musicians of old

Chapter 852 Lakes, Ruins, Setting Sun
"No need to look around anymore, it's all water from underground rivers. It's nothing yet. Once this cave is full, the water pressure will force open the gate of an even larger underground lake."

Fan Ning calmly looked around, then pointed ahead: "Miss Nancy, you can go up this slope."

"The terrain will soon become very high. As long as you walk at a slightly normal pace, it shouldn't be able to flood you in time."

"No, no!" Nancy's eyes instantly reddened. "Mr. Fanning, you must get out of here alive!"

"I believe that there will be a fair conclusion regarding the rights and wrongs of sacred music and theological morality. I believe in you! Perhaps change has already begun! And yes! Those bishops are all reasonable people; they might even vouch for your reputation!"

"Reputation? It's good to have it, but it's not so bad if you don't. The main thing is those things. We should try to salvage as much as possible." Fan Ning said calmly, pressing down on the valve lever with both arms. "A significant portion of the scores and documents in the monastery are still made of good materials. Soaking them in water is better than burning them to ashes. Perhaps future generations can still find a few pieces."

Nancy didn't speak again, she just stood there in a daze.

With this reasoning, she believed that given Fan Ning's personality, there was absolutely no other option to consider.

"What are you still doing standing there!?"

"Let's go! It'll be too late if we don't leave now!!"

Fanning gritted his teeth, his arm veins bulging, maintaining the downward pressure of the heavy gear lever.

The water level had already submerged his groin, and he felt completely exhausted; his calves even began to twitch and convulse.

“Let’s go!!!”

Having finally managed to sneak out of the "Black Monk Tunnel," he was struck by a second wave of suffocation and dizziness. Moreover, standing facing the cave wall, trying to observe the situation to his side and behind, his posture was abnormally twisted and uncomfortable. In a daze, he thought he saw Nancy running up the steps to the side with tears in her eyes.

Just as I breathed a sigh of relief, I saw that the girl was still standing there.

And then suddenly she smiled serenely and shook her head slowly but firmly.

It's as if the possibilities of spacetime have split.

"In that case, I'll stay here with you." The girl stood beside him, leaning against the wall, with her eyes closed.

Fanning tried to persuade him until the water reached his chest.

Until that upward staircase was completely blocked.

He shook his head bitterly and helplessly.

"No, how could this be!"

On the mountain road adjacent to the monastery, a caravan of carriages adorned with the intricate crest of a starry family suddenly came to a screeching halt, and the head guard, Congreve, who was leading the way, suddenly shouted to stop the procession.

The sea of ​​fire was long gone, and the few remaining wisps of smoke had drifted very high, almost reaching the clouds in the sky.

The entire "Guido do Dalezo Monastery"—no, there's no monastery anymore—now only a deep blue, bottomless lake stretches out below!
This place has become known as "Lake Mertraun"!

The ruins of a few collapsed buildings float on the lake: stone pillars and walls, fragments of stained glass windows, huge charred and hardened blocks of paint, and a swing-like pyre with chains.
"No, it's too late! It's already too late!"

Joan jumped off the carriage and collapsed against the cliff face, her shoulders trembling violently.

"It's not too late, Master Fan Ning."

“You’re not the loser. They’re the ones who went astray. You’re standing at the crossroads.” Mr. F gazed at the vibrant, turbulent colors of the sky.

There seemed to be layers upon layers of murky air, capable of refracting and distorting light, which reflected the blood-red six-pointed star on the tower's ground above.

A bizarre pattern of lines stretched, twisted, and tilted in a three-dimensional space.

The features of the six-pointed star can still be vaguely discerned: two triangles that have been pulled away from their original positions.

A pale, serpentine vortex stretches high in the sky, its dark green rising moon linked to the other.

Another set of images stretches across the sky, almost hanging down, depicting the sun in its descent and the sound stream that constitutes the "theme of God."

The source of the beam of light is the vertex of the triangle they share.
The remnants of the past!!

Pale gold, deep purple, and pale white spiraled together, forming a thin beam of light that shot straight up into the sky at the very center of the six-pointed star on the tower.

“Our Lord Lavoisier, the one who basks in the light, Patriarch Scheller, and Mentor Fanning, though I am as insignificant as dust, I still dare to make a request of you.”

"At this moment, only the Holy Spirit remains. My time has passed, may the Father's kingdom come. May our Ones who are bathed in light walk on earth as they walk in heaven. May the Lord's grace and peace, the fellowship of the Holy Spirit, and the Father be with us."

The nameless angel knelt down deeply in worship towards Fanning.

His figure gradually faded and thinned, transforming into countless pale golden rays of light, projecting backwards onto the distant horizon where the sun was setting!

The sun, which was stretched the longest in the triangle, had already sunk below the horizon, but the sky still bore a thick blood red and a dazzling light.

It hovered strangely in the final moments of twilight.

For a moment, it was impossible to tell whether the lingering afterglow was caused by the setting sun not yet having set, or whether the lingering afterglow was supporting the setting sun.

But another set of high-hanging "triangular pillars," in which the "Pureroma" began to flow and proliferate wildly, and the pale color began to spread in the beams of light from the "old" ruins.

Moreover, the scenery of the "ring ruins" in all directions, the mountains and plains of the no-man's land, every particle that constitutes the characteristics of things is spreading outward and spreading to each other, and the concepts that distinguish things from each other become blurred, just like a mixed and broken colorful filling.

“Master Fan Ning, the ceremony is about to end. I’ve reserved applause for this masterpiece. Its power as a prayer is no less than that of the previous ‘Revelation of the Secret Realm’.” Mr. F’s congratulatory voice came from six different directions at the same time.

The fragments of the artifact source god's remains that Fan Ning smashed began to move on their own like a pile of snails, transforming into clumps of temporary, colorful, unidentified matter.

The shapes vaguely exhibit certain characteristics: scraps from a penitential chair, broken cups and saucers, a shriveled mask, a shattered peacock candlestick, and an oracle.
“Master Fanning, stop wasting your energy smashing things. I’ve seen your score in multiple timelines. The design of the two hammer blows, the first one in measure 336, does have some significance for Pogorelich, but the second one in measure 479 is a bit...not very meaningful.”

"The ceremony is almost over. The 'seven witnesses' have already been witnessed. I've said before that the Source Gods are nothing but figments of imagination and distortion under the 'Phantom Man Secret Technique.' Their true face in the 0th history has long lost the meaning of verification. You smashed them into pieces, but they were already 'remains' to begin with."

“But the ‘old days’ are not quite the same?” Fan Ning seemed to smile with a hint of melancholy.

"of course."

Mr. F adjusted his top hat and returned the smile.

"Or to be more precise, the 'old days' were no different from other ruins, but the 'old days' of today are quite different after you've handled them all these years. Do you understand what I mean?"

(End of this chapter)