Soul of Burning Steel

The life of the light chaser is destined to be bumpy and wandering.

In the twilight area where there is no eternal light shining, the light chasers must drive a huge mobile world city, move after the trajectory of the stars, absorb their light and heat, and in the entire nine days, there are very few stars that can be used by the mobile city Not much, either because it is too close to the Steel Continent, enough to turn everything into ashes, or it is too far away from the mainland, and the light cannot provide enough energy to move the mobile city and maintain the inner world's ecological circle.

Even if you are lucky enough to find a suitable star, because of the terrifying and changeable gravity of the Steel Continent, these blazing suns will fall off the balance line at any time due to its gravity, and then fall to the ground—and at that time, the mobile city must Quickly change direction, avoid this area, and avoid the destruction caused by the crash of stars.

Although it is said that the steel continent will absorb all the kinetic energy that erupts when the star collides with the earth and destroys it, it will not cause a huge earthquake that lasts for several light-hours or even several light-days, and will condense the gas that the star collapsed into a new one. stars, but no matter what, this means that the mobile city will lose its source of energy, and they must set sail as soon as possible, heading to the next star that can be used.

Chasing the light, chasing the stars, sometimes as long as a thousand years, sometimes only for a few decades - the mobile city is a huge steel shell that runs on the continent forever, coming because of the stable operation of the stars, and leaving because of the falling of the stars , and the light chasers are the worms hiding in this shell—for most ordinary light chasers, the gravitational force of the steel continent and the various radiation and pollution from the outside world are enough to threaten their lives , if you are not in the city and accept the protection of the artificial world barrier, ordinary people without supernatural power will die within a few minutes.

Therefore, even in the shining area, there is actually no 'stable'. Even because of the endless glare brought by the dense star clusters, all beings in the shining area do not have to worry about energy problems, but more and denser stars also mean more 'starfalls'-every year, there will be A certain mobile city accidentally encountered a "stellar rain" and was destroyed by hundreds or even thousands of star clusters falling at the same time. This natural disaster occurs almost every day in the shining area.

Stars rise and fall, stars are born and stars fall, on this continent of steel, endless everything is turning and moving, there is no stability at all, and besides the brilliance, there are endless chaotic family members coming from the end of the world. Coming, they are afraid of the light, but they travel in the dusk——all light chasers long for stability, long for eternal and peaceful light, and don't have to be tossed and turned forever in migration and fleeing.

This seemingly inconspicuous wish is a difficult problem that has never been solved by anyone in the history of 100,000 years. Countless people have devoted themselves to astrology and astronomy, or explored the distant places of the stars, trying to find out the laws of the movement of the stars. Want to crack the reason behind all these turmoil, but until now, no one has found the answer.

Even, no one can guess how this world was born and how it was created. According to the model of stars, the basic nature of physics and extraordinary power, the most intelligent scholars of the League of Nations have speculated about the possible birth models of countless worlds, but there has never been any model that can give birth to such a strange and weird world as "Three Realms and Nine Heavens" In this regard, they can only helplessly admit that there may really be a 'creator', a real 'god' in this world.

It's not the gods—the gods of the age of the gods, or they are just "powerful people" who can't even reach the "Nine Heavens", neither the sword world nor the ax world. They are also creatures that chase light.

Therefore, everyone can only push the cause of all this to the Almighty 'Heavenly Father', the creator of the endless steel continent, the creator of all living beings, and call this suffering 'trial'—— Because apart from this, they can't find any other reason.

But now, Alpha Falster, an ordinary astrologer and a well-known explorer in the past, finds that he may be walking on the road to the "truth"-in this remote and dark zone , he saw the black giant star revolving in the center of the world, and also saw countless dazzling stars submerged in it, turning into little flaming lights, like firewood adding fuel to the fire.

"... Anyway, I had no choice. They took my Alice, my daughter and my son. I lost everything except the 'truth'."

The silver-haired middle-aged man smiled wryly. He shook his head, turned around, and looked behind him.

Instead of looking at the advanced exploration ship left behind by Calliss, what Alpha looked at was the origin of the 'hill' under his feet and the ultimate goal of his trip.

