Chapter 543
Chapter 543 - 523: The Road to Escape
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No one can live forever.
No god is eternal.
Merely tens of minutes ago, the white moonlight, which was regarded as eternal, was swallowed whole by some entity in front of the whole world, like a drought to a single drop from a small bottle.
Death and escape are not even the most tragic endings for many deities.
But for the mortals left in this world, it is extremely cruel.
After the sky lost its only source of light, the moonlight, the stars also lost their reflected light, turning the long night into an eternal one, and everything fell into silence.
The next moment, the world becomes noisy again.
"Dead spirits, they’re everywhere."
The seal the Moon God had always imposed on the entire world has been completely broken, and the creatures buried deep underground no longer have any restrictions.
One after another, countless dead spirits and mutant creatures crawl out from underground, and the once relatively safe "towns" and "villages" become disaster areas.
As they were previously regarded as the "Land of Civilization," these places were given special attention and forcefully sealed by the Moon God. Now that the seal and its source are gone, a wave of surging disaster ensues, followed by a vengeful World Apocalypse.
The Earth Sealing Skill has met its end, and so has this world.
The Seven Disasters are not a timetable and not linear... with constant interference from outsiders, even whether the original Seven Disasters will all occur is uncertain.
"If this is the so-called Explorer’s tutorial, it is already shocking enough."
Flee? Despair? When the whole world is plunged into confusion and fear.
Where can one escape to?
The chaotic march was not forcefully initiated, the Knights patrolled back and forth, the dim light illuminating the road ahead, also serving as the only source of light in the encircling darkness.
Even Lu Ping’an, the developer himself, did not expect that his little discovery could play such a big role.
By this time, the original plan had completely failed.
So, someone took the "first bite".
The fall of the Moon God is just the beginning of a series of actions; once the scramble for power begins, who would care about ranking, order, strength and weakness... only those who can eat it are real.
Even if the Fruit is not ripe yet, who cares if snatching it now might ruin the "delicacy"?
The thoughts of the "delicacy" on the table probably do not matter to anyone.
This is just the external troubles... the problems on the ground are already nearly endless.
"If this is just a rehearsal course, it’s already cruel enough..."
Looking at the almost infinite darkness in front of him, even Lu Ping’an falls into a trace of confusion.
Everything in front of him heralds a world heading towards its Doomsday.
It’s not about you not working hard enough, or not having hope or fighting spirit, and it’s not even about your generation... when things have developed to this point, no matter how hard you try, it’s bound to be futile.
You’re full of energy and fighting spirit, your determination is unyielding, but you can’t even find a worthy adversary to fight.
In this vast darkness, even the countless battles along the way are just like cockfighting in a cage; even victory is meaningless... the audience outside the cage might find your success or failure amusing if they are in a good mood.
For most, they don’t care about your existence at all; like buying a piece of fatty beef, do you care about how many hairs it once had?
Despair, confusion, even if they don’t know what has happened until the end, that is the fate of most people now.
In this world’s development, it’s like saying to all the Earth explorers that if you’re not strong enough, Earth will eventually become like this.
"There’s fire up ahead!!"
A sudden scream interrupted Lu Ping’an’s thoughts.
He looked up, and there was darkness, but there were faint flashes of fire hidden within.
"... It’s from the Schlei Domain, probably one or two thousand people, but their territory has a population of at least several hundred thousand..."
The scout brought news that among the group were some knights and mercenaries, but most of them were ordinary refugees.
After joining together, these people merged into the Schlei Domain’s group, and Lu Ping’an learned about their experiences.
Actually, there wasn’t much difference, but the sudden "corpse transformation" caused chaos inside and outside the city, then the center exploded, and the entire city fell into turmoil.
But just as the corpse monsters were not enough to destroy the Schlei Domain alone, each domain had its own knight corps and mercenary groups, and they could resist just the same.
Even if they were unprepared, it wouldn’t be too much trouble.
"... the lord is not there, they left several days ago, supposedly went out hunting, taking with them most of the high-level knight corps..."
The high-level power of the guards was taken away, and without any defense, the territory suffered from both internal and external attacks.
𝗳𝐫𝚎𝗲𝚠𝚎𝗯𝕟𝐨𝘃𝚎𝗹.𝗰𝗼𝗺
Then, when a large number of living beings turned into the dead, the high-level law-enforcement who served as the main force of defense vanished, and the city fell into a slow death.
Has that domain been completely annihilated? Not necessarily, it’s just that it has completely collapsed under the combined pressure from inside and outside.
In a way, this group in front of them was rather lucky, as they had successfully escaped the fallen city under the escort of a dozen knights.
But before leaving, there should have been tens of thousands of people... It’s hard to say if there were any other survivors, but no one wanted to look back now.
The encounter with the Schlei Domain was just the beginning, then on their way north, they encountered one refugee convoy and disaster-stricken population after another.
Only then did the people of the Schlei Domain realize how lucky they were compared to others in the same situation in other territories.
Most of the territories faced the same disaster, and it was normal for both internal and external difficulties to occur, while the disappearance of the lord and the high-level combat forces was a fatal blow.
They all headed north in confusion, and although there were more or fewer people, there was no real difference in essence.
From time to time, Lu Ping’an could see some "cavalry units" with many strongmen among them, often with luxurious carriages in the middle.
Apparently, at times, he could see the lord, while at other times, he could only see the subjects.
The anticipated "escape route" became this increasingly large main road, where survivors from disaster-stricken cities became members of the long line of travelers.
Those who don’t leave? Those who hold on? If there were such people, they would probably sooner or later become part of the infinite army of the dead.
The journey of escape was fast for some and slow for others; some simply died on the way.
This road, leading to the north, was prepared for tax collectors and nobles as a carriage route, but it was actually just a slightly cleaner muddy road.
At its end was the root cause of the formation of this escape route.
It was Duke York’s territory, the most powerful lord on the border, and at the same time, the most prosperous and well-defended fortress city.
Just the undead disaster alone would not be enough to destroy a city of that level... Lu Ping’an estimated that many lords had moved in days or even months ago.
And one of his destinations was that area... where there’s a church of the God of Travelers.
The God of Travelers requires Divine Power Nodes (churches) to provide teleportation services, but the nodes themselves are quite fragile, and rampaging beast swarms and corpse monster groups could destroy them.
The churches in the fortress city should be the safest.
"Once we get there, we can retreat anytime... let’s leave as soon as possible."
However, at this time, information provided by a victim attracted everyone’s attention.
"... There’s a monster, it... it seems to be a collection of countless beasts... it, woo, our city wall... disappeared with one foot..."
A strong warrior, embracing his head and crying, perhaps that was the deepest despair, the irresistible natural disaster.
— End of Chapter 543 —