Pillar of Yita

Hansen stopped some distance ahead and frowned at the scene. Only when Fang Hong approached did he turn around, saw Fang Hong and Gita in his arms, and paused before saying, ”Brother Ade, we’ve encountered big trouble.”

”What’s wrong, what exactly is going on?” Fang Hong put down Gita, looked at the abyss before him — along with the half of Fisherman Street that had disappeared, and couldn’t help but ask.

”Do you remember what I told you? This is the boundary of this phantom,” Hansen replied.

”Boundary?” Fang Hong was stunned. ”Shouldn’t that appear only after a quest is triggered? Are you saying that we are now within the quest’s phantom?”

”I’m not sure either,” Hansen was equally perplexed. ”Without the Steadfast’s Martyr’s Mark and a quest target, theoretically, we should have missed the quest, but this boundary... it...”

Fang Hong involuntarily looked back at that scholar, who from the start at Traveler’s Rest, had been behaving very composedly, as if all this danger had nothing to do with him.

He had found it strange from the beginning, but now he couldn’t help asking: ”Scholar sir, do you know anything?”

”Is that a question?” The scholar, looking at him from under the shadow of his hood, asked.

”We are in a cooperative relationship, Scholar sir,” Fang Hong frowned and said, somewhat displeased: ”This isn’t me pleading with you, you know, I am the Invoker.”

”But she is a trainee,” the scholar replied, ”do not try to deceive me.”

Then, seeing Fang Hong about to say something else, he interrupted: ”Enough, I don’t want to waste time on trivial disputes. I do not mind answering the question, as my safety is also closely related. But the fact is, I too am here to investigate, and if I knew everything, I think I wouldn’t be here.”

Fang Hong looked at him, somewhat skeptically, then nodded. He then turned back to continue asking Hansen, ”Then, Mr. Hansen, what would happen if we entered this boundary? I mean, if we abandon the quest, can we cross it and leave this place?”

”This is where the trouble lies,” Hansen said wryly, ”Once you enter the boundary, there’s no way out. Some Invokers say inside is the Starlight Dead Silence Zone. I don’t quite understand what that is, but I heard the Dead Silence Zone doesn’t affect us Natives — but it’s different in here.”

At that moment, Tianlan, who had caught up from behind, tiptoed to peek down into the abyss, shuddered in fright, almost falling down, had Atira not dashed forward to grab hold of this reckless young girl. Elf Miss spoke a bit sternly, ”Don’t cause trouble, Fuli.”

Still a bit frightened, Tianlan then asked. ”What do we do now? Wait until daylight?”

”Waiting until daylight might not work either,” Gita whispered to her while leaning against Fang Hong. ”The phantoms of Dolifen might or might not actually be in Dolifen, and there’s no precedent of outsiders encountering other adventurers during a quest before the quest ends.”

Hansen also nodded and sighed, ”Perhaps we’ll be trapped here forever, until death.”

Death be it, Fang Hong thought to himself, not to mention that ordinary Invokers and Natives could revive five times, a total of six lives. Whereas he, a Stowaway, could only revive twice, having only half of the Starlight, and the two trainees, Gita and Tianlan, couldn’t revive at all.

And the team’s old knight, Diket, was said by Chris to be the same.

He turned back. ”How should we complete this quest then?”

Hearing Fang Hong’s implied meaning, Hansen shook his head. ”Normally, the process goes like this: after obtaining the Steadfast’s Martyr’s Mark, go to the Grey Oak Square to activate the Shadows of the Past, defeat it, and the road to the City Hall will open up. After that, you probably already know the rest of the story—”

”Then let’s go there,” Fang Hong still remembered that junction on Fisherman Street. He turned back to look at the other end of the street and asked, ”If I remember correctly, this direction leads to Grey Oak Square, right? Is there a boundary over there too?”

Hansen was stunned, then replied, ”Of course not, that’s also a quest area. But wait, our problem now is that we don’t have the Steadfast’s Martyr’s Mark.”

”We have to try,” Fang Hong said.

