In that eerily quiet moment, Derrick Berg's first thought Blink regaining his senses was to save people.
However, the two guards sandwiching him did not react at all, as if everything he had just heard was just his hallucination.
"Someone's calling for help," young Derrick reminded the two Dawn Paladin.
Walking to his left, the tall knight in full silver armor calmly replied:
Don't fall for it.
"That's just normal behavior from some superhumans on the verge of going out of control."
Is that so? Maybe he just didn't want to give up and lose control, turning into Monster, which is why he screamed for help... Derrick thought with a touch of sadness.
As his emotions shifted, the illusory buzzing in his ears became much more pronounced.
He walked a few more steps in silence, then the Dawn Paladin pointed to a door on his left and said:
"You'll stay here for a while; we'll bring you food and medicine regularly."
As he spoke, he took out a small, dark iron bottle.
These bottles are woven from the remnants of black grass, a staple food of City of Silver. When they come into contact with liquid, a thin film forms, thus achieving a waterproof and sealing effect.
Derrick took the bottle of medicine, gulped it down, and felt a cool sensation slide down his esophagus and into his stomach.
He quickly calmed down, the swaying scene before his eyes returned to normal, and the auditory hallucinations in his ears gradually weakened.
Clang!
As the iron gate closed and locked, Derrick entered his own room.
The first thing he saw was a candle flickering with Yellow Light, and then he could make out the low bed, chair, and square table.
Besides this, there was nothing else, but the surrounding walls, including the door, were covered with complex and mysterious symbols and markings, which seemed to form a complete seal.
Derrick's emotions were also suppressed by the drug; he sat down without a trace of curiosity and lay down on the bed.
After an unknown amount of time, he suddenly heard a loud banging on the door, but it wasn't coming from outside his room; it was coming from next door.
Derrick sat up abruptly and listened intently. Amid the sounds of collision, he heard a faint, sharp, mournful sob.
His hair stood on end, and he abruptly stood up, assuming a highly defensive posture.
Just then, the thumping sound spread to the metal wall separating the two rooms, creating one slowly collapsing bulge after another.
Just as Derrick was about to pray for the Holy Light, his vision suddenly brightened, and the space he was in seemed to have been completely transported to the outside world, just as lightning struck.
The sounds of banging on the wall next door stopped abruptly, and the base of the round tower returned to silence.
This wasn't absolute silence, but rather a silence so profound that even the faintest footsteps could carry far and echo for a long time.
Derrick was wondering what had happened to the Beyonder next door, someone knocked on the metal wall on the other side.
Knock knock knock!
It sounded as if someone was gently tapping their fingers there.
"Who?" Derrick raised his voice, asking with a hint of fear.
The knocking stopped immediately, and after a few seconds, a deep but rather aged voice vaguely drifted over:
"Turns out it's just a little kid who's not very old."
"Who are you?" Seeing that the other person could communicate rationally, Derrick moved closer to the wall and pressed his ear against the cold metal.
The aged voice chuckled:
"The person next to you almost lost control several times, and today it was finally beyond saving."
"Has he completely lost control?" Derrick asked through the metal wall.
"So he's turned into Monster now?"
"No, not Monster, a corpse. He's been dealt with by the items that sealed this place," the aged voice sighed. "I've been here for forty-two years. Hmm, the guards told me. I've seen far too many similar things."
Derrick asked in surprise:
"You've been here for forty-two years?"
Normally, loss of control can be divided into three stages: first, the appearance of warning signs, such as auditory and visual hallucinations; second, the body and mind are already somewhat out of control, and will occasionally exhibit terrifying or bizarre states; and third, complete collapse, degenerating into a terrifying Monster.
The transition from the second to the third stage is quite rapid; perhaps a discovery is made and one will witness a seemingly normal Beyonder transform into Monster in the depths of darkness.
In other words, once Beyonder in the second stage are sent to the bottom of the tower, they either undergo treatment through medicine, rituals, or other methods to gradually stabilize and leave within a year or two, or they quickly enter a state of out of control and are then eliminated Purification. It is impossible for anyone to be imprisoned here for forty-two years.
Those Beyonder are in the first stage may only need a few days or ten days to eliminate the warning signs and be cured and leave.
The aged voice chuckled.
"Yes, I never imagined I'd stay here for forty-two years."
"I showed no signs of losing control, yet they thought I was extremely dangerous and could turn into Monster at any moment."
