The group ventured through the desolate city. No one knew how long it had been abandoned, but all were astounded by the wondrous buildings before them.
Great spires and high walls all had a faint glint of gold. The streets also seemed to be coated in a smooth layer of molten gold. Despite the scenes of desolation, destruction and ruination, it was not hard to imagine what the city looked like in its heyday.
It was a city from the mythologies, a heroic city made out of bronze and gold. A glorious civilization once stood there, yet today it was silent, a remnant of an age long lost.
The group arrived at a collapsed, monumental building. It appeared to be a public building for huge gatherings. There were many roads leading to it, and a rather large plaza before it. The building itself was split in two, possibly by a disaster similar to an earthquake. Half of its walls had already turned to rubble, along with its wide interior and intricate floating corridor structure. Lily was in her element as she leaped from wall to wall, collecting some golden pebbles as she went. "Mr. Landlord, look! Good pebbles! Good pebbles, I tell you!"
"How long has this place been abandoned..." Hao Ren looked around the large, wrecked area. The building materials were clearly different from the ones on Earth, and they had no signs of weathering. Aside from the destruction caused by an external force, everything including the rubble, looked as good as new. "Did the vengeful spirit create this place?"
Anna was carefully flanked on all sides by the party. She was the only one who could unveil the secrets there, and she was aware of the fact too. Hence, she had been frowning hard, trying to recall something from her jumbled memories. Using the desolate city before her as a base, and comparing it to the images the spirit had left in her head, she finally spoke, "Alamanda. This city is called Alamanda, one of the last three cities."
"What do you remember?" Hao Ren looked at Anna in anticipation. He knew that the girl's memory was key to their investigation of this lost world.
"Alamanda was one of Tannagost' last refuge. It was made out of metal casting, and the city was protected by a great barrier." Anna gave her temple a little knock. "Guessing from the scene around us, we're probably in the city center. The image left in my mind looks different. In my memories, Alamanda was the perfect city. Its skies were eternally painted purple, every building shimmered in gold, and there were many... people."
"Seems like the scene before the city's destruction." Vivian rubbed her chin. "The vengeful spirits... a group of spirits wouldn't create such a city. These buildings were clearly meant for a race with physical bodies. Look at those steps and handrails; their users were probably humanoids."
"Then there's the two keys as well. The spirits obviously don't have fingers, they couldn't have been using them..." Hao Ren pulled the keys out from his pockets. He was surprised to see that the two devices slowly changed color, from black to the faint gold of the buildings around them. "Ugh... how did this..."
Becky recalled the stone pillars in the snow field. The advertisement board, the public transport signage, the notice boards... The color of the pillars did not match the colors of the city, but after seeing the keys slowly turning to gold, she thought she understood what was happening. "So, this is their original form. They probably oxidized on Earth."
Lily gave Becky a weird look. "Don't just throw out terms that you don't fully understand. Oxidization and deoxidization don't work like this, right?"
Becky placed her arms on her hips. "For an otherworlder like me to pick up enough vocabulary to start a flame war online isn't easy you know! Don't start throwing the dictionary at me!"
Anna and Nangong Sanba were stunned for a moment. They did not understand what the "otherworlder" meant. But Hao Ren too did not give them the chance to ask, as he spotted something beneath the rubble in front of them. "Looks like a statue!"
Lily immediately pounced at the opportunity to dig a hole and went forth, howling with excitement. By the time Hao Ren and the rest caught up to her, she was already half way through the rubble. There was indeed a golden statue beneath it. Lily tried to pull the statue out, and as she exerted her strength, she said, "Waaaa! This thing is heavy!"
Hao Ren looked at the human-sized statue in awe. It was a humanoid statue with a lithe figure. Its face was flat but wide, its eye sockets were deep, the ridge of its nose was high, and its arms were long. The figure was clad in a complex and gorgeous dressing. The statue's arms were overlapping on its abdomen in a very elegant standing posture. The statue was probably a decoration of some sort.
This was unquestionably how the citizens of the lost world looked like.
And they looked unquestionably dissimilar to the vengeful spirits... Umm, scratch that, totally different is the correct description. Say... did the spirits have a face to begin with?
"This is a Tannaean." Anna touched the statue's face and a sudden nostalgia welled within her. However, she knew the emotion was not hers. It was a gush of emotion, which came from the memories that the spirit had imparted in her. Or perhaps, the spirit was reminiscing on the times when it had a body. "That was the look the people of Tannagost, but they all perished."
"Tannagost..." Wuyue blinked. "You've mentioned it before. Is that the name of the planet we're on?"
"Mhmm..." Anna nodded. "But, I still can't remember many things. Maybe I'll be able to once I see more of the ruins."
Waving his hand, Hao Ren smiled. "Sure, we'll head farther in.... What the heck are you doing, Becky?"
As he turned, Hao Ren saw Becky standing there, staring at the statue in a stupor. The latter seemed to be hypnotized as she stroked the statue's arm. It took her a while before she yelped, "Oh my God, gooopldddd! Gooooolddd!!!"
Hao Ren was caught by surprise by the volume of Becky's screech and jumped. "What you saying?!"
"Th-Thi-This is gooolddd!" Becky stomped the ground a couple of times before jumping onto the statue to try to drag it away with her. "Gold! Gold! Goooolddd!!"
Lily's rolled her eyes as she witnessed the situation. "Mr. Landlord! She's at it again!"
Hao Ren walked towards the statue, and after tapping the statue, he gave the frenzied mercenary a tap as well. "You sure?"
"I may not recognize myself in the mirror at times, but I never mistake gold!" Becky still tried to pull the statue with all her strength. Her face was red from the effort. "Gold give me strength.... Damn, the laws of physics trump willpower. This thing weighs a ton. How did you pull it out?!"
Lily stepped forward and lifted the statue onto her shoulder. "It's not that heavy."
Becky was still hugging the statue as Lily lifted it. From a distance, it looked like the mercenary was picked up by the collar. "Let's bring this back! I don't have to worry about money forever! Mr. Landlord you can even buy a whole street with the money!"
To be honest, everyone around Hao Ren was rather confused. It was also too much to process for Vivian, the eternally poor vampire. Nangong Sanba pinched his thigh as he asked, "How ridiculously rich were these people..."
"You're surprised?" the MDT's smug voice broke everyone's excitement. "Look around you."
Hao Ren turned his head from left to right, and all he saw were the faint golden buildings.
"Everything here has a certain amount of gold, but the walls have a lesser gold element. It's only used as a paint job, while the statue here is pure gold. Gold is not something that resembles wealth on this planet. It's a very common ore here. Because it's dense, it has to be used alongside cement or any other type of lighter ores, similar to sand.
Everyone was speechless.
"Under the right conditions, you may even run into a planet made out of diamonds or gold somewhere in the universe. Of course, the chances of this happening is miniscule. Gold isn't released in huge quantities in a supernova. But back to that, under the right conditions...."—the MDT circled around the party—"you may find a place like this... Gold everywhere."
Only then did Hao Ren snap out from his stupor. He massaged his arm and turned to Becky. "Just take a small piece as a momento. Time to get busy."
Becky was stunned. "Huh?"
The MDT gave Hao Ren a satisfied bump at the back of his head. "Very good."