The light and shadow collapsed again—the vast hall and the massive device at the end of the hall suddenly disintegrated into countless fragments of light and shadow, and collapsed again like an avalanche into a dim cavern, everything seemed to be a fleeting dream, a chaotic projection of another real world in the current dimension.

Duncan, however, knew that he had really "seen" and could still see.

He looked into the depths of the dimly lit cavern and blinked a few times—in every extremely brief moment, in each blink of an eye, he could see something emerge the moment his eyelids closed and darkness fell, it was the grand hall.

He gradually realized that there were two realities superimposed here, deep beneath the Holy Land Island, and that the deeper "reality" could not be observed by ordinary means, but it would appear within 0.002 seconds of each blink of an eye.

For no apparent reason, Duncan conjured up the unit "0.002 seconds" in his mind, convinced that it was the exact time he saw the hall every time he blinked—a moment that could barely be captured by a human eye, but enough to reflect in his perception.

He looked back at the "relief" on the wall next to him, and in the next blink of an eye, he saw a lifelike bird creature appear in the specimen containment tank, and then darkness rose up, reality switched, and it turned into a relief on the wall again—it was a hideously twisted "Death Bird".

Alice seemed to notice the change in Duncan's expression, and she was suddenly a little worried: "Captain? Are you alright...... His expression suddenly became so serious......"

“…… LH-01 was not able to put everything in the database into the shelter, and those that failed to spawn during the genesis process stayed at the original 'hatchery'," Duncan said softly suddenly, "...... This 'sanctuary' should have been bigger and more complete, but it failed......"

Morris looked at Duncan with a stunned expression, and suddenly reacted: "What did you touch?" ”

"Here's another picture, and that's what it was like before the Great Annihilation...... But you can't see it or touch it," Duncan raised his hand and pressed it lightly against the stone wall next to him, and as the ghostly green spirit fire spread into the cracks in the stone, he could vaguely feel that he was touching more than just the cold stones, "The two realities are superimposed here, but the one that is closer to the original form has been almost completely swallowed up by the Great Annihilation, and it can only exist briefly every time I blink. ”

Morris struggled to comprehend the incredible "state" Duncan described, and by this time the latter had raised his head and looked deeper into the cavern.

"There should be a 'point of contact' here," Duncan said in a deep voice, "and those cultists must have touched something here." ”

As he spoke, he stepped into the darkness, and with the slow spread of the green flames, he strode towards the end of the "hall".

Morris and Alice immediately followed the captain.

……

The dog lowered its head a little tiredly, and followed Shirley silently, the blood-colored glimmer in his eyes flickered and dimmed, and the sound of chains rubbing against the ground seemed to become some kind of distant noise, and it walked forward for a while, and suddenly raised its head with some hindsight, only to find that Shirley had gone far ahead - the girl's back looked blurry, and the edges kept shaking, as if something unstable was superimposed on her.

The dog shook its head, and its empty mind seemed to have lost the ability to think and judge for a moment, but the next moment, it suddenly came to its senses again, and found itself following Shirley as usual—the scene where the two had been separated just now was like a grotesque illusion, and dissipated in the blink of an eye.

Shirley lowered her head in confusion and saw that Ah Dog was walking with her.

She felt a tingling in her arm, and a burning sensation running down the symbiotic chains toward her, like ...... Just like the blood that just came out.

"Dog?" She whispered hesitantly—unsure if she was making a voice or simply calling out from the back of her mind through a symbiotic link.

Ah Dog didn't respond, and there were only two voices of "poof" and "poof" that came into Shirley's ears.

It sounded like a heartbeat.

Not quite right...... I don't know exactly what the situation is, but it's not quite right!

Shirley's whole body tensed up all of a sudden, and the moment she realized that something seemed to be wrong, she reacted, and suddenly looked up in the direction of the captain: "Captain! The situation of the dog ......"

There was no captain in front of him.

In the dark cavern, only her own voice echoed, and soon turned into a vague noise, the captain was gone, and so were Maurice and Alice, and there were only her and Dog, as if they were the only ones from the beginning.

Shirley gasped instantly, and the vast and boundless darkness turned into an even greater fear—a fear so familiar that she felt like she had forgotten the sensation that seeped into her marrow, but now everything suddenly reappeared in her mind—fire, smoke, the smell of blood, the sound of something collapsing, something gnawing at her own flesh......