Derrick frowned slightly and asked curiously:
What exactly happened forty-two years ago?
At that time, his parents had not yet been born.
The aged voice paused for a moment before saying:
"I used to be the captain of an exploration team."
"We discovered a destroyed city half a month from City of Silver, ha, that's at our speed."
"That city is similar to our City of Silver; it clearly shows signs of being ruled by Giant and worships Lord Who Created Everything, Omniscient and Omnipotent God."
"Unfortunately, they were destroyed, destroyed countless years ago."
Derrick was no stranger to similar situations and immediately guessed:
"You encountered some strange things there, which is why you're considered to be at risk of losing control at any moment?"
"More or less." The aged voice chuckled. "After exploring the core area, we discovered that the city was trying to change its beliefs, creating some gods they imagined could save them. However, it was all in vain; even the statues of those gods were destroyed and scattered all over the ground."
At this point, his tone suddenly became serious:
"However, however, we met someone there."
"This is the first living person who doesn't belong to our city-state that we, City of Silver, have encountered in over two thousand years!"
"Outside City of Silver, in the endless depths of darkness, there really are still people alive!"
Derrick asked instinctively:
"You took him back to City of Silver?"
The aged voice paused for two seconds before speaking:
Don't you feel the vibration?
"We in City of Silver have been diligently exploring our surroundings in search of humans like ourselves, and forty-two years ago we finally found them!"
This is indeed quite shocking news, but... but I often see Miss " Justice " and Mr. " The Hanged Man," and I often hear about the Kingdom of Loen and the Seven True Gods. There are still people, city-states, and kingdoms outside City of Silver. Isn't that a very obvious fact? Derrick scratched his head, inexperiencedly feigning shock:
"I... I didn't notice that."
"This is truly unbelievable! Besides the residents of City of Silver, there are other people here!"
"..." The aged voice remained silent for a long while before finally saying, "Has education in City of Silver become so bad?"
Before Derrick could speak, he sighed and said to himself:
"We cautiously invited that person to visit City of Silver, and after considering it, he agreed."
"We monitored and escorted him back along the way, but when we were almost at City of Silver, he suddenly disappeared..."
"We searched the entire area but couldn't find him. And when we returned to City of Silver, my team members went crazy one by one, completely out of control! All of them!"
" The Council of Six suspects that we have all been corrupted by something, that that thing is not human at all, but an evil spirit, a Monster. So, they locked me up here, checking on my condition every now and then, but they never tell me what the problem is, nor do they let me out."
Derrick let out a heavy sigh and said:
Do you remember what that person looked like?
"... He looked very ordinary, with no distinguishing features, and his clothes were similar to ours. Apart from remembering that he was male, I can't recall what he looked like at all... However, the elders should be able to use extraordinary means to see him directly from my hazy, forgotten memories." The aged voice recalled for several seconds, then said with a hint of pain.
Derrick casually followed up with a question:
Did he say his name? Did he tell you about his background?
The aged voice responded with a soft "hmm":
He told us his name was...
He paused and said:
" Amon."
Sunday morning, Factory Borough.
Over the previous two days, Klein and Mike, led by Old Kohler, "visited" many places in the East Borough.
Mike thus witnessed five or six people crammed into one room, and that wasn't even the worst of it.
In the poorest parts of the East Borough, an ordinary bedroom can sleep ten people. The precise division of ownership, such as the right to Angel, and the right to use it at night, amazed the reporter.
Moreover, poverty does not discriminate between men and women. In those places, people of different genders huddle together unavoidably, and there are countless cases that could go to court. Both men and women face the constant threat of violence.
"... Filthy, crowded, and stinking—that's the most immediate impression... I suspect everyone there has a serious Parasitism... In the most dilapidated neighborhoods, because the houses were built a long time ago and don't have proper sewer connections, feces, urine, and vomit are everywhere. Here, there's only one public washroom per building, or one public toilet per street..."
"They are extremely tired every day, but they can barely fill their stomachs and have no savings. If they lose their jobs for just a few days, they will fall into Abyss from which they cannot save themselves... I think that if they are given a little hope, they will not even be afraid of death..." Mike wrote in his investigation manuscript.
In addition, the homeless people driven away in the middle of the night and wandering the streets like Living Corpse, the women standing numbly on the street or in bars, and the drinkers who indulged in alcoholism, were not stingy with violence, and did not want to think about the future at all, all left a very deep impression on the reporter.
He became increasingly silent.