth Matron's dream came:

This time it was a brutal war.

Rachel and Charles saw the fall of Lentiheim and countless elves die in the resistance surrounding their homeland, but no matter how hard they fought, they ultimately failed.

The paradise is no longer there, and the elves are forced to become vassals of other countries, and even become slaves and playthings.

Eventually, there were no more elves in the world.

Then comes the fifth Madam's dream:

This time the elves encountered no war.

They died from cannibalism.

No one can tell the cause of the civil war. Perhaps it was to gain more resources, or for territory or faith. In short, the elves suddenly split into two camps.

They fought till their heads were broken and blood was shed, and the battle roared endlessly.

After an unknown amount of time, they finally shook hands and made peace temporarily, but it was too late. The elves were devastated by their internal strife and the enemy took advantage of the situation and wiped them out.

……

There are many such dreams, and each dream seems to foreshadow an ending.

Natural disasters, wars, fratricide and even resource depletion have forced us to come to a standstill.

Awaken, reform, conquer the world and even start heading towards the stars.

Rachel and Charles experienced countless dreams of the mistress together.

There are good and bad ones, and the endings are not the same -

But perhaps, some things are still the same.

For example, all the Madam’s dreams begin after the Madam disappears.

Compared to the first Matron's dream, the subsequent Matron's dreams seemed more and more real.

At first, you can find obvious loopholes, but in the end, the dream world is almost indistinguishable from reality.

"The Matron's dream is iterating."

Lacie couldn't help but have this thought.

What followed was her gradual enlightenment after experiencing countless dreams.

——She finally discovered the thick fog, which was the essence of the mistress’ dream.

This is an imitation.

The Matron is simulating the future that Lentiheim might encounter after losing Him!

The original dream of the mistress was too simple.

Because the Mistress at that time had probably never conducted a similar simulation before, He chose to use the simplest and most direct method to delete all traces of Himself left in Lentiheim.

But this wouldn't work, it was too rough, so the first mistress's dream was full of loopholes and fallacies, and was easily seen through by her and Charles.

Perhaps the mistress also realized this problem, so in the third and all subsequent simulations, she no longer deleted the traces she left in Lentiheim so simply and crudely.

This series of dreams contains almost all the problems that a civilization will encounter in its development.

Lacie suddenly felt that Fuvenna had given an inappropriate name to this thick fog, this dreamland belonging to the mistress.

It shouldn't be called the Madam's Dream.

It should be called the Dream of Continuity - it is a series of dreams about the survival of civilization.

And in the last dream of survival, after countless failures, extinctions, struggles and restarts, the young civilization called "elves" finally stumbled out of its cradle.

——It stepped into the vast starry sky.

……

The dream of existence is over.

Lacey opened her eyes.

She woke up on the hard and cold ground, and beside her lay Charles, who had not yet awakened from his dream of existence.

The air was filled with a strange, sweet fragrance that made her feel familiar. Although she was in the deepest part of the giant tree, it did not seem dark at all, because there was a calm and soft orange light both above her head and around her.

But Lacie didn't feel at ease at all.

Instead, she couldn't help but clench her wand.

In fact, she should have thought of it earlier.

Why can the elves' teleportation technology ignore the forbidden spells of Ciel; why is the thick fog covering Rentiheim not a creation of magic; why does she always feel that the whole Rentiheim has a strange sense of déjà vu...

Because from the beginning to the end, the mistress of the elves never belonged to the mysterious side.

He belongs to science.

No, now He does not seem to belong to science alone.

Lacie looked at the huge monster in front of her and thought with a wry smile.

It is a combination of science and mystery, half is cold metal and half is vibrant plants.

He silently floated in the air, bathed in the peaceful and soft orange light.

His outline has been distorted beyond recognition, but he does not look ugly at all. On the contrary, countless plants are coming out from the cracks in his huge body, stretching out their branches and leaves, and even blooming brilliant flowers, making him look strangely beautiful.

Rachel didn't know what He was before.

But she knew what He was now—

She is the mad mother of the elves.

[To be continued]

-

27. Open your eyes

As Laciel woke up from the dream of existence, the others behind her also woke up one by one.

First, Charles.

After he woke up, he quickly drew out the holy sword, came to Lacie's side, and looked up with her at the strange existence floating in the huge hole.

"Is that... the mistress of the elves?"

he asked in a low voice.

Lacelear heard the confusion in his voice.

Perhaps in the eyes of a native of this magical world, the elves' mistress should not be like this.

He should be a god-like being, kind, gentle, with an appearance similar to that of an elf, shrouded in holy light, and preferably with a halo on his head and wings behind him.

But the mistress's appearance was beyond his imagination.

Twisted armor, shattered shield generators, and a hard shell with traces of violent explosions...

And the plants growing from any tiny crack in the hull, the lush and swaggering branches and leaves, and the scattered flowers dotted on His body.

Countless plant roots came from all directions, entwined and connected with each other, forming a web, and the elves' mistress was at the center of the web. A faint blue light kept shining from those roots, as if it was supplying the mistress with the nutrients she needed...

In other words, energy.

Rachel felt as if her worldview had been violently shattered, and then quickly rebuilt.

Originally she thought that there was only magic in this world, but now this thing suddenly appeared in front of her.

Although science does not refer specifically to a certain theory or technology, but rather a value system, or a methodology, it can even be said that the White Tower has always maintained a scientific attitude towards the study of magic.

Science and mystery are not two distinct elements. They were born in different environments and starting points, but they have the same destination. After civilization crosses a certain boundary, they will have the same name:

"ladder".

By then, they will all be just "ladders" used by civilization to explore the truth.

But obviously, there is no civilization in the entire Pan-Continent that has developed to this level, whether it is humans, elves, or even powerful dragons.

In front of the vast starry sky, they are all babies who have not yet left the cradle.