Sword of Dawn

Page 438

"Yes..." As soon as Duwart spoke a syllable, his figure suddenly flickered as if he was disturbed, and then he was pushed aside, and Naritel squeezed over from the side.

"It's a woman without legs," Naritil gestured with gestures that no one could understand, and said words that others couldn't understand, "running faster than anyone else..."

Gao Wen: "???"

Chapter 0922 The Vanishing God

Naritil's words made everyone on the scene have a momentary barrier to understanding. No matter whether it was grammatically or semantically, no one could translate the result. Gao Wen even had a sentence in his mind-the words of the gods and the words of the gods. Knowledge is incomprehensible to mortals, and even if you hear His voice clearly, you cannot comprehend His intentions...

He immediately shook his head and threw out the thoughts in his mind: This sentence is definitely not used to describe the situation in front of him...

"What's the specific situation?" He looked at the girl in the holographic projection, "You said there was a 'woman without legs'? Is the intruder a woman without legs?"

Naritil immediately nodded and made a tall gesture: "And she is very tall, like a tower, she ran all the way to the unconscious area at the border of the neural network, where she escaped..."

Gawain frowned a little bit. After realizing that it might be difficult to grasp effective information in this way of communication, he interrupted Naritil's words: "You wait there for a while, I will enter the network to talk to you directly. .”

Naritel nodded: "Oh, yes."

"You are here to deal with the follow-up of the grid connection." Gao Wen turned his head and looked at Rebecca and Kamel beside him, "Although the network looks normal now, we can't relax our vigilance--for all hubs The status will be tracked and observed for another 24 hours, while continuing to monitor the abnormal signals in the network, and in addition... Kamel, import the siren rune into the network in the form of a global broadcast."

The last one came to his mind a second ago—recalling Naritil's messy description and the clues he observed in the previous vision, he vaguely felt that the truth behind this incident might be extraordinary .

After completing a series of arrangements, Gawain didn't waste time in the real world, and soon entered Naritel's neural network through the connection device.

……

This "new world" built on the basis of the consciousness nodes of the human brain has experienced a storm, and now everything has calmed down. The special nature of the virtual world allows it to repair itself at an extremely fast speed, and the traces left by the storm are being The whole world faded rapidly, and now there are only a few cracks and chaotic lines on the horizon as evidence, telling Gao Wen that an uninvited guest once "visited" here.

Located in the mirrored imperial capital at the center of the "New World", a large pyramid-shaped building stands in the corresponding position of the "Cecile Palace" in reality. This large pyramid facility is the Empire Computing Center and a series of distributed computing stations. The projection in the online world assumes the responsibility of a management center here.

At this moment, the senior technical leaders in charge of managing the neural network have gathered in the largest conference hall in the pyramid, including some ex-eternal sleeper archbishops and several experts from the Institute of Magic Technology. When Gawain walked into the hall, At that time, he was the only one left here.

"I saw traces left in the sky outside," he said casually. "It seems that the fluctuations in the neural network are much more serious than the real world."

"We have experienced a storm, and some kind of disturbing 'shock' has spread throughout the entire world," said the voice of Megaul III from a group of expanding and contracting wriggling starlight aggregates floating in the mid-air above the conference table, "But the storm didn't actually destroy anything, it just caused a lot of visual disturbance - and now the restoration work is almost complete."

"This will help us judge the real intention of the 'intruder'," Gawain nodded, and looked at one of the two special seats on his left, "Naritiel, you can directly report what you saw Project it here - if the images are 'safe'."

Naritil obviously understood the meaning of "safety" in Gao Wen's mouth. She stood up and nodded while opening her hands: "It's very safe——I've 'eaten' the unsafe parts."

As her words fell, a large number of changing light and shadows suddenly diffused around everyone, and then formed a projection illusion that could cover the entire hall. In the thick mist that undulated like a sea of ​​smoke, Gawain and the others People saw the chase that took place not long ago in the border area of ​​​​the network-they saw the shadow passing the border, saw the "lady" who was obviously not human, and saw the white spider and the intruder. , also saw the escape of the intruders...

Gawain watched intently with his eyes wide open, and as the picture changed, he captured more and more details. When he noticed the symbols in the magic field, he heard the "intruder" and Naritel After part of the conversation, his brows were immediately wrinkled, and his face became more and more serious.

