Translator: EndlessFantasy Translation Editor: EndlessFantasy Translation
Although Hao Ren could guess what the world looked like at the other end of the Bifröst, and how destructive the “magical energy radiation could be, it was not until the moment he stepped out of the teleportation portal that he realized how tragic the kingdom outside Asgard was now.
They crossed the spiral gate of the Bifröst and stepped into a place, which looked like purgatory.
Everything in the world was burned and broken into ashes. Hao Ren stood on the wreckage of the Bifröst on this side and looked into the distance. Every inch of land he saw showed signs of serious distortion. Huge and terrifying rift valleys were everywhere and smoke billowed in them as if the endless fire in the rift had not burned up till now. Outside the rift valley, there were patches of dirty green glass-like bodies covering everything. The glass-like bodies fluoresced in a disgusting form of viscous fluids, scattering in clusters from under the Bifröst to the end of the horizon.
These glass-like bodies were the products of magical energy radiation. The unprecedented powerful magical energy, coupled with the catalytic shock of the demon hunter’s beam cannon, produced mixed magical energy that completely burned and destroyed the earth, turning all the organic matter on earth into this disgusting, weird, glass-like thing. The residue of these magical energies could hardly be put to any use. Like a curse itself, they covered the earth with scorching and disgusting heat, leaving it barren forever.
A sky of ashes and dust shrouded the earth. The thick cloud of dust almost covered all the light. The world was shrouded in darkness, making this place even more dreary and gloomy.
This was the burnt-out world. It was the world after all the bustling vitality was melted into slag. The air was filled with deadly poisonous gas and radiation. There was no more light in the sky. All life was over and everything was infected. The vast majority of ordinary species would not be able to thrive in this environment.
Wuyue grabbed Hao Ren’s arm in a little fear, stretched her neck and looked out into the distance trying to find a glimmer of life, but apparently, she could not find it. In this completely burned place, the only creatures that were still alive were the tentacles on the edge of the continent.
The powerful Yggdrasil. Its tentacles across the continent could survive even here. Now they were standing on one of its tentacles while the rest were shaking slightly in the distance. Silvery white eerie runes were also shining on these tentacles. These tentacles could not bring a single breath of life and warmth to this place. On the contrary, these weird things could only make the place more gloomy and terrible, like a nightmare in the abyss.
The Bifröst on this side, like the Bifröst in Asgard, only the spiral door was still running and the crystalline trail covering the branches of Yggdrasil had broken into pieces. The crystalline trail on this side was in a more tragic state due to the erosion of magical energy. Hao Ren led the team along the tentacle of Firstborn towards the dead land. He had seen what Asgard looked like after the Twilight of the Gods, and he thought that the situation of this place would be as terrible as that of Asgard, but when he got here, he realized what a wonderful place Asgard was.
Even though the place over there was destroyed by the war, it looked like heaven compared to the situation here.
“Which kingdom is this? Niflheim? Svartalfheim? Muspelheim?” Nangong Sanba could not stop guessing. “It can’t be Midgard… It’s so desolate.”
“I can’t recognize it at all.” Vivian frowned. “I never thought that the magical energy could burn so violently that… the place was completely burned and everything was beyond recognition. The mountains collapsed and the rivers evaporated. I don’t know where we are.”
“The battlefield scavengers we saw on the surveillance video came to Asgard through Bifröst,” Hao Ren looked at Vivian and said. “That means they time-traveled across the wasteland. Who do you think can do this?”
“The strong ones or the Muspell of Aesir should be able to survive in this environment, but certainly not for a long time: there is no water or food here, and it seems unlikely that those things will be produced here. Also, the human figures on the surveillance video are obviously not giants or Aesir. Judging from the way they dressed and their physical features, I think it’s more like the humans of Midgard. Ordinary humans are absolutely unable to survive here for more than ten minutes. I can’t explain this,” said Vivian.
Everyone went down Bifröst and explored this dead world. There were no relics to collect, no battlefield ruins, or anything like that to be inspected. The magical energy storm destroyed everything here equally, leaving only worthless ashes for them.
If nothing could be found here, Hao Ren’s next goal was another Bifröst of more than 100 kilometers away. There was a gate that led to the next ‘world’.
According to Vivian, apart from Asgard having only one “universal Bifröst”, the other eight kingdoms had two Dimension Tunnels, pointing to two kingdoms respectively. After the death of Heimdallr, these tunnels were fixed in pairs, linking several kingdoms into a chain.
Hao Ren could not control the mapping of the Bifröst without the guidance of Odin’s precious stone, so they could only travel one kingdom by one kingdom.
Hao Ren did not have any hope for this desolate continent, but hope always comes unintentionally:
“Landlord! There’s something here!”
Lily was running around in front of them. Suddenly, she stopped in front of a hill and turned her head and shouted at them.
They rushed to her. Lily pointed to a pile of objects on the ground and said, “Looks like these were left behind by humans.”
A few pieces of rock were neatly stacked together. Some pieces of pottery and leather were scattered around the stones. At the top of the stone pile, there was a metal cane, and a small device, looking like a compass, was placed beside the cane. These things may be some kind of symbolic souvenir. A piece of polished slate was laid flat on the ground, and something was written on it in ancient words.
Hao Ren bent down to translate the handwriting on the slate with the translation plug-in. “… Tanarossa, the Lightseeker, rested here. He devoted all his life to searching for the remnant of sparks in the Nine Worlds. The warrior fell down in Vanaheim. May the ancestors and Valkyrie protect his soul and lead him to the eternal kingdom.”
Lily carefully turned it over and found that there were words on the back of the slate:
“Friend, I will continue our journey. Even if there’s only one person left, I will arrive in Asgard. May you bless me in the palace of the eternal kingdom, and if I fall, let us meet again in the eternal kingdom. If there were new Lightseekers in the future, I hope they can see this passage. We are stuck in the long night, but we go forward to the light until death.”
“The Lightseeker…” Vivian whispered it and said, “I have not heard of it in the Nordic cultural system.”
“Obviously, it is a noun produced after the separation of the Nine Worlds from the Material Plane.” Hao Ren frowned, reasoning the hidden meaning in this passage. “Fell down in Vanaheim… So, here is Vanaheim?”
“The home of Vanir. This place used to be very beautiful. There used to be several big rivers and an inland sea, and aurora often appeared in the sky.” Vivian said and sighed softly as she looked at the land that was completely destroyed by magical energy. “I didn’t expect it to become like this.”
Anthony looked carefully at the little grave and suddenly he said, “It looks like it was written not long ago.”
“Not long ago?!” Hao Ren asked.
The old wizard immediately summoned a magic ball. The ball circled around the metal stick several times and then vanished. “No more than two days. There’s magical energy everywhere. According to the accumulation of magical energy on the metal surface, we can estimate when it was last touched by any creatures.”
Lily jumped up at once and said, “Those who left these things may still be in Vanaheim!”
“Let’s split up and look around!” Vivian summoned a swarm of little bats which dispersed in all directions. “There is no sign of anyone passing through the Bifröst in Asgard. I’m afraid this person is already in trouble,” she said.
Hao Ren, Galazur and Anthony immediately opened their own dimensional pocket and released all the detective probes they had. Detection probes and bats soon disappeared under Vanaheim’s chaotic sky and a rapidly expanding scanning area was mapped in the minds of data terminal and Vivian.
Galazur was worried. “This man said he would go to Asgard, but we didn’t find any trace when we crossed the Bifröst. I’m afraid he’s lost.”
Hao Ren’s heart sank. “Getting lost in this kind of place… I can’t imagine the consequences. That man can walk all the way here, I hope he has more ways to save his life.”
