Chapter 819: Chapter 816: Merging into the Long Night

The dead were continuously climbing out of their coffins, and the graveyard was filled with swaying corpses. They queried in confusion, walked aimlessly, or sat on the morgue slab in a daze, futilely recalling and pondering in the slight discordance left after the old order had dissipated, trying to grasp the unease and shadows lingering in their hearts.

Instead of guarding the graveyard to prevent the undead from waking and stirring, the guard was leading these awakened corpses, escorting them away from this temporary resting place, sending them back to their homes.

The dim streetlights cast light on this eerie scene. Even Agatha, who could no longer feel the temperature of the living world, felt a coldness slowly seeping from her soul. She stood dumbfounded beside the path, watching as Duncan ushered the moving corpses one by one out, as if she was deep in a bizarre Dreamscape.

“Alright, you are the last one,” finally, the last staggering dead man began his journey home–a young man killed by homicide, his chest bearing a gruesome hole. Duncan supported this fresh corpse off the platform, gently advising, “You remember the way home, don’t you? Go back, it’s normal if breathing feels odd, you’ll get used to it soon… Now go home, be with your family, don’t think too much, just live well–go out from here, keep walking forward, don’t look back, you don’t have to come back here for a long time.”

The stiff-gaited corpse finally walked away, the dim streetlights illuminating his figure until he eventually disappeared into the vast darkness of the night.

Duncan finally approached the gatekeeper lady. Despite the thick bandages, his eyes still revealed a mild and calm smile: “Thank you for waiting, Ms. Agatha.”

Agatha suddenly felt a bit dazed, feeling as if she was about to forget something very important, but then she abruptly snapped awake, raising her hand to her forehead while murmuring, “The boundary between life and death is gone… Captain, what has happened? I feel… something isn’t quite right, here at the graveyard… just now, that was abnormal…”

Her body shook slightly, as if her consciousness had suddenly faltered, and she nearly fell over.

“Relax, Agatha.” Duncan reached out gently to support the gatekeeper, guiding her slowly to a nearby morgue slab to sit beside a coffin.

“Keep breathing–or it’s fine not to breathe, just keep a calm mindset,” he spoke slowly, just as he had soothed those restless dead, “Being dazed and slightly panicked is normal, it will pass soon. Tyrion is already better, and you will be soon, too.”

Listening to the voices next to her, Agatha felt the tearing conflicts within her mind momentarily subside, her cognition temporarily stabilizing. After a moment of silence, she softly asked, “How much longer?”

“We are heading towards the last node, the node of the god of death. According to past experiences, this might take two to three days. After that, I can confirm Bartok’s status,” Duncan looked into Agatha’s eyes veiled in black fabric, “But if you’re asking about after that, that final moment… that will take some more time.”

“…What will the world become?”

Duncan didn’t speak, only continued to look at her calmly.

Initially, the sea lost its waves, the Endless Sea became a calm mirror of water. Then, the dead no longer rested, the concept of death was twisted, and the boundary between life and death blurred. What’s next?

He suddenly remembered what the Black Sun had once described to him–

One day, the ocean will forget the shape of the waves, life will forget how to die, flames will not remember how to burn, wind will cease to move, clouds will fall from the sky into the sea…

The gods fall into decay through forgetting, and the world forgets as it decays–this is the “Rotten Future”.

That is the counterpart to the “Fiery Future,” another lightless apocalypse.

Agatha didn’t get an answer to her question, but in Duncan’s gaze, she seemed to already know the outcome. As the cognitive tears and contradictions in her mind emerged again, she also faintly realized… such things might not be happening for the first time in this world.

“…I have undergone the strictest training and testing, honing my skills in the temple, strengthening my will. I swore in front of the Lord’s sacred image to protect those who follow us with my strength and faith…”

Her voice softly started, the mortal cold seeping into her mind, seeming to freeze her thoughts. Her voice arose in the cold night air, as if echoing from one grave to another–

“But how do I protect them in these circumstances? Captain Duncan, in the face of the collapse of the world’s foundation…”

“You are protecting them, and everyone in this city is protecting the city in their own way–the way of life here, the memories here, everything,” Duncan’s deep voice interrupted Agatha’s words, “I know, even so, everything is still slowly fading away. The ‘memory’ of this world vanishes like sand through our fingers, no matter how tightly we clutch our hands, we’re only delaying the process, but it’s nobody’s fault.”

