Chapter 716: 16. The Whale and the Sorceress
Emhart always felt his luck had been bad since he and Fisher returned to the past. Thinking back, he was caught by Renee before returning to the past, and then captured by angels when he went back ten thousand years, although it wasn’t so bad being near the angel Gabriel.
And what about now?
He had almost seen Fisher being “divided” by Raphael and Jasmine, only to have it silently diffused; then he was manipulated and knocked away by that damned Baemon until later, when he went to Saint Nali and was forced by Elizabeth to separate from Fisher, spending every day with that little demon.
And now?
Now it was even worse; he thought that the strong presence of Renee wouldn’t return for a long time, so he temporarily turned to Xu and Jasmine for fun. Now he was caught and beaten by the main character, Renee, which was truly unpleasant.
While in Fisher’s arms, Emhart pondered deeply. He cautiously leaned out his head to look at Renee, who was humming a tune and leaning against the deck railing beside him, thinking that sticking with Renee would be more promising.
It seemed that Renee sensed Emhart’s gaze, turning her head to smile at him, making him hurriedly shrink back into Fisher’s embrace.
Renee ignored the unlucky coward and turned to look at the distant, brilliant sea of souls in the spirit realm. At that place, close to reality and the crevice, the sea of souls appeared exceptionally far away, as if standing on land and gazing up at the starry river.
However, the sea of souls was not as vast as the starry river, and its distance was certainly incomparable to that of the starry river from the earth; it was just still relatively distant.
Every time Fischer gazed at the tangible sea of souls, he always felt a calling from within his body. This profound feeling made him uncontrollably want to draw closer and watch it.
But Renee didn’t have that similar feeling; she just pondered while stroking her chin, saying, “Strange.”
Fisher turned his head to look at her and asked in confusion, “What’s wrong?”
“The stars are all gone. I didn’t see them in the sea of souls, and the pollution of the spirit realm seems to have retreated in fright, moving further away from the sea of souls.”
Indeed, from this perspective, the brilliance of the sea of souls was brighter than what Fisher saw when he was beside Ramastia, indicating that the crimson pollution surrounding the spirit realm was retreating.
He thought of something and said to Renee, “It’s because Elizabeth learned from the Outer God how to expel the pollution of the spirit realm while cooperating with it, so she could remain safe after the crevice collapsed. When she failed before, she told us this method as a condition to drive away the Chaos Race entering reality.”
“If that’s the case, then it explains how they got to Hamon Hamon’s base.”
The massive mechanism warship quickly returned along the darkness of the spirit realm to the vicinity of the island where Gouwen lived. Fisher led Renee and David onto Gouwen’s small boat, returning to the island. This time, they finally didn’t see that group of “singers”, not knowing where they went.
Lady Bojiang was still asleep, and listening to the sounds outside, Gouwen, holding several large boxes, walked out from the woods. Upon seeing David following Fisher, he appeared somewhat dazed.
“You…”
“This is David; you should have heard that name. David, this is Gouwen, a friend of Mikhail.”
“Hello, Mr. Gouwen.”
Gouwen opened his mouth and, after a slight pause, dropped the box he was holding that contained some heavy object to the ground. Looking at David, he said, “It would be strange if he weren’t called David. All the artificial intelligences created by Mikhail and Michael are named David, the only difference being a number added afterwards. The one in reality is David Zero, the one at the Creation Society is David One, and there are a dozen more after that. Which one are you?”
David’s angelic face tilted slightly. He simply said, “David is David; my name doesn’t have a number.”
“.” Gouwen raised an eyebrow and carefully scrutinized David again before murmuring, “It’s quite possible they made other models; you indeed are the most special David I’ve seen. The other Davids don’t look like you, having a similar but different appearance to Michael. They all stay in the network, communicating with outsiders through different models of mechanisms. You look very refined; they must have poured a lot of effort into you.”
“Thank you for the compliment, Mr. Gouwen. I also feel very proud of the appearance my parents bestowed upon me.”
“.. That can’t really be considered a compliment, especially not for Michael and Mikhail, but it might be for you.”
Gouwen smiled knowingly, while Renee couldn’t help but wrinkle her nose as if she caught a whiff of something unpleasant and hurriedly covered her mouth and nose, pointing at the box Gouwen set on the ground, asking, “What is this? It smells terrible.”
In fact, Fisher had been focused on that box since Gouwen walked out. He already had many completion manuals, and the chaotic power from the other divine being was unimaginably sensitive; thus, he quickly realized that the chaos emanating from that box was something he had never encountered before.
“Chaos?”
Fisher squatted beside the box and looked at Gouwen. He nodded, putting on a pair of experimental white gloves and squatting on the other side of the box. He said, “Didn’t I mention that the chaos of Hamon Hamon caused a catastrophe thousands of years ago? A type of aberration virus that could infect any material. What’s inside this box are the samples of the aberration virus I collected a thousand years ago, preserved until now.”
