Forests Don't Support Idle Goblins

"This name..." Charles pursed his lips; it sounded so familiar.

I feel like I've heard this somewhere before...

Suddenly, he remembered something. "Don't you have... a follower with a crawling claw?"

"The Crawling Claw?" Spencer thought for two seconds, then immediately nodded. "There is one. You mean the Horse King, right?"

"Horse King?" Charles was taken aback. "What's that?"

"My servant, a crawling claw, of course, wasn't before. After I came to the Material World, I found myself a coachman. His name is..." Spencer closed his two large, vertical pupils and thought carefully for a moment, "Sorry, it's been a while, I've forgotten a bit."

"Uh, he..." Charles didn't know what to say for a moment, but he really wanted to complain in his heart, "Little paw, your master has even forgotten your name."

"Oh, right, his name is Lula," Spencer clenched his fist and waved his hand, seemingly pleased that he had come up with a name. "Later, Lula was quite good at driving a carriage back then, and he even told me that he should be the 'Horse King,' and that all the horses were willing to obey his commands."

At this point, Spencer sighed, "But you know, I later became a lich, so his black carriage could only carry one coffin."

Uh, that thing must be a hearse, Ciel forced a knowing smile.

"Later, when Rula got old and fell ill, he didn't want to leave me before he died, so I had no choice but to transform him into a crawling claw, specifically to drive the carriage."

"Oh, I see." Charles waved his hand, smiling politely, but a scene involuntarily flashed through his mind—

On the road in the early morning, several travelers were making their way to their destination. Because they had missed their stop, they had to travel at night. Suddenly, they heard the jingling of carriage bells behind them. Just as the travelers turned around, a black carriage pulled by four black horses burst out of the mist and stopped in front of them in the pale moonlight.

In the lamps hanging beside the carriage, green flames, like will-o'-the-wisps, were burning on candles, and in the driver's seat, a skeletal hand was holding the reins.

As the travelers frantically grabbed each other, trying to escape immediately, the carriage door suddenly opened with a bang. To everyone's horror, they saw that the carriage was empty except for a luxurious coffin.

With a creak, the coffin lid was quickly pushed open, and the travelers watched with trembling legs as a thin body sat up from the coffin. Then the creature slowly turned its head, making a soft "creaking" sound.

"Hello, excuse me, I'd like to ask for directions, could you tell me where I'm going..." The man stared with two huge, green, vertical pupils, then paused for two seconds before grinning with a mouth full of sharp teeth, "Sorry, I've forgotten where I'm going."

“Now that you mention it, I’m a little confused,” Spencer’s words interrupted Charles’s reverie. “I didn’t see the Horse King when I woke up. Logically, he should have been guarding my ‘bed’.”

"Uh, I," Charles stammered for a moment, but quickly smiled apologetically and said, "I'm not sure if the Crawling Claw I know is your servant, but I can bring him to meet you."

"However," he paused, then looked at the lizardman lich with some suspicion, "as far as I know, the Claw of the Creeping wouldn't have lived that long. You really... were you in that floating city?"

"What, you don't believe me?" Spencer grinned slightly.

"It would be a lie to say I have no doubts, after all, that city existed 5000 years ago, but you also..."

“That’s right, I’m definitely not that old, I don’t even have a lifespan of 500 years.” Spencer nodded, confirming Charles’s guess. “But I did go to Avalon. When I rushed out of the abyss, I was unexpectedly caught in a time turbulence.”

"Wait," Charles quickly waved his hand, "I know Avalon, you said it's the name of the floating city, but what is the Abyss? And what is the Temporal Turbulence?"

As a graduate of the Royal Grammar School of the Kingdom of Fran, and having worked as an administrative assistant for a time while also helping his father manage the territory's affairs, having seen countless goods and travelers, Charles began to doubt this world for the first time.

"The Abyss is an interlayer." Spencer smiled, but seeing that Charles was still frowning and looked completely clueless about what he was talking about, he could only sigh. "It seems that these things haven't spread to the material world yet."

