Where is this giant going to take me?

Fanna followed the giant's footsteps curiously and confusedly, and stepped into the endless yellow sand. The sand and dust blown up by the wind seemed to form a hazy barrier in the distance, as if blurring the boundary between heaven and earth. And at some point, the ruins of the city formed by the piles of black rugged rocks had disappeared in the depths of the sand and dust. When Fanna wanted to look back, she could no longer see anything.

The sky was gradually getting brighter and the temperature in the desert was rising little by little.

Fanna waved her hand and summoned a giant sword condensed from ice. She used the protection of the goddess of storms to fight against the discomfort brought by the desert, while looking up at the sky.

The huge crack emitting an ominous red light still covered the entire world. I didn't know if it was an illusion, but the bloodshot from the edge of the crack seemed to have expanded a bit since the first time I saw it.

The sun was still not visible as far as the eye could see, but the sky was getting brighter and brighter - this gave Vanna a feeling that the concept of "sunshine" had been imprinted in a certain "cycle" between heaven and earth. Even if the sun had disappeared, the light and heat it left behind would still appear in this world "on time".

The giant's attention was attracted by the giant ice sword in Vanna's hand.

He had seen the giant sword in the other person's hand before, but he had never seen the process of Vanna summoning this sword - he seemed to think that this power was very magical.

"Your sword is made of a power that does not belong to this world. This power is incredible. It can summon miracles from the yellow sand. I haven't seen 'ice' for a long time."

"This is the power bestowed upon me by the god I believe in," Vanna said immediately. "He is the master of storms and oceans, and ice is the authority extended from the storm."

"The god who rules the sea?" The giant whispered thoughtfully, "Storms and oceans... This place is very far from the coastline, and the so-called sea has now dried up. But I still remember that they once built a very glorious city by the sea. That city had pure white walls and many blue roofs. They named the city after a gem and built the first ship that could cross the ocean in the city..."

Vanna listened quietly to the giant telling her about the forgotten ancient things, and then relayed the information she heard to others who were acting in the dream. The heat around her was still rising, so she took the giant sword in her hand and took a bite. While chewing the ice, she asked curiously, "What's next?"

"Then, the city disappeared in the bubble. When the erosion occurred, many things changed in ways I couldn't understand," the giant said. He couldn't help but look down at Vanna, looking at the ice sword that had been bitten by her. "...So this is how it is used?"

"It's a bit hot here," Vanna said, a little embarrassed, "I... am afraid of heat."

"It's good to be afraid of heat. Being able to feel uncomfortable in the environment is a proof of being alive," said the giant. Then he stopped and said, "We are here, traveler."

Vanna stopped and looked in the direction of the giant's gaze, her expression suddenly becoming a little dazed.

There was a huge... sinkhole in front of them, embedded in the earth like a shocking scar, and she and the giant had arrived at the edge of the sinkhole without knowing when, only a few steps away from the wall.

After a brief moment of surprise, she took a cautious step forward and observed the situation in the pit. She saw that the pit wall was like colored glaze, and the dark rock was molten and solidified like the ruins of the city before. She also saw that the yellow sand around the pit receded, and the exposed ground was horribly cracked. The scale of the pit was huge, as if it could accommodate a city-state as huge as Plunder...

In the center of the pit, one can vaguely see a towering object - it looks like a tower of astonishing size, but now only its twisted and hideous appearance remains. Around the "tower" one can vaguely see melted roads and uneven... stones.

"What is that?" Vanna asked in surprise, pointing at the tower.

The giant did not answer her directly. Instead, he slowly came to the edge of the pit, sat on the ground, placed the huge cane beside him, and pondered quietly.

It was unknown how long it took before he broke the silence.

“I can’t remember a lot of things, but I still remember this place… After realizing that the world was gradually collapsing and that human power was no longer able to save it, they built a huge archive here. The big pit you see is the ruins of the archive—they tried to leave all the evidence of their existence in this world in a building.

"Everything you can think of, culture, art, history, countless volumes and artifacts, seed banks and huge sculptures, all piled up in well-protected and solid warehouses. They also made huge stone slabs, using the most stable material, and carved a simple introduction to the world and civilization into stone.

