Echoes of the Past

Chapter 51 Beast Ears and Horns, What a Civilization!

Chapter 51 Beast Ears and Horns, What a Civilization!

As he passed by the garden, Nan'an glanced at it deliberately.

Empty and desolate.

The skinned buffalo, along with the strange cowhide scroll, has disappeared without a trace.

This thwarted Nan'an's plan to try and extract more information before leaving.

Guided by the orientation sensor on the algae stone, the three of them wandered through the vast and complex interior of the church building for a long time.

After passing countless similar arches, corridors, and empty prayer halls, and after repeatedly walking through paths where there were paths and breaking through walls where there were no paths, a huge archway, half-collapsed and inlaid with broken stained glass, appeared at the end of the field of vision.

Outside the door, the sky was a clear, deep blue, without a single cloud. The light of the sky was so beautiful that it didn't seem like one was in a dark fog.

A relatively open area of ​​ruins, filled with rubble and withered plants, came into view.

"Finally, I'm leaving this awful place."

Suiyue didn't dare to talk much along the way. She was on high alert, keeping an eye on the fly fog's condition, afraid that the TV might suddenly come out and eat people again. Although she didn't understand why it couldn't eat her and Nan'an, but could only eat Nilar.

The three stepped out of the archway and onto the soft, muddy ground outside, but they hadn't gone very far.

Behind me, without warning, came a dull, heart-stopping bang.

They turned around warily.

The magnificent and ancient church, with its thick stone foundation, is violently heaving and cracking outwards.

Huge rocks, like toy building blocks, were scattered in all directions by an invisible force.

The entire church, along with its towering spires, magnificent dome, and exquisite stained-glass windows, rises "from the ground."

The rocks twisted and deformed, and the structure at the base of the church was reassembled as if it were alive, forming several massive legs as thick as mountains.

Every step on the ground triggered a small earthquake, leaving terrifying footprints several meters deep in the ruins and stirring up clouds of dust.

Nan'an's mind was in complete turmoil.

I'll beat up the whole church?

Being immune to divine and demonic power does not mean being immune to magical or physical attacks.

A colossal, mountain-like object was hurtling towards them; the three of them were probably not even a speed bump.

Fortunately, the "church" had no interest in the three.

They were like insignificant ants at the feet of a giant, grandly ignored, watching it go in the opposite direction, making muffled "thump-thump" sounds like drums, getting farther and farther away, disappearing at the horizon.

Nan'an exchanged a glance with Suiyue and Nilar, and said with admiration.

"Did the veterans of the Fogbreakers always have to deal with these things? My apologies."

Nilar was speechless for a moment.

His experience of venturing deep into the chaotic black fog and confronting anomalies is quite extensive compared to most ordinary fog breakers.

Most of the time, the main problem to deal with is the harassment of spirit erosion. Occasionally, when encountering strangely shaped gods and demons, they usually follow the strange tacit understanding that "if you don't provoke it, it won't bother you," and they live in peace with each other and go their separate ways.

Even when encountering gods and demons that must be fought, the difficulty is nothing like the endless battles we face today. One troublesome god or demon after another, it's like experiencing a relay race of challenges.

Oh no! Oh no!

However, despite the hellish difficulty, he survived unscathed—the profound strength of the senior was truly beyond doubt.

On their first trip deep into the Black Mist, the algae stone from Nan'an Suiyue was of no use, so this was the first time the two of them had experienced this magical item born in the Black Mist Era.

Gently pinching the algae stone, a soft, aurora-like band of light began to emerge from beneath Nan'an's feet, winding its way into the distance.

The beam of light was not straight, but cleverly bypassed the ruins and ravines ahead, and even passed through several seemingly impassable walls, pointing in the direction they had come from.

Walking along the band of light is a unique experience.

The ground beneath my feet was still broken rubble and soft soil, but the pale blue trail in my vision that guided my way gave me a strange sense of security.

It's not a psychological effect; this is the comfort that algae stones offer to those returning home, effectively alleviating the anxiety of those who are rushing back from the brink of death.

No matter how the chaotic black mist separates the mist-breakers from reality or leads them anywhere, as long as they follow the guidance of the algae stone, they can overcome spatial barriers and return to their homeland.

Based solely on the effects exhibited by algae stones, they should also be classified as "divine and demonic".

However, it was discovered in an area that was not affected by the black fog and passed the test of the windwort.

Perhaps the harrowing experience had exhausted the malice of the area, or perhaps the departure of the Walking Church had taken away some kind of core, unusual power; the return journey was unexpectedly peaceful.

After walking for an unknown amount of time, the light blue band of light underfoot gradually increased in brightness and became more directional.

After they crossed a natural boundary formed by collapsed stone pillars, the surrounding scenery suddenly opened up.

The desolate ruins have disappeared, replaced by relatively flat ground, makeshift fortifications, and dark blue tents bearing the owl emblem.

The suffocating atmosphere in the air receded as quickly as the tide.

Nilar let out a long sigh of relief, his tense shoulders finally slumped, and he looked relieved despite being almost exhausted.