Beside him, a large number of archbishops who were former eternal sleepers also showed serious expressions one after another. Obviously, these experts who have dealt with "God Power" for half a lifetime (or a lifetime/two lifetimes) have also had similarities with Gawain. Lenovo.

The intruder...had very distinct "mythical" characteristics.

Soon, Naritil's "memories" ended, and the illusion in the hall receded like a tide, and Gawain immediately looked at the witnesses of all this: "Naritiel, when you are entangled with this intruder , Do you feel that the other party has a certain 'characteristic' similar to yours? For example... a certain aura that both you and Duvalte have..."

Gawain had difficulty expressing his thoughts. He found that human vocabulary was so poor when describing this super-experience concept. In addition, Naritil was a "young god" with not so much experience. It was difficult to explain exactly what he wanted to say, but in the end, Duwart, who was sitting on the other side of Naritil, understood what he meant. The old man in black nodded and replaced his "divine half body" Replied: "There is a similar aura. Naritil mentioned it when she came back. She felt that the intruder was a little bit like 'us'... of the same kind."

The faces of almost everyone at the scene froze instantly.

Naritil followed closely and added seriously: "It's just 'like' the same kind, the difference is still very big - I have more legs than her..."

Gao Wen: "..."

Why is this white spider so obsessed with the problem of legs?

Naritil's weird obsession with "legs" almost made everyone in the hall lose their emotional coherence, but the seriousness of the situation in front of them quickly made everyone focus on the business. Selina, who never spoke Geerfen stood up: "So we can roughly confirm that a god has invaded our network..."

Yuri broke the silence: "It's not necessarily an invasion, it's more like using our network to execute some other plan..."

"That's essentially an invasion," Magnum said aloud, "He didn't ask anyone's consent..."

"The key now is the identity of this god. Among the known gods, which god is more in line with that image? We can first rule out the God of War..."

The people in the hall began to discuss, and at this moment, Hetty's voice suddenly sounded in Gawain's mind—it was Hetty's urgent contact from the real world.

"Ancestor," Heidi said with a hint of urgency and tension in her voice, "something is wrong... Just now, the Grand Consul of Victoria sent a message, and the prayer to the goddess of magic suddenly completely lost response."

"What did you say?" Gao Wen's eyes changed instantly, he sat up straight suddenly, and at the same time asked quickly in his mind, "You mean, the goddess of magic... is gone?"

Hetty didn't seem to expect that Gawain would come to such a radical conclusion directly. She was taken aback for a moment, but she quickly gave an affirmative answer: "I'm afraid that's the case...Although usually when I pray to the Goddess of Magic, I almost never get God. There is no response at the technical level, but at least the prayers can feel the feedback at the psychological level and the transcendent gaze from the gods, but from just now, even this most basic feedback has disappeared when praying to the goddess of magic, Mirmina Yes. Cold Winter Castle has organized a large number of mages of different strengths and beliefs to conduct several prayer experiments, and the results are the same.

"In addition, when I received the message just now, I tried it myself... There is really no response."

Gao Wen's face was sinking, and he said slowly: "According to our research on the operation mechanism of gods, as long as a god exists, it will definitely have contact with believers--prayer will inevitably produce feedback, and this feedback does not change with the will of the god. Yes, unless he destroyed the god's position and fell into suspended animation like Amon, or was replaced like the Lord of Storms..."

"Yes, ancestor," Hetty said in a deep voice, "so there is only one explanation for the current situation: the goddess of magic has disappeared... At least, the 'divine position' corresponding to the goddess of magic has disappeared."

"...This is probably the truth," Gao Wen replied, "You should stabilize the situation first. Most mages have superficial faith in the goddess of magic, so there shouldn't be too much confusion. Announce the news of the successful grid connection first. Then release all the things we prepared in advance to deal with unexpected situations, news about football games, promotional videos of new ghost dramas, aerial documentaries, commercials, including those songs recorded by Wendy... Let them all out, let the ordinary people have something to see first, and occupy their attention. As for the voices of the mages...the goddess of magic has no church, let the extraordinary affairs management department of the government affairs department to connect with those mages—now At this stage, we only accept information from folk feedback, and everything is waiting for the investigation conclusion of the magic research department.

"Arrange it like this first, and the specific situation will be discussed after I return to the real world."

"Yes, ancestor."

