Chapter 1 The Sculptures

The sculptures standing silently in the darkness were left behind by the earliest builders of Twilight Capital. After they finally stabilized the city structure within the barrier and were able to smoothly control the opening and closing of the barrier, the group of people who had been separated inside the city left these things outside the gate. Now, two thousand years have passed, and these sculptures have been rebuilt and replaced countless times, but they still maintain the appearance of that year one hundred percent. They stand in the darkness, constantly reminding the survivors of Twilight Capital to remember everything they once lost—the entire world outside the barrier.

There are many versions of stories circulating about these sculptures, but even without understanding these stories, Hao Ren could see a lot from the faces of the sculptures with different expressions. It is said that each statue is a real person, the last batch of ancestors who fell outside the gate when the Twilight Barrier rose. Wendell knew the stories of these sculptures like the back of his hand.

So, in Wendell's narration of the sculptures, the group crossed the gate of light.

Hao Ren felt as if he had passed through a faint wall of wind. The light shield that protected the entire city was actually only a thin layer, and he could hardly feel its thickness when he walked over. The moment he crossed the barrier, he felt that the scorching heat and harmful radiation filling the air were completely isolated outside, and a not-so-pleasant smell of smoke and dust rushed towards him.

He looked around and found that the city entrance was even more desolate and dilapidated than he had imagined. It was obviously an important gate of the shelter, but there were no decent outposts around, and even fewer people. Everywhere he looked were dilapidated and tall gray-black buildings. Two crooked towers stood symmetrically on both sides. The outer walls of the towers were mottled and peeling, revealing the uneven metal structures inside. A wide ramp sloping upwards extended in front of him. Both sides of the ramp were full of old and dilapidated facilities and sparsely lit buildings. Metal pipes and steel cables were intertwined like spider webs above the buildings. Smoke and dust swirled between these "spider webs," making it look hazy.

Following the inclined ramp, he could see Twilight Capital piled up like a spiral mound, with layers of buildings stacked infinitely upwards, as if the buildings were too crowded, squeezing the entire city's terrain into a swollen lump. Between those stacked buildings, puffs of white smoke could be seen rising from time to time, and vaguely visible were huge mechanical devices operating where the white smoke rose, with rumbling sounds echoing throughout the city, monotonous and annoying.

"That's the big boiler," Wendell couldn't help but smile after returning to his hometown. Although he had embarked on the journey of seeking light with the intention of no return, human emotions could not be avoided after all. Being able to return here filled his heart with joy. "There is the largest steam boiler, and half of the city's power is provided by several large boilers."

"Steam boiler?" Hao Ren suddenly realized, "You use steam power?"

"Yes, the great steam technology," Wendell said with emotion. "It is said that this thing was originally created by the giants of the ancient times. Surtur, the King of Flames, was the controller of all steam power, but after the gods fell and the world collapsed, the power of steam scattered to the world, and gradually became something that humans could also control. I used to have a workshop, and I was good at making gear mechanisms—but the workshop closed a long time ago."

Hao Ren nodded and looked around. He noticed that even though this entrance was desolate and dilapidated, it was not completely deserted. Many figures emerged one after another from those dilapidated buildings that seemed to be a century old. These people were dressed in tattered clothes, slovenly, and with strange expressions. They looked at the people coming in from outside the city in surprise, and lingered far away, not daring to approach. Then, someone finally recognized Wendell as a "seeker of light," so the person let out an exclamation and quickly ran away.

Several other people ran away with him.

"Don't worry about these people," Wendell said as he walked forward on his own. "They are the 'miners' on the outer edge of the city. They have long-term contact with the outside radiation environment, and these people are a bit neurotic. They deserve respect, but they still cannot integrate into the society of the inner layer, so they gather here."

"Miners," as the name suggests, are those who collect resources. But in this Twilight Capital, the work of miners means paying a heavier price.

They are responsible for collecting resources outside the city—outside the Twilight Barrier.

