After saying goodnight, the mage lady waved her wand and floated towards the outer wall of the tower. As if she was walking on flat ground, she walked along the wall towards her lab cum bedroom at the top of the tower.
After she left, Nangong Sanba sighed. "Ahh, I didn't expect Ms. Rheia to be an atheist."
"Strictly speaking, she's a disbeliever, or a despiser," Vivian corrected him. "An atheist is someone who doesn't believe in the existence of God, and Rheia is someone who doesn't care if God exists or not. That's normal. Mages are a group of people who are easily indifferent to religion. After all, they study the laws of nature and the truth of the universe. Naturally, they don't want to set a god to explain everything. It's not in line with the way researchers think."
"What a drama." Hao Ren looked up at the sky. The shattered divine kingdom had left the highest point of the night sky and was slowly sliding from east to west to the other side of the sky before disappearing into the sea of stars. "The land of the fallen kingdom, the place where the goddess of creation had the strongest influence, and now it has given birth to a scholar like Rheia. No wonder Raven 12345 once said that God is a property owner. If the water pipes don't leak for two consecutive months, the residents will forget that there is a property owner in their neighborhood …"
Wuyue pursed her lips as she did not comment on the goddess's clear-cut metaphor. She and Hao Ren looked up at the shattered celestial remains, and her voice was uncertain. "Mr. Landlord, do you really think those are the remains of the Star of Creation?"
"I'm just guessing," Hao Ren said. "After all, we don't know how many celestial bodies were dragged into the Umbral Realm when the Star of Creation exploded, and we don't know if the celestial bodies that were dragged in were torn apart like the Star of Creation. So those floating in the sky could be the Star of Creation, or something else. The biggest problem now is that Nolan can't leave the atmosphere, and even the probes can't go out. Optical observation can't see much. "
Nolan had been silent since the start, and only then did she reconnect. "Boss, I was using the optical detector to observe the celestial fragments, and in the part facing L 'Haronne, I did find the remains of man-made objects. It seems to be some kind of pedestal, and it has been severely damaged. In addition, there are also small fragments of buildings in the space between the wreckage. It might be the temple of the goddess of creation. "
Hao Ren pondered for a moment. "Hmm … this does add some credibility. We can assume that the 'shattered heaven' floating above L 'Haronne is the wreckage of the Star of Creation."
Nangong Wuyue wagged her tail. "Isn't the surface of the Star of Creation covered with a layer of red seawater? Did they all evaporate? "
Y 'zaks nodded. "It's hard to say. Such a massive energy explosion could tear the entire planet apart, and the probability of the liquid Sea of Origins evaporating is quite high. But the Sea of Origins is not real seawater, nor is it standard lifeblood. Who knows what its physical properties are like?"
Hao Ren thought for a moment and began to assign tasks. "Nolan, continue to try to launch probes into space, and at the same time collect various physical parameters of L 'Haronne. Find a way to find out why it can't leave the atmosphere. At the same time, don't stop tracking the shattered heaven, and find a way to plot its orbit relative to L' Haronne. That way, even if we are trapped in the atmosphere, we can at least figure out a rough celestial model. The rest of you, continue with the original plan. Follow Rheia to the Great Pit, and see if you can find the historical reason why this world has become what it is today. "
The rest of the night passed uneventfully.
By the time they set off the next day, it was already noon.
The group enjoyed a not-so-sumptuous but tasty lunch in Rheia's mage tower before following the mage lady to the open space in front of the mage tower. Rheia took out an exquisite brass carriage model from the pocket of her old, faded robe. As she chanted a spell, she threw the model on the ground, and with a strange creaking sound, the palm-sized brass model turned into a complete carriage in front of everyone.
There was even a bronze horse made of gears, springs, and levers tied to the front of the carriage.
"Awesome, right?" Rheia looked very proud when she saw the surprised look on Hao Ren and the rest. "This is something I made myself, based on an ancient text found in a ruin. Tsk, those idiots always laugh at my research. They have no idea how much valuable knowledge is in those ancient relics waiting for people to dig out. "
No, no, no, Miss Magus, those people only laugh at the risk of your every move and the price you pay for it …
Hao Ren held back his urge to complain as he watched Rheia expertly inspect the gears and springs of the alchemical bronze horse before inserting new magic crystals into its back. After a few minutes, the bronze horse let out a piercing neigh as the connecting rods and bearings in its belly began to spin happily.
"Let's go!" Rheia leaped onto the carriage as she extended her hand to Y 'lisabet, who was standing beside Y' zaks. "There's enough room for one more. Come with me, kid."