"Books decay quickly, advanced recording devices are prone to malfunction, and sophisticated storage media cannot be read directly. However, words engraved on stones can be preserved for thousands of years, or even longer, so those stones are placed in the center of the archives and are regarded as the 'heart' of this place.

"They can't find a more reliable and long-term record keeping method than this."

"Then...what next?" Vanna couldn't help but ask, even though she already knew the answer before she opened her mouth.

"The stone turned into bubbles," the giant lowered his head and looked into Vanna's eyes, "in one second."

Vanna suddenly felt suffocated.

"The artwork melted and flowed like water, seeping into all the cracks. The books turned into shadows and were imprinted on the walls. The sculptures sublimated in the air and turned into pale mist. Then the whole building began to sink and shatter, and the whole land sank." The giant raised his hand and pointed to the deep pit. "People gathered there, the last survivors, they were there to mourn their civilization and were ready to die calmly, but the fact is that mourning and dying calmly are also a luxury.

“Right before their eyes, everything they had recorded became something… unspeakable.

“This is the reality: when the world itself enters destruction, nothing recorded in the ‘world’ will be preserved.”

"Then..." Vanna opened her mouth for a long time, then she raised her hand hesitantly and asked again, "That tower..."

"When the whole building began to collapse, that was the last safe place," the giant whispered, "They ran there, just like they ran down from the trees and ran to the safety of the open plains many, many years ago when the first fire spread to the settlements in the forest. Only this time, the 'fire' was going to burn more than just the forest...

“In the end, only one person ran there, and I don’t remember what he looked like, or whether he was a man, a woman, an old man or a child.

“He stopped there and died standing up.

"In the last minute before his death, he grew as fast as a mountain, even as if he was about to touch the sky. That scene was like... there was something wrong with the scale, because their 'science' told me that the human body structure could not support a body of that size..."

The giant raised his head and looked at the "tower" in the center of the deep pit, as if after so many long years, the long-standing confusion still lingered in his heart.

Vanna finally knew what it was.

That is the last person in this world.

★Illustration 22★

Her eyes slowly widened, and in shock, she stared at the center of the "big pit".

Even from such a long distance, she could see the astonishing scale of the "tower". It was taller than the tallest tower in the city of Plande, and even more magnificent than the city-state cathedral. How could it... be a person?

However, gradually, Vanna finally made out the chilling details in the strange and hideous appearance of the "tower" in the distance. She saw the molten and deformed structure raised like an arm, and the twisted torso. For a moment, she even thought she saw a creepy...face embedded in a certain part of the tower.

But she knew it was an illusion. At such a long distance, even if there were such details on the tower, she couldn't see them clearly.

What's more, it has been distorted to the point where its original appearance cannot be recognized.

Fanna found it difficult to describe how she felt at the moment. She only knew that her heart was shocked and huge questions almost overwhelmed her mind. She stared at the black "tower" for a long time, at the last tombstone left by the last person of the destroyed ancient civilization. Then she slowly raised her head and stared at the sky covered with red cracks and where the sun was not visible.

After an unknown amount of time, perhaps to divert the heavy feeling in her heart, she suddenly asked, "The sun...did the sun disappear at that time as well?"

"sun?"

Vanna raised her hand and pointed at the sky: "It shouldn't be like this. Where is the sun that shines on this world?"

"Oh, yes, the sun, I almost forgot, it's the sun..."

The giant muttered softly, with a tone of emotion that Vanna could not understand. Then he raised his hand and fumbled in his tattered robe for a while. It seemed that he finally found something in the deepest part of his clothes. He then took it out and placed it in front of Vanna.

"The sun is here."

The giant said gently.

Fanna stared at him in amazement, at the thing he showed her, at the thing that lay quietly in the giant's palm, as if it was only as big as her fist...

Glorious sphere.

It radiates a bright glow and a little bit of warmth, as if it is floating there, floating in a dimension parallel to reality.

So...small and peaceful.

"It fell down," the giant continued, looking calmly at Vanna, "and I picked it up."