Synthesis-type adventurers

Chapter 37 The world is a giant graveyard

The next morning, before dawn, the fog was at its thickest in Ruang Bay.

Rod and Ivyra stood in the queue leading out of the city, waiting for the gates to open.

Fully armed, Avira's plate armor, enhanced with both weight reduction and hardening, allowed her to move freely, and the barrier she carried on her back, enchanted with [Liquid Buffer], also seemed less heavy.

Rhodes wore a trench coat reinforced with [Petrified Skin], a [Structurally Reinforced] shirt underneath, an inconspicuous gray cloak on top, and long boots with [Silent Stealth] on his feet.

However, the most valuable thing he owned was the longsword at his waist, which looked ordinary but actually contained a terrifying curse.

Behind the two men were two sturdy draft horses.

This was something Rhodes had specially rented from the post station at a high price. Although the expensive daily rental fee and the deposit, which was almost equivalent to a piece of chainmail, made him feel quite pained, he couldn't save that money.

At this moment, the two large horses were snorting loudly, with enough dry rations, drinking water, and a waterproof tent treated with oil and wax piled high on their backs for two people to use for a week.

To prevent the supplies from making noise while moving, all the hooks were carefully wrapped with soft cloth.

"Final check of the equipment."

"Main weapon in perfect condition, shield structure intact, and potion supplies complete," Avira quickly reported. "All in good condition, ready to depart at any time."

"Very good," Rhodes tightened the collar of his cloak. "Remember the principles of combat: prioritize using traps and terrain to restrain the opponent, never engage in direct combat if you can ambush them, and always use head-on confrontation as a last resort. Upgrading your equipment doesn't mean we can charge in recklessly."

He took a step, his boots landing silently, and his figure became slightly blurred as he moved, easily blending into the darkness.

"Let's go, Avira. Destination: Darkwood. It's time to complete our mission."

"Yes, sir."

As the gates of Rusty Harbor officially opened, the figures of the two men and two horses quickly disappeared into the dawn mist.

-----------------

The wilderness east of Ruin Harbor is utterly devoid of any open roads.

The horses' hooves struck the gravelly ground, each strike producing a dull, crisp sound.

There is no fragrance of soil here, only stale dust that enters the nasal cavity, thick enough to be tasted on the tongue.

Rod pulled on the reins, guiding his draft horse away from a jarring, raised, greyish-white obstacle.

The outline is not a rock, but a fossilized rib of a giant creature. The fractured section is as wide as two adults can hug. After tens of thousands of years of wind erosion, the surface of the bone has become rough and porous.

"Watch out for the horses' hooves," Rod warned Avira behind him, "Don't trip over this mythical trash."

"Mythical relics?" Avira urged her horse to catch up, her gaze sweeping over the enormous skeleton, a look of awe appearing in her eyes. "The church's scriptures say that these are the remains of gods who fell during Ragnarok, sacred relics."

Before all recorded history, there was a distant era known to later generations as the "Mythological Age".

For unknown reasons, the ancient gods waged a world-ending war and ultimately perished together.

This is the source of all epics and myths, but its truth has been completely buried in the dust of time and cannot be traced back.

Rhodes scoffed at this: "If dead things can be called sacred objects, then the whole world is just a giant graveyard."

He pointed to the gray earth stretching to the horizon and continued, "Look at your feet, Miss Knight. You think we're treading on the earth? No, we're treading on corpses."

He pointed with his riding whip at a distant, undulating black shadow that resembled a mountain range.

"Did you know what? That thing isn't a mountain; it's the ruins of a giant fortress from the Demigod Era. Dig down another hundred meters, and you might unearth the remains of a magic cannon from the Radiant War. And another five hundred meters down, and you might find a buried elven royal court."

There's no such thing as innate erudition; this is just a survival guide that Rhodes risked his life to obtain.

For the first three months after his transmigration, he served as a low-level logistics worker in the Anvil Adventurer Group.

At that time, Rhodes had a vocabulary system, but no power to rely on.

Their daily work consisted of scrubbing toilets, cleaning equipment, moving cargo boxes, and cooking large meals. Only by occasionally recycling and selling scrap could they earn a meager extra income.

But while others finished their adventures and flocked to the tavern, numbing their nerves and bodies with alcohol and prostitutes, Rhodes was like a cracked sponge, frantically absorbing everything about this strange world.

He used his meager salary to buy cheap rye beer in order to get the mouths of those veterans with broken legs to listen to their stories from their deep underground dens.

Taking advantage of his position cleaning the regimental commander's study, he made the most of every minute to peruse the dusty "Illustrated Explanation of Stratigraphy" and "General History of the Continent";

He even learned to peel away the historical framework, embellished with ornate language, from the exaggerated ballads of bards.

It was through those 90 days and nights of eager accumulation and countless rounds of indirect probing that Rhodes was able to piece together the true outline of the world before him amidst the fog.

"Aethergard has never been an ordinary planet—it's more like a giant mille-feuille, or a layered nest," Rhodes said slowly. "We living beings are nothing more than parasites, living on the outermost fragile shell."

The so-called dungeon adventure, to put it bluntly, is nothing more than a group of desperate tomb raiders, carrying shovels and longswords, digging towards the earth's core, towards the deeper, more ancient, dangerous, and more thoroughly polluted piles of corpses.

The deeper you go, the older the civilization becomes, and the more distorted the rules become.

Of course, the burial goods also became increasingly valuable.

“Your metaphors… are always so unique and unsettling.” Avira paused for a moment, seemingly processing these blasphemous remarks. “But whatever lies beneath our feet, our mission is to venture into the Darkwood and resolve the troubles that threaten the living.”

"That's right." Rhodes chuckled. "Whether it's a god or a demon buried down there, as long as I can dig up gold coins, I'm willing to offer it a good drink."

He held the reins in one hand and with the other he pulled out and unfolded a simple, hand-drawn sheepskin map from his pouch, his eyes scanning the route marked on it.

"If we follow this direction for two days, we'll see the dark purple mist characteristic of the contaminated area. The guild euphemistically calls it 'magic backflow,' but the truth is nauseating." Rhodes closed the map. "That's probably the echo of an ancient god from deep underground seeping up through the cracks, accumulating into a high concentration of pollution capable of warping the mind."

"That's why I was against accepting this bronze-level commission in the first place." Hearing this, Avira frowned and couldn't help but speak again, "We're only iron-level professionals; facing the source of pollution is far too risky."

Rhodes gently patted the horse's neck, his tone flat: "Fifty orimms, roughly equivalent to five hundred six-cent gold coins, is enough for us to teeter on that dangerous edge."

"Remember what I told you? This time, the target is limited to the third observation station on the western edge. We are only responsible for resetting the nodes and recording data. We will never step into the deep areas."

"If we encounter monsters, detect any high-risk reactions, or if your intuition tells you something is wrong, we will retreat immediately."