Frankly, for a few moments, Duncan even had an absurd and disturbing thought: was he too late?

Just because she was a little slower to set off, or there was a delay on the road for a while, the Storm Goddess, who had been "delayed" in the state of death for 10,000 years, just didn't wait for herself to enter the door, and really and completely died here? Has her will dissipated?

But the somewhat absurd thought quickly dissipated from Duncan's mind, and he confirmed that until the Lost Land docked next to the island, Vanna had "read" the mind of the storm goddess Grimana, suggesting that at least the latter was in some kind of "running" state......

It can't be that coincidental, right?

Duncan glanced up at Vana with a subtle expression, only to see that Vana also happened to turn her head to look at him, and the two of them made brief contact and immediately turned away strangely.

“…… Don't think about it so much just yet, go down and see how it goes. Duncan muttered for two or three seconds, taking the lead forward, followed by the others.

They stepped into the circular "hall" so wide that it was suspicious that it had defied the rules of the architectural structure, and stepped on the circular staircase that descended down layer by layer, as if walking towards a whirlpool towards the waterhole at the end of the staircase, the "Queen Leviathan" with its large, pale tentacles lying nearby, and the smaller branches extending from the tentacles like roots had merged with the black "stones" that made up the building, and withered between the steps.

Duncan suddenly had the feeling that this huge palace, and even the black island that carried the palace, was like a huge, man-made "shell", and the ancient sea beast endowed with "divinity" was the flesh and blood in this shell, and the beast died, and the flesh withered and shrunk, leaving many "chambers"—those corridors, rooms, and halls.

They walked in the "shell" of the behemoth, stepping on the cavity left by the withering flesh, and little by little they came to the behemoth's stopped beating heart.

The faint green light of the fire burned along the steps, dispelling the darkness around him, and Duncan came to the spot where the circular waterhole met the steps, and noticed that there was actually a curved stone platform slightly higher than the surrounding area, and a cloud of pale tissue about the size of the roof of a neighborhood church peeked out of the waterhole and lay lifeless on the platform, and beside it, the edge of the platform......

There are wreckage like tables, chairs, and altars, as well as ...... Human bones?!

Lucrecia was the first to notice the bones, she was stunned for a moment, and she came to the stone platform in three or two steps, frowning while carefully observing, and slowly spoke: "It's not a standard human or elven bone, but it's similar in structure...... At least some kind of humanoid. ”

Duncan also walked over, frowning at the situation on the platform.

The bones were so small as the Leviathan queen's corpse that they were scattered in a corner that no one noticed them when they first entered the hall.

"Who could this be...... Left? Nina was a little nervous and frightened, and she subconsciously ducked behind Duncan, "The explorer who arrived before us? Sea Song? ”

"No, Miss Lucrecia just said, these bones aren't standard human or elven bones - I don't look like a Senjin, the sternum of a Senjin is a whole bone plate," Anomaly 077 immediately broke silent, "and I remember...... The sailors of the Sea Song eventually dissolved into the fog and foam near the island, and in order to gain 'peace', they could not have left any remains in the temple. ”

Duncan didn't speak, but solemnly examined the other things that were scattered around the bones—some pieces of armor or clothing, some remains of what looked like weapons and sacrificial utensils, and the small altar that had fallen apart.

Vanna, who was next to him, suddenly noticed something and broke the silence softly: "These clothes ...... It's a lot like what I saw in my vision, those who used to make pilgrimages on this island......"

"Pilgrims on this island?" There was some surprise in Duncan's tone, "The generation before the Great Annihilation?!" ”

What Vanna saw in her vision was undoubtedly when the Storm Goddess Grimona was still the "Queen of Leviathan", a record of a civilization that had developed in symbiosis with the Leviathan Behemoth before the Great Annihilation, just like the elven civilization before the fall of Sirantis, or the era in Taregin's memory...... Can the "material" of that time survive to the present?

Duncan looked at the relics scattered around the bones with a hint of amazement—outside the palace, everything of the old times had long since turned into that strange black crumpled substance, or, as the sailors described, into fog and foam in the sea, into forms beyond human recognition.

Why have these bones and relics been preserved?

At this moment, Alice's voice suddenly remembered, interrupting Duncan's thoughts: "Look, Captain! What is this? ”

Duncan immediately approached the puppet, and following the direction of the latter's finger, he saw an object in the corner of the altar covered in dust and broken pieces of cloth.

