Ke-style law enforcement officers

Chapter 769 Ancient Civilization

"Have we already reached the Southern Continent?"

"Bullshit! We've only been sailing for a few days, it's far from over!"

"Then who can explain what this land in front of us is all about?"

...

The black sailing ship set sail from the "graveyard" of Vovadaus at dawn. As the fog dissipated around noon, a vast expanse of land appeared ahead, completely blocking the sea route. It stretched as far as the eye could see on either side, and had nothing to do with islands.

As they slowed the boat and approached the land, the cats studied the nautical charts until they were practically worn out, but they still couldn't find the land ahead.

However, even if the course was deviated, it shouldn't have deviated this much. Moreover, the South Wind Sea is known for its numerous and scattered small islands, and I've never heard of such a large landmass in the South Wind Sea.

This is land that doesn't exist.

And that's not the only strange thing.

Before we even got close to that land, a stench of decay and putrefaction began to rise, and just from that smell, you could almost picture a mountain of corpses crawling with worms.

...

The ship successfully docked.

The scene presented to everyone was still strange.

There wasn't much green vegetation on this land; instead, the view was filled with all sorts of brightly colored things...

"Coral? Is this?"

Damp and muddy, every inch of rock and sand is covered with traces of rich microorganisms.

Only by setting foot on this land can one know just how slippery it is.

As for the stench that could be smelled hundreds of meters away on the sea, it came from the rotting carcass of a sea creature that could be found every few dozen meters on land, or some kind of huge whale, or an even more bizarrely shaped sea creature.

They were mostly dead, and traces of their last struggles remained on the surrounding rock layers. The flesh, which had dehydrated and decayed rapidly, was easily scraped apart by the rocks like tofu, leaving behind bits of flesh.

Of course, besides the carcasses of giant marine mammals, there were countless small and medium-sized fish, and the ground was covered with shellfish of various colors that shimmered brilliantly in the sunlight.

On land, there are still many pitted ponds or larger lakes where the lucky fish and shrimp that didn't die from the sun now live.

...

The bizarre rock formations, combined with the vibrant colors of the coral reefs, are shrouded in an extreme stench of decay.

The scene was undeniably dreamlike, yet it was permeated with an aura of death.

Even a fool, upon seeing this scene, could roughly deduce the origin of this landmass.

It's just that the answer was too bizarre.

...

Morgan tiptoed across the dry ground to a low-lying puddle, touched the water's surface with his paw, then licked his paw clean. Finally, he turned to the group and said:
"What delicious fish soup!"

It was only then that Milo realized that the so-called stench was only relative to humans. The abundant aquatic products and fishy smell here were a food paradise for cats. They didn't even need to hunt; they could simply dip their paws into the water and scoop up a listless fish.

Milo crouched down by the water's edge, gazing at the wondrous scenery that could only be seen underwater.

"Do you think it's Mu Continent or Lemuria?"

...

In the world of lucidity, Mu and Lemuria are two sunken continents located in the Indian Ocean and the South Pacific Ocean, respectively, which geologists deduced based on the similarity of biological communities on different continents.

In the other world that Milo knew, which was the Earth where he first lived, both the Mu continent and Lemuria have been proven not to exist by the theory of continental drift, and so far no archaeological evidence has been found to prove the existence of ancient Stone Age civilizations.

The theory of these two "sunken continents" was probably proposed during the 19th century in the world of the waking world.

...

However, it doesn't matter how the geological evolution of the conscious world changes, whether it's the sinking of land or the drifting of tectonic plates, because in the dream world, both the continent of Mu and Lemuria are real.

It is impossible to verify whether the geologists who proposed the theory were powerful dream weavers who created these two sunken continents in a dream world, or whether the speculations and theories about these two continents originated from what they saw and heard in the dream world during their dream-like state.

You might ask, then how did Milo determine the reality of the Mu Continent and Lemuria in the Dreamland?
The answer is actually quite simple.

It comes from the memories of the dead of Vovados and the snake-men he buried and spied on even earlier.

...

