Chapter 142 The Other Side of the Eternal Veil

The four major churches have been amassing a large fleet on the borders of the civilized world—and they have been doing so for quite some time.

The reduction in regular patrol fleets and the massive accumulation of ships, personnel, and supplies near the Eternal Veil could not be concealed from the border city-states. Even before today, Lucrezia had learned of the churches' unusual movements from Sara Meier. However, Duncan and she had been unable to figure out the purpose of the churches' actions—until now.

The truth about the death of the gods, the true purpose of the pilgrimage arks, and the current state of the gods entering the "corruption phase" ahead of schedule, allowed Duncan to finally guess the purpose of those fleets.

"...We are looking for 'Them'," Helena finally said after a moment of silence. "This is one of the purposes, and the initial purpose."

"You mean, the gods are in that 'fog' of the Eternal Veil!?" Lucrezia stood up instantly, looking at the four popes opposite her with disbelief. "Just outside the 'border'?"

"We're not sure," Banster replied, the black-robed old man slowly shaking his head. "But we are certain that the initial 'aura of decay' permeated from the Eternal Veil on the border—so our current plan is just to find the source of those auras, but what we will see at that source... no one knows."

Luen took over the conversation: "That might be the 'divine kingdom' of the gods, or perhaps just some kind of 'connecting point' between them and the mortal world, or perhaps..."

He stopped there, not continuing.

Duncan, after a moment of silence, suddenly asked again: "You just said this is only one of the purposes, what about the others? Besides looking for 'Them', what else do you want to do?"

"Another purpose is to understand what exactly happened to this world," Helena replied, in this frank "gathering," all the secrets finally had a chance to be revealed. "Reports of the border collapsing are increasing day by day. Along with the recent 'malfunctions' of the 'sun,' various anomalies related to the Eternal Veil are becoming more frequent—an obvious fact is that the fog may hide secrets closely related to our world's 'current state' and 'foundation'."

"...Understand what exactly happened to the world, and then what?" Duncan couldn't help but ask, instinctively feeling that Helena hadn't finished speaking.

"...If possible, try to find a 'new route' that can completely pass through the veil, and then take as many people out as possible before the worst happens," Helena said, "If the 'collapse' within the veil is a foregone conclusion, then our only way out is to 'go out.' There may be other worlds outside the veil—more expansive worlds.

"Perhaps it's not so habitable, perhaps the outside of the veil is more dangerous than the Boundless Sea, but as long as we can survive, no matter how harsh the environment, it can become a new habitat for civilization... as long as we live, life will find a way, even if it requires a long and painful adaptation... or even a mutation process."

As Helena's voice fell, the hall fell silent for a time. Duncan could feel Vanna and Morris, who were beside him, subconsciously holding their breaths. After several seconds, he heard Vanna break the silence: "Is the situation already so bad?"

"The worst part is that we don't even know how bad the situation will get—if it weren't for the *Ghost Ship's* 'warning,' we wouldn't even know that the sun had completely gone out for twelve hours last time," Luen shook his head. "In those twelve hours, the four arks also disappeared from this world along with other city-states, which further convinced us... we must face what might happen next with the worst possible expectations."

"But the 'world outside the veil' is just a guess, a baseless guess," Duncan suddenly said lightly, his voice not loud, but as if coldly falling on everyone's heart. "Most likely, this is just your wishful 'effort'."

"Better than doing nothing," Helena's expression did not change at all, she just calmly and frankly met Duncan's gaze. "We don't act because we are sure something will succeed, but because we have no choice but to do so—there may be nothing outside the Eternal Veil, and it is even very likely that the Eternal Veil has no end. We will never find the so-called new route, but we always have to do something..."

She stopped, and Frem, who had not spoken much since the beginning, broke the silence with a low voice: "In an even worse scenario, we are even considering how to survive in the Eternal Veil."

"Survive in the Eternal Veil!?" Nina exclaimed in astonishment—she had not been speaking, just sitting quietly next to Uncle Duncan, because she felt that this was not a place for her to interrupt casually, but this time she really couldn't help it. "Can people live in that place? Can humans reproduce in that fog?"

