Eternal XXVIII

The weapons in the hands of the Min'er People and their crystal-cluster bodies, glittering with light, were like two flashing lines on the horizon as they crashed into each other. It was a scene ordinary people who had never experienced war could never imagine. The earth let out a deafening roar, and the sounds of slaughter surged like a tsunami, drowning out the dying screams of the living, as well as fear, hesitation, and every other negative emotion. The smoke and dust raised by the war obscured the sky, dimming even the dazzling sunlight.

The scene before him was glaringly real.

Yet no history book recorded such a war. Even after searching through the mountains of documents beneath the dust and cobwebs in the Buga people's ivory tower, there was nothing. In the game, players circulated all kinds of information, and the strange rumors on the forums were endless, but there was still nothing.

Crystal clusters, a species players remembered as having been born in the Crystal Forest, seemed to be a scattered population isolated from the main thread of history in the game. They existed in remote, rarely visited corners of the world, appearing only fleetingly during adventurers' journeys. The historical record concerning them was a blank. From the appearance of the Divine People, to the fall of Babel Fortress, to the Golden People opening the Second Era of mortals, the rise of the Silver People, and the spreading flames of the Black Iron People across the earth, with the banners bearing the eagle and hydra raised in their wake—in all that long history, historians and white-robed wizards had left only a few dull, formulaic words about them: "They possess neither intelligence nor consciousness. They seem to be a kind of crystal derivative, attacking intruders who approach their territory