He is looking at a 'mountain'.

An extremely huge 'mountain' that is more than 400 million kilometers high, and it takes 24 minutes to travel by light just to go straight up and down. It is even bigger than many stars.

However, on this infinitely huge continent, even such a huge mountain cannot be called the tallest. The 'Datianshen Mountain' in the shining area, the sanctuary where the gods lived in the past, is as high as the time of two lights, But even so, such a mountain peak and the continuous mountains around it are nothing more than the wrinkles on human skin.

——The light chasers live in such a huge world, and they are small, struggling in this world.

It can be seen that at the very top of this mountain, at the highest point that completely surpasses the range of ordinary people's vision, there is an extremely eye-catching tip exposed—it is a sharp prism-shaped object made entirely of silver and luminous crystals. The tip, and this tip is shining like a star, releasing a little bit of starlight.

Alpha stared at this light, he felt the blood in his body was boiling, and an inexplicable induction began to appear... What is this feeling? What exactly is in his blood? Why did I, who had been living in the shining area, feel 'familiar' with the crystal tip on a high mountain in this distant dark zone?

Could it be that he is really not as ordinary as he imagined? Is it because of this that Mr. Carliss chose himself as a student, and what does the so-called "son of the silver goblin" mean?

Countless questions lingered in the tired middle-aged man's mind. However, even after losing his wife, child, and everything he had fought for all his life in the shining area, he hadn't lost his courage and curiosity—he still Haven't lost the blood and impulse in my heart, as well as the determination to move towards 'truth'!

"let's go."

Having said that, taking courage, Alpha once again entered his own exploration ship, and with the light of the jump engine starting to light up, he began to head towards the top of that 'mountain'!

【——Alpha's Exploration Log——】

[In the dark and lifeless area of ​​the no-light area, I found something puzzling. It was a crystal-clear prism tip that was completely made of crystal and released blue light.

It is located on the top of an unnamed mountain, emitting a bright, but cold light without any temperature. I originally took a full set of heat insulation measures, but the result was completely in vain, but this can not be said to be a bad thing, because I can leave the exploration ship. , together with other shipboard artificial intelligences, took tools to observe closely and explore its situation. 】

[After several days of careful investigation, I can finally confirm with astonishment that the shining crystal prism at the top of the mountain is actually the top of a huge crystal obelisk! The bulk of it is buried under mountains, and mountains—all, all! Composed of the corpses of Chaos monsters! Heavenly Father, it is hard to imagine that the main body of such a huge mountain range is actually composed of endless piles of corpses of chaotic monsters. After a long time, these chaotic monsters have lost their strange and maddening toxicity, and have become only A little bit of soil and rock left over from pollution remained, and this obelisk was buried in it.

I am sure that there is a way to enter this obelisk. Mr. Carliss guided me here, there must be a purpose, definitely not just to surprise me, and such a huge obelisk, if it is not for me to enter but It was really too embarrassing for me to dig it out... And for some reason, I felt that something inside this obelisk was attracting me. 】

[After searching for a long time—actually, it took only two and a half hours, I found the way to enter this obelisk. The method is very simple, that is, don't carry any protective equipment, enter the silver cold light, touch the crystal with your own hands, it will naturally inhale me... To be honest, if I don't think the protective clothing is too stuffy, I just prepare to wear it. Breathable, I would never do this. With my strength at the middle level of gold, if I encounter any accidents in the dark zone, I will die without a place to die, but when the cold light shines on me, I will I feel like I can even stop breathing and it will naturally provide me with all the energy I need to stay alive.

There was no other choice anyway, so I got into it. At the moment I was inhaled, I felt that there was an extremely huge force that far surpassed the stars, sweeping my whole body up and down—this power far surpassed the supernova explosion that my teacher and I observed decades ago, enough for a Instantly wipe out tens of thousands of mobile world cities. Come to think of it, those Chaos Familia must have touched the crystal obelisk rashly, so they were wiped out. It took tens of thousands of years or even longer to pile up and bury the entire obelisk in it. 】

[And I found that the light in this crystal is transforming my body—I gradually don’t need to breathe, and the feeling of hunger and thirst has disappeared. I can feel that the energy around me is gradually getting closer to me, but with At the same time, my ears began to become sharper, my skin began to look a bit like metal, and my need for energy increased greatly... This should be the ability of high-level gold, or even extreme-level elementalization and psionicization, It's happening on me... Is this a good thing or a bad thing? I don't know, anyway, when I wake up from the trance, I have come to an unusually vast crystal hall, with many small caves all around it.

