After Keus left, Loran Hill sat in the small room, untied the string on the file bag, took out the stacks of yellowed pages, and read through them carefully.
These pages do not seem to be original, but copied by people later. However, it is understandable that they were probably kept in the safest place and generally would not be taken out. For such records, as long as they are true, it doesn't make much difference whether they are original or not.
Most of them are scattered records, but only one of them is carefully bound together.
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Where did the vortex of chaos come from, where did it lead to, and what monsters those twisted shadows were? These are what scholars of all generations have wanted to know.
As a Staff Priest of the Bronze Candle Palace within the Church, I have more access to those tomes than many of my colleagues. In my spare time, I have read almost all of the Church's treasured tomes. With the exception of a few secret notebooks belonging to the Pope, I have reviewed them all in detail.
I have to say that the chaos and confusion of historical materials during the chaotic and disastrous period more than a thousand years ago is unimaginable today. All kinds of fantasies and inferences are mixed in with the real but one-sided records, and it is unclear. It took me nearly 40 years to slowly remove all kinds of unsupported, contradictory, and fact-inconsistent information from the vast amount of text, and gradually pieced together the fragmented information into a vague pattern.
Where does the vortex of chaos come from?
This question dates back to an unknown period after the Twilight Age and before the Age of Dragons and Giants. While there is no record of its origin, it can be inferred that it must be related to ancient people who possessed strength that we still cannot imagine.
And where does the vortex lead to?
Many say its bottom lies in a lightless hell of sin, the edge of time and space, another world. But the only one who has truly entered the vortex and returned is the Seraph. Though she didn't say it explicitly, the heroes around at the time recalled that the Archangel's return brought only greater loss and unspoken sorrow.
Perhaps it is not a lifeless and lightless hell, but it still cannot be called a wonderful world.
What exactly is the twisted Chaos Shadow?
This question is the subject of the most misunderstandings and interpretations, with various theories ranging from the darkness of human nature, unconscious confusion, lost and fallen souls, and people abandoned by God.
But putting aside these considerations of the mind and good and evil, and explaining them purely from the perspective of power and the supernatural system, they are undoubtedly a special form of "virus." This "virus" will infect its surroundings and gradually destroy the surrounding environment, but in order for it to proliferate, it must have the existence of a soul.
As we all know, the higher the level of intelligence, the stronger the soul, and intelligent life forms such as humans, orcs, and elves are its prey and food.
They will fundamentally destroy a person's consciousness or soul, causing it to become irreversibly disordered and distorted, and finally shattered into scattered, unconscious, distorted, new chaotic phantoms. In other words, these chaotic phantoms were originally the souls of intelligent creatures, that is, the remnants of human nature.
Once its nature is determined, it must be easy to guess where those disappeared ancient people went.
Although it is not 100% correct, at least a considerable number, or even 99% of ancient people, perished in this strange "virus".
Didn’t ancient people ever resist or rebel?
I believe there are, and those resistances turned into reality are probably the origin of angels.
As a life form that particularly emphasizes the purity of the soul, their existence is as if turning their souls into transparent and flawless bricks, and then using them to build an indestructible crystal castle.
One is turbid, the other is clear, one is scattered, the other is solid, just like the two poles of a concept, opposing each other.
Did the angel succeed in doing so?
Although I admire the ancients who found a new way to create such an extraordinary sequence, I still have to admit that the angels failed.
Perhaps they have an advantage in quality, but compared with enemies that are hundreds, thousands, or even tens of thousands of times larger, their resistance is just a drop in the bucket.
I guess the birth of an angel is not easy, but rather very difficult, so much so that many ancient people did not even have the chance to take this path and disappeared from the world.
Later research further supported my hypothesis.
Lower-level angels' emotions aren't lively, or rather, rather rigid. They seem to lack some sense of feeling. While this allows them to maintain their composure in the face of chaotic illusions, it also leads to a rigid rejection of everything, believing only in the commands of higher-level angels. They're like unthinking fanatics who simply believe whatever a priest tells them.
This is a comfortable thing for the pastor, but it is probably not a good thing for him/herself, as it means losing himself/herself.
We have no way of knowing whether these numerous low-level angels are doing this voluntarily or under duress. But what is certain is that this is indeed effective. If one day in the future, the world once again falls into an irreversible crisis, our church will be forced to consider whether to take similar measures.
Not all lives can maintain courage and rationality when facing fear and disaster. For the survival of the race, we must not give up those effective extreme measures, even if it means becoming sinners for all eternity.
.....
Loran Hill kept flipping through the pages, his brows sometimes furrowed, sometimes relaxed, until he finally sat down at the desk, motionless.
She stroked the black words on the rough paper with her fingers, feeling a lot of emotions in her mind, but she didn't know where to start.
Sighs, regrets, sadness, or loss for the past humanity, many complex emotions slowly revolve in the mind and heart.
She had once thought that perhaps those angels were humans who had survived from a distant era, but she hadn't expected that this small hope would be shattered. Many of the lower-ranking angels could no longer be considered alive.
They have no social skills, will not do anything that is not related to fighting, have no other hobbies, and even have no emotions.
Only a few Seraphim still retained their wisdom and emotions, but they also fell, fell silent, and were seriously injured in the disaster of Chaos.
After reading through the most important records, the remaining information is not very new. It only contains some supplements or reference sources of this information, etc.
Finally, at the end of the material, a piece of thin paper fell out.
Loran Hill picked up the tattered piece of paper, on which were written several things that had been excavated in the Dusk Ruins. Unfortunately, these things are now kept in the Pope's Hall and ordinary people cannot see them at all.
Among them, there was one that the girl looked familiar with: a three-dimensional, perfectly segmented prismatic cylinder. If she was right, this cylinder should also be a data storage device in a base in the Twilight Era.
It seems that we have to seek the current Pope's approval, but has the Pope been elected yet?
Loran Hill slowly closed the paper in his hand, thinking about the current situation of the church.
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