Chapter 116: Chapter 120 Rescue
Time seemed to suddenly slow down, slow down to a crawl; in the darkness and the gradually approaching heat, Nina felt her mind uncontrollably racing—
She seemed to recall her childhood smallness, the chaos she’d create “helping” her uncle in the antique shop as they ran up and down, her uncle fabricating stories behind those “antiques,” recalling her first day of school, the first time she saw a steam machine in her textbook, the first time she received praise from a teacher, the first time she made a friend… and the first time she lost one.
Her mind was muddled, consciousness increasingly confused.
Smoke began to slip into the room bit by bit, affecting her breathing and her stream of thoughts.
And those scattered memories all eventually morphed into images engulfed by flames.
A great fire… a great fire that existed only in memory seemed to blaze before her eyes once again.
Nina gazed absently at the ground nearby, as if at any second it would suddenly burst into flame, but just then, she felt an icy hand rest on her forehead.
“Are you okay?” Sherry looked at her “friend” with some concern, “Your eyes just glazed over… and you were mumbling something under your breath.”
“I… I’m fine,” Nina quickly shook her head and grasped Sherry’s arm, “Thank you… I just suddenly thought of my family.”
“Family…” Sherry hesitated at these words, then seemed to ask casually, “Who do you have at home?”
“Just an uncle… My parents haven’t been around for many years, I grew up with my uncle,” Nina thought for a moment, her head slowly sinking into her knees, “I promised him I’d come home early today…”
“You… You must be very close with your uncle, right?” Sherry seemed a bit uncomfortable with the topic, as if unsure how to comfort a friend, speaking as if grasping for words, “What does he do?”
“He’s just an ordinary person, we run an antique shop in the Lower City District, he takes care of it alone…” Nina said slowly, quickly gesturing with her hands when she noticed Sherry’s surprised look, “It isn’t the kind of impressive antique shop you’re thinking of, there are no real valuables.”
“That still sounds impressive!” Sherry quickly offered a compliment, “A shop owner! Owning a shop of your own, even if it is in the Lower City District… So life at your home must be pretty good, right?”
“Actually, it’s quite ordinary,” Nina continued to gesture, “my uncle hasn’t been well for a few years, and the business isn’t doing so great, we haven’t saved much money… But I think my uncle is really amazing, he can even talk with Mr. Morris for ages! He knows a lot, Mr. Morris always says he’s a learned man…”
After listening to Nina’s tale, Sherry nodded as if very seriously, “Then when we get out of here, I definitely want to meet your uncle…”
Nina smiled, was just about to say something, but suddenly heard a loud noise from the direction of the entrance—next second, the already flimsy washroom door was kicked open from the outside and came crashing down with a clang!
The instant she saw this, Nina’s first reaction was to fear that the corridor’s flames would roar in, fuelled by the broken door, a knowledge she had gleaned from school, but the next second, she saw a familiar figure step through the entrance—no flames materialized as she had envisioned.
Sherry too was startled by the thud of the breaking door; she turned around in shock, stiffening upon seeing the figure at the doorway.
She saw the shadow of the Subspace silently standing at the entrance, and in her peripheral vision, the last flicker of flame seemed to cower and dissipate at the figure’s feet. With a trace of fear, she attempted to step back—there was a fraction of a second when she even considered whether to send Nina, her new “friend,” out but before she could act, Nina had stood up behind her.
“Uncle Duncan?!” Nina looked at the figure in the doorway with delight, all fear and repression seemingly dissolving with the appearance of that silhouette.
“Nina?” Duncan looked at the girl with some surprise—he had actually followed the “mark” left on Sherry to find this place, intending to locate Sherry the Summoner then continue the search together for remaining parts of the museum but didn’t expect to stumble upon Nina directly.
Next second, his gaze fell on Sherry.
So… the conversation he had heard through the “mark” before, it was Nina talking with Sherry… Nina’s classmate who said they should travel together was Sherry?!
