Chapter 37 The Giant Vine

With a strange sense of concern, Duncan led Alice quickly to the giant "vine" quietly lurking in the shadows of the building.

It was larger than Duncan had imagined.

Even at its trailing end, the "vine" was taller than a person, and its thicker "source" stretched down from a slope deep in the street, seemingly dissolving into the darkness as if directly merging with the night. Only vague, massive structures could be seen rising and intertwining among the shadows of the buildings, as if some larger, more complete "body" existed there.

However, a sense of haziness shrouded that surprisingly large "body," making it impossible to see clearly no matter how one looked. Even the "sunlight" that filtered through the gaps in the high canopy seemed unable to penetrate that hazy texture.

Alice was dumbfounded by this thing she had never seen before. Hugging the head of her wooden doll maid, she widened her eyes, trying hard to see the "source" of the vine that stretched across the street. After a long while, she blankly asked, "Captain... is this also a 'plant'?"

Duncan didn't answer her. He was still observing the giant vine that almost blocked the street ahead. After a long while, he stepped to the end of the vine and bent down, cautiously reaching out a finger to touch its rough, hard surface.

Lucrezia's voice came from the doll's head Alice was holding. "Papa, did you find something? Did you find the 'Dreamer'?"

"We didn't find the Dreamer, but we found a surprisingly large... vine," Duncan said without looking up. "It looks different from the other plants in the street, very large, but it seems to be only part of a larger 'plant.' For some reason, I always feel that this vine is... alive, or rather, active."

He raised his head, his gaze sweeping over the towering shadows of the trees around the street.

Lush plants filled the entire block, but these plants gave him a feeling of lifelessness, as if they were mere phantoms lacking vitality. Only the giant vine in the middle of the street gave him a sense of something alive.

After hesitating for a few seconds, Duncan took a light breath and decided to try to establish a connection with this unique "vine."

A wisp of ghostly green flame coiled around his fingertip like flowing water, then quietly seeped into the vine, the firelight flashing and disappearing in the dimness.

Familiar with controlling this wisp of flame to spread and diffuse in the "foreign object," while also instructing Alice to pay attention to the surrounding movements, Duncan then closed his eyes slightly, and began to perceive the information transmitted by the flame, trying to communicate with and understand this "vine" that seemed to have spread out from a vast dream...

In the darkness, it was as if something was rising and falling, coalescing and dissipating.

Duncan "opened" his eyes in the darkness. In this weak and vague connection, he tried as much as possible to see clearly the outlines that were coalescing and dissipating in the darkness—

Mist rose from the darkness, and deep within the mist, something was emerging.

There really was something here!

Duncan's heart stirred, and he immediately moved closer to the thing that was vaguely taking shape. He felt himself transform into a swift wind or shadow, quickly shuttling through this dark mist, and as he approached, the hazy shadow rapidly expanded in his vision and gradually began to present more details.

Duncan couldn't help but speed up his "travel," and the blurred details quickly became clear in his eyes. Gradually, he began to distinguish some things—

A towering and majestic bow, a dark-colored hull, gunport lids arranged below the bulwarks, a complex structure of masts and ropes, and sails that appeared translucent at the top...

Duncan stopped in astonishment.

He raised his head in the darkness, staring dumbfounded at the familiar scene that appeared at the end of the mist, looking at his... *Lost Country*.

……

Nina, who was cautiously moving forward on a rugged forest path, suddenly stopped, frowning as she listened to the movement coming from deep in the forest.

After a moment, she turned her head. "Mr. Morris, did you hear anything?"

"It's the sound of the wind. The wind suddenly picked up, and the direction is chaotic... an unusual movement," Morris's face gradually became serious. He glanced at Nina, who was following beside him. "You 'go up' and check the situation in the distance. Don't stay in the sky for too long, and be careful."

"Okay!"

Nina immediately agreed, and then suddenly transformed into a leaping arc of flame, rushing straight into the sky—the bright arc of flame quickly circled above the forest, and almost at the same time, the forest condensed from dreams reacted to this. The trees illuminated by the arc of flame began to grow wildly, making creaking sounds as they stretched towards the sky, and the clouds in the high sky began to gather towards Nina's direction, gradually forming an encircling ring...