Renee floated up to sit behind Fisher, a habit she enjoyed; despite not adding any weight to Fisher, apart from the fragrance she emitted, he could hardly feel her presence.
Fisher’s gaze involuntarily moved up, only to see her fair fingers and the silhouette of her thigh draped in black clothing resting on his shoulder.
It was unfortunate that Renee’s manifestation couldn’t do anything because she was too shy. Fisher guessed that if she got too shy, she would simply disappear; kissing was probably her limit unless he could lower her shyness in that regard.
How to lower it?
By doing it often.
Fisher retracted his gaze, focusing back on the box before him to avoid being affected by that troublesome woman.
“The strength of this chaos feels very strange; I can only faintly sense its power, even just slightly inferior to the pollution of the spirit realm.”
“Hmm.” Gouwen nodded and replied, “As I mentioned earlier, Hamon Hamon’s power is second only to Dream. If he hadn’t been sealed in that angel’s refuge during the myth war, it would have likely evolved into a more terrible disaster. But don’t worry; when I preserved it, it still had activity, and I already checked it before taking it out; what’s inside has lost its activity.”
As Gouwen explained, he slowly opened the box on the ground, revealing something encased in a somewhat translucent substance, resembling the head of a creature to Fisher’s eyes.
That thing should be a head, as the lifeless object had several pairs of torn facial features awkwardly overlapping, like a face that had been ripped apart, becoming numerous tightly stacked faces. However, Fisher felt that it wasn’t exactly a head because neither its material nor shape corresponded to any subhuman’s head. It looked more like a piece of—
“A stone?”
Renee pointed at her lips, being the first to speak that answer.
Fisher frowned, looking at Gouwen, who nodded in agreement with Renee’s answer, saying, “Correct, this is a stone infected by Hamon Hamon’s aberration virus. The moment it was influenced by his power, this stone lost its original properties and transformed into a monster covered in flesh and facial features. I created a substance with special properties to encase it; no matter how it transforms, it won’t turn into a carrier of the aberration virus, which is why it can be preserved.”
“.. It seems like even after such a long time, the aberration virus has also lost its activity?”
“No, quite the opposite.”
In response to Fisher’s question, Gouwen’s finger rested on the strange substance covering that “stone head,” and the material began to crack open, revealing the true form of the head inside.
A surge of intense dread washed over Fisher. He warily watched that head, witnessing the air first touch the head as the material from Gouwen’s encasement was lost, starting to aberrate.
The originally invisible air, sealed by the island’s protective barrier, abruptly thickened, coalescing into colorful liquid droplets in mid-air, transforming into a more resplendent, glowing solid while cascading down to connect with the head below.
The air in contact with the head underwent such changes; needless to say, the head itself began to aberrate, shifting from a living flesh-and-blood entity toward a certain type of ore. As the transformation continued, it became something like pink wood, with twisted blue branches growing from it, which then began to absorb nearby polluted air, transforming it into liquid-like bright green leaves.
The leaves trembled slightly, becoming aberrated into wings of green butterflies. To Fisher’s astonishment, as those butterflies prepared to take flight, Gouwen quickly covered the bizarre tree with the previously translucent substance again, halting its further aberration.
In the span of just a few seconds, Fisher watched the palm-sized head grow to about double its size, morphing into an extravagant, colorful stone tree adorned with numerous green butterflies ready to soar.
“This—”
“This is the aberration virus; it was this very thing that thoroughly destroyed the angels, making their last remnants vanish entirely during the myth war. I witnessed angels turning into statues, monsters, and indescribable entities due to this aberration virus. However, the aberration virus you see now is not to be compared with that of a thousand years ago.
“It lacks lethality now.”
Renee also curiously gazed at the transformed, colorful tree-like substance, speaking to Fisher, “He’s right; the aberration virus from a thousand years ago couldn’t display such magic tricks just for the sake of showcasing its wonders. You should understand that the monster transformed from that stone had significant aggressiveness when the aberration virus activated back then, but now this transformed stone has none, instead becoming a piece of art.”
Fisher didn’t know the specific appearance of the aberration virus a thousand years ago, but from the description, it seemed that the Hamon Hamon back then was not much different from other Outer Gods, and he also caught the unspoken implications in Gouwen’s words.
He glanced at Gouwen and asked, “Are you suggesting that Hamon Hamon may have undergone some kind of change? A benign one?”
“I didn’t say that, but at least his transformation doesn’t seem as uncontrollable as it was a thousand years ago, which means there’s good news and bad news.”
Renee raised her hand, asking first, “Let’s hear the good news.”