These people have to set off every day wearing heavy protective gear, take steam locomotives from another exit to leave the city, and go to the mining fields in the vast darkness. The mining fields have low-power protection devices, but they cannot be compared with the powerful Twilight Barrier: these miners are therefore exposed to deadly magical radiation and toxic gas environments for a long time. These deadly harmful environments constantly erode their bodies and spirits, eventually causing these people to become haggard and slow-witted, as Hao Ren saw. The Steam Council provides the families of these miners with the best rations and housing in the city, but these miners themselves...

Their blood is poisonous, their hair and nails are poisonous, and even their breath is poisonous—they can only live in the outer zone.

However, in order to allow their families and descendants to enjoy a superior living environment, many people still voluntarily come to the outer edge of the city to become miners. Of course, there are also those who are unwilling, and those are the criminals exiled here, but they usually have no way to come out and show their faces.

Wendell led Hao Ren and his party away from the main road and skillfully walked into an alley hidden in the shadow of the building. Hao Ren thought the other party was deliberately avoiding something: "Are you hiding from the people of the Steam Council? Actually, we are just not interested in that council, and we didn't intend to hide from them..."

"I'm not hiding from them," Wendell shook his head helplessly. "It's just that to go to the inner layer of the city from this gate, you have to take this road. The wide road has been in disrepair for a long time. Since the team of light seekers has been reduced, that road has been almost abandoned, and the other roads are even more difficult to walk. I'll take you to see an old friend. He is the administrator of the mine locomotive. He can take us to the inner layer of the city. After we get there, I can contact the headquarters of the light seekers."

Hao Ren nodded and stopped talking, just silently following Wendell, walking towards the dark, dirty buildings that looked like lurking steel monsters, while curiously observing this strange city in a closed state.

Obviously, after the Twilight of the Gods, the survivors of this world did not allow civilization to completely stagnate. Although their development path became very strange, and the city within the barrier seemed deformed and distorted everywhere, their society was still developing tenaciously. Two thousand years ago, the humans of Midgard were experimental products and playthings raised by the Norse gods. They lived a primitive and rude life like other humans of the same period, but two thousand years later, they built a steel city driven by machinery and steam power within the Twilight Barrier—even Galazur was surprised by this.

Under such circumstances, their technology tree is still developing!

Wendell led the crowd winding deep along the path, passing through many old buildings that looked like abandoned, but still had sounds coming from inside from time to time. Judging from the slope of the road under his feet, Hao Ren believed that he was moving towards a higher place.

Eventually, they arrived at an open space.

This was a huge steel platform, supported by surprisingly large pillars, completely built in the air above several tall buildings, and several parallel steel rails extended from the edge of the platform. One end of these steel rails extended straight to the Twilight Barrier in the distance, passing through the gate of light on the barrier, and disappearing into the vast darkness: they were obviously leading to those mines, and the other end of the steel rails extended upwards along the city's terrain, heading to the top of this cone-shaped city.

This is a major artery.

When Hao Ren and his party arrived at the platform, they saw the "steam locomotive" in Wendell's mouth.

Those were two bulky but rugged and powerful mechanical monsters. They were larger than any kind of train Hao Ren remembered (including the old steam locomotives he had seen in movies). The cylindrical locomotive traction section was covered with thick pipes and rivets. The dark steel machine looked particularly clumsy and heavy, and behind this powerful traction engine, several dirty carriages were dragged.

Many men in greasy work clothes were busy around these two locomotives, busy greasing the machines, calibrating gears, tightening valves, and writing sacred runic characters on the front of the car with white paint to bless this steel body to return safely from the darkness outside the Twilight Barrier. A large number of miners were waiting to board the train next to the carriages behind. These miners were wearing heavy protective suits. The dirty clothes were inlaid with runic characters with some kind of metal soft silk. Each miner also had an ugly spherical helmet hanging on his waist. The helmet was made of leather and metal, and connected to the clothes with two pipes.

These heavy protective suits were slightly similar to those worn by Wendell, but were obviously more rough and clumsy. Although they looked thick, their effect was quite limited. The equipment and amulets of the light seekers allowed wearers to cross the ruins of the nine kingdoms, but the protective suits and helmets on the miners could only allow them to survive safely for ten hours under magic radiation—after this time, they had to come back to replace certain key components and recharge the runic characters.

Therefore, the most important lesson that every miner had to take before entering the job for the first time was: they must catch the returning steam locomotive in time.