Chapter 54 Unexpected Turn of Events Looking at the faded, stiff state before him...

Looking at Selene, who was still stiff and pale, maintaining her previous posture, Ethan wiped away his tears and sent a message to the Guardians with trembling fingers, saying that his situation was the same as everyone else's.

It happened very suddenly. Ethan had just finished a relatively relaxing day of campus life and was back in the alternate dimension dealing with those documents when a voice suddenly rang out.

"Ethan..."

The voice sounded familiar; Ethan recognized it almost immediately upon hearing it—it was Starfall's voice, though it was somewhat intermittent.

"Go...borrow...find us..."

Hearing these terrible words, Ethan was suddenly gripped by a huge sense of panic. He didn't know why he suddenly had such a bad feeling. He couldn't help but shout Starfall's name, but before he could understand what had happened, he received no response from Starfall.

Moreover, Ethan felt as if something invisible was being ripped from his body, which startled him and left him bewildered, forcing him to calm down immediately.

Alarm bells rang in his mind, and Ethan hurriedly opened a portal to Starfall City to see what had happened, only to be left speechless for a while.

Everyone, all the people of Starfall City, stood still.

They were all still in the same positions they were in before the incident; some were working, and some were chatting and laughing.

Some cars were still moving when impatient drivers leaned out of their windows to hurl insults at people, spittle flying everywhere. Birds fluttered their wings, and nearby balloons were frozen in mid-air.

Everything seemed to be paused, completely still, even the original colors turned black and white, as if the colors had been removed.

Starfall City has become a completely dead city.

Ethan's mind went blank. He mechanically opened a portal and arrived next to Selene. His mother, whom he had been longing for day and night, was walking on the path, carrying a bag of groceries and still in a walking posture.

"...Mom?" Ethan asked softly.

No one responded to him, and there was no trace of other activity in the city.

Ethan couldn't hold back any longer and opened his arms to hug Selene. The last time he hugged Selene was a few years ago when he had just become a Guardian. He only had time to hug her when he was trying to erase his mother's memories. After that, he only dared to dream about it at most.

He failed to protect his mother.

A sense of powerlessness arose from the depths of his heart, and self-blame overwhelmed him; this feeling was somewhat painful for him.

He was too weak to protect what he wanted to protect; he was too weak to even know what had happened; he was too weak to put his mother in an unknown and dangerous situation.

Tears welled up in his eyes. To be honest, Ethan wasn't a big crybaby; he just had a high level of empathy.

At first, he cried out of fear, embarrassment, and sadness. After becoming a guardian, he gradually came into contact with new and different levels, and he grew in every aspect.

His tears no longer flowed from his wild thoughts, but from his sorrow at not being able to save more people, and from his grief for the suffering and death of others.

Having been a guardian for several years, his heart has become more resilient, and he no longer has such strong empathy that he often sheds tears.

It's not that he's no longer saddened by these things; he's just become stronger inside and learned to swallow these negative emotions instead of letting useless tears flow.

But all of this happened so suddenly. He couldn't even find Lord Starfall, and he was completely clueless about everything. He was also panicking, wondering if he could handle it. How could he solve it? Even Lord Starfall hadn't responded.

Logically speaking, the city's will wouldn't fall into slumber for no reason. Even if it does fall into slumber, the guardians can pull the city's will out of its slumber, just in case the guardians can't handle some major events.

However, this is not a slumber. Lord Starfall has not shown any intention of going into slumber for nearly a hundred years. But if it is not a slumber, then what is it?

Under what circumstances would you receive no response? Is it because the city's will has been erased?

Ethan had heard of cases where the city's will was erased, but those were cases where the city itself had been reduced to a state of near extinction, to the point that the city's will was annihilated only when the city itself was destroyed.

Nothing major has happened in Starfall City recently, and there's no news of it happening in other cities either. Why is Starfall City acting so strangely?

Ethan released Selene and was typing to ask his colleagues for help, but his colleagues responded faster.

"Rena: [Photo.jpg][Photo.jpg] The above situation has occurred in Novigrad. Please check if other members are experiencing the same situation in their own cities."

"Tenas: The same thing happens in Kagerou City; everything seems to be frozen in place."

The next few messages were dozens of similar ones, which made Ethan's heart sink. Especially when he sent messages to his wizard colleagues, no one responded. Had even Bertha not escaped?

Thinking about what Lord Starfall had said at the end, which might have been a form of guidance, Ethan quickly sent it in the group chat.

Upon hearing this, Reina immediately convened an emergency meeting to discuss the matter thoroughly.

With a heavy heart, Ethan went to the Guardian Base, where many people had already arrived and taken their seats.

"You said you received a message left by the will of your city before this?" Upon seeing Ethan, Reina asked impatiently, "What did it say?"

Ethan repeated the fragmented words as he sat down in his seat.

After hearing the meager amount of information, the meeting room fell silent. Everyone frowned and pondered, trying to decipher the potentially crucial points contained in the analysis.

"Borrow...borrow? Borrow what?" Reina muttered to herself, clutching her head. "Find them? The City Wills were all taken away??"

Ethan didn't think he was as smart as Rena, who dealt with a lot of politicians and led the Guardians, so he just kept flipping a coin to ask questions.

Has Lord Starfall been taken away? "Yes."