And in the center of the crystal hall, there is a staircase that is a bit narrow for most light chasers, leading to the depths of this obelisk - it seems that this obelisk is made of a body that is larger than ordinary light chasers. It is built by creatures that are smaller, but this building is far larger than many stars. It has to be said that this is a shocking miracle.

Without hesitation, I chose to continue in-depth. 】

Stopping the recording pen and continuing to maintain this good habit that he has persisted in for more than ten years, Alpha took a deep breath, and he walked to the central staircase of the crystal hall, and continued to go deeper.

The hall at the beginning was a semicircle with a radius of about fifteen kilometers. With optimized eyesight, Alpha could see that the walls of this crystal hall were filled with many large and small hollows, and wind came from it. It seemed to lead somewhere else. On the walls on both sides of the stairs in the center, there are countless incomparably complicated runes engraved, and there are also many neat and beautiful handwriting, but it is not clear what language the glyphs are.

Alpha felt that he could vaguely understand the meaning of this glyph. Maybe it was some kind of rare ancient language? The exploration ship happens to have translation equipment, and when the time comes, bring these pictures back to the ship for a try to see what they are talking about.

After walking a long distance, the glyphs gradually disappeared, and layers of murals gradually appeared. Alpha quickly took out the shooting equipment and recorded the layers of murals.

Unlike language, murals can be understood only by looking at them. It can be seen that this series of murals seems to tell the life of a "priest" who was born in an ordinary farmer's family. He didn't know any of those chaotic monsters) attacked, the priest's parents died, and he was adopted by the kind priest in the village, and he was able to practice the extraordinary way.

There are seven gods served by that priest, which is very rare, because these seven gods form an alliance of gods and share the glory equally. And the young cleric has been devoting himself to practice, traveling in the cities of the world, helping the poor commoners, until middle age, he is unknown, and his deeds are at most sung by some ordinary people. However, after the abdication of the previous pope, he participated in the discussion conference witnessed by the gods, and defeated all opponents in terms of knowledge and strength, becoming the pope.

Very inspirational story - Alpha was a little envious when he saw this place, from ordinary people with nothing to the Pope at the highest point in the world, this is not something that anyone can do, you must have great courage , Great determination, great perseverance and great wisdom are enough, and he himself, at most, has a little courage, determination and perseverance, not to mention wisdom.

The mural is not over yet, but the story continues—this cleric has been trying to benefit everyone in the world since he became the Pope. He once fought against a group of giant lizard-like monsters and killed many Chaos monster, he once confronted other evil gods, and joined forces with the Seven Gods and many other powerful people to seal the black mist monster many times beyond the stars.

The first half of his life was unknown, and the second half of his life was turbulent. In the end, this clergyman, standing side by side with a giant god standing on the galaxy, rushed towards the eternal and endless darkness and chaos like a lightless belt. in the cluster.

"This should be the end of the age of the gods, when the last remaining gods and their churches fought against the chaos that swarmed from the no-light zone? This is the experience of which prehistoric mobile city, so legendary, but I never Never heard of it?"

Alpha has no doubts about the authenticity of this mural—who would be bored to build a gigantic stele of stars just to deceive newcomers? Compared to this, what is strange to him is that the logic of this matter is a bit less smooth.

The gods and their Pope... Can they really build this unparalleled monument of wonders that is as high as twenty-four light centimeters? If it was the gods, Alpha would reluctantly believe it, but what this mural is about is obviously just a pope.

And... finally, that four-armed giant standing above the endless galaxy... Who is he? He is not one of the seven gods, nor is he any god in myths and legends. There are no rumors or descriptions similar to him.

"It's strange to say that the defense facilities inside this obelisk have failed?"

