Chapter 183 The Missing Parameter

For Duncan, the Great Annihilation was finally no longer a completely unknown mystery. In the depths of the endless, heavy, ancient curtain, the truth finally revealed a corner to him—a crucial corner.

The mutual "collision" of worlds led to the Great Annihilation, and the "incompatibility" between different worlds twisted the ruins after the collision into the bizarre and dangerous Deep Sea Age we see today. The scene remaining in the deepest part of Slandis' nightmare is a microcosm of that collision.

But it was only a microcosm—more than just these two worlds collided.

Duncan could feel that as he "understood" these truths, something was changing, and these changes were happening to him.

Just a moment ago, he even felt that everything in front of him had turned into a chaotic and empty… color. In the depths of that color, he saw the essence of the world, saw that they were all crumbling starlight, each cluster of faint light composed of abstract information descriptions.

He also saw that all things were on the verge of a slow collapse. Mutually contradictory essences caused them to continuously collapse and reorganize in the depths of information. He seemed to understand the true side of the entire world, and almost found the "only solution" to all contradictions and imbalances…

But that was only for a moment.

He seemed to be missing something, a most important "parameter."

Duncan's reason returned to reality. He blinked, feeling as if countless voices were roaring in his mind. Then, those roars gradually faded away, and he slowly regained his ability to think.

He had already understood the essence of the Great Annihilation, understood how the current Deep Sea Age was formed… but what was that missing "key parameter"? He had already understood the truth of the world, so what was it that he still didn't understand?

The strong impression of seeing the true side of the world still remained in Duncan's mind, and he couldn't help but think about these abstract and difficult questions. But soon, he forcibly controlled his thoughts and noticed Lucrezia's worried gaze.

Now was not the time to continue thinking about those questions.

"It's nothing, I just suddenly understood some things." He waved his hand, then turned his head and focused his gaze outside the ship's railing.

The Vanishing Sail was sailing on the surface of the light screen formed by false sunlight. The raging spiritual flames were rapidly spreading across this light screen, eroding and melting through this seemingly powerful barrier. The mutual impact of forces set off storms of light and flame in the distance.

But it seemed to take some time to completely melt through this "light wall."

Unless… the barrier itself suddenly developed a "weakness"…

Beneath the light screen and the sea of fire, on that nameless world covered in yellow sand, a desert storm formed again. In the depths of the storm, a huge flash of light erupted once more.

The gale sweeping across the desert dissipated again. In the disordered and chaotic airflow, the curtain formed by the storm shattered, and sand and dust scattered to the ground.

And in the gradually thinning dust and fog, a round of increasingly dim "sunlight" was gradually emerging. It floated on the overflowing lava lake, its surface visibly flickering, expanding and contracting.

A breeze rose, and ashes gathered, gradually reshaping.

"What exactly are you?!?"

The chaotic and trembling roar finally sounded again, human-unintelligible language mixed in that terrifying noise. Beneath the false corona, the Sun Spawn's countless eyes trembled violently, staring fixedly at the figure emerging from the ashes.

Its roar finally contained human-like… emotions, that was anger.

Vanna slowly raised her greatsword, her eyes calmly watching the "sun" that had fallen to the ground in front of her, and slowly opened her mouth: "In the end, you're just a derivative of an ancient god, not that strong."

The Sun Spawn ignored her and continued to repeat: "What exactly are you?!"

Vanna finally lowered her head and glanced at her body.

The last wisp of ash was gradually returning to her body under the traction of the spiritual flames. She could feel her senses recovering from numbness, blood was reappearing and beginning to flow, and a heart—a human-like heart—was already beating again in her chest.

She could even feel the process of that heart being reshaped.

"Just a pile of ashes." She said softly as she took a step forward.

"Ashes? No… you are not ashes at all!" The Sun Spawn's hoarse and low trembling came from afar, "The subspace… you have the aura of the subspace, you are a subspace shadow leaked into the real world—what exactly are you?!"

Vanna suddenly stopped.

A hint of astonishment appeared in her eyes, followed by thought. Then, she seemed to vaguely understand something, and said thoughtfully: "You're saying I'm a subspace shadow?"

The Sun Spawn did not answer her question, but only emitted an unsettling, low, chaotic noise. Flames and light gathered again, repairing and reshaping the "corona" on its surface.

Vanna didn't care. She didn't expect to get all the answers from this blasphemous thing. Or rather, she had already gotten the answer herself.

