The Record of Unusual Creatures

With Anthony’s help, the old man finally gradually opened his eyes.

However, he seemed to be confused about the current situation. When he saw the stranger in front of him, he neither showed panic nor curiosity. He just stared blankly at Hao Ren and Anthony for a moment before he muttered, “When on Earth am I?”

Hao Ren then realized what was going on. The old man did not know that he had been rescued, and he was still hallucinating.

Lily poked the old man’s arm with his paw and the cold air coming from it sobered the old man up. “Wake up, you’ve been saved! The poison and the magical energy in you have been cleared!”

The old man moved his eyes back and forth between Lily and Hao Ren several times, and then gradually sobered up from the confused state. He suddenly took a deep breath and forced himself to sit up and asked, “You… You are… Who are you guys? Where am I?!”

“Relax, don’t move.” Vivian immediately pressed the old man’s body to prevent him from moving vigorously and said, “You are weakened by radiation, and cell repair takes some time. You’re still Vanaheim, but you are safe now. We are investigators and we just passed by.”

“Investigators?!” The old man looked a bit confused. “Where did you come from? You also came from the Twilight Capital? It’s the Steam Assembly… No, it doesn’t look like it. Are you… coming from other worlds?!”

Hao Ren grabbed his hair and said, “Err, I don’t know how to explain it to you, but it’s certainly not the Twilight Capital you mentioned. We’re from somewhere outside Yggdrasil… Well, it looks like you can’t even understand where the ‘outside’ is. Well, we came from other worlds.”

Hao Ren just answered perfunctorily, but he did not expect that the old man immediately got very excited and even jumped up, ignoring that he just recovered from a serious illness. “Other Worlds! The remnants of light in the dark! It’s exactly what the ancient books say… The universe collapsed suddenly, but a new light was kindled in the ashes of Yggdrasil, and the new world would eventually emerge… Where do you come from? Jotunheim? Niflheim? Svartalfheim? Or Vanaheim? No… We have passed through these worlds, and there’s only scorched earth everywhere. The best case is Jotunheim, but it had turned into a desert. Asgard? Do you come from Asgard?!” The old man asked excitedly.

Hao Ren did not know why the old man was so excited all of a sudden, but he could vaguely guess something. He took the old man’s hand and tried to calm him down. “Calm down first. We did come from Asgard, but we… Err, all right, we come from Asgard. Are you the only one who survived?”

It took a long time for the old man to calm down. He looked really sad when he mentioned his dead teammates. “Yes, I’m the only one who survived. There were more than a dozen people when we set out, but all the others were dead. I’m going to Asgard, and I know there must be some light left there. I must go there, even if I can only have a glance at it. But I didn’t hold on. How did you get here? Are you looking for other surviving lands in the Nine Worlds?”

“We’ll talk about it later.” Nangong Sanba suddenly came up and asked, “Where do you come from? Can you tell me something about yourself? Is there any other human settlement in this world?”

“My name is Wendell, Wendell Franc,” the old man introduced himself. “I’m from the Twilight Capital, the last fortress in the long night. I’m a Lightseeker, searching for the remnants of light in the long night. I don’t know if there are any other kingdoms beyond the Twilight Capital… except for Asgard.”

“Nice to meet you, Wendell.” Hao Ren nodded and introduced him to the surrounding people. “You can call me Hao Ren. These are my friends, Vivian, Lily…”

“Where is the Twilight Capital?” Vivian asked immediately after they introduced themselves.

“It was called Midgard a long time ago,” the old man said with a bitter smile. “That’s what the ancient book said. But since the world collapsed and the daytime was over, the Midgard continent was shrouded in darkness. Nearly 90% of the lands were no longer habitable and the rest of the area was protected by a light curtain. A great ancient saint is our guardian. How’s the situation of Asgard? Is there a Twilight Capital there, too?”

“According to your description, Asgard should be much better than your world.” Hao Ren sighed, and then suddenly thought of something. “You say you are a Lightseeker. Are all the Lightseekers dressed like you?”

“Yes,” the old man said while looking at his costume. “These blessed things enable the Lightseekers to withstand the power of darkness.”

“Then a group of people like you should have arrived in Asgard a hundred years ago, and they also mourned for Heimdallr on the battlefield in front of the Bifröst,” Hao Ren said and frowned. “Didn’t they take the news back? You look like you don’t know the situation in Asgard at all.”

The old man took out a piece of parchment with his trembling hand and said, “They failed to bring the news back. I know the warriors of one hundred years ago, the bravest men. They must have found Asgard, but they were all dead on their way back.”

Vivian took the parchment, looked at it and sighed.

There was no doubt that the group of 100 warriors of a hundred years ago mentioned by the old man was the group of ‘battlefield scavengers’ appearing in Valhalla’s surveillance video. Y’zaks speculation was wrong. Those people were not looking for treasure on the battlefield, they were actually investigating the survival of other lands.

There were only five people appeared in the video and the fate of the other ninety-five people could be imagined. And the five people in the video also failed to bring their discovery back.

Y’zaks suddenly came up to the old man and asked, “Can you take us to your Twilight Capital?”

Wendell was shocked when he saw Y’zaks big face. He did not look at them carefully when Hao Ren was introducing them just now, so now he was shocked and exclaimed in surprise, “Oh my ancestors! The descendant of giants!”

Y’zaks was speechless.

“Err, this is not a giant, though the giants in those years also looked so ugly.” Vivian waved her hand awkwardly and said, “Let’s talk about the Twilight Capital.”

Wendell nodded without hesitation. In fact, after seeing the strangers in front of him, a peculiar sense of ecstasy and unreality had completely enveloped his heart. In this state of dizziness, he felt that he would promise almost anything to them—as long as it did not dissipate like a dream.

And Wendell did not recover from this dizziness until he embarked on the journey back to Midgard.

“I… should go and see Asgard first,” Wendell said suddenly. “I still can’t believe that…”

“Oh, that’s easy.” Galazur nodded, taking out her data terminal and said, “Just show you the video. If you really want to visit that place, then wait till we’re done with the business, you’ll have plenty of opportunities to visit everywhere.”

The data terminal immediately projected the landscape of Asgard. There were a vast expanse of plains, twisted but still verdant jungle, the ruins of the glittering Aesirian Garden, and a clear and radiant sky. Although Asgard was also destroyed by the Twilight of the Gods, compared to other worlds that had been thoroughly distorted into strange lands…

Asgard was as beautiful as heaven.

Wendell was initially startled by the ‘data terminal’, but he was quickly fascinated by the scenery on the holographic projection. He was hooked on it and stared at the holographic projection until Galazur coughed impatiently.

“Ah… Sorry, I’ve never seen this kind of…” Wendell shook his head and was thrilled and puzzled. “I’ve never seen anything like this. I’ve read similar descriptions in some ancient books, but I don’t know what it actually looks like. This is… beautiful. It’s hard to believe that in the corners of the world, there’s a place that has recovered to this point. We should have known it earlier. The Steam Assembly of the Twilight Capital should have known it earlier…”

“Tell us about the Twilight Capital,” Vivian said suddenly. “What kind of place is it? How did you survive the collapse of the Nine Worlds?”

“Before that, we’d better get a different vehicle,” said Anthony, then glanced at Wendell and asked, “It looks like you’ve recovered after a long walk. Do you get airsick?”

“Airsick?” Wendell was a bit puzzled.

The old mage raised his hand, and his magical spherical spacecraft appeared out of thin air. “I’m talking about this.”