Saying this, as if satisfying his curiosity, he took one more look at the unfathomably deep abyss, then put his arm around Gita—who nodded to him—and continued walking in the other direction.

At that moment, even without a command, Hansen’s men also followed him in that direction — after all, the ghosts were getting nearer and nearer from behind.

Hansen naturally followed and sighed to Fang Hong, ”Though I always feel it’s superfluous, you’re right, no one wants to sit around waiting for death, we have to try.”

”I haven’t thought much about it, Mr. Hansen, it’s just a habit, I don’t want to give up until the end,” Fang Hong replied quite seriously.

Hansen unexpectedly gave him a look. ”Twenty years earlier, I had as much drive as you, Brother Ade.”

Fang Hong chuckled and said no more.

Gita muttered somewhat defiantly, ”Brother Ade is different.”

Hansen was startled and then laughed at the little girl, ”I can’t agree with that. Even an uncle like me was young once. How is it different?”

Gita moved her lips, of course, she knew about Fang Hong’s courage during the battle with the Silver Forest Spear and the Jiefulite Red Cloak Team in the Dragon Roar Mountains. The day Fang Hong confessed, she had found that video in the community and watched it over and over again in private.

How could an Invoker and Combat Artisan like that be the same as everyone else?

But as the words reached her lips, she remembered that these were not things to be spoken of, and adding that she was quite embarrassed, her face turned red and she curled up, not speaking anymore.

Seeing her expression, Hansen couldn’t help but tease, ”Of course, even when I was young, I wasn’t as popular with the girls as Brother Ade.”

Luckily, this guy could still make a joke under pressure, with enemies behind and blockades ahead, turning both Fang Hong and Gita’s faces beet red.

”It’s not like that!” Fang Hong hurriedly explained, what a joke, wasn’t this setting him up for a three-year start? ”Mr. Hansen, you might not understand—”

”I understand, I understand,” Hansen said, laughing, ”Young people have thin skins, I get it.”

”No, it’s not like that.”

But such a pale and weak defense only brought a round of laughter. Fang Hong turned his head to ask Tianlan for help, but the French girl happily watched his embarrassment, playing dumb on the side.

In the end, Fang Hong could only walk to the front of the group alone, determined to stay away from these boring folks.

According to Diket, the part of Ruins Avenue that leads from Fisherman’s Fork to Grey Oak Square is still technically part of Ruins Avenue, and the avenue doesn’t have many intersections, running almost straight to the square.

Therefore, it didn’t take long for Fang Hong to faintly see the statue on the square with its spear and flag.

The moonlight was undoubtedly bright that night, with a solitary moon hanging on the horizon, brimming with light.

Fang Hong recalled the moon phase a few days earlier, still puzzled, thinking that today shouldn’t have such bright moonlight. Gita, who had been curled up in his arms observing his expression quietly, seemed to see what he was thinking.

She clutched his clothes with her little hand, whispering to him, ”Brother Ade, Dolifen was abandoned about thirty years ago in April or May, and there was a full moon during that time.”

”Has time also frozen to that day?” Fang Hong glanced around at the ghosts that were approaching from all sides, wishing he could figure out what exactly had happened that day.

Being in the front, the two entered the square first.

Unlike Lady Tengye’s inn, which was swarming with ghosts, this square was quiet—the surrounding buildings in the Phantom were well-preserved as they were decades ago, with no signs of being burnt at all.

But the buildings were closed tight, utterly silent, with not a light to be seen, engulfed in darkness.

On the uneven slates of the square, only the clean gleam of moonlight was visible.

Fang Hong put Gita down again, looking around the place with some confusion—in his view, there seemed to be nothing noteworthy here.

There was neither the legendary Blade of Victory nor any signs of enemies’ presence, not to mention the Shadows of the Past, there wasn’t even a single ghostly citizen.

But if there was anything strange, indeed there was one detail that caught his attention.

He turned back and said to Gita:

”Gita, do you feel anything?”

”Hmm, it’s strange, Brother Ade.”

The little girl also replied softly, pausing between each word.

...