Heidi hung up, and Gawain returned his attention to the venue. Wendy, who was sitting not far away, seemed to have noticed something, and cast a curious look: "Your Majesty, what did you think of?"

"That's probably Mirmina, the goddess of magic," Gawain exhaled, with a complicated expression on his face. "Just now, Hedi sent news that the seat of the goddess of magic, Mirmina, has disappeared."

The people in the hall immediately looked at each other.

"Naritel," Gawain turned to the left, "that 'intruder' once told you that she can't have any contact with mortals now, that she broke off contact with mortals after a lot of trouble, right? ?”

"Yes," Naritel nodded, "and she finally said that she owed someone, and asked me to tell you that she would pay it back one day... But I always feel that she has no intention of coming back..."

"...If everything is as I guessed, then she definitely doesn't intend to 'come back'," Gawain said unhurriedly, a lot of clues formed in his mind, along with a lot of guesses and hypotheses emerged, The original chaotic fog seems to have dissipated for the most part, and the ins and outs of this incident have finally gradually formed in his mind-under speculation, it is a shocking conclusion, if it hadn't been for seeing Amoen who was suspended animation and had a relationship with him After some conversation, he probably would never think in this direction, "Another god who smashed the god's throne by himself..."

Immediately afterwards, he shook his head—although he is now almost certain that the intruder that Naritil encountered was Mirmina, the goddess of magic, and he is also sure that the other party definitely does not intend to "come back", but the "come back" here It refers to "returning to the god position". As for the "Goddess of Magic" and Naritil's promise to "repay favors"...he kept looking forward to it.

The reason is simple—it is difficult for a god to lie, let alone make promises at will. Even a god who has lifted the shackles of the god position still seems to be limited in this respect.

It's just that now is obviously not the time to think about how a god will "repay a favor"-because a willful god suddenly ran away and left a lot of mess.

Of course, what He left behind was not just a mess. For Gao Wen, who is very good at seizing benefits, there are still a lot of valuable clues in this mess, which can help him understand the rules of operation of the gods, and even use them to speculate on the behavior of other gods. state.

Maybe...it's time to talk to Amorn again.

……

The deepest part of the Fortress of Rebellion is located in the "courtyard area" of the Shadow Realm. Countless fragmented boulders are connected to form a broken land floating in the air. Holding the huge "corpse" of a giant white deer.

In this dark and chaotic world, Amorn hibernates patiently as always, loneliness and silence seem meaningless to him.

But suddenly, His closed eyes opened again, and his eyes, like light-cast jewels, were staring at the depths of the Shadow Realm.

A lavender figure containing many balls of light and runes suddenly appeared in the depths of the vast and chaotic darkness, flying towards it like a gust of wind, and passing not far in front of Amorn like a gust of wind skimming everywhere.

Amoen quietly watched the "gale wind" appear and go away. He watched the direction where the other party disappeared, and waited patiently for a while. After a while, he saw the lavender figure rushing from a distance again. fly.

The figure stopped, and a lady as tall as a clock tower with dim light stood on the fragmented land of the Shadow Realm. He stared at Amorn lying there, and made a suspicious and unexpected voice : "You...so..."

But in the next second, she shook her head: "No, I have to isolate deeper..."

Before the words fell, the lady turned into a "gale wind" again as when she came, and flew to the depths of the Shadow Realm very quickly. Only a gradually fading voice came to Amorn's ears in the darkness:

"Don't say I've been here!!"

Amorn didn't make any sound or move during the whole process. He just watched silently, and all this was quietly reflected in those eyes like light-cast crystals.

"……what?"

Chapter 0923 Talking Again

On the top of the tallest mountain in Tarrond, the resplendent sanctuary is bathed in the starlight that will last for half a year.

It seems that the eternal starlight sprinkled from the sky, casting a faint glow on the pale golden outer wall and dome of the sanctuary, and the smoke-like clouds flowed slowly at the foot of the sanctuary, and there was a faint faintness under the clouds. See the prosperous lights of Tarrond in the night - the lights illuminate the kingdom of dragons, the huge intercity pipeline network and air traffic guide lights criss-cross, weaving between highly developed and ancient cities There are web-like lines, and there are extraordinarily large-scale facilities standing in the depths of the lights. Those are huge factory facilities or large-scale environmental maintenance devices.

Relying on the mountains, the whole of Tarrond seems to be divided into two distinct layers. The plains and the foot of the mountains are densely populated with cities and factories, while the upper layers of the mountains are temples, parliaments, senate, and various giant enterprises. headquarters.

