Volume One

Chapter Six: Passage of Time

In the early hours before dawn, the giant egg gradually turned gray, then lost its vitality, coming to a stop on the ground and solidifying into a hard object like a stone.

The reason they knew it was early morning was because William Carter and Little Grace soon left the way they had come. On the open ground, the pack of wolves was gradually dispersing. The sky was beginning to lighten. Although Little Grace had spent the whole night playing with the giant egg as it rolled around, she was still full of energy, while William Carter was immersed in the wonder the underground palace had brought him, pondering the meaning of the things he had seen the previous night.

Last night, Little Grace had been playing with the glowing furball the whole time. William Carter, on the other hand, lost interest in the furball after a short while, so he left the underground palace, gathered some branches to make a torch, lit it, and walked around the underground palace.

The underground palace was huge, probably covering the entire open area. Although many parts had collapsed and been destroyed, it was still possible to guess that it was a perfect circle. The place where Little Grace was playing with the furball was probably just a short distance down the stairs. When William Carter made his way around a few obstacles at the back, he saw something that greatly surprised him.

There were still scattered stones all over the ground, but the shapes of these stones were quite unusual. Rather than stones, they looked more like eggshells—eggshells from giant eggs over two meters in diameter!

No one knew how many thousands of years this underground palace had endured. Many of the eggshells, which should have been thin and tough, had already crumbled to dust. So, what was laid out before William Carter was a thick layer of fine sand covered with countless tiny fragments. These fragments were so small that it was hard to see a complete arc, but as he walked further in on the fine sand, he found several places where huge, intact eggshells still remained. They sat on the sand like large cauldrons, about half a meter high, their surfaces long since eroded by the wind, full of holes. It was easy to see that these were parts similar to the furball Little Grace was playing with.

Very few eggshells could survive the passage of so many years, but it was still possible to imagine the scene that once existed here: inside the vast underground palace, countless giant eggs arranged in formation like a parade, and then, under some mysterious force, one after another hatched into countless creatures about the height of a human...

What kind of creatures were they? The history that once existed here had long since weathered away with time, leaving only a few clues. If William Carter had come any later, perhaps even these clues would have disappeared. He walked forward on the fine sand and finally saw a huge stone wall curving out to both sides.

There were words on the stone wall!

On the moss-covered stone wall, faint traces could be seen. When he peeled away the moss, a variety of deep and shallow carvings covered the entire massive wall. They stretched out from in front of William Carter in all directions. Some resembled writing, others looked more like abstract drawings. These were all connected by strange lines like a musical staff, extending to the left and right, seemingly covering the entire underground palace.

Because there were once complete pictures to use as reference, the man-made elements were easier to spot. For example, there were straight knife marks as if made by a huge, sharp blade, and small cylindrical holes clearly made by human hands. It could be guessed that a fierce battle had once taken place here. Many other areas had been destroyed by powerful weapons, but from the collapsed piles of stone, it was impossible to tell whether the damage was caused by battle or by the natural passage of time. As he walked along the stone wall, William Carter saw something even stranger.

A statue!

Or perhaps it was not truly a statue, but rather a human body that had been petrified. It was a petite, beautiful woman. Although countless years had passed, the exquisite features and even the natural texture of her skin were still clearly visible. The woman was completely naked, yet frozen in a fighting pose: one foot lunging forward, the other stretched straight back, both hands seemingly holding a stick-like weapon, though it was now missing. Overall, the statue radiated a sense of strength and beauty. William Carter couldn't help but form a guess in his mind.

Hundreds or thousands of years ago, a great battle took place here among many creatures. This young woman was one of the warriors. In the chaos, she charged at her enemy with her weapon, and just as she was about to strike, she was instantly petrified. Over the millennia that followed, her clothes and weapon had long since weathered away, but her body, for some special reason, had not suffered the slightest damage.

Driven by a certain dark curiosity, he brought the torch close to the statue—of course, it was a statue, not a real girl, which was important—and wiped away the dust from between its legs with his hand. His heart pounding, he stared for a long time, then touched it a few times with his fingers before standing up with a strange expression. Sure enough...

It was too lifelike. If it were just a sculpture, it shouldn't be so realistic. And to sculpt a naked woman in such a pose—if it really was man-made, that person must have been quite the pervert.