Shaking his head, he temporarily put his doubts behind him—Alfa recorded all the text and murals, and prepared to translate them with the help of the translation system after returning to the exploration ship. Compared with these intellectual problems, what was even more strange to him was that he had seen a lot of crystal sentinel equipment that were obviously used for defense along the way. Knowing why, these sentry guns didn't move when they found him, as if they were broken.

However, as soon as the drone that Alpha brought into the obelisk was released, it would disappear instantly and be turned into ashes by the invisible light beam... This immediately scared Alpha's legs and almost knelt down. You know, That drone was much harder than his head, if it could burn the drone in an instant, it could also burn his head by the way.

It is so advanced that it can wipe out the gold level in an instant and severely damage the ultimate intention-and it is not known whether this is the ultimate micro-weapon equipment, not even in the League of Nations, or even in the mobile city ruins of the age of the gods!

What kind of building has such high technical power? On the Datianshen Mountain in the Shining Zone, the Great Temple of the Pantheon is not one percent as magnificent as this building. Although their decorations are luxurious, they are far inferior to the sense of power. The most powerful god in the age of the gods, 'Star Sea Voyager', the god of star sea and exploration, his temple is not as solemn as this ruins, not to mention, what is chanted here is just a pope, a clergyman. That's all.

"Could it be that... this is the... relic of the 'beginning of the birth of all things and all living beings' before the age of the gods?"

Thinking of this possibility, Alpha couldn't help shaking his head. This silver-haired middle-aged man didn't look chic, but was very old and tired, but it was precisely because of this that his serious expression seemed extraordinarily real. He murmured: "It is said that 'Heavenly Father' created the three realms and nine heavens. He drove out the original chaos in the darkness of nothingness, and created endless stars. In this initial light, gods were born from the stars."

"However, it is too difficult to expel chaos. Even the 'Heavenly Father', after destroying most of chaos, can only sleep in exhaustion. He handed over the world to the management of the gods, and then turned into All things in the three realms and nine heavens—this prehistoric age of mythology is the 'beginning of the birth of all things and all living beings'."

Could it be that... this relic is the creation of the ancient era that has been lost for a hundred thousand years? And what this mural said, could it be that the original gods and their believers fought back against the original chaos together with the heavenly father?

But how is this possible!

"'Heavenly Father' is just a myth created by light chasers to avoid despair... He does not exist at all, and there are no temples or ruins... Well, the one in front of me may be half of it, but this does not prove I would rather believe in the existence of Heavenly Father, it is the creation of seven powerful gods in prehistoric times..."

Almost, almost at the end of the ladder, Alpha was shooting, but his thoughts drifted to the endless distance, he said to himself with a slightly bitter tone: "To put it bluntly, 'Heavenly Father' and 'Trial' are just ancient Scholars and scholars create fig leafs in order to explain those questions that don’t make sense for the time being. It’s like pushing the answer to God when you encounter something you don’t understand—it doesn’t matter whether the existence of the Heavenly Father is at all.”

"No, you are wrong, the existence of Heavenly Father is very important."

Suddenly, a voice sounded from behind Alpha. The voice was loud and serious, like a giant iron drum being struck, and following the sound, a series of footsteps appeared behind the middle-aged man.

Alpha turned his head in shock—he had no idea when the sound and those footsteps appeared behind him, but just after he turned his head, the man saw a man in red and black, like a flame The white-haired man in the ember-like coat was standing on the stairs behind him, and he was walking down the stairs step by step. Behind this man was a whole group of guard soldiers wearing the same 'Ash Apparel'!

These people are all members of the [Ash Cult]!

Facing the stunned Alpha, who seemed to have no time to react, the leader, the white-haired old man who should be a high-ranking member of the Order of Ashes, stood firmly on the steps. The hem of his clothes is in the wind, and no one can tell that his age has reached the aging stage except for the white hair and wrinkled face.

"Alpha Falster, don't make false claims about Heavenly Father and God—even if He has never manifested His own miracles, He is still extremely important to our civilization."