“The good news is that the change in Hamon Hamon is not only known to us; other Chaos Races seem to have realized this as well. Just now, Lady Bojiang informed me that many Chaos Races passed by here, headed for Hamon Hamon’s base, and quite a few emerged from there. It can be confirmed that many living beings have safely gathered there.
“According to Lady Bojiang’s inquiry, that group of Chaos Races did see living angels there, and not just one.”
David’s ceramic-like hands slowly clenched as he reiterated, “Mr. Fisher, can we consider this a condition to head there?”
Fisher did not answer but continued to ask, “I’ve heard the good news; what about the bad news?”
“The bad news is—”
Gouwen sighed, just about to speak, when Fisher suddenly felt a chill from behind. Before he could turn around, a cold, dream-like whisper echoed,
“Why does this sister of Teacher Fisher seem a bit familiar?”
Fisher froze slightly, his hairs almost standing on end. Before he could react, the nearby Renee already raised an eyebrow and turned her head.
“Oh?”
He saw Xu, expressionless, arriving with Jasmine, wrapped in a layer of blue light, standing behind Fisher and the others. Jasmine wore a dazed expression, recalling what the “Teacher Fisher” had said to her earlier, dressed in a robe.
“If he talks to any other woman again, just kill him!”
Her lips trembled, and the long whale tail behind her swayed gently, causing Renee’s gaze to involuntarily follow the swaying tail.
“Ah, I remembered! We indeed met a few years ago at Saint Nali University.”
“Saint Nali University.”
Right, Jasmine raised her small head, recalling what had happened back then.
She remembered that she and Teacher Fisher weren’t familiar with each other back then. She had attended the Godlin Festival ceremony with Isabel and Milica, and at that time, Elizabeth brought Teacher Fisher over. There, they encountered this sister who claimed to be “Teacher Fisher’s good friend.”
It seemed that this sister had even clashed with Elizabeth back then; Jasmine didn’t remember it too clearly but felt that part of the memory was particularly vague.
Because back then—
What was she doing back then?
She seemed to have been eating cake!
“You’re that saintess of Cardu?!”
Jasmine finally realized, raising her hand, but her small head couldn’t quite comprehend it. “But… why is the saintess of Cardu in the spirit realm? And…”
“Pfft!”
Jasmine’s words hadn’t finished, and Renee started laughing, her smile gentle and warm, like an older sister amused by Jasmine’s actions. However, Fisher understood Renee; generally, the more she appeared this way on the surface, the more bad thoughts she harbored inside.
Jasmine was dumbfounded, opening her mouth in confusion and asking, “What are you laughing at?”
“Sorry, sorry, I just didn’t expect you to know nothing… Ah, could it be that Teacher Fisher hasn’t said a word about me to you? Or did he talk about it with others but forgot to mention it to you?”
“Ah?”
Jasmine was momentarily stunned. Not to mention that Elizabeth wasn’t a match for Renee, even Alagina, who was defeated soundly under Renee, couldn’t compete!
She was just a friendly little whale; how could she have ever seen such a scene? Suddenly, she was caught off guard by Renee’s words, genuinely starting to doubt whether Teacher Fisher had spoken to other women about this matter but failed to mention it to her.
“Teacher Fisher…”
Xu helplessly reached out to pull Jasmine back to her side, conveying a “don’t look at the bad comments” vibe, yet her look toward Renee and Fisher was not friendly, especially given the insane aura emanating from Fisher.
At this moment, Fisher, squatting in front of the wooden box, was sweating. He remained silent for a moment, gritting his teeth and glaring at Gouwen, asking, “Is this your so-called bad news?”
Gouwen wore a dark expression, feeling a mix of relief and frustration while looking at Fisher.
“Idiot, this is your bad news; it’s my good news, not our bad news.”
“…”
Fisher couldn’t find words. He didn’t expect Jasmine’s arrival to be so swift. The flow of time between the spirit realm and reality differed, leading to his misjudgment. If he hadn’t felt fortunate to hear the Duke of Peach’s voice during the phone call earlier…
Now, he faced a boomerang that flew straight back at him. Jasmine’s parents were here, and being close to Jasmine, he also had an eager and aggressive sorceress by his side.
This was truly splendid!
He wished he could attack Hamon Hamon right now, not caring about any potential traps; anything would be better than staying here!
But the fun wouldn’t disappear; it would only shift.
Just as Emhart was tormented by Renee, almost laughing out loud, now it was his turn to suffer. Peeking from Fisher’s embrace, Emhart smirked at Xu, who was accompanied by Jasmine, as if he had seen his savior.
Quick! It’s almost time for Emhart’s luck to turn around!
Earlier in the Dragon Court, Jasmine and Raphael shared a close sisterly bond, preventing Emhart, who had meticulously planned a surprise, from enjoying the fun. Now—
Fisher, with those thick eyebrows and big eyes, finally had his karmic retribution!
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(The End of This Chapter)