However, due to the highly distorted nature of Vovados's memories, the truly clear information actually came from the serpent people, from the deformed dragon warrior born from the union of Ig and the Hierophant he had captured... In its memory, the reason why the continent of Mu and part of Lemuria sank was because of Ig.

That was some ancient era that has been lost to the passage of time.

At that time, some snake-people groups living on these two lands incurred Ig's hatred because of their belief in the ancient Zatogia.

So the Father of all serpents cast a curse, causing many serpent people to degenerate into unintelligent serpent-like savages or even pure serpents.

It even unleashed some terrifying, ancient being that sank part of both landmasses.

...

Why do they know this so clearly? Because the one who cast the curse on those "disobedient" snake people is none other than the venomous snake itself.

As for why it was ultimately necessary to summon that terrible thing to sink the continent, Milo guessed that perhaps the act of cursing ultimately provoked a counterattack from Satogua? The Serpent Man didn't know much about this.

However, considering the normal course of events, it is understandable that Zatogua would defend his followers, and Milo had a deep understanding of that desire for reckoning.

……

The group traveled south for about half a day and soon encountered other living creatures besides the marine life that were barely surviving in the low-lying pools.

Well, he's a familiar face, isn't he?

Snail people.

Yes, I had a brief encounter with the Snail People in the ancient city of Snail Annihilation. They were soft-bodied creatures covered in mucus and carrying heavy snail shells.

Back then, Milo and Monquia's large group of hunters were chased all over the place by these snail people in Snail City.

As a former Cthulhu clan that once lurked deep in the ocean, it's not surprising that the Snail People, extinct in the waking world, appear in the dream world.

Of course, it's hard to say whether these people are descendants of the snail people or their ancestors.

Interestingly, the snail people of the South Wind Sea seem to have degenerated considerably compared to the race Milo remembered.

They are no longer as aggressive.

Although they can survive in the air, they were clearly still in a state of panic and fear from the sudden rise of the seabed to land. When they saw Milo and the strange two-legged creatures, as well as those furry, fierce-looking creatures, the snails were so frightened that they scattered and fled back to the puddles in the low-lying areas.

This reminded Milo of the physically disturbing scene he witnessed in the City of Snail Annihilation—an unfortunate snail-man, while fleeing, got his snail shell stuck on something, and in his panic, he tore his soft torso in two...

...

However, the snail people were just a minor incident.

They are clearly not highly intelligent beings, and are no different from schools of fish in the ocean.

Milo initially thought the Snails might be some kind of signal, perhaps they would find ruins related to the Snail Annihilation City's beliefs after venturing deeper inland, perhaps they would encounter Deep Ones, or even Dagon...

But no, after crossing the brightly colored coral reef ahead, Milo and his companions found ruins that had no connection whatsoever with the city of Lurkrei or R'lyeh.

It was an ancient city ruin covered with seaweed, coral, and fragments of various shellfish.

...

Today, the main structure of the building is dilapidated and no longer what it once was, leaving only an outline resembling a foundation on the "ground". Most of the traces have been buried by the remains of the rich marine life.

However, Milo still discovered some interesting things in these ruins.

sculpture.

Even today, when the main structure of the building has been corroded and destroyed, many ancient and relatively intact sculptures still remain in the ruins.

They are generally over ten meters tall, and are humanoid in shape, with their torsos and limbs intact. Even after wiping away the mud and marine fossils covering their shells, you can still see the black material of the sculptures themselves and the patterns carved on them.

It's easy to imagine that giving the sculpture a complete cleaning and renovation could completely transform it into something brand new.

Even in its current state of disrepair, it's not hard to deduce that all these sculptures represent the same person, or rather, the same deity, only with different figures and postures.

The cloak, the floating flame totem, the star symbols, and some more straightforward fragmented proverbs all indicate the name of the sculptor.

It was Volvados, the very same person Milo had seen whose remains not long ago.

In other words, before this continent sank, a civilization that worshipped Vovados lived here.

Most notably, the heads of these sculptures were all smashed.

……

(End of this chapter)