Yes, by definition, she was a subspace shadow—it was the power of the subspace that reshaped the pile of ashes from more than ten years ago into "Vanna," and in that reshaping process, she was essentially already a subspace creation.

Therefore, "an existence returning from the subspace" should look like her.

"So… it turns out the captain is another kind of existence…"

Vanna whispered to herself. Then, she seemed to feel something and raised her head to quietly watch the "sun" on the distant earth.

The Sun Spawn noticed her gaze, and even sensed some unsettling meaning from it. Its surface swelled and wriggled, and began to emit a low tremor, as if threatening, or as if warning.

Vanna smiled, not caring at all about the heat waves surging around her, or the deadly "sunlight" that was gradually gathering on the Sun Spawn's body.

"You also know fear." She took a light breath, and said with a smile.

Then, the sky was ignited.

A sea of fire that undulated like the ocean and surged and boiled like a storm suddenly appeared, and almost instantly covered one-third of the sky. The flames briefly dispersed the clouds and mist between the two worlds, and began to gradually sink and collapse towards the earth below.

A huge shadow emerged from the center of that sea of fire, and gradually crushed down as if to pierce the sky. As that huge shadow continued to enter, layers of pale golden "sunlight" briefly appeared on the edge of the sea of fire, as if to reshape the barrier and block this "invasion." But the next second, those rays of sunlight shattered like glass—accompanied by a illusory cracking sound, the giant ship wrapped in flames finally descended from the sky.

The Sun Spawn let out a series of chaotic roars. It was shocked to discover that the barrier it had painstakingly constructed had been melted through by an external force at some point, and even the flames on the barrier no longer obeyed its orders. Then, it was attracted by the giant ship descending from the sky.

The "outer shell" made of flames and light opened, and the tentacles piled up inside the outer shell involuntarily extended and stretched outward in the sunlight. A series of non-human-like eyes turned to the shadow of the Vanishing Sail. They stared at the ball of fire, stared at a figure in that ball of fire.

The truth has arrived.

A voice came from the sky: "You see me."

Then, the flames on the Sun Spawn's outer shell suddenly took on a layer of ghostly green—the ghostly green firelight, like a living thing, began to spread all over this ancient god's derivative, and instantly ignited and transformed it from the inside out.

But it was not instantly burned to ashes—in the rapid burning of the spiritual flames, it struggled to float up from the ground, and then suddenly rushed towards the sky.

Almost at the same time, a bright stream of flames shot out from the bow of the Vanishing Sail.

It was a golden arc of flame—the stream of flame rushed towards the sky from the bow of the ghost ship like an eruption, and unhesitatingly pounced on the Sun Spawn, which was dragging a long tail of flame like a falling star flying upside down, and pierced it in the blink of an eye.

However, that "fireball" was not dead yet. It just paused briefly, and then struggled to continue flying towards the sky.

It was almost about to escape this world.

But just as that fireball was about to turn into a phantom on the border of the sky, a huge phantom suddenly appeared on its escape path.

It was a pitch-black mountain goat.

He was as huge as a mountain, floating on the horizon like a cloud. Illusory lightning jumped between his horns, but his eyes reflected a ghostly green fire. His body was formed from the sea of spiritual fire flowing in the sky, and presented a chaotic and uncertain posture—he lowered his head slightly towards the Vanishing Sail, and after a silent greeting, he turned his gaze to the fireball that was trying to escape this place.

The mountain goat took a few steps back in the clouds, then lowered his head and suddenly accelerated—the sea of fire gathered behind him, and spread under his feet to become a road. He began to run along this path of flames, like a black meteor falling from the clouds. In the blink of an eye, he accelerated to the point where the naked eye could not capture it, and then violently collided with the fireball that was constantly accelerating upwards.

The huge explosion and impact shattered the last remaining clouds between the two worlds, and even shattered the distant mountains and part of the already crumbling earth. The ascending fireball shattered into pieces in this collision. Large and small fragments instantly turned into dust in the burning of the ghostly green flames, and a shiny "core" fell from the sky, but halfway down, it was swallowed by a spiritual flame that appeared out of thin air, and disappeared in the blink of an eye.

The black mountain goat walked out of the firestorm caused by the explosion. He stepped from the clouds on the horizon to the earth, and landed in front of Vanna along with the Vanishing Sail.

(End of this chapter)