Sword of Dawnbreaker

Chapter 1138: Chapter 1137: An Unexpected Exchange Between Gods

When Amon realized it, he had already been standing for a long time in front of the interface that filled his vision, which was quickly refreshing and changing. During this process, countless pieces of information continued to flow endlessly. Significant events from various regions slid past his eyes under the automatic refresh mechanism until he realized that these quickly refreshing items could actually be stopped with just a thought, or he could scroll through their history records at will.

He soon became immersed in the novelty of browsing the news and viewing various public discussion forums.

In Pompeii, north of Rocky Ridges Fortress, a new rune factory is under construction. In the Sorin region, reorganized families of the Healer have welcomed this summer’s first baby—a healthy baby. The direct railway to the Sacred Dragon Kingdom has begun construction, magnificent snowy scenes from the northern mountains have been reported, and to the south, the summer afternoon fields are already waving with wheat.

On a "section" directly under the command of the Imperial Administrative Office, Amon saw a map updating in real-time. It depicted the entire territory of the Cecil Empire, displaying the weather changes every moment on this vast land. The temperature and weather change colors and icons fluctuated as if alive on the screen, and in one corner, he saw a line of text:

The data is calculated in real-time by the Servo Brain, in a technical trial phase for demonstration purposes only.

Amon did not know what a "Servo Brain" was, but in those ever-changing patterns, he could indeed feel an indescribable... vitality, a vitality that transcends the individual, beyond the moment. He pondered for a long time before realizing that this vitality came from every individual connected to this network, and from today’s entire mortal civilization. In all the years of his memory, mortal civilization had never grown as vibrant as it is now, throbbing like a strong heart.

"Great... truly great..."

The former God of Nature couldn’t help but express admiration, a smile appearing on his face. In all honesty, what he saw now didn’t mean much to a former god. When he could still hear the prayers of his followers, countless elves and a small number of human believers channeled their minds and faith toward the god. By reading this information, Amon could always grasp the changes throughout the Silver Empire and even parts of the human territories, especially changes involving the domain of nature. Although what he "saw" at that time appeared differently, its content was not much different from the information flowing in the neural network.

But this is precisely what touched and even shocked him the most about the whole affair—it was something he could do before, and that was due to the power of a god. But today, mortals have achieved almost the same thing, relying on their own wisdom. And now, who can use these once-divine abilities?

Anyone can—as long as you can afford the Immersion Capsule equipment. In today’s Cecil, the usage costs for these new devices are decreasing at an astonishing speed every day. In some areas, the Administrative Office even allocates a large amount of funds to subsidize the public, allowing these "basic facilities" to spread throughout society as quickly as possible.

With these complex thoughts swirling in his mind, Amon’s attention continued to roam those continuously refreshing messages. The feeling of connecting to the neural network was completely different from watching Magic Web programs. This wonderful sense of immersion and immediacy delighted him to no end, and just then, a newly appeared message caught his attention:

"The alliance fleet bound for Talronde set sail today from the Empire’s Northport, with Marshal of the Navy Byron Kirk personally commanding the powerful magic flagship ’Winter’ to carry out the escort mission—the fleet is carrying the first batch of aid materials and support teams to the Dragon Kingdom. His Majesty Gawain Cecil, the Empire’s Sovereign, along with the allied nations of Loren providing aid, send blessings to Talronde, hoping that the alliance’s banner will forever illuminate our allies..."

A large amount of related information entered Amon’s view under the expandable entry of this message. In content apparently compiled by official scholars of the Empire, about half of the text was devoted to introducing basic common knowledge about Talronde to the public, explaining that "dragons," long thought to be mere legend, are actually a real species. The remaining text was split between discussing the composition of the Alliance Countries and introducing concepts of magic-conducting machinery ships and long-distance ocean navigation.

Evidently, the intent of these entries was to "dispel ignorance," with scholars making their best effort to use simple language to impart some basic knowledge about the world to the public. If placed in the old days, this level of knowledge would undoubtedly be the exclusive privilege of "upper society members."

But for Amon, what he focused more on was Talronde itself—he lingered for a long time on the picture accompanying the news, which was evidently taken at the distant Northport dock. The image showed an imposing steel ship slowly departing amidst a cheering crowd, and further away, the entire fleet could be seen already on the sea. Beyond the fleet, the ocean, once obscured by the Eternal Storm’s cloud wall, was now vast and endless under the clear sky.

As the former main deity of the elves, Amon was not familiar with what had happened in Talronde, but as a god, he had long sensed the presence of the Dragon God from the ripples spreading from the "deep sea" at the world’s foundation. That vast, ancient, chaotic, and twisted being stood like a dazzling lighthouse in the dark depths of the sea. Though trapped in Talronde, its "ripples" covered the entire world and were sensed by every deity in the world.

The gods cannot directly communicate, but through resonance in the deep sea depths, they are able to confirm each other’s existence. In all of Amon’s memories, since the day of his birth, the Dragon God’s mighty radiance has been ever-present, like the natural order of this world, impossible to ignore.

Now, this oldest flame has finally been extinguished.

Amon could not help feeling emotional. Although he had already known of Talronde’s fall and the oldest deity’s demise when watching the live broadcast of the alliance meeting, he hadn’t thought too much at the time. Only now, seeing the fleet that was heading to aid the Dragon Kingdom, did he suddenly feel the world’s change following the divine fall—and consequently think of the Silver Empire through three millennia of ups and downs.

