Deep Sea Embers

But just before he was about to speak, he suddenly saw the flickering blood light in Dog’s eyes. Although he could not see any emotional changes from the bone skull, he seemed to be able to feel the fierce and turbulent mood of this dark hound.

In the next second, he heard Dog’s stammering voice come out: “You… You’re the ‘Mr. Duncan’ we’ve been dealing with these past two days?”

Duncan was taken aback by the comment since he didn’t introduce himself to the hound. Glancing down at Shirley and the chain connecting the pair, he’s sure they didn’t speak just now. So, that leaves only one answer: they’re able to communicate through some sort of information-sharing ability.

“It’s me,” Duncan said gently, “do you need me to explain anything? Or do you have something you want to know?”

“No!” Dog almost screamed, and his whole body was squirming, “We don’t need to know any ‘knowledge’ or ‘truth’. We have no intention of prying into your secrets!”

“…… I always feel that there is still some misunderstanding between us, but it appears to be getting more difficult to clear things up.” Duncan sighed, shaking his head in a helpless manner, “Forget it, let’s use time to build up some mutual trust between us. As for now, I have something I want to know.”

Dog hung his head down: “You… please speak.”

Duncan frowned. He was actually very curious as to why his main body, who was famous in the real world, had such a great influence among demons. In his impression, the deep sea was a “place” that’s very close to the subspace. If going by that logic, a shadow demon shouldn’t hold such intense fear towards him, the mobile natural disaster of the sea.

However, it now seems that the demons, who are themselves “dangerous existences” to humans, are just as afraid of losing their homeland as humans do, which puzzled him.

However, before he figures out this problem, he must first resolve this nightmare inside Shirley’s dream world.

“I want to know about this dream,” Duncan said, his gaze falling on Shirley, “I know it’s a painful memory for you, and if you don’t want to say it, you can refuse.”

“…… There’s nothing I don’t want to say,” Shirley just shook her head slightly, “I should thank you. If you hadn’t interrupted this nightmare, I would’ve kept suffering…. As you can see, that’s what I went through eleven years ago.”

“Fire eh…” Duncan nodded, then shifted his attention back to Dog, “What I saw was your first ‘encounter’ with Shirley, right?”

Dog flinched sideways to avoid contact: “I was just a common shadow demon at the time.”

“Then how did you suddenly gain a ‘heart’?” Duncan asked curiously, “As far as I can tell, you almost killed Shirley back there.”

“…… I don’t know,” Dog fell silent for a few seconds, shaking his ugly skull in a loss. “When I first became self-aware, Shirley was already dying on the ground.”

Duncan took in a deep breath and deepened his gaze at the hound, then eyed the chain linking the guy with half of Shirley’s body.

“After that, both of you became fused together?”

“Sort of,” Shirley murmured, hanging her head and hiding the expression under her hair.

“Actually, I don’t remember exactly what happened during this period. I was only six years old at the time, and then I spent a long while afterward just surviving through each day…. If you’re really curious about how I got into this relationship with a shadow demon who almost killed me, you can grab a psychiatrist and hypnotize me. Maybe…”

“You don’t have to.” Shirley’s words were suddenly interrupted, and then she felt a large palm resting on top of her head.

It felt so warm to the touch….

“Sorry, I’m not trying to reveal your scars. I just want to know the details from eleven years ago.” Duncan gently soothed the girl’s head, understanding the question may be unpleasant for the child. “You should know that it wasn’t just the sun fragment that appeared eleven years ago, but also countless cultists that ravaged the city. Theoretically, it should have been a member of the Annihilation Sect who summoned the dark hounds.”

Shirley raised her head in a daze, only to be brought back to attention by Duncan’s continuing deduction: “A demonic creature from the deep sea suddenly acquired its own consciousness, which in itself is a mutation. Have you ever considered this mutation might be the inducement of a certain thing back then?”

Shirley blinked, a little slow in grasping the meaning, “The sun fragment?”

“I’m not sure… No one knows what form or power the sun fragments have, but in the teachings propagated by the suntists are that it doesn’t give humanity to other items or things.” Duncan shook his head, “So what caused Dog to gain a sense of awareness may be something other than the sun fragment… something else entirely.”

“You mean that there may be more than just the sun fragments that appeared in Pland eleven years ago?!” Shirley finally woke up from her confused daze, her eyes widening in shock.

“Just a little theory,” Duncan patted Shirley lightly on the shoulder before withdrawing his hand, “I always felt that something was wrong with the whole story. A big contradiction in the matter. If the sun fragment is a holy relic pointing to the Suntists, its power should be straightforward according to the descriptions of those lunatics. But the chaos eleven years ago didn’t fit into that box. According to the documents leaked by the officials, the cultists they captured included Annihilators and Enders. Why would members of the other cults get involved if the incident was caused by the Suntists?”

“Of course, it can also be explained that the power of the sun fragments is so great that even people who do not believe in the sun god are affected, making them go crazy on the same day. But this can’t explain the strange phenomenon like Dog here.”

“Now, let’s go further than that. Looking at it from the above angle, there are too many suspicious points that we’ve overlooked. This includes the veiled curtain hanging over the ‘fire’ and the fact that the memory remained inside you and Nina’s mind. How can only a select few remember the weird phenomena in the sixth block…. We’ve always attributed the cause of all things to the sun fragment, but is that really true? Can you honestly believe the sun fragment is that omnipotent?”

Duncan expressed the doubts in his heart, and some of the doubts actually arose before today’s event. However, it was only after seeing the change in Dog from eleven years ago that he’s become firmer in his theory.

The fire eleven years ago may have been caused by the sun fragment, but there was definitely something else at play in the whole event!

Shirley still didn’t fully catch onto the whole theory. She was actually not very good at thinking about these complex things. In her stunned state, Dog’s voice rang rapidly: “Shirley, are you okay? Did he just touch your head to release a curse? Are you still sane? You…”

“I’m okay,” Shirley replied with a whine, “Dog, you’re too nervous~”

“Nonsense, how can I not be nervous! You had direct contact with a source of corruption that can turn any sane person mad!” Dog’s mental voice flew into dread, “How are you feeling?”

Shirley thought about it and touched the top of her head unsurely. From as far as she could remember, the last time someone stroked her hair like this was when she was still a child. Back then, her mom used to do this a lot before putting her to bed.

“It’s warm….” She spoke softly in a trance.

Dog was dumbfounded: “Shirley, something is really wrong with your brain now.”

“…… You shut up!”

Duncan didn’t know what Dog and Shirley were talking about in their internal link, but he had something else he wanted to check out. Glancing up at the dim window with the reddish hue, he asked: “What’s out there?”

“Huh?” Shirley didn’t react in time and blurted this out.

Duncan raised his hand and pointed to the window: “Outside the room, what’s out there?”

“I… I don’t know,” Shirley blinked, suddenly realizing that she’s never once stepped outside this room where the nightmare haunted her. “I never thought about it. Every time I dream, I am stuck in this room…”

“But now you’re free,” Duncan walked to the door and swung around. To the girl, his words were no different from a temptation, “Don’t you want to try, see what’s at the edge of your dream?”