Her eyes widened in horror in the darkness, bone spur-like structures creeping out of her arms, shoulders and spine, blood-colored shimmer filled her eyes, distorting everything in her vision, and in her increasingly distorted perception, she heard a slightly unfamiliar voice suddenly coming from the side: "Shirley...... I feel...... It's a bit cold......"

She slowly turned her head to look in the direction the voice was coming from.

The dog is slowly sinking—sinking in the dirt and rocks, as if melting, its body is gradually swallowed up by the ground, which seems to come to life, and the surface is covered with sticky and sluggish ripples, and the ripples seem to contain hundreds of millions of living creatures, and the dog's figure sinks into those "living creatures" little by little, first the limbs, then the body, and now only the neck and part of the head remain.

It opened its mouth towards Shirley, and its bones closed one by one, as if it was struggling to say something, and as if it was trying to spit out something—

"Dog !!"

The numb and stiff mind finally began to work, and Shirley finally remembered the name of the other end of the chain, and she rushed to the ground that was gradually activating, and shouted as she pulled the chain on her arm with all her might, "Dog! I'll drag you out! You hold on! ”

However, her efforts could not stop the dog from sinking—just as the head of the dark hound was about to be completely swallowed up by the sticky mud, a voice suddenly came into her ears.

“…… Shirley, my dad and I went to buy you a cake, it's your birthday...... When we come back, you won't be angry, okay? ”

The girl was stunned suddenly.

The voice from the other end of the chain briefly interrupted her sanity—and in the moment it was interrupted, she heard a crisp snapping sound.

There was a sudden lightness in his hand.

The shadow of the Hound completely disappeared into the mud, and the heavy pull from the end of the chain suddenly disappeared, and Shirley suddenly staggered backwards.

She saw the other end of the chain fly out of the mud - it was broken, and the familiar dog was not visible at the end of the broken chain, only two fist-sized objects were carried out of the mud and landed next to her.

They fluttered and fluttered on the ground as if they were alive.

That's two hearts.

Shirley watched the scene stunned, motionless as a sculpture.

The pitch-black mud began to slowly swell, converging from all directions, and the mud seemed to have the illusion of a distant land, and countless strangely shaped shadows floated around—

In the depths of the sea, countless demons have noticed an uninvited guest approaching their dimension.

And in the farther darkness, an incomparably large structure was sleeping, its main body lying like a mountain across the shattered earth, its snaking tentacles wrapped around countless floating islands, the dark blue glimmer surging on his body, countless demons spawning from the surface of the touch, and constantly being devoured by it every moment.

Shirley, however, didn't seem to see the approaching vision—she sat on the ground for a moment, then slowly got up, crawled to the two still beating hearts, and carefully picked them up and held them in her arms.

She hadn't hugged them in a long time.

"Daddy...... Mommy ......"

Darkness swirled, and her figure disappeared into the depths of the deep sea.

……

Duncan suddenly turned his head and looked at the clearing not far behind him.

A vague figure flickered there and disappeared in the blink of an eye.

He reacted instantly: "Something happened to Shirley!" ”

"Shirley!?" Morris, who was walking behind Duncan, was stunned for a moment when he heard this, as if in this brief moment, he had even forgotten the name "Shirley", and the captain's words instantly reset his memory to the correct "position", and then he raised his head in hindsight and realized that there was one person missing from the team...... There's also a ghostly demon.

"Hey! She was walking next to me just now! Alice also reacted at this time, and looked at the location of Shirley and Ah Dog before with wide eyes, "I still heard her talking to Ah Gou......"

Duncan's expression was instantly solemn: "Didn't you all notice when she disappeared?" ”

Morris and Alice shook their heads.

Duncan's brow furrowed, and after a very brief moment of thought, he waved his hand violently in the air.

The dark green spirit flames rose in the blink of an eye, and with a series of crackling sounds that almost roared, the flames roared like a storm and swept towards every corner of the entire cavern!

The roar of flames seemed to shake the time and space itself, and the entire cave, and even the entire Holy Land Island, suddenly trembled at this moment, and after this "tremor" that almost shook the dimension, Duncan's face had quickly become gloomy.

"Shirley and Dog have all the marks on their bodies," he looked up and looked at Morris with a solemn expression, "...... But they separated. ”

(End of chapter)