All this, like the stars in the sky, has not changed for too many years.

A golden vent stood at the end of the terrace of the Great Sanctuary, bathed in starlight, overlooking the continent of Tarrond.

But his sight didn't stop at the kingdom of dragons, but extended towards the edge of the continent, as if he had crossed the endless ocean, crossed the eternal storm, and landed on the continent occupied by humans.

"My lord," the dragon priest Heragor lowered his head, "the observers have sent news that the 'Magic Net' of Cecil of the Human Empire has been connected to the grid today, but there seems to be some twists and turns in the middle. investigation……"

"There is no need to investigate," Dragon God said in a calm tone, "There is nothing worthy of your attention."

It's just a reckless and lucky god who managed to break free from the shackles. However, the whole process has no reference and is destined not to be repeated.

"...Yes, my lord." Heragor lowered his head and responded respectfully.

After a few seconds of depressing silence, he finally heard the god speak again: "Tomorrow, let the young dragon named Melita come to see me."

"Yes, my lord."

……

Although Naritil failed to keep the god who was suspected to be the goddess of magic, the hunt was rewarding after all-Naritel collected the "remnant" stripped from the body of the goddess of magic in the border area. Ember, a vital sample of gods for participants in the Rebellious Project.

In the Great Pyramid of the Neural Network Mirror Imperial Capital, Gawain saw the black fragments collected by Naritel—they looked like flakes of ashes left after some kind of paper was burned, looking weightless, fragile and loose The ground is piled up in one place, but in fact each fragment is much stronger than it looks, not only has high physical strength (in the network), but can even resist Magnum's psychic storm.

"Actually, I'm curious," Gawain looked at these samples, and couldn't help but said to Yuri and the others beside him, "These fragments from Mirmina's body... are they a piece of data in the neural network? It is still possible to produce some kind of...entity in the real world. The gods have flesh and blood entities, but their 'entities'...seem to be different from what we understand."

"For the gods, maybe fiction and reality are false propositions," said Selina, who was standing not far from Gawain, and subconsciously looked at Naritel who was quietly guarding the pile of ashes One glance (the latter seems to be seriously protecting his loot), "You should remember how the upper storyteller almost walked from the dream to the real world."

"So... as long as the method is right, theoretically, these ashes can also be brought to the real world and become analysis samples in the laboratory," Gao Wen said thoughtfully, "as long as we find a way... to connect the neural network with reality." The 'interface' that came up—not an immersion chamber or an artificial nerve cord, but something more abstract and advanced."

Selina's expression was a little weird for a moment: "This sounds like a challenge to common sense, but Naritel and Duwart may have ideas, but do you really intend to bring these things to the real world?"

"...No, forget it, there are too many uncontrollable factors, and the potential risks are too great," Gao Wen shook his head, "I even suspect that these ashes were deliberately left by the goddess of magic, she may be waiting for us to take these things to the real world?"

"There are some conspiracy theories, but in the field involving gods, conspiracy theories are not bad at all," Magnum said carelessly, "You are right, let these 'ashes' be kept in the virtual laboratory of the neural network It is the safest, at least there are Naritil and Duwart guarding here, and we still have those 'deep sea power' as protection."

"The power of the deep sea..." Gawain repeated in a low voice. Tyre's sleepy face first appeared in his mind, and then Tyre's tentacles danced in ecstasy in the form of a sea monster, and finally Only then did the sea monster's deep-sea runes emerge correctly, "Kamel is preparing to import the siren runes into the neural network, but how to make those runes play the best effect is still a matter that needs to be studied carefully. The most direct The idea is to let those lines cover the visualization area of ​​the entire network, and project them to various places in the real world through the magic network terminal connected to the network, but this idea...is not realistic."

"It sounds like a terrible picture," Semler imagined, and sighed sincerely, "It's scary no matter how you think about it..."

"It is said that Kamel and Jenny have further ideas, and I will check with them when I go back," Gao Wen said casually, and then he took a last look at the ashes samples left by the goddess of magic, "Properly handle them." These samples, give me a full protocol report before running a battery of tests."

Yuri, Selena, and the others at the scene immediately bowed to accept the order, while Gao Wen nodded, stepped back half a step, and his figure gradually faded.

