After exchanging a few words with Klein, Leyton got up and walked towards the cabin, intending to ask Bernadette about the dream behind the door deep within the temple.
As soon as he stepped out of the stairwell, he saw Cattleya hesitating at the door, her right hand raised but not yet knocking. She seemed to be still deciding whether to knock.
Noticing footsteps from the stairwell behind her, she turned back in surprise, and seeing that it was Leyton, she seemed to relax, then turned her gaze away.
When Leyton approached, he met her gaze, then stepped past her and raised his hand to knock on the door.
Thump! Thump! The knocking sounded, but there was no response from inside the room.
Cattleya looked at the unresponsive room in front of her, her expression slightly crestfallen.
After a brief pause, she asked, "Why are you here?"
"There are some things I wish to inquire about." As he spoke, Leyton had already reached out and distorted the doorknob.
Click!
The door was pushed open directly. Leyton stepped aside, indicating that they could enter.
Cattleya stood at the doorway, looking inside. Apart from some idle fishing nets, harpoons, canvas, and other tools, there was nothing else in the room, and no one standing by the window.
Seeing that Cattleya made no move, Leyton stepped into the room first, saying, "In my homeland, not speaking generally means tacit consent."
"Tacit consent?" Cattleya murmured, and followed him into the room.
Thick, green vines suddenly descended from above their heads, covering the surrounding area like a downpour. They intertwined and rapidly formed a forest, layer upon layer, with no end in sight.
In the center of the verdant forest, Bernadette, dressed in an olive-green long dress and an old-fashioned black soft hat with a fine mesh veil covering her face, sat quietly at a desk. To her right was an open book.
She looked at Leyton and Cattleya with interest, and said with a hint of doubt in her tone:
"In Feynapotter, does not speaking mean tacit consent?"
"No, that's just a custom of a small place." Leyton explained with a somewhat awkward smile.
Bernadette didn't dwell on the question, her gaze fell on Leyton, and she said in a calm tone:
"Your mental state has recovered very well, better than I expected. You seem to have already prepared a certain number of anchors for yourself?"
"Just some necessary preparations." Leyton admitted the question frankly. After a brief pause, he continued, "I want to ask you about the dream left by the Ancient Sun God deep within that temple."
Bernadette didn't seem surprised by Leyton's question. She nodded calmly, then asked:
"Are you looking for a way to enter the Forsaken Land of the Gods? What attracts you there? Or rather, what attracts the Hidden Sage there?"
"With the help of the seals left by the Seven Gods, that place can cut off the Hidden Sage's connection with me, ensuring that I won't be assimilated by Him the moment I advance."
Leyton briefly stated his intentions, but also held back some information.
Bernadette nodded gently, fell silent for a moment as if thinking, and then said:
"The ritual for advancing to 'Sage' is essentially about establishing a connection with information in the Spirit World that has distinct imprints, is of a very high level, and is exceptionally solid. This ensures that one's own consciousness won't be dispersed by other information for a short period, helping the advancer to initially stabilize their consciousness and gradually gather the scattered and diluted main information torrent."
"The True Creator is isolated in the Forsaken Land of the Gods. He can fulfill the ritual requirements, but as a True God who presides over the Fallen domain, you need to be careful not to be influenced by Him."
Leyton nodded gravely and seriously. He did not explain that his advancement did not require the aid of a ritual, as this would cause unnecessary suspicion in the other party.
After asking Bernadette about the Ancient Sun God's dream before His fall, he bade her farewell and was sent away from the forest woven from countless pea vines by Bernadette.
After Leyton's figure disappeared, the emotions hidden in Cattleya's eyes finally showed.
She looked at Bernadette, who was sitting opposite her, with a complex expression, pressing her lips together. She had originally wanted to say, "You were clearly on the ship, why didn't you show yourself?" but what came out was:
"When we encountered the Death Announcer, did you make a move?"
Bernadette nodded gently and said, "Yes, you handled the matters on the ship very well, so I didn't need to show myself to help."
"But—" Cattleya opened her mouth, but then didn't know what to say.
On the other side, on the deck of the Future, as soon as Leyton walked out of the cabin, he saw Frank squatting nearby, his expression a mix of shock and bewilderment.
Following his gaze, Leyton looked at the deck of the Future. As Frank tapped, the gaps between the deck boards suddenly widened, and a milky white liquid sprayed out, splashing Frank's face.
Frank subconsciously licked the liquid that had gotten on the corner of his mouth. His expression changed from bewilderment to surprise, and he couldn't help but shout loudly:
"The Future is producing milk! It's producing milk!"
His voice attracted the attention of the surrounding pirates. Everyone looked over in surprise, their expressions becoming strange and fearful.
At the same time, the rows of cannons clamped on both sides of the ship's hull also changed. Milky white liquid flowed out of the muzzles, which should have been firing cannonballs, and poured directly into the sea below.
The pirates at the edge of the hull quickly noticed these changes. They pointed in horror at the position of the cannons below and said:
"The muzzles, the muzzles are also spitting milk!"
