The ripples in the darkness gradually calmed down, and the pale words no longer appeared. No matter how hard Zhou Ming concentrated or searched in the darkness, he could no longer see those strange "conversations."
Yes, a conversation, it was undoubtedly a conversation, and... it seemed to be a conversation between the gods.
At least, Zhou Ming still knew the name "Bartok".
In the darkness, Zhou Ming stood quietly. He no longer tried to create new ripples, but fell into a long period of thinking. An astonishing amount of information surged in his mind like a tide. Hidden in the seemingly calm thinking was a huge astonishment and confusion in his thoughts.
Is this a bad joke? Unlikely.
So is this really happening? If so, when are these conversations happening? Is this a record of something that happened in the past, or is it just happening right now, in some mysterious dimension? "They" are talking, and this conversation is reflected in this dark and strange place.
Bartok is the name of the god of death, this is certain, then what do the other names represent? The most reasonable idea is that those names represent gods, so the Fire King is probably Tarekhin, the "Eternal Flame" worshipped by the Firebearers... What about the Queen of Leviathan? Is she the Goddess of Storms?
Another name for the Storm Goddess is "Leviathan Queen"?!
In the darkness, Zhou Ming gradually frowned. The extremely special title of "Leviathan Queen" made him think of all kinds of speculations and associations, but compared to this, the fourth name made him unable to control his thoughts even more -
The one who talks with the gods is named "LH-02".
If the people we just saw talking represent the four gods, then the last one can only be Lahm, the one who holds the power of wisdom and folly among the four gods.
Lahem's name... is "LH-02"?! This doesn't sound like a name at all, but more like a number! A sequence belonging to a machine!
Countless crazy conjectures were surging up in Zhou Ming's mind. He felt as if his mind was boiling. He even had to try hard to restrain his wild thoughts to prevent those conjectures from becoming too absurd. While sorting out these messy conjectures, he did not ignore the shocking information mentioned in those "conversations".
The situation is not optimistic, and the critical state is accelerating... The cluster controller has begun to replicate itself, or has completely lost control...
Just these two sentences were enough for Zhou Ming to smell the tense and heavy atmosphere. What situation did "they" refer to? Was it the state of the mortal world? Then the critical state was accelerating... Did it mean that the collapse of a huge system was imminent?
Zhou Ming instantly recalled his last conversation with Agatha - Plande and Frost had accidents one after another, and Anomaly 001 had a "malfunction". This series of events seemed like the "precursor stage" of a huge system that was constantly having problems.
Then the cluster controller has begun to replicate itself...
Zhou Ming's expression suddenly froze, and a sentence emerged in his mind -
【This is a fake】
In the darkness, he couldn't help but take a deep breath and subconsciously looked at the space where the text had just appeared, as if expecting more information to appear there.
Of course, nothing appeared there.
Zhou Ming withdrew his gaze with a serious expression.
Of course, there are still many issues worth paying attention to. Although I just saw a few sentences of conversation, the amount of information behind each sentence is astonishingly large. Even the names of each interlocutor are worth thinking about for a long time. For example, Lahem, Gemona and Tarekin all used "pseudonyms", so why did the god of death Bartok use his real name? At the end of the message, "LH-02", who is suspected to be the god of wisdom Lahem, also mentioned a suspicious visitor and said that the other party "sent a dog head and left"... What is going on?
To be fair, if the first few sentences hadn’t contained so much information, Zhou Ming’s entire attention would probably have been focused on the “dog’s head” at the end.
But now, this incongruous remark just seems a little strange.
At this moment, a slight noise suddenly came from the depths of darkness, interrupting the storm in Zhou Ming's mind.
It sounded like the sound of something quietly breaking. At first it was very faint, almost like an auditory hallucination, but almost in an instant, the breaking sound became obvious and dense, and then, countless disordered light and shadow lines appeared in the dark space - increasingly dense noise filled Zhou Ming's mind, and the entire dark space began to disintegrate and shatter rapidly. Rotating light and shadows rose from all directions, and the next second, he heard a loud "boom" in his head!
The next second, the brief feeling of weightlessness and dizziness "pulled" him back to the real world, and the touch of sitting on the chair made Duncan suddenly open his eyes.
The raging flames filled his eyes, and the nameless black leather book was already burning fiercely in his hands!
