Live off the Mountain if You're Near One, Live off the Water if You're Near It-Damn It! / I See! I Completely Understand Now!

"Doc Otter is testing whether remote takeover can be carried out in the town," Kal'tsit explained.

After a series of negotiations, Cat successfully obtained the right to negotiate within the Interstice from Oute —to avoid Oute's intentional or unintentional, overly honest truths.

Actually, what Oute is testing this time is... time.

Overall, if Oute doesn't act recklessly, the entire process of "entering the Interstice, completing the dungeon, and leaving the Interstice" takes only a fleeting moment in reality.

So short, it didn't even have time for the broken, grayish-white charcoal to fall to the ground.

In previous tests, when Oute tricked FrostNova into revealing her body in the town, the town's time synchronized with real time—a point that could potentially have interesting applications in some situations.

In addition, Alina spent seven days alone in the town on several occasions...

The two different points above independently prove that the flow of time at the Interstice is almost unrelated to reality before it is forcibly linked by Oute.

Chapter 109 Those who live by the mountain live off the mountain, those who live by the water live off the water, rely on...

The only factor affecting the flow of time in the town is now just one thing: running dungeons.

However, when FrostNova was summoned a second time, she still spent seven days there when Oute and the others returned to the town.

But at that time, Oute and the others had entered the dungeon they hadn't finished clearing last time!

If there's a fixed ratio between time and dungeon progress, then FrostNova should have three to four days to complete the dungeon!

Therefore, a conclusion that is very confusing in reality but very simple in the game becomes obvious.

What causes time to flow forward within the Interstice are event nodes. More specifically, each time Oute completes a dungeon, the town's timeline... must advance by one week.

In games, this is easy to understand... but in reality, it's a force that commands attention.

W was not satisfied with Kal'tsit's explanation, and she asked loudly, "If it's research, wouldn't leaving you here be the same?"

No, they're not the same.

Oute shook his head.

In another location named after the Interstice, time is also driven by the defeat of a boss and specific event milestones.

Rather, for a significant number of games, using event nodes rather than a precise flow of in-game/out-of-game time to drive the story forward is a technically cost-effective approach.

However, time still flows non-linearly at the Interstice... This is something that is expected and reasonable, yet it sends chills down one's spine.

It was necessary for Oute to confirm this himself—and even more necessary, to promptly "dismiss" all the Engineering Department staff and Instructor Dobermann before his experiment actually messed something up.

This is something Kal'tsit couldn't do.

Of course... this way, Oute can also take advantage of Kal'tsit's absence to prepare for the hospital and surgery.

"I still have some technical details to discuss with the Engineering Department," Oute said, changing the subject. "If it really is..."

If you really can't bear to part with me...

No, you can't say that. If you do, she'll kick me.

He changed his tune, saying, "... If you really need my help, W, say 'yes'."

"Huh?" The Sarkaz girl said, feigning reluctance, "Unless the enemy is like that the Shambler and the necromancer, we don't need your command at all!"

But Oute had already gone inside.

The difference in temperament between W in his true form and W in his Oute form is very obvious.

It was obvious that the little deer had already started to chuckle.

No way, how come you ship every single pairing?

"So..."

"So..."

Oute intentionally reminded W, and spoke through both bodies, "The team for this expedition consists of the powerful attacker Blaze, the caster FrostNova, the gunner W, and the healer Kal'tsit."

Is there too much legroom in the back with this configuration?

Thinking about it carefully, the cat also has the fast-resurrection true damage melee guard Mon3ter, so the front line isn't a big problem. Moreover, FrostNova is wielding Cryo-Driven Power Halberd this time, attacking in her magic damage melee form...

W hesitated for a moment, but managed to say it, "Can that old woman really be considered a proper doctor? On the battlefield, she was clearly only focused on her own precious baby and herself, wasn't she?"

Kal'tsit looked at her with a very dangerous gaze.

"... You guys are basically immune to injury," Oute said, sounding a little guilty.

So you're not even going to refute the point that "Kal'tsit isn't a proper healer"?

It seems there's really no way to refute that.

Before being banned by Theresis, she was a Guardian, but now... she is the invincible Mon3ter summoner.

The girls bid farewell to Oute and headed towards the distant, hazy the Cove.

Zooming out, illuminated by the torches, numerous murloc corpses lay scattered around their harpoons and staffs. Some had suffered brief, violent slashes; some had been blasted to pieces; some had been torn apart by sharp claws; and some unusually small murlocs had been suddenly frozen solid.

Huang weighed the Thermal-Driven Axe repeatedly and adjusted its center of gravity using the counterweight. It seemed that the recent combat test hadn't brought her a very pleasant experience.

"So fishy!" W exclaimed. "Their skin is sticky and slippery, it's disgusting!"

The big cat replied, "Yeah, it's making me almost not want to eat fish anymore."

FrostNova raised the Cryo-Driven Halberd and shook her head, saying, "I'm not quite used to its Arts Unit yet."