It was a strangely shaped, delicate and ancient hourglass.

After a slight hesitation, Duncan reached out, picked up the hourglass, and blew the dust off it.

The intricate symbols and words on the surface of the hourglass are clearly visible.

"An hourglass?" Morris looked at the thing in the captain's hand in surprise, and the lens group extending from his eye socket expanded and adjusted, and then he seemed to sense some kind of disobedience, "Strange ......"

Vanna subconsciously spoke: "Strange what? ”

Morris thought for a moment: "...... It feels like the style is different from the temple as a whole, especially the text on the hourglass...... There are also a lot of runes on the outer wall of the temple, but they are obviously not the same system as the hourglass, this thing is a bit like ......"

Listening to the old scholar's analysis, Duncan was thoughtful, and then he suddenly noticed something:

The overall outline of the hourglass looks like two triangles that are upside down from the side, and the shape of the decorative frame and the inner hourglass body seems to be ...... Bartók's door.

“…… Like some holy artifact of the Church of the Dead! Morris said quickly.

The Sacred Vessels of the Church of the Dead...... The creation of Bartók, the god of death?

Duncan's expression froze, and then he vaguely guessed something, and then thought of the bones and relics preserved in this palace, and he gradually came to an idea.

After a moment of contemplation, he turned to gaze at the lifeless remains of the beast by the waterhole, then gently flipped the hourglass in his hand.

The pale golden couch in the hourglass made a faint rustle that was imperceptible to the human ear, and quicksand fell from the container like a mist and circulated between the two "death's doors" that were upside down from each other.

In the next second, the whole world fell silent, as if some kind of force blocked the world into two parts, life and death - everything in Duncan's vision turned into a black, white and gray tone like the spirit world, and at the boundary of everything there were layers of constantly shaking phantoms, and in the illusion, everyone's figures disappeared, and only himself holding an hourglass was left next to the stone platform, and ...... The bones that were rapidly reassembling and growing bloody flesh.

The remains became living people—two tall men in armor with serious faces and a taciturn appearance, and a young woman in a white robe who looked at her with a smile on her face.

Duncan looked at the three figures in surprise at the "reversal of life and death" in front of his eyes, but before he could speak, the woman in the white robe shook her head at herself and quietly stepped aside.

At the edge of the waterhole, the pale limb, which was as large as the roof of the church, shook slightly, and then its surface shimmered like water, and a gentle voice came into Duncan's mind—

"We finally meet, usurper."

"Gemona?" Duncan reacted immediately, and glanced at the hourglass in his hand with some surprise, "...... I didn't expect it to work, I just gave it a try. ”

"Yes, thank you for taking the plunge - in the temporal stream of the temple, I am in a state of complete death, and in that hourglass there is a brief life that will be preserved for me to talk to you if necessary...... Bartók had said when he was building the hourglass that he would flip it. ”

Listening to the gentle voice that sounded in his head, Duncan suddenly raised his eyebrows in surprise: "Wait, you mean...... You know I'm coming, I'm going to flip this hourglass, I'm going to talk to you here...... Everything is predestined? ”

"On the day this sanctuary was born, its time was closed, usurper...... In our eyes, this time in the middle of this narrow snail, is not a river, nor a line, it is an unobstructed plane - on this unfolded 'scroll of time', all possible things have come to an end......"

The gentle voice paused for a few seconds, then continued softly:

"As for you, usurper, your arrival is the only event at the end of this scroll of time that can be determined to happen, but not how it will end."

"I've learned a lot about the flow of time...... I can imagine what you're talking about, it's just that it's hard to connect with reality in the first place," Duncan said, looking up at the place as he raised his head, "Is there a flow of time in the temple...... It's no wonder that after we stepped into this temple, neither I nor Vana could perceive your 'activity' anymore, and we saw the ...... on the platform."

As he spoke, he subconsciously glanced at the figures standing aside, and then quickly withdrew his gaze.

"When I saw the bones, I vaguely guessed that there seemed to be some kind of 'difference' between the inside and outside of this temple - after stepping into this place, it was as if we were walking into a unique 'selection branch'. Why? ”

"In order to delay the 'decay' of the outer barrier," Grimana said softly, "we are rotting, usurper, we must find a way to 'lock' our own rot, otherwise we will not reach the limit of the life of the shelter, and the world will be eroded by the 'festering' we have unleashed." ”

(End of chapter)