After saying that, he stretched out one hand, and his black, sharp claws slashed in the air a few times. Two small pieces of bone floated up not far away.

The two bone fragments slowly floated to Ciel's front, hovering in the air, forming a shape that fit together vertically.

"I don't know if you've heard of the Eternal Brightness Plane and the Eternal Darkness Plane," Spencer said, pointing to the two bone fragments.

"I know that," Charles nodded immediately. "The Eternal Bright Plane is said to be bathed in light all year round, with no night, while the Eternal Dark Plane is dark all year round, and you can only see your surroundings when a huge lightning bolt streaks across the sky."

"Not bad," Spencer said, hands behind his back, giving Charles a deep look. "It's a bit surprising that a goblin would know this."

Charles didn't answer, but just smiled mysteriously.

"It's fine if you don't want to talk about it; everyone has their own secrets," the lizardman lich wagged his finger, then asked, "Do you know what these two planes are like?"

"You mean..." Charles's gaze was led by Spencer's finger to the two floating bone fragments, "These are two dimensions?"

"right."

"But," Charles stared at the bone fragments in mid-air, "is this plane... a relative plane?"

“It’s flat, but not relative,” Spencer smiled, “it’s opposite.”

He drew a circle above the bone fragment with his finger. "If this side is the Yongming Plane, then on the bone fragment on the back..."

As he spoke, he drew a circle on the side of the bone fragment facing the ground, saying, "This side is the Eternal Dark Dimension."

"They're opposite." Charles stared at the two bone fragments and muttered, "Isn't this supposed to be a flat earth with a round sky? No wonder there's no sunrise in the east and sunset in the west, but only eternal light and darkness."

"Hmm, your description is surprisingly apt." The lizardman lich looked at the goblin in front of him with some surprise, and the slight disdain in his eyes gradually disappeared.

"Then, the people in these two planes, their lives..." Charles frowned, looking at the two bone fragments in the air.

However, before the other party could explain, Charles waved his hand and said, "I understand."

His tone was somewhat calm, but the lizardman lich could still discern the emotions within it. Charles, on the other hand, was simply recalling the situation in the Eternal Dark Plane that the Tauren Bloodhoof tribe had mentioned. It now seemed indeed not optimistic, and the Eternal Bright Plane probably wasn't much better off either.

"So, between the two planes," seeing that Charles didn't say anything more, Spencer stretched out his finger and inserted it between the two bone fragments, continuing his explanation, "this place is..."

"The Abyss?" Charles raised an eyebrow, his eyes fixed on the narrow gap.

"Yes, you're right." The lizardman lich nodded.

"But why is it named Abyss?" Ciel asked, somewhat puzzled.

"Because," Spencer slowly inhaled and then exhaled, as if talking to himself, "there are many spacetime rifts there. If a creature gets caught in one, it will disappear completely and can never be found again."

"Can't be retrieved?"

"Yes, of course, there's one situation where it can be retrieved," the lizardman lich chuckled, "that is, the spacetime rift disappears the moment you enter it..."

As he spoke, he clasped his hands together, indicating that the rift would simply shrink into a single point and then disappear. "After it disappears, if your body hasn't had time to pass through, it will leave a remnant in the same spot."

"Huh? Isn't that it?"

"Yes, you're dead, but at least a part of your body can be recovered." Spencer smiled. "Of course, if you want to try, you can first put your arm into the crevice, so when it disappears, you'll only be missing an arm."

"That joke isn't funny at all." Charles frowned, looking at the smiling lizardman.

"You're very kind," Spencer nodded with a smile, "but there's no other way. I have to squeeze through the crevice, or I'll end up on the stake."

"But that would mean death, and who would want to burn you alive?"

"The other lizardmen," Spencer said calmly.

"Lizardmen?" Charles was taken aback, then he immediately realized, "You mean, here..."

He pointed between the two bone fragments and asked with some surprise, "Do lizardmen live here?"

"right."

"No wonder there isn't a single lizardman in this world, yet there are legends about them; they're all hiding here."

