Along the once-bustling streets, a glance revealed densely packed corpses lying everywhere.
Because a massive number of living beings died in a short period of time, the environmental negative energy exploded, and some of the dead bodies quickly stood up again to become terrifying undead creatures.
Among them, the warriors, knights, and spellcasters who possessed high occupational levels during their lifetimes were continuously evolving.
The tops of those magical towers that originally stood tall no longer flickered with dazzling, colorful auras.
Either they had already been breached by countless surging undead who ruthlessly slaughtered every living thing inside, ultimately causing the entire tower to be eroded by the negative energy symbolizing decay and death;
Or the mages inside the magical towers had actively sealed off and cut off all contact with the outside world, hiding trembling in their final bastions and barely maintaining survival using the food in the storage rooms.
They didn't dare to recklessly conduct various magical experiments like they used to.
As for escaping to other places by using portals...
Sorry, that was already an impossible thing to do.
Because just fourteen days ago, a terminally ill Archmage believed that the situation was irredeemable, and with the help of the central tower's power, released an immensely powerful confinement spell.
The entire city was completely locked down in midair four thousand meters above the ground.
All teleportation magic, flight magic, and magic that slowed down the falling speed failed to take effect.
Even birds that accidentally entered the spell's range would immediately drop vertically from the sky and smash to their deaths.
And the most terrifying thing was that this spell had a validity period of one hundred years!
This also meant that no one could escape.
Unless those survivors who hadn't died yet could find a way to live until a hundred years later, they could only starve to death, die of thirst, or die of old age.
Of course, if they felt that dying like this wasn't heroic or thrilling enough, they could also choose to rush onto the streets and have a big fight with those undead, or jump down from four thousand meters high.
This was Plantia Floating City, the first floating city jointly built by the initial Archmages, and also the center and pride of the Aelir Magical Civilization.
But nowadays, it was merely a city on the verge of destruction.
In fact, it wasn't just Plantia Floating City; cities and villages on the ground were also experiencing similar things.
This inexplicable, terrifying plague swept across the entire continent in a mere month or so.
Whether it was the "superior" spellcasters living within the floating city or those warriors, knights, mercenaries, merchants, and slaves living on the ground who served the spellcasters, none of them managed to escape disaster.
No one knew what the source of the plague was, nor did anyone know how to treat it.
The only thing necromancers knew was that this terrifying plague would constantly mutate and evolve.
All treatment methods could only temporarily alleviate symptoms!
And before long, it would erupt again in an even more fierce manner!
Even potions and spells that were previously claimed to cure all diseases only played a slight role at the very beginning.
Soon, however, death swept through like a storm, killing tens of thousands of people in a very short time.
Even the high-and-mighty Archmages, who were akin to gods, had quite a few die in the plague.
Panic!
Fear!
Despair!
By now, social order had long since completely collapsed.
The extremely few lucky ones still alive on the ground had all fled into the deep mountains and old forests.
Others even boarded ships and headed out to sea, intending to go to other islands and landmasses that were still in a primitive state to seek refuge, physically cutting off the possibility of contacting the plague.
In short, the powerful magical civilization established by the Aelir people over a period of more than two thousand five hundred years had already marched toward destruction under the ravages of the plague.
Even if those fleeing immigrants could ultimately survive, I'm afraid they would no longer have the courage to set foot on this land.
It was even less possible for them to recreate past glory and prosperity with the limited knowledge and resources on hand.
However, the mages who fled the floating city probably would never have guessed that the source of this civilization-destroying disaster was ultimately just the result of a certain transmigrator from Earth catching a cold, falling sick, and sneezing.
Yes!
It was just a tiny sneeze!
Unlike most soul-transmigrating peers, Raymond was a standard physical transmigrator.
Judging from the destructive power of this plague, his body certainly hadn't been disinfected and sterilized when he transmigrated, carrying a large amount of terrifying viruses and bacteria from Earth.
And these viruses and bacteria, after arriving in the New World, combined with magical energy and underwent some unknown mutation.
One day over two months ago, Raymond worked hard without sleep or rest for more than forty hours during a process of crafting a magical oddity.