Ignoring the actions of Alpha, who seemed to be evasive and seemed to want to retreat, looking for a chance to escape, the senior executive of the Ash Cult looked around the murals on both sides of the stairs, then turned his head and looked at Alpha, and said in a solemn tone: "I know, for you For bachelors, neither the Heavenly Father nor the gods are as important as 'knowledge and truth'. Compared with the ancient and vain glory, everything you think actually exists on this continent of steel is real—but Have you ever thought that if we lost the 'gods' and lost the 'Father', we might not be able to develop the great civilization we have today?"

"this……"

Although Alpha was flustered on the surface, he was actually very calm in his heart - he understood many things in an instant, such as why the Ash Cult captured his wife and children, but he just warned himself not to come back, and continued to explore the truth instead of taking Grab it yourself. They just wanted to track themselves and find the location of this huge 'Crystal Obelisk'! The only thing he didn't quite understand was why the senior executive of the Order of Ashes in front of him didn't ask his guards to arrest him, but looked at him and talked about these "rather weird" issues?

As for hatred... A rational person would not show his anger casually in a situation of great disadvantage. After all, he is a bachelor, so it is impossible for him to be so stupid.

And as if seeing Alpha's disguise and the hatred hidden under the other's calm expression, the white-haired old man smiled slightly and didn't take it seriously. He started, continued to move forward, crossed Alpha, and came behind him, at the end of the ladder—he continued to say in that solemn tone: "Many people nowadays, especially bachelors, find it difficult to understand that in the civilization Originally, 'rational thinking' didn't actually lead to progress. Do you understand? Reason in the old age was not used to explore truth and knowledge, but to think about how to defeat beasts, how to find food, and how to perpetuate future generations , how can we live as long as possible.”

"'Rational thinking' does not allow the ancients and the current scholars to explore the truth of the stars and the laws of the operation of all things-it is only used to summarize the knowledge that is actually used in life, such as farming, Raising animals, building houses, and making traps. On the contrary, it is the original "perceptual thinking", those earliest romances, fantasies, and original "imagination". Only these things can think about why the sun rises and why it Falling, why does the water flow toward the lower places, not toward the sky? In the ancient times of suffering, rational people would not waste energy thinking about these meaningless issues for survival. Only the existence of sensibility and impulsiveness will For all these unknown phenomena, all kinds of 'stories' are fabricated, which is the so-called 'explanation'. Similarly, only 'gods and religions' need to explain to all living beings and to their believers. Behind the phenomenon, is the 'why'."

"Only this kind of irrational thinking will think about the story among the stars, and only the gods created by this primitive worship need to explain why fire can burn wood, why water can extinguish fire-why fan the wings , spraying flames can generate upward momentum and fly high into the sky, why do the stars repeat the cycle of ups and downs, causing us to suffer so much."

Having said that, the white-haired old man had already arrived at an arch, which was the end of the stairs, and the guards of the Order of Ashes also followed. They completely ignored Alpha and left him behind like this, as if they didn't care at all. Whether he runs or stays—and Alpha has been at war with heaven and man for a long time, finally gritted his teeth and decided to follow.

The old man seemed to have known for a long time that he would make such a choice, so, just like that, the members of Alpha and Ash Cult stepped through the arch and came to a huge and incomparable grand hall with no end in sight.

It can be seen that the hall is filled with gentle silver light, but there are colorful spectrums lingering at the top of the hall, countless ups and downs, fused and split light bubbles emerge and disappear at the highest place, and all the light , all the light bubbles surround a crystal pillar hanging in the center of the hall.

And in this crystal pillar, there is a beautiful boy with light golden long hair, just like a fetus, curled up, sleeping peacefully - the brilliance of endless colors shrouds its surroundings, presenting a dreamy and blurred holiness.

"God is the most romantic explanation of intelligent life to the truth behind everything in the world! Because we are curious about the truth behind the flame, the Vulcan appeared. Because we worship the mighty power of the sun, the Sun God was born. We respect water as life. The most important composition, so the water god appears on the throne—but all of these are far inferior to the existence of the heavenly father!"