Alice exclaimed from the side: "It's burning! Captain! The book is burning!"
Duncan was startled and immediately put his hand on the blazing flame. In the blink of an eye, he controlled the fire. However, the book burned at an abnormally fast speed. In the blink of an eye, most of the book had turned into ashes, and only a small part of the messy pages remained on the table.
Dark red liquid like fresh blood seeped out from the remaining half of the book, soaking and rotting the pages. Duncan frowned and turned over the remaining pages, only to find that they had all turned into soft and rotten flocs, and were obviously no longer readable.
He raised his head with a subtle expression: "I don't think I did anything."
"Judging from the phenomenon... this book probably can't bear your power." Morris hesitated for a few seconds and said hesitantly, "This is a significant 'supernormal overload'."
"Can't withstand my power?" Duncan frowned and muttered subconsciously.
Just can't bear its own power? This book just bore... I'm afraid it wasn't just its own power.
Perhaps, just now it acted as a medium - a medium that far exceeded its own limitations.
Duncan recalled the golden sun mask he got from Plande - he glimpsed the appearance of the "real sun god" through the mask, but it also caused the mask to be scrapped.
Morris didn't know what Duncan was thinking, but he noticed that the captain didn't look very good, so he couldn't help but add: "This book should be just a 'copy', a supernatural item copied from the 'original' using some special ritual. This supernatural item itself is indeed fragile..."
Duncan raised his head. "That is to say, if there is an 'original', then I might be able to... 'read' it stably?"
Morris adjusted his monocle: "...In theory."
Alice looked left and right, and finally couldn't help but come over: "Captain, did you see anything just now? Why do you look so serious..."
Duncan rubbed his brows, and everything he had just seen in the darkness came to his mind again, but as soon as he opened his mouth, he suddenly controlled the urge to tell the truth.
To weaker mortals, much of the "information" is inherently poisonous.
"I saw something - different from what Morris saw," he said slowly after thinking carefully for a few seconds, "but I can't tell you the details because it might hurt you."
Vanna and Morris looked at each other immediately, and the next second, the same tension and solemnity appeared in their eyes.
Morris thought for a moment and then said, "It's different from what I saw... In other words, the book will present different contents depending on who reads it?"
"That may be the case, but it may also be that different contents are presented to me," Duncan said thoughtfully, and then there was some regret in his tone, "What a pity... I should have tested it last, even if I let Tirian take a look at the contents of the book first, at least I could get more clues. Now the only 'sample' has been burned."
Morris's face suddenly looked a little strange. He opened his mouth to say something but didn't say it. Vanna on the side was more straightforward: "This... should also consider Mr. Tirian's physical and mental health?"
"It's better to read more books than to watch striptease," Duncan waved his hand, "and I'm here to take care of her, nothing will happen... Let's not talk about this."
He shook his head, then his eyes fell on Vanna, deciding to verify some things indirectly.
"Vanna, have you ever heard of the title or term 'Queen of Leviathan'?"
"The Queen of Leviathan?" Vanna was stunned when she heard this. The shock and confusion in her expression did not seem fake. "I have never heard of her... Is she the ruler of a city-state? But I have never heard of any city-state with this name."
Duncan observed Vanna's expression, while also concentrating on sensing whether there were any abnormal aura fluctuations or extraordinary phenomena around him.
Because he was very curious whether mentioning the name "Queen Leviathan" in the real world would also trigger any phenomenon.
But half a minute passed and nothing happened.
"Okay, let's forget about this question for now," Duncan shook his head and then looked at Morris. "LH-02, have you heard of this?"
"No," Morris didn't understand, but noticing the seriousness in Duncan's expression, he recalled it seriously before shaking his head, "This sounds like the code name of some kind of machine?"
The reactions of both "saints" did not seem fake.
They really had never heard of these two titles.
But this still cannot rule out the possibility that these two titles correspond to "Storm Goddess Gemona" and "God of Wisdom Lachem" respectively.
After all, above the saints there is the Pope, and above the city-state cathedrals there are several "pilgrimage church arks" that cruise on the vast ocean for a long time - the secrets closest to the gods are kept in places far away from the world.
"Forget about these two names for now." After a long while, Duncan exhaled and shook his head after confirming that nothing had happened in the cabin. "Don't mention these names to anyone, especially after you leave the range of the Lost Homeland. Don't tell anyone these words."