If we don't find the city's willful leaders, will the city remain in this state? "Yes."

What should we do?

This time, the coin was tossed halfway through when it suddenly hovered in mid-air, flipped several times at its original height, and then exploded into pieces.

Ethan was stunned for a moment, and when he came to his senses, he was even more distressed. Even the coin that had been his fortune teller for several years could not withstand his question about how to solve the problem, and an inexplicable force destroyed it.

Ethan tried to calm himself down while pulling out his tarot card again.

After witnessing his magician colleagues' various amazing and accurate divinations, Ethan shamelessly asked for their guidance and received invaluable instruction from his wonderful colleagues. While it can't be said that he surpassed his teachers, his divination skills were not much worse than Cassie's.

Ethan drew a card, and the first one was the Tower in the upright position.

This is indeed a major crisis, fraught with danger, but it is also an opportunity. In this terrible situation, there is a glimmer of hope, and what they need to do is find that glimmer of hope.

The second card is the reversed Seven of Swords.

Accepting reality and making changes, exploring new friends and venturing into new territories are good signs for moving forward. It's about facing problems and finding solutions.

The third card Ethan drew was the Star upright.

This card signifies that the future is full of hope. Although the light is faint, it can still guide the way. Hardships are only temporary, as long as you bravely take the first step and accept the challenge.

This means that if he makes some new acquaintances, he might be able to win back the city's will, and his new friends might help him.

The cards he drew weren't particularly bad, and Ethan felt his mind calm down; the panic he had felt earlier was gone.

Ethan put the tarot cards away and tried Cassie and the others' divination methods one by one; the meanings were largely the same.

While Ethan was performing his divination, the other guardians were already arguing amongst themselves, each holding their own viewpoint and debating the possibilities they had analyzed. The noise was like dozens of ducks quacking, giving Reina a headache.

I understand everyone's panic. Who doesn't have family or friends? Now, in so many cities, apart from the guardian himself, there's no one else alive; everything is frozen in time. I understand, but the noise and chaos are just too much.

Ethan quietly stood beside her and told her to look at the results of his divination; the Guardian wasn't someone who couldn't see the future at a glance.

Upon hearing this, Reina stopped rubbing her temples and asked him if he could guarantee the accuracy of his divinations.

Ethan felt that his divination was quite accurate, and since he had tried several different methods, he should be able to guarantee some accuracy.

Reina made a gesture, and the guardians she had trained immediately fell silent. Reina then told the others about Ethan's divination results, first calming the guardians down.

Reina suggested that they contact guardians in other countries first. If all goes as expected, the other guardians are in the same situation. They could see if they could cooperate with guardians from other countries to overcome the difficulties together.

Ethan clearly remembered that the government had explicitly prohibited its own Guardians from having private contact with Guardians from other countries, and that all contact methods were controlled by the government's top brass. In theory, the Guardians should not have been able to contact each other.

But who is Reina?

She is one of the high-ranking members. With her own abilities, she climbed to a high position in another identity at a young age. She fought against a group of old fogies who were old enough to be her grandfathers, and she managed to outmaneuver everyone and enjoy many benefits.

Moreover, their country is so free, claiming to be the freest country in the world, with hundreds of genders, vegetarians and meat-eaters fighting each other, and everything can be politically correct, even replacing white actors with black actors for the sake of political correctness, so it's normal for them to do whatever they want.

Even now, Ethan still doesn't have the courage to see the little black mermaid.

Reina dialed the first number first, and the conference room screen was projected for a video call.

However, the person who answered the video call was not one of Reina's guardians.

"Donato?" Reina's expression turned grim. "Why is it you? Why is Luca's phone in your hands?"

"Luca?" The smiling Italian man in the video said casually, "He's dead. Our city seems to have been put on hold for some reason. Except for the Guardians, everyone suddenly started fighting amongst themselves."

Reina's face turned even uglier in that instant. She never expected that other countries would start fighting amongst themselves before they even had a chance to contact them to discuss whether they could overcome the difficulties together. Their guardian leaders had actually been killed.

“We wanted to talk to you about this too.” Reina’s expression was grim, but she didn’t forget the point: “You…”

"Sorry, Reina, sweetheart." Donato interrupted Reina, winking playfully at them. "We're choosing a new leader here, and I want to see who survives, so I won't be involved. Good luck to you guys, it's best if you succeed, but it's okay if you don't. See you next time, Reina, sweetheart~"

Seeing the call disconnected, Reina trembled with anger, but quickly composed herself. This was precisely why she hated people who caused trouble; they always seemed to think things were going too far.

Rena contacted several guardian leaders from friendly countries and found that they had all started fighting amongst themselves to varying degrees, and some had even gone mad, as if possessed. Only a few remained calm, and after connecting with them and understanding their intentions, she was able to manage to win over a few neutral factions.

After hanging up the communication, Reina felt genuinely relieved to see that although the Guardians were initially noisy, they hadn't started fighting.

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A note from the author: The tarot cards used in this article are from online sources. I'm not a professional, so please point out any errors, and I'll correct them accordingly. [Applause]

The exam is over. Bored, I watched others answer the questions and realized the system had assigned all the practice questions to the student next to me. I watched helplessly as she got several questions wrong, while I only saw five questions I had reviewed before, yet I still passed. It was all luck!