He lingered in front of this message for a long time before finally remembering something and awkwardly opened the comment section below it using his thoughts. A massive number of dazzling comments then entered his view—even though the neural network was still in its early stages, the comments below this news were shockingly numerous, indicating that the fleet heading north had already attracted the attention of countless people in the Empire. Amon’s eyes scanned those comments, finding that most were blessings for the fleet’s safety, or wishes for Talronde to quickly come out of its crisis. The rest were asking about dragons and that northern continent.

Almost nobody was concerned with the fallen deity on that continent—for the mortals of the Loren Continent, a god of another race and another land probably wasn’t worth their attention, or perhaps they were simply unaware of the Dragon God’s existence.

Amon hesitated for a moment, pondering whether what he was about to do might violate some "taboo," but the words of Goddess of Magic that remained in his mind reassured him. Considering that all he was doing was possibly under observation anyway, he calmed down and left a message at the bottom of the page:

"Guardian of Talronde, please travel well, you did your best, and have already done your best."

Seeing the words he had in mind turn into text on the interface, Amon felt a sense of novelty and couldn’t help but murmur to himself. He didn’t mention the Dragon God’s name or include any religious implications in the message, so... it shouldn’t alert that "highly difficult" network administrator as mentioned by Goddess of Magic, right?

He pondered for a moment, and after a few seconds, when nothing—a white spider with eight legs or an old man carrying a lantern—appeared to give him trouble, he finally relaxed. With a self-mocking smile, he shook his head and was about to exit the array of interfaces before him to explore other areas of this dream city—he had already spent too much time on this square.

But just as he was about to proceed, a synthesized voice suddenly echoed in his mind, stopping him: "A user has responded to your message just now. Do you want to check it?"

Amon paused and instinctively chose to view the content in his mind, and then a new interface appeared in his "vision." It displayed a dialogue format like a message board, with a neural network user named "Tea Egg" sending him a message consisting of just one word: "Thanks."

Amon stared at this seemingly random message in surprise. He couldn’t fathom what there was to be thankful for in his statement of emotional reflection, so he asked out of curiosity: "Why say thanks?"

Meanwhile, his attention also landed on the peculiar name of the sender—what kind of thing is "Tea Egg"? It seemed like an awkwardly assembled phrase, some kind of food? Or a way of processing food?

The former God of Nature was utterly confused, but he realized that in this incredible neural network, many people indeed have quirky names. If names as odd as "Tea Egg" can seriously be considered as names... then perhaps "Highspeed Stag" isn’t so unacceptable?

Amon relaxed a bit, but found that the sender "Tea Egg" had not sent any new messages, and his question was like a stone sunk into the sea, without a response.

Perhaps they have already left... After all, not everyone, like him or Goddess of Magic, has nothing to do all day and can stay in the yard. Other users in the neural network are busy in the real world.

Amon felt he had found the answer, and slightly regretfully closed the communication interface. Once it vanished, the square with the towering oak returned to his sight.

Goddess of Magic still hadn’t returned, and probably didn’t intend to come back. The girl named Patty had also left the bench by the shrubbery, seeing this, Amon shook his head and left the tall pillar, randomly choosing a direction to walk slowly.

This vast city needed to be explored with heart, and he didn’t plan to dash around like Goddess of Magic using teleportation—that would be disrespectful to the mortals who created the city. Of course, mainly because Goddess of Magic didn’t teach him how to use the teleportation function in the dream city when she left...

...

Deep within the Cecil Palace, in the brightly lit hatching room, a set of specially designed Magic Web Equipment was operating steadily. It mainly consisted of an indoor Magic Web Terminal and a hemisphere device less than a meter in diameter connected to the terminal. At this moment, the Magic Web Terminal projected the words "Neural Coupler in process", and the runes on the surface of the hemisphere pulsed gently like breathing. Inside the two devices, the rune trigger and neural coupler emitted a pleasant humming sound.

Not far from the two devices, on the pedestal in the center of the room, a light gold dragon egg stood quietly. Runes on the surface of the dragon egg slowly drifted, faintly resonating with the magical power of the nearby neural coupler.

How long this resonance lasted was unknown, but eventually, the continuous humming sound quieted down, and the connection between the golden egg’s runes and the neural coupler was severed. Betty, who had been napping nearby, happened to wake up, rubbing her befuddled eyes: "Ah, Lady Enya! You’re awake?"

"I wasn’t sleeping," Enya’s voice came from the golden egg, "I was just browsing the contents inside the neural network... It’s indeed an interesting thing."

Her words had just dropped when the hatching room’s door was pushed open from outside, and Gawain walked in, casually saying: "To receive a ’interesting’ evaluation from you is quite a high compliment for the yet immature neural network. Those Node Scholars and Mage Technicians who burn the midnight oil should be delighted."

Betty quickly stepped forward with a joyful smile to greet Gawain, and then bowed her head: "Ah, you asked me to check Lady Enya’s condition, but I accidentally fell asleep..."

Gawain lightly tapped Betty’s hair, signaling the girl to rest. Enya, with a smile in her voice, said: "You just returned from Sorinburg?"

"Returned a while ago." Gawain, approaching Enya, said casually.

"What about the Little Elf Empress?" Enya asked with some curiosity, "Did she return with you? Or did she go straight back to her Elf Kingdom?"

"She returned, for some important arrangements, but she’ll be back soon." Gawain replied.

"Is that so... From here to the Silver Empire is not close. For the ruler of an empire to cross continents back and forth twice in such a short time, what she does indeed seems important."

"Yes, she is going to draw the final curtain for the elves’ Age of Mythology..." Gawain said, suddenly curious, "Why did you suddenly start paying attention to her? Have you become interested in elves?"

"No, I just saw a bit of Heragor’s shadow in her, though only a little bit," Enya said softly, "They are both ushering in the end of the Age of Mythology, yet facing different fates... I hope they both succeed."