Eldritch Horror Theatre

It felt like autumn had arrived, though this particular crop seemed long overdue for harvest.

There was a reason even someone like Classmate Su Gao, a top-tier Hunter, was surprised.

The massive space seemed to stretch its structural materials to their absolute limits, laid out in a rigidly uniform pattern. Aside from a narrow central walkway, the belly of the ship before them was almost entirely crammed with those peculiar structures.

The lower sections consisted of coarse rope. Further up were human bodies sealed in a layer of transparent gelatin, colored like Amber.

Dried-up Amber, at that.

From this angle, these uniformly sized "fruits" were completely shriveled, looking much like mummified corpses.

The curled-up figures inside had almost no flesh left. Their identical light-colored robes clung tightly to their frames, encased in the transparent golden gelatin that seemed to isolate them from the rest of the world.

A quick glance revealed hundreds of these rope-and-body structures. Coupled with their coloring, they genuinely resembled an autumn wheat field.

In addition to these, there were a considerable number of empty ropes.

The perfectly uniform formation was broken in several places by such sights, as if the people inside had long since shattered their restraints and escaped.

But that wasn't even the most unusual part. Every one of these fruitless ropes had lost its upright tension, drooping haphazardly to the ground.

The visual impact was truly bizarre.

After all, the fallen ones proved the ropes were soft, yet the intact ones stood perfectly straight, supporting each Human Amber.

The only logical explanation for this contradictory scene was that the Ambers were being buoyed up by water, with the ropes beneath simply tethering them in place.

This surprisingly aligned with their earlier impression—aside from the lack of water, it looked exactly like a sunken ship.

...

"The things that attacked us just now—did they come out of here?"

While Fu Qian silently studied the scene, Su Gao took a few steps forward, scanning the area as she asked for his assessment.

"Probably. Though that makes this place feel a bit too quiet."

Nodding in agreement, Fu Qian gestured behind him.

Given the sight before them, having a private room inside this sunken ship was special treatment. The two of them had picked a pretty good landing spot.

And it was easy to connect the two attackers from earlier, suspected to be mutated humans, to these broken Ambers.

At the same time, if each fallen rope represented an escapee, then theoretically, this place should have been far livelier than it currently was.

Yet after they executed those two, there had been no further movement, nor had any new clues appeared.

"It is a bit strange. Maybe they gathered somewhere else?"

She clearly hadn't dropped her guard, but even as she peered into the surrounding fog, Su Gao couldn't spot anything else.

"Shall we keep going down?"

The next moment, she glanced up at the ceiling and softly asked for Fu Qian's opinion.

"It does seem to be the topmost level."

Tapping his shoe lightly against the floor, Fu Qian evaluated the structure within view.

Logically, this should already be the uppermost deck, though theoretically, looking upward for traces of the falling Meteor would have made more sense.

Then again, far too many things here already defied common sense. More importantly, he had already spotted the path leading down.

...

"Mr. Fu, what do you think the origins of this place are?"

Having received his agreement, Su Gao didn't hesitate to continue taking the lead.

As she navigated through the "fields," she tried to make sense of everything before her.

"Even though I managed to open the entrance just now, I still couldn't get a clear read on it. The only thing I can confirm is that the burden of that sword strike was incredibly heavy."

"You still did an excellent job."

To maintain that level of control without even knowing what she was cutting, Classmate Su Gao's Power of Echo was truly unreasonable.

"As for the burden, I lean toward the reason you just mentioned. The Rank of the power maintaining this place is quite high, making it difficult to destroy."

While not stingy with his praise, Fu Qian hadn't forgotten Su Gao's initial reminder.

Quite high?

Although he was simply borrowing her own viewpoint, coming from Professor Fu, Su Gao clearly treated it as a double confirmation worth pondering.

"An ancient Divine Entity? Are all these people Its believers?"

As she quietly studied the surrounding sights, she suddenly voiced a startling idea.

"That would explain why their attire is so uniform and why they look like mummified corpses. This place might have existed for thousands of years."

Although it was just a guess, suddenly brushing up against a possible ancient secret—and the thought that the two targets she had just slain might be ancient remnants from thousands of years ago—clearly stirred some special emotions in Su Gao.

Even if it wouldn't affect her actions or train of thought.

As they spoke, the two had already arrived at the downward passage without encountering any harassment along the way.

"That night?"

Just as she took her first step down, Su Gao seemed to finally realize something. She drew a soft breath, her gaze falling on Fu Qian's face.

"It was protecting them, helping them survive that long, dark night?"

...

"We certainly can't rule out that possibility."

Fu Qian didn't blindly agree.

It was obvious that Classmate Su Gao loved to learn. Even while carrying out her duties, she never forgot to enrich her knowledge. Her historical sensitivity was quite high.

And the question she asked was exactly what he had been pondering since they walked through the door.

The moment he realized this place was actually a ship, and upon discovering this dense crowd of special passengers, a specific word had popped into Fu Qian's mind—The Ark.

Although, up until now, no similar myths or legends had been discovered in this world.

And the Long Night wasn't a flood, so it didn't seem to pair well with a giant wooden ship.

But one couldn't judge things purely by their surface. At the very least, the core purpose of both was to hide away, wasn't it?

Not to mention that in this world, mighty powers that defied common sense truly existed.

Of course, this would require assuming one thing: that during the Long Night, not every Divine Entity had abandoned Its believers.

Besides, there were still many anomalous details about the place right in front of them.

"But aside from their uniform clothing, I haven't found any faith-related elements in here, like an Emblem or anything similar. Furthermore, for a place like this to appear so accurately within the Academy, isn't it a bit too coincidental?"

Having received his validation, Su Gao, true to form, softly continued to raise her doubts.

"Good question. By the way, among the higher-ups of the Night Watchers, is there anyone skilled in the Miracle-type powers of the Benevolent Curse Institute?"

However, Fu Qian didn't rush to pass judgment on her questions, abruptly changing the subject instead.

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