Finally, as expected, because of catching a chill, coupled with excessive fatigue and a lack of rest, he fell sick.
As everyone knows, a cold makes people sneeze and have a runny nose.
Sneezing in particular would spread a large amount of droplets carrying bacteria and viruses into the air, forming the initial spread of infection.
All unlucky creatures that came into contact with these droplets would automatically become virus carriers, and subsequently infect more people unconsciously.
What is more, people from the New World had never been exposed to mutant viruses and bacteria from Earth, let alone possessed any immunity or antibodies.
Consequently, a disaster erupted suddenly without the slightest warning.
Looking at the dissecting table on the first basement level used for necromancy experiments, as well as the corpse upon it that had just been eviscerated, was still bleeding continuously, and emitted a pungent, foul stench,
Raymond, who was only about one hundred and thirty centimeters tall and resembled a child of around ten years old, could not help letting out a slight sigh, discarded the scalpel in his hand, stepped on a stool to release the meager remaining water reserve inside the tower, washed away the bloodstains clinging to his hands, sterilized his entire body with high-concentration alcohol, and only then opened a diary to begin recording in somewhat hasty, blocky Chinese characters.
Solar calendar, August 12, 2535. The weather is somewhat gloomy.
Roughly a month and a half has passed since the plague outbreak.
One year, nine months, and fourteen days have also passed since I came to this magical world.
There are not many living creatures left inside Plantia Floating City.
Because too many lives perished rapidly in a short span of time, this city standing aloft in the sky is transforming in the direction of a city of the dead at an unimaginable speed.
Even the proportion of negative energy in the environment is doubling.
It is foreseeable that before long, this place will no longer be suitable for living things to inhabit, and will instead thoroughly degenerate into a paradise for undead creatures.
According to the conclusions drawn from the final autopsy and observation,
this plague should not be a disaster caused by a single mutant virus or bacterium, but rather by several, a dozen, dozens, or even hundreds and thousands of them.
This is also why magical potions, which claimed to be able to cure almost all diseases, quickly and completely failed.
On the skin surface of some deceased individuals, large patches of pustules resembling smallpox and chickenpox appeared, the density of which made one's scalp tingle just to look at them.
There were also those whose internal organs suffered severe failure, and accompanied by the collapse of the respiratory system, even their alveoli rotted away completely.
Digestive systems such as the stomach and intestines were covered with black spots I had never seen before, which should be the result of bacterial action.
These spots robbed the nutrients that ought to have been absorbed by the human body, causing the victims' bodies to grow increasingly weak while expanding recklessly within them like cancer cells.
What is even more terrifying is that those corpses that died many days ago could still exist as sources of contagion for a long time after standing back up and turning into undead.
This meant that the mutated bacteria and viruses did not die along with their hosts.
They adapted to this magical world, becoming ten thousand times more terrifying than they were on Earth.
In the tower where I live, whether it be the apprentices, warriors, knights, and slaves located in the middle level, or the various monsters and beasts located in the dungeons, all of them have already died off completely.
Only I and that female red dragon—Vermees—who was captured from the other side of the portal, kept locked away in the Binding Chamber on the lowest level, and completely cut off from the outside world, are still alive.
As for my mentor and collaborator, the master of this tower, and the chief Archmage of the Magic Council's necromancy faction—Astar, he vanished without a trace long before the plague broke out.
I reckon that he must have taken that set of notes snatched from an old wizard in Faerun, hiding in some unknown place to try and transform his own aging body into a powerful, immortal spellcaster—a lich—through a cruel and terrifying magical ritual.
Of course, none of this matters anymore.
Anyway, the Floating City has been completely locked down by magic; the people inside cannot get out, and the people outside cannot get in.
Aside from this, there is nothing left to eat inside the tower.
The storehouse holding food has been contaminated by negative energy and the corpses of dead slaves.
What is worth celebrating is that I already have a plan to escape.
Finally, I want to emphasize that regarding this plague, I really did not mean to do it.
It was merely a terrifying accident...
Before you continue