Chapter 716 — The Defiant Ghost

Those druids who had charged into the wasteland and survived... They had likely been thoroughly twisted long ago in that dreadful, hostile environment of chaotic magical energy, had long since abandoned their self-conception as human beings and their principles of conduct. Yet because the Grand Wall blocked the way, the Order of All Things' End headquarters, able to maintain only limited contact with the wasteland, had been utterly oblivious to all of it.

To be honest, this wave of deaths in the Order of All Things' End had been quite unjust.

But considering the harm they had wrought, Gao Yang could only say that a dead cultist was a good cultist.

He truly dared not imagine: if the Order of All Things' End had not suffered this "self-detonation," if what they had created had been a complete, lucid "Great Stag Amorn"—what would this disaster have grown into? By then, the Cecil Legion would likely have been truly unable to hold.

And with humanity's defense line collapsed, whether those deep-sea salt-cured fish would arrive in time to save the day would become an utter unknown.

With three parts lament and seven parts relief, he let out a breath, then frowned and said, "So by that reckoning, that 'half of the Order of All Things' End' out in the wasteland is likely still alive... No one knows what they intend to do next. In the end, it will remain a threat."

"Yes, no one knows what they intend to do next," Beiyila said leisurely. "So if you wish to charge in and wipe them all out, I will support you with all my heart—provided you can do it."

"You know as well as I that it is impossible," Gao Yang glanced at Beiyila. "To counterattack the Gondor wasteland—that is a grand goal, but the present Cecil Empire cannot achieve it."

"The Cecil Empire..." Beiyila seemed to start at the name, and then her tone suddenly grew distant and drifting. "I saw the gold-edged Cecil banners hanging over those camps. So it is true..."

After that came a few seconds of silence, and out of that silence Gao Yang heard her murmur low: "Crossing the sword and the plow—that was my proposal, you know."

"I remember. You wished later generations to remember the hardships of the frontier, and you wished the nobles who bear swords not to forget the common folk who hold the plow."

Beiyila gave a small laugh. "But really, it was because the design you first came up with, with the sword and plow set side by side, was just too ugly."

"...You never told me that."

"Seven hundred years, and I've finally said it," Beiyila sighed, a note of self-mockery in her voice. "You truly did inherit his memories. For a moment I almost thought you were him."

"Now you can tell me, can't you? Why do you say that Gao Yang Cecil's soul has completely withered away? And how do you come to know these things?"

Beiyila quietly regarded the Gao Yang before her.

This was an outlander wanderer, a soul of unknown origin, an "indescribable thing" that had descended from the starry sky and could seize another's shell for its own.

The whole of that race was a mystery. They traversed the stars, wrought destruction, offered shelter, conducted observations—seemingly doing as they pleased, yet seemingly bound by some rule.

The Eternal Sleepers feared the power of the outlander wanderers, for the latter were the perfect counter to magic of the spiritual domain. She herself had once been full of wariness toward this outlander wanderer, because he had taken possession of Gao Yang Cecil's body.

But today, they had talked for so very long, and it seemed... that even outlander wanderers could be conversed with, and perhaps even bargained with.

Perhaps this was merely a mimicry adopted after seizing a human body, or perhaps it was just one of that race's countless faces—but be that as it may, at least for now he seemed kind and rational, and claimed to bear this world no ill will.

Life, sometimes, requires a bit of adventure—even when one has become a tree.

Gao Heng knew that Beiyila gazing at him in silence was imagining all sorts of things; he could only strive to maintain his persona of calm detachment and goodwill. Then he heard Beiyila speak: "Gao Yang Cecil once undertook a voyage that no one knew of. Since you have inherited that memory, you must surely know of it."

Gao Song's breathing abruptly hitched for half a beat.

That half-beat was caught by Beiyila.

"I know there was such a voyage," Gao Yang said, steadying himself and speaking in a low voice, "but the specific memories are a blank, as though the relevant content were deliberately erased. I suspect this is the one memory I failed to inherit from Gao Yang Cecil's mind."

Then he fixed his eyes on Beiyila: "You know the inside story of that voyage?"

Beiyila shook her head: "I'm afraid I must disappoint you. I was not with him at the time, and I too have always wondered what he encountered and saw on that mysterious voyage. But one thing... it now seems I know a little more than you."

Gao Yang's gaze burned: "What is it?"

"After returning to the mainland, Gao Yang Cecil once said something to those beside him," Beiyila recounted, word by word. "He said he had made a deal in the Sea of Eternal Darkness, with his soul as the stake."

Gao Yang: "..."

Beiyila went on: "No one knew what he meant by that sentence, and he never mentioned that voyage again afterward. It is said that a mage even examined his soul specifically for this, yet found not the slightest problem, so that baffling remark was soon forgotten by all. Only the old and deathless would remember it forever.

"After Gao Yang Cecil died, I found a way to slip into the funeral and finally confirmed for myself whether that sentence was true or false.

"For a normal human—even an ordinary person—the soul lingers for more than a few days after death. Given the right conditions, a soul bound by obsession may persist for years. A powerful transcendent may even retain a degree of self-awareness after death, and have the chance to transform himself into an undead creature and continue to 'live'...

"But in Gao Yang Cecil's body, so recently dead, there was not even the faintest trace of a soul.

"It was a blank shell."