“Yes, that’s the kingdom of the lizardmen,” Spencer chuckled. “Surprising, isn’t it?”

"Indeed, it's quite unexpected," Charles said with a smile. "Why are they living here? Did they originally live in the material plane? And why did they want to kill you?"

The three consecutive questions proved that he had a strong interest in this area. Moreover, he seemed to have heard the Skeleton Warrior, Mr. Elton, say that when the Holy Kingdom still existed, lizardmen would do business with kobolds, giving them some hard objects and then taking back their excrement to hunt and fish. This proved that at least 5000 years ago, lizardmen lived in this plane.

But why did it disappear?

"Let me answer one by one," Spencer said, taking a few steps in front of Charles with his hands behind his back. Then he turned back apologetically and said, "I'm sorry, too much time has passed. I need to recall."

"Ah, no, no, it's nothing." Charles quickly waved his hand. The lizardman lich in front of him was surprisingly polite. If you ignored his appearance, he should be one of those well-educated people, even similar to the lecturers on the podium of the grammar academy.

However, the lich's tail, full of joints, that swirls behind it is impossible to ignore.

"The story begins with the Day of Annihilation," the lizardman lich said slowly after a few minutes' pause.

However, he was interrupted by Charles, "Wait a minute, what is 'The Day of Annihilation'?"

"The Day of Annihilation is a great cataclysm recorded by the Lizardmen," Spencer stated calmly. "Of course, this only exists in the records of the Lizardmen; I have never heard of such a claim in human society."

"Is that so?" Charles frowned.

"On that day, the world changed dramatically. Many creatures died or disappeared, and the rest were gripped by panic. They hid in their closets, under carriages, in cellars, or even in makeshift burrows, hoping to escape the disaster."

"It sounds rather tragic." Charles stroked his chin, trying to recall the knowledge he had in his memory.

“Yes, the Lizardmen’s clay tablets describe the situation back then. The word ‘tragic’ doesn’t even begin to describe it.” Spencer shook his head as he spoke. “Back then, the Lizardmen’s ancestors used magic to immediately teleport to this interlayered area, intending to escape the catastrophe that swept the entire world.”

"Did they say who caused it, or who died?"

"No," the lizardman lich chuckled. "I'm sorry, but lizardmen aren't a very good race at recording history. It's already quite impressive that they managed to carve these things onto clay tablets."

"I see..." Charles frowned slightly, but did not interrupt the other party.

“After that, the lizardmen have lived in this area. According to legend, most of their people moved here,” Spencer said, pointing to the bone fragments in mid-air. “They survived there.”

"It's already pretty good that we escaped the disaster," Charles said with a smile.

"No," the lizardman lich shook his head, "this area is not as comfortable as you imagine."

"Because of those, spacetime rifts?"

"That's only one aspect. There's no light in this area, not even a ray," Spencer sighed. "Fortunately, our ancestors brought a lot of things with them, including several kinds of luminous mushrooms."

"If there's no light, then even food..."

“Yes,” Spencer glanced at the goblins, “so they quickly started planting, growing mushrooms, and in order to survive, they had to try growing the poisonous mushrooms of the mushroom people, simply because those mushrooms can grow to enormous sizes.”

"A mushroom from a mushroom-man?" Charles raised an eyebrow, recalling the small piece of mushroom that the evil book had eaten earlier, which had caused it to "lose" a third of its weight.

"Yes, and then these mushrooms were used to cultivate larger organisms, which gradually survived."

"Then why kill you?" Charles looked at the lizardman lich, somewhat puzzled. In this situation, every member of the workforce should be valued.

"Me?" Spencer smiled. "Because I studied magic."

"magic?"

"Yes, magic is not allowed among the lizardmen. Only the lizardmen's royal family can learn magic, because they are afraid that magic will bring about another cataclysm."

"Then why are you still learning?"

"Sometimes, the more you forbid people from learning something, the more people are willing to try it," Spencer said, blinking his eyes. His green vertical pupils shimmered like jewels in the torchlight.

Chapter 386, "The Day of Annihilation," is now available! Read it now!