Sword of Dawnbreaker

Chapter 242 - 241: God of Nature

To survive, it’s not easy.

A Magic Fortress lost in the Otherworld, severed from the real world externally, and internally lacking resources sufficient for long-term survival—the storms triggered by the chaotic wave destroyed The Hall of Stasis and the large warehouse accompanying it. Within the remaining structure of the fortress, Kamel and his fellow Watchers had to meticulously calculate the resources for the days ahead.

"We are participants in the ’divine evils’ experiment. Each of us has undergone the final stage of mutation transformation, allowing us to survive longer than ordinary humans, but the lack of resources remains a big problem. We firmly believe that the situation will improve and that there is a day when all problems are solved, but first, we must live to see that day. Under the leadership of the Master Mage, everyone began to conserve every piece of resource and started repairing the remaining facilities in the fortress."

Kamel led Gawain’s party through a series of abandoned zones, reaching the existing edge of the "fortress." The chaotic wave had destroyed many things in this area, shattered rooms and corridors being the most common sight. However, due to a powerful magic barrier still functioning, these areas were not entirely uninhabitable.

"We first restored the supply of magical energy—the fortress built in the Otherworld has its energy circulation system, allowing us to draw energy from the external environment to maintain its operation. We then repaired most of the damaged internal walls and barriers to prevent dangerous chaotic magic from seeping in. Lastly, we attempted to restart the magic door leading to the outside world... This attempt failed.

"The chaotic wave altered the operational mechanism of the magic door. It wasn’t damaged, but it couldn’t be activated. We diverted half of the fortress’s energy to the magic door, but not even a small crack could be opened. During the continuous attempts and research, our resources dwindled, and every member’s health began to deteriorate.

"The chaotic wave did not completely fail to affect us. In fact, its influence is omnipresent and subtly pervasive. Over time, everyone’s body started showing issues. It turned out that the ’divine evils’ transformation couldn’t allow us to survive indefinitely. Claude Perlin was the first to die; a sudden illness took him down in the laboratory, followed by the eldest son of the Pal Berlindi Family...

"Some died in accidental incidents. The siblings from the Korden Family were struck off the platform by a large floating rock while trying to repair the barrier. Xirot was blown up during repairs of the Magic Focuser. Our numbers kept decreasing, yet there was still no hope of leaving here—even just sending out an Eye of the Mage to take a look at the outside world would suffice, but unfortunately, the door was shut and couldn’t be opened at all."

Aunt Heidi’s expression darkened: "Then... everyone died..."

"Humans are fragile creatures, both in body and mind," Kamel sighed with an energy-induced quiver in his voice, "We couldn’t maintain order until the end. In the last few decades, a severe... chaos erupted. The heavy pressure shattered everyone’s hope, and even the Master Mage couldn’t sustain it. Right here, a large part of the people found... ’release’."

Kamel led Gawain to a wide area, which seemed to have been a gathering hall, half of which extending outward had completely broken down. The floor, walls, and ceiling debris floated disorderly in the dark space, covered by an energy field screen at the shattered boundary line.

Traces of destruction by powerful spells could be seen everywhere here.

"After everything ended, the surviving ones who had calmed down realized how foolish they had been, yet nothing could be undone. Only a dozen or so were left alive, and they couldn’t live much longer either."

"We quietly accepted our fate, and in the very end, managed to maintain the last bit of dignity as the Empire’s Master Mages."

Gawain looked at Kamel’s energy-filled body: "Then, how did you become like this?"

Kamel was silent for a moment, then slowly said: "I was the last one—hard to say if it was fortunate or unfortunate, my ’divine evils’ transformation succeeded exceptionally well. I became the healthiest and longest-lived here. After everyone died, I showed no signs of weakening.

"I spent a dazed decade arranging the bodies of all colleagues during this time, as you can see, letting them sit there as if everyone was still alive... I thought I might have gone mad, but I no longer remembered what a sane mind should be like. Then I wandered this empty fortress for years, continuing my work—inspecting ancient equipment, inventorying things in the warehouse, observing external environmental changes, leaving records, occasionally doing some experiments, occasionally talking to myself, occasionally speaking to those sitting in the hall...

"But I still did not die. My day of natural death seemed far away, and during this process, I found my mental state was deteriorating more and more.

"So, I decided to end my life early—using a method of my own choosing."

"A method of your own choosing?" Tiel curiously looked at Kamel, "What method would turn you into... this appearance?"

"As I said before, this is the Site of the White Starfall. Three thousand years ago, the God of Nature fell here, and this entire ’defied’ fortress was built with the ’White Star’ as its core and foundation. I have paid a lifetime’s price for this place, so I decided to end my life with ’it’—"

Kamel stopped in his tracks, a barrier cast from some unknown metal and covered with runes stood before the crowd. As Kamel cast a spell to activate the rune array on the barrier, the heavy metal wall began to tremble. With the runes lighting up one by one, it slowly and solemnly rose before everyone.

