Chapter 266: Dreams and Ruins

Three shrouded figures, their very presence warping the fabric of reality, tore apart the night sky. The world began to shake a moment later, crumbling away into a hollow emptiness. Reality was ending, and Claud was powerless. Something had bound him tightly, holding on to him and preventing him from even moving a finger.

As the world burned on and on, Claud noticed an abnormality in the crumbling world.

The Moons were missing, their light completely absent. Moments after that thought forced its way into his mind, Claud's eyes flicked open, and the tight, solid restraints that had held him down the whole time turned out to be a blanket.

A nice warmth was hugging him tightly, and he had to forcibly restrain himself from moving after remembering that Lily was right beside him. Instead, his right arm snaked out, and with a dexterity that came with years and years of artful, slick movements, he captured the papers all around the bed. At the same time, he took a few deep breaths, banishing the nightmare that came from learning about the dangers of the Celestia Ruins.

That nightmare earlier had been his personal rendition of how the Celestial Ruins ended up in its current state.

After stacking the papers responsible for his nightmare into a neat pile — a deed a lot harder with only one free arm — he placed them on the floor and wondered if he should just sleep in today. They had spent the previous night reading through the many odd dangers and sightings that Celestia had, and while it was relatively safe, reading these papers had simply reinforced a single tenet: curiosity killed the cat.

"Don't go near that," Lily mumbled. "There's a trap there too…why can't you see that?"

Claud looked at Lily, who was almost certainly dreaming about Celestia, before patting her head. Playing with her cheeks, Claud squished her face gently, hoping to ease her out of those bad dreams. He could remember how his mother had did it long ago, and it involved gentle, soothing movements that were antithetical to the nasty contents of many a nightmare.

Humming gently, he patted her head slowly, and before long, her murmured words had turned into a hum. That was a sign that the nightmare she was experiencing was beginning to unravel, and Claud called her name slowly, waking her up.

Letting out a small groan, she took in the sight of his face, and then flung her hands around him without any warning.

"I won't go near traps," Claud replied gently, "so you can let go of me now, okay?"

Hugging her back, he got up from the bed. "Maybe we shouldn't be reading these things right before we sleep next time. I had a nightmare too."

"A nightmare?" Lily asked. "Share, share!"

"It's about one of these things," Claud replied, fishing out a particular piece of paper. "The visions of the end that some unlucky soul saw."

Lily looked at the piece of paper. "With a single strike of his knife, one of the three destroyers tore apart the entire world, cleaving it into two. Someone appeared in thin air a moment later, and one of them grabbed the newcomer. Plunging his hand into the newcomer's chest, he extracted an orb, and the world completely shattered."

"Yeah, that's the one," Claud replied. "But the guy who saw this survived, or else we wouldn't be reading this now."

Lily nodded. "The fact that all these things have been recorded shows that everyone who saw them survived without any injury, since there's nothing about being crippled here."

"On the flip side, that can also mean that there were some dangers that went entirely unrecorded because no one saw them," Claud replied. "At any rate, we should memorise how these people got out of these dangers and follow suit if we ever encounter similar things."

"That's how you use them?"

"Tried and tested method is what I want to say, but the sample size is too small," Claud replied. "For instance, to survive the vision of the three gods destroying Celestia, we need to stand and watch the whole thing. That's what all the claims here say. But what's more disturbing is that there's absolutely no one that claimed running away worked."

Lily breathed in sharply. "Because there's no such incident…"

"Yes. We can assume that running away will kill us. After all, there's so many people. Some of them must have tried to flee when they saw the vision, right? If they did and survived, one of them must have recorded that fact down," Claud replied, before pausing. "Wait, did I go through this line of thought last night?"

"You did, but we were too sleepy to think that hard," Lily replied. "Should we wash up first and determine the best course of events to take?"

"That sounds nice." Claud got up and extended a hand to Lily, who took it.

Lily smiled. "Thanks for tidying the place up."

"That's what a thoughtful thief does," Claud replied. "Come on, let's freshen up and get back to work. I think we'll have to delay our departure for a few hours, while we work out the best responses to take."

"You're the professional, I'll just nod along. Race you to the bathroom?"

"You're on the side closer to it, though…"

By the time they were done, the sun was blazing down with full force, a sight that made Claud and Lily glad that they were heading to the ruins in the late afternoon. Although flying under the hot sun wasn't all that bad, it definitely took a toll on one's mental health, and the last thing Claud wanted was to explore a set of dangerous ruins with a somewhat peeved face.

"That reminds me. I'm going to try for my second mana circuit one last time today," said Lily. "I think it might be useful, and I just had a feeling that I would succeed this time."

"Oh?" Claud took a towel and made her sit down. Wiping her long hair dry, he nodded. "In that case, go and push for it. I'll be fine on my own, so do you best."

Tying her hair up into a stylish ponytail, he assessed for from head to heel, and then gave her a hug. "Do your best! We'll go down and get some rich stew after you're done."

"I want some strawberry cake," Lily replied.

"Does Lostfon still have that?" Claud muttered. "I'll try, anyway."

Lily grinned, and then climbed onto the bed. Settling into a comfortable position, she closed her eyes, and blue light started to shimmer faintly. Claud looked at her quietly, and then pulled out Crown. Although the little fellow couldn't help her in any way whatsoever, Claud still wanted someone to watch over Lily as she tried to complete her second mana circuit; Crown was the best person.

Taking a deep breath, he deposited the small stack of papers on a small table and started to scan through these papers once more. This time, however, he was more focused on making notes on what might have happened and what other people did when they encountered these dangers.

It was long, hard work, and the more Claud read, the more he understood why this report was so highly priced in the treasury. Given the circumstances last night, where they were going through a cursory, surface reading, he hadn't given it too much thought, but…

This was a record that had to be older than Count Nightfall.

While some of the occurrences weren't all that common, the remarkable thing was the uniformity in the solutions provided. For instance, in a scenario where one faced a spatial fracture that looked like a five-petaled flower, there were only two people that witnessed it and survived to tell the tale. Both of them chose to channel their mana and saturate the area around them with it, rather than fleeing or anything.

Whether it was a common occurrence or not, Claud didn't know, but by now, he had understood that Celestia was probably a pretty dangerous place after all. The book he had read at the library, though informative, wasn't as detailed and thorough as the explorers' notes, and if he didn't get it wrong, the author probably didn't venture too deep. Keeping that in mind, Claud immersed himself into his work once more, and the passage of time blurred.

A wave of power swept out from the bed as he recorded down yet another solution, and Claud turned to look at Lily. Her presence had abruptly intensified, and her lithe frame seemed more real than before.

She looked at Claud, smiling, and then at little Crown, who was meeping cheerfully and incessantly. Putting down the papers in his hand, he got up and hugged her.

"Congratulations," Claud replied.

"Mm."

"Get used to your new status and the change first," Claud added. "I'm almost done…let's go out and get some lunch after that, shall we? My treat!"

"We share our money anyway, so what's the point of saying that?" Lily pointed out, before smiling. "But I gratefully accept."

Rolling his eyes, Claud patted her hair, and then got her to sit by his side.