Y 'lisabet was furious. "You're the kid! You'll always be a kid! "
"Pfft, I won't ride. But you don't have to worry about following me all the way to the destination. Let's go to the carriage house in the west and I'll rent a horse for each of you. The place we're going to is quite far. "
The mage lady was clearly in a good mood as if she was purposely showing off that she had recruited a group of people. She even drove the eye-catching brass carriage to the entrance of the mercenary guild and blared the horn. Hao Ren suspected that if she was driving on Earth, she would be a high-beam dog and a honking dog, the kind that would get killed within ten meters of the road.
After showing off for a while, Rheia got down to business. She helped Hao Ren and the rest pack the horses and went to the shop to stock up on some common spellcasting materials and travel rations. Finally, they left the place with the cheers of the mercenaries lining the streets.
The mercenaries who came to see them off did not even try to hide their "you'd better die outside and never come back" expressions.
It was not easy for someone to be like Rheia, who was hated by the heavens and the people.
The towering walls of White Maple Leaf City gradually disappeared into the distance, and not long after they left the city, they left the main road and began to follow Rheia's directions to tread on the paths that were rarely used by travelers and even the beast paths. Looking at the direction they were heading, the path seemed to be parallel to the Longwind Ridge.
Rheia's amazing alchemy carriage once again showed its incredible side. It looked cumbersome, but it could travel very smoothly on the uneven paths, and the cogwheel and spring powered bronze horses could travel on the barren paths like they were on flat ground, even better than a real horse.
"This is a must-have for my travels." Rheia pulled down the foldable roof of the carriage, and this allowed her to chat more easily with Hao Ren and the rest who were riding beside her. The mage lady smugly patted the carriage. "I've ridden it to the mountains of the Longwind Ridge, to the hinterland of the great plains, and even through the Longwind Ridge Tunnel to the Hekluwe tribal kingdom on the other side of the mountains. Ah, only when you go out will you realize how big the world really is. What you can read in books is just a drop of water in the Endless Sea compared to the real world. Those stubborn people who shut themselves in the magic tower all day will never understand. "
As she said that, she smiled and glanced at Hao Ren. "Of course, you adventurers who run around all day have a better say in this than me."
Looking at the innocent smile on the mage lady's face, Hao Ren could not help but think of her valiant demeanor when she was shouting at a bunch of people in front of the mercenary guild.
It was like they were two different people.
It seemed that other than enraging matters, the mage lady was very approachable when it came to her friends or her field of interest.
The ruins that Rheia was looking for, of course, could not be in a place where people came and went. In fact, it was even further away from White Maple Leaf City than Rheia had described.
The group trekked in the wilderness for two whole days.
At noon on the third day, they finally arrived at the entrance of a forest.
This was a dense forest next to the Longwind Ridge Mountains, and the mountains took a bend here, forming a sunken bow-shaped "shelter", and the towering ancient trees grew in this shelter, lush and full of life. Countless ancient trees that were hundreds of years old or even older stood there, and the dense canopy blocked the sun, making the entire forest as dark as dusk. Even though it was noon, Hao Ren and the rest felt like it was almost dusk not long after they entered the forest.
Soon, they arrived at an area where ordinary horses could not go any further. The vines and rotten leaves made it even more difficult for horses to move forward. Rather than riding on the back of a wobbly horse, it was better to trust their own legs.
After all, the people standing here were not ordinary people.
Nangong Sanba used Letta runes to carve a barrier on the surrounding tree trunks to prevent the horses from running around or wild beasts from coming in and hurting their mounts. Rheia, on the other hand, shrunk the brass carriage back to the size of a palm and carefully kept it in her pocket. Before she led the group further into the forest, she reminded them, "It'll be a little dangerous if we go further. According to the records, the ruins are not completely underground, and part of it is exposed. This could cause magical energy to leak, and the creatures in the forest will become aggressive."
"… What an old-fashioned setting," Lily mumbled.
"Huh?" Rheia did not catch it.
"Oh, I mean we're experienced!" Lily quickly tried to smooth things over.
Hao Ren did not join in the conversation, and he focused his attention as he tried to sense any movement in the forest.
He did not know if it was an illusion, but ever since he entered this place, he had felt a sense of unfamiliarity. It was hard to describe, and if he had to describe it …
It was like he had suddenly fallen into a slight trance, and could not understand why he was standing there, and was confused by everything that was happening around him. It was as if some sort of power was blocking his thoughts, and slowing his mind.
This greatly increased his vigilance.
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