Outside the barrier, there was a semi-transparent energy field screen. Through this energy screen, the true situation outside the facility finally unfolded before Gawain’s eyes.

This was indeed not the shadow realm—but rather a place even more bizarre and chaotic. Countless fragments of giant stones floated in the dim and deep space, these countless floating rocks formed the boundless "land" of the space, and above this fractured earth swirled never-dissipating chaotic clouds. Strange dark lightning raged silently in the high sky, weaving various indescribable, terrifying hallucinations within the chaotic clouds. Amidst this chaos, one thing deeply captured everyone’s attention.

It was a massive white stag, like a small mountain, floating among the fragmented floating stone islands. Numerous thick chains bound its limbs, and a hazy white radiance enveloped its body. Around the giant stag, many broken, floating metal and crystal remnants could also be seen. The massive metal debris was severely twisted and misshapen, their forms so peculiar that Aunt Heidi couldn’t imagine what they originally were or what purpose they served. However, Gawain vaguely felt that these enormous metal remnants pieced together resembled some sort of flying apparatus—with tail structures like propellers and skeletal extensions like weapon mounts. These constructions are utterly incomprehensible to the current inhabitants of the Loren Continent!

More importantly—the texture of those metals and crystals was remarkably similar to the Eternal Stone Slate!

Gawain felt his heart pound as he heard Kamel’s voice beside him: "Behold, this is the fallen White Star, the God of Nature once worshipped by the Druids—Amoen, the Giant Stag!"

"The God of Nature!" Aunt Heidi finally couldn’t suppress her astonishment and exclaimed, "My heavens!!"

"No need to worry, the ’barrier’ will protect your minds," Kamel seemed to think Aunt Heidi was worried about the consequences of facing a deity directly, so he raised his hand to point at the hazy energy screen outside the metal barrier, "This barrier is the most valuable discovery we found among the remnants surrounding the deity’s corpse. We’ve simulated the energy fluctuations of those remnants and found that the same frequency of magic power can neutralize the divine power’s damage to a mortal’s mind. As long as the barrier holds, you are safe."

Gawain looked with shock at the semi-transparent energy screen, through which he viewed the metal remnants surrounding the god corpse of "Amoen, the Giant Stag." He had never thought he would come into contact with the secrets of gods and the relics of those "God Slayer" so quickly. And when all this was vividly presented before his eyes, apart from surprise, he felt nothing but profound awe—

This is the place where gods fell, this is the fallen deity, this is the "weapon" that killed the god...

The creators of that weapon have left, but their creation remains here, and the "surveillance satellites" they left in this world are still operational to this day.

Gawain withdrew his gaze and looked at Kamel not far away: "So, was it the power of a god that changed you into this?"

"I still can’t be sure if my mind was influenced by the deity at the time, although there is this barrier, but after all, I’ve been here, coexisting with the deity’s corpse for hundreds of years, it’s impossible for my mind to remain completely normal," Kamel said self-deprecatingly, "I opened the door, entered that unprotected space, without any protective gear or shielding spells, approached the stag, and tried to guide its energy into my body, hoping to kill myself that way—then the energy exploded, my body was torn apart by the divine power, and ultimately...transformed into this state."

"You became an energy being, even less able to die," Gawain casually wiped away the saliva from Tiel’s mouth beside him, looking up at Kamel who had had his life form transformed, "How many years went by after that?"

"I can’t remember clearly, my memory has been intermittent since my life form was transformed," Kamel said helplessly, and raised his hand to point at his armor piece on his chest, "I etched these on myself to remind myself, to prevent myself from turning completely into an unconscious monster, but if not for meeting you unexpectedly, becoming an unconscious monster would probably be just a matter of time..."

"At the first meeting, you questioned whether we were real," Aunt Heidi remembered what happened at the beginning, "What did that mean?"

"You see, before you appeared, I had ’seen’ at least seven times that living people appeared before me," Kamel’s voice was full of bitterness, "I saw someone finding this sealed, forgotten fortress, I saw someone opening that magic door, I saw those colleagues who had evacuated years ago returning to this place, they came to take me away, told me the mission was over... I was experiencing hallucinations, repeated hallucinations, at first I thought it was my mental problem, but later I realized it was the divine power continuously affecting me—it sometimes seeped through the barrier, creating various hallucinations before my eyes, so when I saw you, I doubted if you were illusions, doubted if the barrier had malfunctioned again..."

Gawain finally understood the strange behavior of Kamel at the beginning and looked at the ancient Master Mage in front of him, marveling at how his mind could persist until today—although his own "history" was countless times more distant than Kamel’s, he knew that’s because his life form had mutated from the start, whereas this person... before his life form was transformed, he had persisted as a human for hundreds of years!

After a long silence, he exhaled lightly: "Rest assured, we are real."