Looking up at the young man sleeping in the crystal pillar, staring at the "life" conceived in this huge obelisk, the tone of the white-haired old man of the Ash Cult began to get excited: "Belief in countless gods is actually a It is equivalent to not believing in any gods. Human curiosity will be consumed by the false "explanation" of the gods. After all, the gods do not represent the truth. They only hold power and are the final product of "perceptual thinking". exist……"

"But the Heavenly Father is different from the God who was 'created' because of 'we need'. The Heavenly Father created this world, but made us suffer. This kind of 'unwillingness' and even 'hate', this kind of Emotions that have nothing to do with belief and worship make countless people have to ask religion to give an 'explanation', after all, gods who can't even explain the 'why' don't exist, and no one will believe in them."

"So, the original pioneers, in order to explain the reason why the heavenly father created all things, and to explain the laws of the stars' movement, they created the first mobile city in this way. They chased the trajectory of the stars and discovered the 'universal gravitation'. They dissected the sun and decomposed it. Matter has discovered the "authority of division and fusion" - but this is not the end, gravitation cannot explain the existence of the steel continent, and the authority of division and fusion is not the most efficient way to use energy, at least the creation of the heavenly father, just It is impossible to use this method to obtain energy, so above this, there is a higher truth!"

"The existence and belief of the Heavenly Father are very important. Civilization must have a target, and progress can only be made through constant doubts and debates. Rational thinking must step on the bones of sensibility and pass 'denial'. "Imagine" method, spiral upward bit by bit, otherwise, it will never be able to get out of the rational fence, and will only live for the sake of life like a wise insect."

"Heavenly Father is the only and supreme Creator who created God. He is naturally right forever, but where is He right? Some people set a good target and start explaining how Heavenly Father created the world, and then another group of people will refute , pointing out the other party's inaccuracies, the wisdom of human beings who are at a loss and at a loss, will progress with the 'struggle' in this way."

"It is precisely because of this that in the endless struggle, laws and rules are discovered one by one, and the world we know is getting closer to the truth - because of this, society is gradually progressing and productivity is gradually developing. Let you rational scholars, you don't have to think about 'how to live', but raise your head and use that wisdom to look up at the sky."

"...I don't deny that your theory is interesting, but..."

Hearing this, Alpha frowned, suppressing hatred in his heart, and wanted to scold the other party for nonsense, but regardless of the number of people and power of the other party, everyone's strength is higher than him, even if it's just for the safety of his wife and children , he can't be impulsive. So, after thinking about it, and feeling that the situation couldn't be worse, he couldn't help but ask aloud: "But this old man, what does all this you said have anything to do with the ruins we are in now? What does it have to do with your Ash Cult kidnapping my wife and children, exiling me from the shining area, and following me here?"

"It's a big deal. And, don't call me old man, I'm the Grand Inquisitor of the Order of Ashes, Gron Danis, and you don't have to pretend, you can call me 'damn old man' or 'The most vicious kidnapper'."

Grand Inquisitor Grong turned his head. He no longer stared at the light-blond boy sleeping in the light, but looked at the silver-haired middle-aged man again. He narrowed his eyes and said in a solemn tone: "Great scholar of the capital of learning, Alpha Falster, I said this mainly to tell you that the light chaser, or even any intelligent creature, can never be Purely rational beings, they are bound to be impulsive, emotional, and will make 'wrong' choices other than 'correct' because of romance, impulsiveness and various reasons-and these mistakes are the ladder of our progress, so don't be fooled Heavenly Father does not exist' such inertial scholastic mind-shackles, only in this way can you understand the real truth."

"What's more, the 'Heavenly Father' does exist—compared to the speed of light, the laws of physics, and all the so-called 'truths' that may be changed, this is the only one that can never be shaken." True'! And whether it's you or me, or your disappearing teacher and boss, it's all for Him."

Another old friend shows up... guess who?

There will be another update later in the evening, please ask for a monthly pass first.

In fact, I found that the setting of this volume is too long. If I expand it, I can write a medium-length semi-sci-fi exploratory novel... Sigh, I just concluded it a few days ago, and I made the mistake of setting the party again. Steel Continent The story on the Internet can really be written very long, but the text does not leave much room for him.