Translator: Lonelytree
To make things even more complicated, a few figures were spotted to be heading down their way on camelback. Gu Jun recognized them as the remainder of Peacock’s group, there were 2 guys and 1 girl. They were Gold, Amberlite and Aquamarine, they were responsible to seek help and purchase spell books at Dylath-Leen but they had returned empty-handed. They were confused by the situation at the ‘settlement’. Peacock heeded Nightmare Man’s advice and had Aquamarine summon the stunned Malachite. Soon, Malachite who was literally standing metres away from them was led over and it was then that he saw the rest.
“I don’t have time to explain and honestly I am not even sure what is happening.” Gu Jun addressed the five. “But I need all of you to come with me. I am giving you two choices, you can follow me voluntarily or I will make you do so.”
“You are going to do what?” Gold was made even more confused, “Sir, what are talking about? We are not going to follow the orders of a stranger!”
“You made me do this.” Gu Jun’s gaze shifted as he released the nightmarish energy to attempt to knock them out, he had no more time. But Peacock intercepted in a hurry. “Mr. Nightmare Man, please, let me do the talking!” She pleaded with her friends. “Guys, if we want the Pnakotic Manuscripts, this is the only way to do it. We need to listen to him. Just this one time, trust me, you’ll understand why soon enough.” Due to their trust in Peacock, Malachite and the rest agreed after a short discussion. They agreed to have their hands tied up and their eyes blindfolded by Peacock.
Gu Jun brought along the beast hide and the scale, he had Peacock and the rest drag the rock with the Ancient Seal with them. Malachite and the rest had no idea what was happening but Peacock had a sense of what Nightmare Man was planning. He was going to return to the old world through the channel… She found that hard to believe. After doing all the preparation, Gu Jun followed the Zoogs. Indeed after about 500 steps, they reached a cluster of rocks in the desert. Several larger ones were stacked together to form a gap. A strange light was coming out from it, it matched the pathway that he had seen in Kathlyn’s memory perfectly. He contemplated to himself, the small medic bag would have to suffice as the lighthouse.
“That is as far as we’re willing to go.” The Elder Zoog patted his stomach. “Can you give us the camels as a departing gift between friends?” The Zoogs did not wish to follow this madman any further. This man was even harder to deal with compared to the evil cat. Gu Jun nodded. Since the Zoogs were not unwilling to come along, it might cause them to rebel should he force them. That could be dangerous because they were more familiar with the channels than he was. With the Zoogs watching, he moved into the stone gap, Peacock with her four friends trailed behind him.
“Follow me.” Once he entered the channel, the surroundings darkened. The five followed beside him. When Gu Jun turned back to look, and the entrance had faded away into a pinprick of light even though they had not wandered that far away from it. He moved about 10 paces forward but he felt like he was stuck at the same spot. It probably due to the fact that the darkness was moving around them…
The ripples of darkness coagulated into different shapes and illusions danced at the corner of his eyes. Time and space were made twisted inside this channel. Peacock was as confused as she could be. Even though the other four were blindfolded, they too were assaulted by this strange feeling. They mumbled, “Is this the Pnakotic Manuscripts?””Where are we going?””I appear to see… a ruin…”
“Stay tight!” Gu Jun resisted the mental pressure and tightened his grip on the medic bag to sense the direction. ‘Is it this way or that way?’ Every direction seemed to speak out to him. Static voices grew louder and louder, messing up his mind. Gu Jun suddenly whipped his head around to look down a direction, in that moment he felt like he had entered a city ruin. The sky was dark and the streets were filled with abandoned vehicles… There were human carcasses everywhere, they were dressed in modern clothes and the blood stains that seeped through their mask had turned black.
“No, not this way…” Jolts of pain travelled through his mind. ‘Was that the future? The age of collapse? The future described by the land’s travellers…’ He turned his head to look down another direction, a different voice was now singing to him and it intensified his headache. Illusory fragments flashed before him. There was a skull that was pierced through a bamboo pole, the eyeballs were dug out, his own face was staring back at him… there were more totem poles next to his and more skulls. He could not see the faces clearly but he could sense that they were Zixuan and Siyu… Gu Jun gripped his head, death, death…
He appeared to hear the voices of many people singing, “Phecda Chaos, Tragedy Birth, High Treason, Big Collapse.” More illusory fragments followed… They wear different visions of his own death. In them, he was split in half, pummeled into pieces and burned alive…’Are these… part of the future? I will embrace death? Or is this part of the chaos in Phecda? Which world will have this future?’
“Whether this is the destined future or not, I will have to return.” Gu Jun tried his best to calm down. “I need to return to that world!” However, there was something that spoke to him, it was as if there was something that awaited his understanding among this chaos. Another voice was calling him, he turned to look and the illusions changed again…
He was inside a chapel with domed-ceiling. The ceiling was so tall that he could not tell how big the chapel was. He looked around and saw circular windows, arches, podiums and tables of unusually big size. Some of the tables were as big as houses. This kind of architecture did not seem possible to be manmade. But the thing that occupied this space the most was the bookshelves. They were made from a black-colored wood. They were arranged in long rows and each row was lined with equally large tomes. The spines had strange characters and pictures, lines, patterns…
All of a sudden, he saw a familiar picture, the Ancient Seal printed on one of the book spines. He was about to take a closer look when he sensed something. He turned around and there stood a blurry shadow next to one of the bigger podiums. The shadow was so enormous that Gu Jun could not tell whether it had a human shape or not.
“Who are you?” Gu Jun asked darkly. The shadow appeared to come from the future, but different from the timeline where the City of Kindle resided. Suddenly a thought popped into Gu Jun’s mind. Someone had channeled the soul of the land’s travellers into the bodies of Kathlyn and her friends. The goal was to help Gu Jun leave Dylath-Leen, escort him to Ulthar to get the Pnakotic Manuscripts and lead him back to the City of Kindles where he would get the three sacred relics and the information about the important change in the future. The puppet master pulling the string was this shadow.
Gu Jun quickly blocked his mind off. No! He reminded himself. This was a thought that was inserted into his mind, the shadow was trying to manipulate him…
“Who are you? Why are you doing this?!” He glanced at the large shadow, suppressing the anger and confusion. “These information, do you think I will believe them blindly? Also why go through all these troubles, why not just tell them to me directly? What do you want from me?”
A twisted voice replied haltingly. It was in an unknown language, but it appeared to come from the shadow,
“…Mask-bearer… Not evil… Sweet dream, use sweet dream… change…”