Chapter 1239 — A Word of Warning
Blade of Dawn · Page 1 of 4
It was a thick, heavy book bound in pitch-black covers. The binding was made of some unknown material, smooth as a mirror, and within it flecks of starlight surfaced and shimmered from time to time. The drifting trails of those stars made Amber think of the teeming multitudes thronging the streets of the imperial capital. Beyond that, no text or symbol could be seen anywhere on the cover—no title, no author's name.
It lay there quietly atop the stone pillar, its star-traveled cover seeming to stand guard over the contents, while the pillar itself called to mind a reading stand in a church or a library... Or could that truly be its purpose?
Amber could not resist glancing back once more at the colossal throne. Compared with that mountain-like seat, the little pillar before her and the black-covered book upon it were almost negligible as grains of sand... If this was the Lady of Night's reading stand, then she must have been thoroughly uncomfortable using it...
Absurd associations kept popping unbidden into Amber's head, but her attention soon returned to the black-covered book. She heard that aged, gentle voice come from within it once again, tinged with amusement: "Yes, I do seem to be a book—though I feel as though I was once a person... A human. Isn't that a curious thing?"
"Have you always been like this?" Amber asked cautiously. Though she could more or less guess what this strange place and this strange "great book" were about, with the situation still unclear, every word she spoke had to be carefully weighed. "How long have you been in this place?"
"Always... That is an interesting question, because I do not know why I became like this, or when I came here," the voice from the book said with a laugh. "I have been here a very, very long time, but the passage of time is very indistinct here, and I cannot be sure how long I have lingered... How did I become a book?"
The voice from the book seemed a little puzzled, as though he had searched his memory, only to sigh with regret in the end: "I have no recollection at all."
Then he paused, and spoke again with a trace of curiosity: "But you, little girl—how did you come to this place? You do not look nervous or flustered in the least... Nothing like an ordinary person who has wandered into unknown territory."
"I... my situation is rather special," Amber replied, weighing her words as she answered this "great adventurer Wilde." "I come from the Shadow Realm, and I know... a little about this place."
"Oh... the Shadow Realm..." The voice in the book seemed to blur for a moment, as though the great adventurer's thoughts had been disturbed by some hazy recollection surfacing all at once. "I know that strange things are always happening in the Shadow Realm... But honestly, I never knew the Shadow Realm could produce a creature like you, who looks so much like an ordinary person—or should I say... a half-elf?"
If this topic went on, it would never end. Amber immediately seized the moment while the voice in the book paused to take the initiative back into her own hands: "Sir, do you know what this place is?"
"This place? Oh, this is the Lady of Night's divine realm," the voice in the book answered at once, speaking with a candor that caught Amber entirely off guard. "At least, it used to be."
Amber's eyes widened slightly for an instant—though she had already learned from earlier intelligence that this boundless gray-white desert might be the Lady of Night's divine realm, hearing the fact with her own ears carried a different kind of shock. Then she caught another phrase Wilde had used, and could not help repeating it: "Used to be? What does that mean?"