"Fortunately, the Future isn't a ghost ship, otherwise Frank would have been thrown overboard, right?" Leyton's mouth twitched slightly, and deep blue radiance flowed in his eyes. His gaze swept back and forth across the Future.
Noticing the changes on the ship, Klein, who had rushed over, looked at Frank with a serious expression and asked:
"After the Future is infected, will they then infect the people on the ship?"
Frank thought seriously for a moment and said, "Theoretically, yes—"
Thump!
Before he could finish his sentence, he was suddenly kicked aside by a figure who rushed over, tumbling several times across the deck, leaving behind puddles of white milk.
Nina, wearing a linen shirt and a dark blue jacket, glared angrily at Frank, her chest heaving from the intense movement.
Without giving Frank time to react, as soon as she stood steady, she cursed angrily:
"What the hell are you researching?! Do you think my chest isn't big enough?!"
"Hurry up and deal with them!"
"...Alright." Frank patted his backside and stood up from the deck.
He took out a bottle of dark green powder from his Pregnant and grabbed a large handful, chanting a Jotun incantation while sprinkling the powder around.
"Wait a—" Before Leyton could finish his sentence, Frank had already completed the casting motion.
As soon as the dark green powder touched the deck, it immediately sprouted greenish-blue vines. These vines grew wildly, quickly absorbing the milk on the Future and the things that produced the milk.
Frank was about to say that the problem was solved, but his face suddenly turned very ugly, and he shouted somewhat urgently, "They, they've mutated too!"
As if receiving ample nourishment, the greenish-blue vines quickly wrapped around the entire Future. In just a few seconds, the Future turned into a moving forest of greenish-blue.
Leyton sighed slightly, and warned in a serious tone:
"This sea area is filled with the residual aura of the Earth Mother. Do not use Beyonder abilities from the Earth domain here; they will all undergo uncontrollable mutations."
Hearing Leyton's words, Frank's eyes lit up, then he clasped his hands together, making a gesture of holding a baby, and said:
"Praise be to You, Merciful Mother!"
Then he bent down and devoutly kissed the vines on the light deck.
"You truly are devout..." Anderson, who witnessed this scene from the side, exclaimed with a twitching mouth.
At this moment, a Sailor staggered over, covering his head in horror and shouting:
"I... I grew a watermelon on my head!"
Boom!
A huge slapping sound rang out, and the entire Future shook twice, as if some giant object was attacking the ship's hull.
The staggering Sailor lost his balance and fell onto the deck. The watermelon that had grown on his head instantly shattered, revealing a milky white "brain" full of grooves inside, and scarlet liquid like blood flowed out of the watermelon.
The Sailor's body instantly stiffened, losing all signs of life. The Beyonder characteristic on his body also rapidly precipitated at this moment and began to condense.
Boom! Boom!
Two more loud bangs, and another huge gray-black arm stretched out from the sea. Two arms from different directions slapped the Future, trying to drag the Future into the sea.
On the deck, Leyton slightly raised his right hand, and one star after another emerged around him, densely packed and dazzling.
These stars scattered rays of light, converging into a magnificent pillar of light that enveloped everything around them. The greenish-blue vines entangling the Future were quickly dissolved by the starlight, collapsing and dissipating.
Pure and brilliant starlight quickly Purified all discordant auras on the Future.
The two huge gray-black arms hissed under the starlight, and a mixed smell of decay and burning spread with the faint black smoke.
The entire Future suddenly became transparent, then illusory, turning into a pile of foam.
These bubbles, under the midday sun, reflected dreamy colors, drifting everywhere and vanishing in an instant.
The huge gray-black palms grabbed at empty space. With the disappearance of the Future, the massive shadow that had been hidden beneath the sea surface also revealed its True appearance.
It was a monster composed of countless wriggling flesh and shadows, as if patched together from countless grayish-black corpses. Two withered arms like dry wood seemed to belong to a giant, but the body behind them had a scaly fish body, a lizard-like remnant torso, and distorted human corpses. They were piled up in layers, haphazardly forming a floating island of flesh.
From the seams where different corpses were joined, streams of yellowish-green gas spewed out, spreading outwards, seemingly intending to envelop the surrounding area.
On the other side, the Future, which had just been taken a certain distance away by Leyton, was quickly caught up by these yellowish-green gases.
Cough! Cough, cough!
The Sailors who remained on the deck immediately started coughing, coughing more and more violently, unable even to straighten their backs.
Whoosh!
The hazy cosmos rubbed against the air as if it were solid, stirring up a brilliant storm that quickly dispersed and Purified the yellowish-green gas approaching the Future.
As the yellowish-green gas in the air dissipated, everyone on the deck once again clearly saw the huge, gray-black monster made of pieced-together flesh approaching them.
Dense strands of hair suddenly grew between the monster's corpses. The hair was deep black with a hint of dark green, forming a deep black tide that rapidly approached the Future.
"What kind of monster is this?" Klein frowned and asked. His Spiritual Perception felt numbness, extreme poison, madness, decay... countless negative effects from those deep black and greenish hairs.