When Mon3ter brought Kal'tsit the first sample of the enemy, the cat once again "had an epiphany".

It turns out that this is the Seaborn Project's projection in Oute's subconscious!

You... certainly have a rich imagination.

The main enemy group in the Cove is the fish-men.

In Kal'tsit's eyes, this was indeed easily reminiscent of Seaborn Project.

She examined the fish-men's tissue samples with her personal instruments, and as expected, the result was a blurry mess.

While the skeletal structure is relatively clear, the more intricate details seem to be discernible only to Oute. Just like those distorted and chaotic characters...

Kal'tsit was no longer surprised.

Because, in her eyes, all of this merely reaffirmed her point of view: this place reflects Oute's inner world. Its bizarre appearance and its vague inner world are irrefutable evidence.

Kal'tsit then thought of the Fate Reconstruction.

No... he didn't learn anything from this, he just remembered something.

Kal'tsit quickly came up with a self-justifying explanation: although Oute's physiological structure as a human did not support the use of Originium Arts, he copied a degraded version of DWDB-221E, which made it possible for him to indirectly use Originium Arts.

Good grief, you actually managed to explain this?! And you even split it into two parts?!

As a game with a very strong Kryptonian flavor, Darkest Dungeon naturally features not only tentacles but also plenty of seafood.

The green lynx looked into the void. Oute glanced at FrostNova's pressure gauge, then explained to the team, "Our the Ancestor's research into mysticism and his digging deep into the mansion consumed a huge amount of his funds. Although he was originally incredibly wealthy, he couldn't withstand such a literal bottomless pit. Soon, he will have to find ways to open up new sources of income besides exploiting his people."

"As the saying goes, 'those who live near mountains live off the Cove, our the Ancestor initially 'only' engaged in smuggling. But after falling out with the smugglers, the natural caves Sea Cliff became his 'channel' for communicating with the fish-men. By selling the girls who had fallen for him to the fish-men, our the Ancestor would take the treasures, pack his bags, and leave, while the entire the Cove became a paradise for the fish-men."

After saying that, Oute began drawing using the cat's body.

Chapter 110 So that's how it is! I understand completely now!

As the first copy of the Cove, Oute's goal on this trip remains to map the terrain.

Kal'tsit herself, however, pondered: Why did Doc Otter intentionally exclude the two Abyssal Hunters from this expedition?

Could it be that his remaining memories still contain information about Seaborn?

No, actually, Blaze and FrostNova have already used up two of their weapon testing slots. The remaining slot will either go to W or Alina...

While bringing Alina, an antique, along would yield a lot of treasures, which is quite good, it would also mean W would stay in Hamlet Town, and she might even interfere with Oute's work. It would be better to just add her to the team for now!

You seem more like the kind of husband who leaves the kids with his wife while he focuses solely on work.

In addition, Kal'tsit herself must be included in the team.

Otherwise, where would Oute have the opportunity to prepare for the technical demonstration? If he were to tinker with the hospital right under Kal'tsit's nose, what if she discovered something?!

As for the issue of technical justification, the hospital in Hamlet Town is certainly not as well-equipped as Rhodes Island. However, like the ornaments in the Interstice, it harbors rules from another world—it possesses extraordinary power in the field of "mental health."

However, this time, Oute really was going to use his rudimentary medical equipment.

On the other hand, Oute's description of the Cove led Kal'tsit to make some almost obvious associations.

Furthermore, Oute had previously concealed an obvious fact from the girls, whether intentionally or unintentionally: when he possessed them, he could sense their clear thoughts and chaotic emotions.

If an intelligent being wants to think, she either uses "language," constructing logic with "voices in her head," or she uses "emotions," organizing large, vague fragments of thought in a non-verbal form under the guidance of emotions and intuition.

Oute can monitor almost both of these.

Of course, dealing with the latter requires a lot of guessing and decoding... and there's no guarantee of getting a result.

So, in a sense, the Instinct faction is actually quite restrained by Oute?

What they call "clear thoughts" are, in essence, their "thought processes" constructed with language rather than emotions. In other words, Oute can not only hear what they want to say, but also listen to their "inner thoughts."

For example, when Oute taught W how to communicate with him in his mind, he actually heard W's adorable "criticisms" perfectly clearly (Chapter 39) - at that time, after she learned how to actively communicate with Oute using her thoughts, she immediately shouted "Oute big idiot!"

Cat glanced at the rest of the team, interpreting the absence of the two Abyssal Hunters as a subconscious attempt by Oute to downplay the Seaborn issue. Kal'tsit, meanwhile, was engaged in intense, open-ended thought under these circumstances.

The imagery of the Ancestor and pre-civilizations remains unchanged.

Rich and powerful?

This likely refers to an extreme abundance on a material level.

The whole story is clearly closely related to Seaborn... but what does it really mean?

Kal'tsit allowed Oute to take control of her body, letting her consciousness sink deeper as she embarked on her own quest.

The group didn't stop walking.