……

Gawain, who returned to the real world, did not waste time. After making some arrangements, he set off for the Dark Mountains and entered the deepest part of the Rebel Fortress.

He wants to have another talk with the god in suspended animation.

This time he only brought Veronica - it doesn't matter how many people he brings with him when talking to the giant deer Amon. The two of Tire, plus Veronica and Kamel who can protect themselves in a relatively short period of time with technical means, among them Tire is a guy who only has cookies in his head. Now that he knows that Amo En is suspended animation, so of course I can't bring Tire there again - she didn't feel depressed, and she suffered from scene hunting, so it's better not to bring her.As for Kamel, he will be responsible for the final technical work after the magic net is connected to the grid, as well as the research on importing the siren rune into the magic net.

So this time, the only person who entered the fortress of disobedience with Gawain was Veronica, who was an ancient rebel—in fact, if it wasn’t for having someone to take care of him in case of unexpected situations, Gawain even felt that he was alone. It's okay to come, but it is obvious that Hetty will never agree to such a risky plan, and Gawain himself... In his position, he has long lost the qualification to act willfully and recklessly.

The ancient alloy barrier slowly opened, and the vast and chaotic land and sky in the Shadow Realm appeared in front of the two of them. Standing in front of the last safety barrier of the rebellious fortress, Veronica looked at the quiet mountain like a mountain from a distance. The dormant god nodded to Gao Wen beside him: "This time I will go with you."

The last time Gao Wen talked with Amorn, she was standing in the safety barrier with others, and she didn't go forward in person.

"This may be risky," Gao Wen guessed that Veronica would ask for it, but he still reminded, "I don't doubt your protective measures, but this is a real 'close contact' after all."

"My consciousness once faced the God of Holy Light at a closer distance," Veronica just smiled faintly, "In fact, my protective technology may be more effective than you imagine."

Gao Wen raised his eyebrows.

"In that case, I won't stop it," he said, "but you have to pay attention to your state at all times-I think this should not be difficult for an experienced rebel."

Veronica didn't speak, just nodded slightly, then raised the platinum scepter in her hand, and opened a small opening in the ancient security barrier.

The two crossed the barrier, set foot on the broken courtyard directly exposed to the environment of the Shadow Realm, faced the visual pressure brought by the "God of Nature" (although he had already left the position of God), and crossed the fragmented roads and ancient The connection bridge built came to the giant deer Amoen who was closing his eyes tightly.

The other party had obviously been sensing the changes around him. As soon as Gawain and Veronica approached him, the giant deer as huge as a hill slowly opened its eyes. Staring intently at the uninvited guest who came in front of them, a deep and pleasant voice sounded directly in the minds of the two of them: "Welcome - today there is an extra guest who came to my small courtyard."

"I stood farther away last time," Veronica said in a calm tone, "and you should have known me earlier—I was a different identity back then."

"Then you have to tell me about your name and identity at that time," Amoen said, "Different from what many believers preach, gods are neither omniscient nor omnipotent, and no matter how strong our beliefs are, we cannot truly endow us with these two things." The ability to break the rules..."

Veronica smiled slightly: "My name was Ophelia, Ophelia Norton."

"...Ah, I do have some impressions," Amorn suddenly said after a short memory, "Those mortal scholars who were busy punching holes in me or building brackets mentioned this name in their chats. ...they also mentioned Herman Norton and Simmons Norton."

Veronica nodded: "That's my father and brother."

"It's really worth remembering--for you mortals, this has been a long time ago. So how did you, who is supposed to be a human being, survive to this day? It seems...your body is just a human being."

"This is my secret—since you are neither omniscient nor omnipotent, let some secrets remain secret," Veronica shook her head, "Today we are not here to find a god to reminisce, we are here I want to ask you some questions."

"Ah, I guessed it, and I even guessed what you want to ask..." There seemed to be a hint of a smile in Amoen's tone, and then he paused before saying unhurriedly, "There is a The hurrying 'God' passed by from the Shadow Realm, and I happened to see her, she should have run far away by now."

Gao Wen was sorting out the language and thinking about how to start the topic, but he was caught off guard when he heard the information directly thrown out by Amon, and immediately swallowed all the words, leaving only surprise and consternation on his face, and even Wei Wei who was next to him Ronika was stunned for a moment.

"It seems that you really want to ask this." Amoen's tone was still calm and indifferent, "Why, are you looking for her?"