Quickly piecing things together in his mind, Duncan realized what was happening and promptly noticed the rapid change in Sherry’s expression. Before this Transcendent Summoner with whom he had a certain “affinity” could speak, he stepped forward, scanning their surroundings, “It seems like both of you are okay.”
Next second, he noticed a third person in the room: a young lady in a long dress lying unconscious on the floor but apparently still alive.
Sherry finally regained her ability to think. She abruptly recalled what Nina had said earlier and after a moment, her neck stiffly turned as she looked at Nina with an expression as if she had seen a ghost, “Nina… he is… your uncle?”
“Yes!” Nina said happily, then rushed over to Duncan in a few steps, “Uncle, how come you are here?! Is the fire outside extinguished?!”
“Not yet, but the flames are under control,” Duncan replied casually. He knew that such a vague answer would seem highly suspicious under normal circumstances, but now Nina was clearly in a state of confusion, and the startled girl just clutched at his arm, repeating, “That’s great, I thought today I would have to…”
“Alright, let’s talk about everything once we get out; this isn’t the place for it,” Duncan interrupted Nina, then his gaze swiftly swept over Sherry and the lady who was lying on the ground, “We need to take this lady with us.”
“Ah… okay!” Nina belatedly realized what was needed and hurried over to try to lift the woman. Sherry also rushed over to help—but due to the height difference, it wasn’t easy for them, so Duncan stepped forward, ready to do it himself.
But as he reached out to help the woman up, something suddenly caught his eye, causing him to pause.
It was a familiar-looking amethyst pendant.
Duncan paused, slowly recalling the home visit by Mr. Morris and some of the details mentioned during the conversation.
“Uncle?” Nina’s voice came from beside him, interrupting Duncan’s thoughts.
Duncan shook his head gently, glanced at Nina, then his gaze seemed to casually sweep over Sherry and he smiled slightly, “It’s a small world.”
After speaking, he helped the woman up, then with the assistance of the two girls, he picked her up on his back.
The group left the utility room. There were no flames to be seen in the corridor outside the utility room, and even the thick smoke had mostly dissipated “for unknown reasons.” Sherry looked ahead at the pitch-black corridor and hesitated before asking, “Which way should we go?”
Duncan looked up, just about to point out a direction, but suddenly, through the “fire power” that had earlier engulfed the museum, he sensed something. With a thought, he changed the originally intended path and swiftly headed toward another exit, “This way.”
Guided by the retreat and instruction of the flames, they quickly left the area. Shortly after their departure, a squad appeared around the corner of the corridor near the utility room.
It was the squad of Deep Sea Church Guardians who had previously rushed into the blaze.
The squad was dirty and sooty, but the Ocean’s Blessing had yet to wear off their bodies—they had charged in with a resolution to die if necessary but had narrowly escaped harm due to the sudden rapid retreat of the fires inside the museum.
“The fire here is out too,” the priest leading the team murmured with a slight frown as he observed the surroundings, “Even the smoke has dissipated.”
“It’s good that the fire is out,” a guardian whispered.
“It is good, but normally, a fire of this scale wouldn’t extinguish so easily,” the priest said in a solemn voice. Suddenly, he noticed the violently destroyed door of the utility room.
“Somebody has been here…” A guardian swiftly approached to inspect, confirmed the traces near the door, and expertly took out an incense burner and prayer book. He then donned a set of specially made lenses on his head.
The lens set looked like a half-helmet made of brass tubes, cranks, and a series of lenses, with complex runes etched around the edges of some of them.
This guardian placed the incense burner on the ground and then started adjusting the lens set on his head, observing all the residual clues in the vicinity.
“No residual transcendent powers… They are ordinary people, the exact number is uncertain, their presence is very chaotic,” the guardian rapidly reported, “They’re likely tourists who were trapped earlier… The door was destroyed from the inside, it looks like someone broke the door from outside to rescue them.”
“Are you sure there are no transcendent powers?”
“None.”
“…Continue the search upstairs.”
“Yes!”