He turned his head, looking down the small path in the cemetery, and at the morgue slabs beside it that had now completely quieted down.

Some of those morgue slabs still bore marks of bullet and blade strikes, displayed bouquets from the living to the dead, and even seemed to retain traces of un-dried tears.

People had fought here at the boundary between life and death, mourned those who had stepped through life into another world, and now it had become thoroughly quiet. For a long time in the future, it might no longer have any “visitors”.

People will gradually forget the purpose of the cemetery, and then, it becomes an inevitable “neglect”, where death will become a state transition that people do not care about. Bartok’s priesthood will be blurred, the concept of the Death Church will become natural, yet incomprehensible, and no one will even think of trying to understand its existence. This dying world will once again undergo an “adjustment”, where “ignorance” is another blessing it gives to beings–to prevent fragile mortal minds from accidentally glimpsing the hidden fear and horror of corruption and rot in the depths of darkness.

Agatha feels the cold air gradually filling her chest, and slowly exhales with each breath.

It seems that she hasn’t breathed in a long time, and after the death of this body, she has become increasingly accustomed to the identity of the deceased, so much so that she gradually forgets about “breathing.”

But now, she starts to breathe naturally again.

The dark night gently envelops the world, and the haze in her mind is gradually fading away, all her confusion and unrest slowly dissipating.

She hears Captain Duncan speaking beside her, his tone reassuring and calm.

“Agatha, did you know? Human eyes can actually always see their own nose tip–it blocks a large part of a person’s field of vision, forming a theoretically inescapable dark shadow when both eyes focus.

“But your brain has been dealing with this ‘trouble’, it learns to ignore that shadow and through incredible imagination, deception, and calculation ‘fills in’ the gaps in your vision, and only at specific angles and positions can you notice the existence of that ‘blind spot’.”

“Meanwhile, due to the structure of the nerves, human vision is upside down, and your brain needs a lot of computation and adjustment to reverse the signals sent by the nerves back to normal–so some people, when they experience neurological changes, will briefly see that upside-down world and even struggle to walk in it.”

“Humans are such an imperfect species that the human brain must resort to ignoring, forgetting, and even deceiving itself to live normally in this world.”

“And this world, like your brain, has a ‘corrective’ mechanism–those dreadful tears and contradictions will ultimately be hidden under this correction mechanism, although they accumulate more and more, and although the entire world still gradually sinks… but this is already the best ‘They’ can do.”

“Agatha, this world is so imperfect that its designers must go through ignoring, forgetting, and even deceiving themselves so that you can live normally in this world, and now that process is nearing its limit.”

“Like sand flowing through the gaps between fingers.”

“But ‘They’ have tried their best.”

Duncan retracts his gaze from afar and quietly watches the gatekeeper sitting on the autopsy table.

“…I will return to the cathedral.”

Agatha suddenly says softly.

Green flames flicker deep inside her shattered body, smoldering at the position of her eyes.

“People will come to the cathedral seeking help, there will be other priests like me who experience brief confusion and unease, they need me–and after this ‘process’ temporarily ends, I will continue to fulfill my duties… I should be with the followers, let everyone’s life continue even if just for one more day. Then…”

She breathes a slight sigh of relief, then jumps off the autopsy table with agile posture.

She stands firm in the night like a tombstone, as if the days she spent praying in the cathedral in a long dress as a nun hardly diminished her aura as a gatekeeper.

“Then, this world might get even worse,” Duncan’s voice comes from beside her, “Life has forgotten how to die, flames may also forget how to burn, wind and clouds, light and dark, many things will gradually sink in this unstoppable decay–and the world’s ‘correction’ will reach its limit, and some people will wake up in the dark, noticing the terrifying changes in this world, by then…”

Agatha lifts her head, calmly facing Captain Duncan’s gaze, a breeze gradually emerges beside her, and her figure begins to crumble into ash in the wind.

A smile appears on her face.

“I will still fulfill my duties and patiently wait–each of us has our own things to do, right?”

Duncan nods gently.

Agatha’s figure transforms into the Grey Wind, blending into the night, leaving the quiet cemetery.