After climbing up the stairs in the cellar and leaving the north tower from the ground, Gawain and Amber saw what changes had taken place in the castle.
Just as Gawain speculated, the entire castle has been shrouded in a long-term illusion, and all the appearances it presents are the dreams of the dreamer Lilith Kant. It is shaped from the world, but at the same time it is not a simple dream - the boundaries between reality and illusion are extremely blurred here. They overlap and influence each other. Things that happen in the real world can interfere with the dream, and things in the dream will also be reflected. Come into reality.
When the dream completely fades, you can see the eroded appearance of the castle.
In the most severely eroded area of Dreamland, half of the tall and majestic North Tower has disappeared. It broke from it. The entire upper part collapsed an unknown number of years ago. The remaining boulder structure is like It points to the sky unevenly like a broken skeleton, taking on a ferocious appearance in the dim light of the morning. In the open space around the tower, bricks and tiles that have been buried in loess and vines can be seen everywhere; and the North Tower The main body of the castle that is far away is still well-preserved. It is a place where "reality is better". Therefore, the servants living in the main body of the castle have indeed maintained the castle. There are not many signs of collapse, but the outer wall Disturbing cracks and vines and moss growing wantonly can be seen everywhere. As the power of the dream fades, some of those vines and moss have even climbed to the high spire of the main building.
On the way to the main building of the castle, Gawain and Amber met the knight Philip who was rushing over.
The young knight has not experienced battle, but destroying a huge magic center by himself is enough to exhaust him. Philip looks very tired, and there is still a deeper, deeper feeling in his eyes. He felt mentally tired, but after seeing Gawain, he immediately cheered up and stood up straight: "Sir! I'm glad to see you are safe and sound!"
Gawain looked at Philip's eyes Expression, nodding slightly: "It seems that you have seen something that is psychologically stressful."
"Yes, sir, as you expected," Philip sighed, "where Butler Carter disappeared." It's the 'inner boundary' of the dream, where there is a... ritual site full of blasphemy and sin. It's really hard for me to describe the scene there."
Gawain nodded: "Take me there and have a look - "You didn't demolish the whole place, right?"
"Of course not, sir, those are all evidence of the cultists' crimes," Philip nodded, "But those people... I'm afraid they can't be saved. ."
"...I guessed it," Gawain sighed, "Take me over to see the situation. By the way, Amber, go to the castle first. I guess everyone there should be awake. and you are in panic. Go find the advisor, treasurer, chief knight and priest in the castle, let them calm people's hearts and summon the supervisors and knights in the territory. I will soonGo to the main hall and take charge. "
Amber blinked: "Are you sure those people will listen to me? "
"You are more or less the Duke's personal guard now. Do you think you will have no say in front of the servants of ordinary little nobles? Gawain glanced at this guy, "And now that the dream is over, the correct understanding of this castle in the past thirty years is returning to everyone's brains. This incredible impact will plunge everyone into a huge panic - —In this case, people easily accept guidance. ”
The second half of Gawain’s sentence seemed not to have entered the half-elf’s head at all. Amber had already begun to drift away after hearing the first half of the sentence, and her mind quickly turned around. There are at least sixty ways to make money and eighty ways to deceive - basically all revolve around the central idea of Hu pretending to be a tiger. Unfortunately, she was seen through by Gawain just a few seconds after she floated, and the latter directly He glared: "If you dare to use my name to cheat, I will slap you on the wall! "
Hubo rolled his eyes: "Can't you threaten in another way? ”
“Then slap it on the ground,” Gawain waved his hand and turned away, “Anyway, if you dare to lie, slap it on the wall, if you dare to steal something, slap it on the ground...”
However, the upright knight Philip asked worriedly after following Gawain: "Then what if after she steals something, she lies to you and says she didn't steal it? "
Gawain stopped and glanced at Philip silently: "...Have you ever considered getting a perm? "
"Huh? ”
Gawain sighed in his heart: Sure enough, the most difficult thing about living in a foreign world is not being able to communicate with the locals, even if the other person is a compliment.
The two arrived. The underground hall discovered by Knight Philip
The magical power entrenched in the hall has dissipated, and the oppressive and crazy atmosphere has also disappeared, but it is still an eerie place. In Gawain's sight, the platforms neatly arranged around the stone pillars were like dissecting tables exuding the smell of blood, and on these dissecting tables, the "lambs" waiting to be slaughtered were still alive.
< p>Gawain noticed the tube-like objects that connected the victim's head and the stone pillar, which looked like some kind of biological tissue. They were blood vessels and nerves that grew in a tangle, but they obviously did not proliferate or mutate from the human brain. One end of them is connected to the foundation of the stone pillar, where there is a layer of expanded and twisted flesh and blood structure, tightly attached to the runes of the stone pillar like some independent organism, while their other end is connected to the human body. The connection should be the result of some kind of parasitism (perhaps surgical operation).Since Philip Knight destroyed the runes on the stone pillars, these "biological tissues" attached to the stone pillars have now appeared. There are obvious signs of weakness and death. They begin to shrink and crack, and reddish liquid flows from the cracks. More than half of the victims connected to them are already dead.