But Nina only circled in the sky for a few seconds. Before the forest's reaction became more intense and dangerous, she quickly returned to Morris's side.

"Scary... this place really doesn't welcome me..." She patted her chest with some lingering fear.

"Perhaps your light is too strong for this 'otherworld.' Most otherworlds will instinctively reject those 'invading forces' that can pose a threat to them," Morris said. "What's the situation in the distance?"

"There's an area deep in the forest where something happened. It looks dark, and the trees and ground seem to be rotten, but it's far away from us. In the other direction, I can see very tall, continuous shadows, which look translucent, like a light curtain. Apart from that, I didn't find anything..."

Nina quickly described the scene she had seen in the short few seconds she circled in the sky, while raising her hand to gesture the approximate location of what she had seen, but just as she was halfway through her words, another whistling sound suddenly rang from deep in the forest, and the chaotic wind piercing through the forest, as well as the sudden creaking of the surrounding trees, interrupted her movements.

The whistling chaotic wind seemed to be mixed with countless blurred howls and noises, and an unusual sense of tension and repulsion instantly surged into Nina and Morris's minds.

It was as if the forest shaped by dreams was being subjected to some kind of huge external impact, as if everything here had suddenly begun to teeter.

The two subconsciously exchanged a glance, and then they saw the towering giant trees in the distance shaking and collapsing like phantoms. The sky quickly filled with fine cracks, and the light and shadows of the real world seemed to be shining through the cracks, and a feeling of suddenly waking up from a dream surged into their hearts.

At the same time, in another corner deep in the forest, Shirley also heard the whistling noises that were rapidly approaching from a distance, and then the Annihilation Cultist walking in front suddenly stopped.

Shirley's heart suddenly panicked, but she quickly controlled the expression on her face. "Huh? What happened?"

"The dream's stability is decreasing. The operation is over. Everyone, leave the Dream of the Nameless," Richard turned around, saying as a look of doubt finally appeared on his face. "You didn't receive the message?"

Shirley was stunned for a moment, and quickly adjusted her expression, with an innocent and bewildered look on her face. "I don't know—maybe I was careless and missed it..."

"Careless?" The Annihilation Cultist who called himself Richard immediately stared into Shirley's eyes. He seemed to finally notice the sense of disharmony that this "young comrade" had given him along the way, and a hint of vigilance and doubt floated in his eyes. "Comrade, I seem to have forgotten to ask... which city-state are you active in the real world?"

Shirley noticed the subtle change in the other party's eyes at the first moment—she was incredibly sensitive to the slightest malice that strangers showed, but still maintained the harmless expression on her face. "I'm in the Mokha City-State. There are a lot of elves there..."

"'Comrade,'" Richard suddenly interrupted Shirley, his voice changing as if some other obscure syllables were suddenly mixed into his speech. He stared into Shirley's eyes, and as his mouth opened and closed, it seemed as if some kind of bewitching power was spreading. "We are prohibited from revealing our true location in the real world during operations, even if we meet 'our own people.' What a pity..."

Vicious magic had quietly gathered in his mouth. The power of the Doom Bird was transmitted along the symbiotic chain into the cultist's body. He sensed that the spell had locked onto the girl's mental entity in front of him, and the other party seemed to have not reacted at all yet, still standing blankly opposite him.

Seeing this scene, he was finally more certain of his judgment—

Knowing nothing about the power of magic, she couldn't possibly be a true child of the Abyss Saint.

Although he didn't know where she came from, how she managed to create this lifelike disguise, or what was going on with that seemingly flawless "Abyssal Hound," there was no doubt that this "comrade" was fake—luckily, he discovered it in time, and the other party seemed to have no combat experience.

It was time to say goodbye. No one could survive under the Doom Bird's curse...

Everything happened in an instant—Richard's momentary judgment and sigh in his heart, and Shirley's suddenly revealing a pleasant and radiant smile.

Richard was stunned to see the girl opposite him suddenly give him a radiant smile, and he only had time to be stunned for a moment—he had no time to react, and no time to see what happened. He saw the girl named "Sarah" suddenly raise her arm at him, and then a hideous black shadow smashed towards his face!

Shirley raised her hand and dropped the dog, the chain whistling as the dog smashed onto the head of the cultist opposite her—

"See you later, motherfucker!"

(End of this chapter)