"Not now," Frem shook his head calmly. "At least with the current life forms of mortals and our current understanding of the laws of the Eternal Veil, human society cannot reproduce in that fog—the 'human society' here also includes elves and Senjin people."

Nina opened her mouth: "Then..."

"This is what I mentioned just now," Helena said softly, "We may need a long and painful adaptation or even a mutation process—we may need to become no longer 'us' to survive in the world after that, perhaps like those mysterious shadows that appear in the fog, perhaps like those noises that whisper in the wind..."

"What if that's still not enough?" Duncan asked again, "The chaos of the Eternal Veil may be impossible to 'adapt' to. If both the new route plan and the adaptation plan fail..."

"Then we will go to the Spirit Realm, and if the Spirit Realm still doesn't work, then we will launch an all-out attack on the Deep Sea," Banster said calmly, "Since there is a group of people in this world who can summon demons to the real dimension, then we can also go to the worlds of those demons. They can survive in the Deep Sea, and so can we—and if that still doesn't work, then we still have the Warp."

This time, even Shirley couldn't help but speak: "The... the Warp?"

Banster nodded slightly: "No one can survive the Warp. All mortals who witness it will dissolve in eternal madness and distortion, but if it really comes to the last moment, the Warp can also be an option—any choice, even the worst choice, is better than calmly and docilely heading towards that doomsday."

Shirley and Nina were both silent, a look of being shocked appeared on their faces.

Duncan showed a thoughtful expression, he stared at the four figures across the table for a long time before whispering: "Is this the 'revelation' you received?"

"This is not a revelation, this is just a 'admonition' we received in one chaotic and weak communication after another," Helena said slowly, raising her hand and outlining the emblem of storm and deep sea on her chest. "They tell us to live on, at all costs, unscrupulously live on."

Duncan did not speak for a moment.

He fell into thought, and was a little shocked.

He admitted that these people, who always seemed to arrive late in every "incident," and even seemed a little slow and weak, were actually doing more than he imagined.

Compared to the Ancient Gods, compared to the *Ghost Ship*, they really didn't have much power—but they were trying to do things that the *Ghost Ship* and the Ancient Gods couldn't do.

After such silence lasted for an unknown amount of time, he finally broke the silence: "I want to know the progress you have made so far."

Helena hesitated for a few seconds, and sighed softly: "...Unfortunately, progress is still limited—we have set up several forward bases at the six-sea-mile critical point within the Eternal Veil, and we can barely gain a foothold in that position, but that's all... so far, no one has been able to break the 'record' left by the *Ghost Ship* back then."

"The *Ghost Ship* 'had an accident' after returning from six sea miles outside the veil," Duncan shook his head, his attitude was very frank. "Strictly speaking, that was not a successful 'exploration record'."

The faces of the four popes were a bit strange, and obviously they didn't want to continue on this topic.

Duncan didn't care about this, he just adjusted his sitting position, and after briefly sorting out his thoughts, he changed the topic: "Then, since your progress in this area has been blocked, I have some 'information' here that might be useful, you might be interested."

Helena subconsciously opened her mouth: "Information?"

"A few days ago, my daughter and I 'captured' a ship," Duncan nodded, unhurriedly said, "That was a large ship built by the Annihilation Cultists, which they used to invade dreams in the previous Breeze Harbor incident, and it is full of traces of bloody rituals and blasphemous creations... but that's not the point.

"The point is, such a ship obviously cannot dock and resupply in normal city-states—guess where its home port is?"

Helena and Luen and others looked at each other, but they almost immediately reacted—Luen was the first to speak: "Wait, could it be... the border?!"

"Yes, they are hiding in that fog," Duncan did not continue to play riddles, but nodded with a serious expression, "That is a nest of the Annihilation Cultists, and may even be their largest nest and 'headquarters', they call it a 'holy land'. Now I can't be sure what state this so-called 'holy land' is in, nor can I be sure whether it is on the 'inner' or 'outer' side of the six-sea-mile boundary, but even on the relatively stable inner side, a 'veil colony' that has been hidden in the Eternal Veil for a long time, and can even be used as a large supply port to operate stably, must be of great research value to us."