I have never felt so exhausted during my career in Elkeson.

At the edge of the camp, the owl team members on duty seemed to have heard the commotion and were looking in their direction with a puzzled expression. Soon, Grave arrived at the scene.

Faced with the group that quickly returned, he calmly and concisely learned about their encounter with the television demon.

Grave nodded and turned to Nilar.

"Sorry, it's just a routine procedure."

Nilar was clearly prepared for this and had no objections. He stood up in tacit agreement, put his hands behind his back, lowered his head slightly, and assumed a posture of accepting inspection.

Several members of the Radiant Owl team who arrived immediately stepped forward and skillfully took out Windvelvet Grass potions and testing crystals of different sizes, and began to tinker with Nilar's body.

Graves brought over a female owl: "No need for Senior Nan'an, Ms. Suiyue, would you please cooperate?"

""

After the two were taken away from the scene, Grave asked for more details.

"So that's how it is—Senior Nan'an not only rescued Nilar, but also tore the Spider Demon apart with his bare hands, leaving only its head. Seeing is believing—I'm really impressed."

Nan'an couldn't help but rub his forehead.

The locals in Nora clearly cannot understand or imagine the term "television set".

After a series of gestures and descriptions, the monster with a screen on top, dragging power cords, and having spider legs and octopus tentacles was indeed transformed into a variant of some kind of spider under Grave's cognitive reconstruction, and the main body of the television naturally became the spider's "head".

He could imagine the strange details that Greif had secretly imagined under his awe-inspiring gaze.

It must be a skillful headhunter, which shines even when headhunting strange and grotesque gods and demons.

My reputation among the Nora Mistbreakers is probably heading straight for "human demolition crew and god/demon headhunter," and there's no going back.

But this is a misunderstanding.

Grave did not ask for the detailed steps to rescue Nira.

He admitted that this was based on work experience.

It's safer to let the immediate supervisor know about information involving special abilities of gods and demons or high-risk operations, and then let the higher-ups decide what can be shared with them.

That evening, Nilar moved into the newly built house inside the isolation wall.

Because Suiyue did not have excessive contact with gods and demons, she was able to return to Nan'an's side. However, the two of them could not leave and needed to stay temporarily for two days according to the procedure.

Greif arranged for the two to rest in a quiet area near the tower.

Logically, their treatment should be the same as Nilar's.

When Nan'an asked about this, Grave smiled and said, "Rules are rules, but with Senior Nan'an around, I think that if Ms. Suiyue shows any signs of being corrupted by gods and demons, her head will be in his hands."

"Pfft, cough cough cough!"

Suiyue, who was holding a black bread in her left hand and a bowl of bean soup in her right, and whose mind was still full of nostalgia for the exquisite cat food, choked suddenly upon hearing this, and some of the bean soup spilled out.

She looked up, her face flushed, and protested, "Mr. Graves, I... I'm a summoner, the master of my summoned creatures!"

Having dealt with black fog for many years, Graves is straightforward and speaks frankly.

"Making summoned heroic spirits obediently follow orders isn't easy. If Senior Nan'an doesn't listen, does Ms. Suiyue really have a way to stop her?"

Suiyue had no choice but to sit down in frustration and bite into her bread fiercely.

After Grave left, Nan An comforted him, "Don't worry, I didn't intend to mess with your head."

"Old man, what you're saying doesn't sound like you're trying to comfort me at all." Suiyue pouted. "If you like touching the horns, just touch them openly. There's no need to hide it—after all, you said it yourself that the horns feel best when they're warm."

Nan'an didn't stand on ceremony; upon receiving the invitation, he immediately put his hand on hers.

Suiyue muttered to herself, "They really didn't hide anything—okay."

After swallowing the dry bread with bean soup, she asked curiously, "Old hand, your technique is so skillful, you must have touched a lot of corners and ears, right?"

"Uh... I've touched plenty of dead people, but you're probably the first one to touch a living one."

Suiyue asked suspiciously, "Really? As an adventurer, haven't you ever been to a place like that? It's like—"

Taverns or inns that offer services with kemonomimi (animal-eared girls)?

"People in the group will go, but I'm not interested."

Nan'an wasn't lying. In his previous life, the animal ears he saw most often were Aslipan's wolf ears, which were fluffy and had a healthy gray sheen in the firelight, making him want to pinch them.

But considering that if he dared to reach out, he would most likely be folded up by Aslipan's inverted triangle double-door-shaped body and pinned to the ground, howling in pain —

At that time, the warning phrase "Don't reach out, or you'll get caught" kept echoing in Nan'an's mind.

The adventure team had quite a few members with animal ears in the later stages, but they were all rough men. The only cute girl was Nan'an, and he wasn't sure if her memories were true. At least the bookworm remembered that she did have a pair of beautiful, slender ears.

Thinking about how he had transmigrated and how the beast ears and horns he touched before his death came from the dead, Nan'an couldn't help but feel sad.

Having been reborn as a summoned being, he had no more scruples.

Animal ears, large horns—what a fine civilization!

It's fun, I love touching it, I want to touch it more!