Even those who are not dead. Those who can't be saved obviously - they have alreadyAfter being connected to those "nerve cords" for too long, individual consciousness has long been completely obliterated, and the brain tissue has suffered irreversible and devastating damage. Their remaining brain nerve cells are only providing information for this huge "human brain array computer" It's just calculation power, and as the magic power here dissipates, they will die soon.
The only thing worth celebrating is that they no longer feel pain during this process.
"I can't identify what this is," Knight Philip suppressed his disgust and squatted near the foundation of one of the stone pillars with Gawain. He pointed with his scabbard at the twitching people in front of him. , shrinking biological tissue, "Even in the ancient books that record the craziest black magic, and in the crazy ravings of those heretics, I have never heard that this kind of... creature exists in the world. The Eternal Sleeper is not Drew Yeah, they don't have the ability to transform species or summon life. These biological tissues should be found and reproduced from somewhere, specifically for extracting souls, but...where did they find these things?"
< p>"Maybe these are really cultivated by the Eternal Sleeper with the help of the Death of All Things," Gawain frowned, "They are connected after all."Knight Philip was very surprised: "Those cultists are Will the cooperation between them be so close?"
"If the reason for their fall is as I think, then the closer cooperation between them will probably be beyond the imagination of most people in the world," Gawain Sighing, "Compared with these, I care more about the 'technology' used by the Eternal Sleeper."
Phillip is a warrior after all, and is a bit slow in this regard: "Technology?"
"The letter left by Viscount Victor mentioned that this is a 'computing node' built by the Eternal Sleepers," Gawain pointed at the victims connected by nerve cords, "They seem to be trying to create A kind of 'real dream' that can replace the real world and use the power of dreams to achieve something, and this requires terrifying computing power - you can simply understand it as brain power that no great magician's brain can. To accomplish this feat, they came up with this crazy idea of connecting brains to create a 'human brain array computer'. Do you know what this means?"
"Meaning? Will they kill more people?"
"This is just an appearance, the deeper meaning is: this means that these cultists are not only crazy, but also have crazy technology!" Gao Wen said seriously! He said, "They are still developing despite being ostracized by mainstream society and living in seclusion. They have even developed new technologies that far exceed the level of contemporary magic. You know, cultists with crazy thinking are not scary. They are scary. What’s amazing is that these cultists actually have scientific research capabilities—even their scientific research capabilities are not weak!”
As he spoke, he stood up and looked around the entire underground hall.
“The most terrible thing is that if this crazy technology they created is used in the right place, it will make their technological progress even faster.Horrible..."
After collecting some rune rubbings and debris samples, Gawain and the knight Philip left this place.
After the power of the dream receded, the main hall of the castle It is one of the areas that has changed the least. Apart from the sudden signs of aging accumulated over thirty years on the outer walls, pillars, ceilings, etc., this place is still brightly lit, neat and shiny - the living servants living in the castle Their daily cleaning behavior is real, and the intersection of dreams and reality ensures that their cleaning effects are not limited to dreams.
In fact, due to the end of the dream effect, it is always present. The vague and gloomy atmosphere inside also disappeared, and the main hall of the castle was now much warmer and more peaceful than before.
But this warm and peaceful atmosphere could not make the people gathered there. The people in the hall felt at ease.
Fear was gripping everyone's hearts - even the chief knight who had been loyally guarding this place for thirty years.
At that time. After the dream ended, the people in the castle suddenly woke up. Their shielded consciousness and memories started to work. The moment they gained the ability to think freely, everything they had experienced here in the past thirty years turned into a bizarre nightmare. ——Sleepwalking in an aging castle, taking care of an apparition that has been dead for decades, and a ghostly mistress wandering among the ruins of the north tower, it's all eerie.
For those servants, knights, advisors, and supervisors who are old enough, things are even more terrifying: they clearly remember when the bones of the old master and the young master were secretly returned to the castle, and they also clearly remember They remember how the hostess used magic to control everyone's mind thirty years ago. What happened every day after that, and the changes that took place in the castle every day, all came to their minds.
And those territorial stewards who were called back and lived near the castle were also in fear, because anyone who frequently entered and exited the castle had been affected by dreams, but compared to Those servants and knights who have never left the castle for thirty years are less afraid.
But no matter what, no one can remain calm as long as they realize what they have experienced. Calm.
Amber was standing on the high platform at the end of the main hall, scratching his head anxiously.
That was where the lords usually stood, but now no one was standing on it. The "little girl" put forward opinions, because everyone knew that she was the Duke's bodyguard, and in this emergency, she was standing there as the Duke's spokesperson, so instead of questioning her, everyone put a Dao looked at her expectantly.
But this made Amber want to find a chance to go back to the shadows - the feeling of being a big shot turned out not to be as good as she had imagined before! >
"Don't panic, don't...don't be nervous! The Duke went to purify the last lair, and he soonCome here - don't panic, he's coming right now! "
Amber stood on the stage and tried in vain to comfort everyone. Just when she felt that she would lose control of the scene if she delayed for one more second, Gawain finally appeared together with Knight Philip.