Deep Sea Embers

Shirley stood beside her partner with a nervous face. It wasn’t until she was confident Duncan wasn’t going to eat her did she ask the hound: “Dog, is there really no ‘residual pollution’ here?”

“If you’re referring to ‘chemical leaks’ in the general term of what people think, then don’t worry, there’s none of that. The pollution was washed away long ago…” A hoarse and deep voice came from the hound’s throat, “But if it’s ‘pollution’ in the supernatural sense of the field, then I can’t say.”

“Did you find anything?” Duncan asked on the side.

“…… No, not really,” Dog lowered his head slightly, “I just saw a moment’s ‘fire’, but now there is nothing. It might just be some kind of ‘reverberation’, a memory left over by the ruins and frozen in time… Many supernatural powers leave similar traces in the real world, but to find out what kind of supernatural power it is… I’m afraid we will have to go in and take a look.”

“Then let’s go in,” Duncan nodded and walked towards a gap in the abandoned fencing, “you two follow behind me.”

Shirley hesitated but still stepped forward to follow. On the other hand, Dog shook his head from side to side to tell himself this was real. Then, as he followed as well with the chains rattling due to the motion, he curiously asked with caution: “You… why are you also interested in what happened eleven years ago? Ah, of course, I’m only asking out of curiosity. A big person like you must have his own plans in mind…”

“Because I’m interested,” Duncan interrupted the hound, “don’t be so nervous in front of me. It makes me uncomfortable.”

“Aigh, okay, okay, we’re not nervous, we’re not nervous…”

Hearing the obviously nervous answer from the other party, Duncan just shook his head helplessly. Then shifting his sight to Shirley with a curious look of his own: “You have a big fire in your memory, but only you can remember this fire, right?”

“Mhmm….” Shirley nodded. She had already realized something by this time, “Based on your attitude… you also know about that fire, right? So that fire really existed, didn’t it?”

“…… Yes, I know, so I’m even more curious now about who erased the traces of that fire’s existence.” Duncan lightly nodded in confirmation.

At the same time, his mind was also full of thought – he never thought that things would develop so coincidentally, nor did he expect that there would be a third person in the city-state of Pland who knew about the “fire” besides himself and Nina. His chance encounter with Shirley, the joint investigation between the two sides, the fire that was erased, the hallucination of Dog just now… All these things seem to be pulled together by invisible forces, just like planets revolving around the sun.

This feeling of being manipulated by invisible forces has already made him vigilant.

Nina’s textbook has roughly described some “common sense” in the transcendent field and mentioned that powerful anomalies or visions often have the power to interfere with the development of reality. For example, it could even lead to certain events like weaving scripts in a play. Also, if there are too many coincidences, then it’s no longer a coincidence. All these clues are omens to be wary of, which often means a person involved has been affected by an anomaly or vision without their knowledge.

In the face of this invisible push and influence, my “ghost fire” is effectively useless.

Thinking of this, he couldn’t help but sneak a glance at Shirley.

The girl and Dog are currently carefully watching for any movement from the ruins of the factory. She seems to have no superfluous and complicated thoughts at all, or maybe it’s because of the “big terror” next to herself that’s causing this. Regardless, Duncan had no idea why.

“…… This looks like an ordinary ruin…” Dog’s low voice interrupted Duncan’s thinking, “I don’t sense any sign of supernatural power present.”

At this answer, Shirley raised her head and looked up at the crisscrossing pipes and distorted ceiling beams above their heads.

This was the first “room” after they entered the factory, which had been badly damaged in an accident from eleven years ago. Most materials had either been snapped or ripped; now, all that remained was the skeletal structure of the building.

However, except for these traces of an explosion and collapsed structures, there’s no trace of a fire though.

“It doesn’t look like a fire happened here. I can’t find any scorch marks or melted metal,” Shirley muttered thoughtfully.

“Yes, this is the biggest problem,” Duncan’s deep voice suddenly came from the side. He had also been watching the environment and found the destruction unfitting. “These damages don’t look like they’ve been through high temperatures, more like a sudden release of a huge force that blew everything apart. All elements of the fire have been erased somehow. It’s far too clean to be normal.”

Dog immediately follows on Duncan’s deduction: “Yes, the way it looks here now, it’s like… all elements related to ‘fire’ were deliberately erased, but because they were removed too cleanly, they left a more striking mark of a blank.”

“Erased….” Duncan muttered softly, then slowly walking deeper into the factory building, eventually finding a twisted hunk of machinery next to a hole in the wall. Immediately, his eyes jerked wide in shock.

Fire! A monstrous fire!

A raging sea of red had risen from the opposite side of the hole connecting to the barren waste outside the factory. Everything was burning, from the air to the ground, nothing was spared. Not the factory, not the streets, and most definitely not the housings. Everything had flared into a billowing smoke of cinder with frenzied crowds fleeing for their lives. Truly a scene straight out of hell itself!

This terrifying and fiery scene caused Duncan to flinch due to the intensity, but in the next second that he blinked, it was gone….

Dog picked up on Duncan’s unusual behavior and immediately asked, “What did you find?”

“I saw the fire just now,” Duncan replied quietly, “but it’s gone again.”

“It seems that the reverberation here is very strong,” Dog analyzes. “it reproduced again in such a short time period. Only a powerful supernatural force can achieve something like that. If I had to guess, the sun fragment those suntists are looking for did appear at this place before… I wonder what is the rule in triggering this reverberation….”

Duncan didn’t say anything. He just slowly returned to the position where he had seen the “echoing remnant of the past” and stared thoughtfully into the hole.

There seems to be nothing here.

After a moment of thought, Duncan suddenly raised his hand and gently rubbed his fingertips, summoning a cluster of green flames from nothing.

Dog reacted instantly at the sight of the green flame. Shrinking his neck in, the hound took several steps back with the chains shaking due to the shivering bones. Likewise, Shirley also backed off with her companion and looked in horror at what Duncan was doing: “You… you’re really planning to cook us?!”

“What are you afraid of?” Duncan glanced at the pair expressionlessly, “This is not for roasting you.”

He then points his fingertips downwards to allow the green flame to trickle down to the ground, causing a rippling effect on the concrete floor. In the next second, the entire area of several meters under Duncan’s feet had fallen under his control!

Shirley looked at this scene in disbelief: “… AH!?”

Wherever the flames swept over, something would suddenly appear from the originally empty spot.

It was ashes, patches of greyish ash that could be vaguely made out to be human form!

Suddenly, Shirley thought of something, and she raised her head and looked around at the empty factory.

Under Duncan’s conscious control, the green ghost flame swept through the entire factory like a fresh breeze.

As a result, the traces that had been erased finally reappeared briefly in the eyes of the visitor.