Deep Sea Embers.

Chapter 810 Ashes in the Wind
In the deserted city, Vanna walked forward cautiously. Her invisible travel companion walked beside her, happily introducing her to this prosperous, lively and beautiful place.

This is the most prosperous city on the entire "continent". Almost everyone knows about it, and most people live here or at least pass by here on their journey. The guards here are diligent and responsible, the residents here are friendly and generous, and all the fresh and interesting goods in the world are gathered here, as well as all the fresh and interesting ideas and stories in the world.

"Everyone likes it here, and you will too," the cheerful voice said beside Vanna, "Just stay here for a few days and you will know its appeal!"

Fanna listened to the enthusiastic tour guide beside her talking to her in a disjointed manner, but some strange but practical... thoughts were turning in her mind.

She was thinking, since she couldn't see the "people" in this city at all, but she could occasionally hear other people's voices nearby, so to the residents here (who might really exist), was she just like a blind man holding a big sword? Such a dangerous militant walked on the street with his eyes closed, swaggering around...did those invisible residents really have no reaction at all?

She thought again of the noisy guide beside her - judging from her voice, she was a young girl - she couldn't see her or even touch her, so it was naturally difficult for her to "tour" this place according to her instructions. So Vanna just explored among these ruins based on her own judgment along the way, and basically ignored whether the "companion" beside her was following her or whether she could keep up, but the "guide lady" didn't seem to think there was anything wrong with this.

She just followed naturally beside her all the time. No matter which direction Vanna suddenly walked in, her voice remained at a distance that was neither too far nor too close. She communicated with Vanna fluently and naturally, as if this was the tour route she had planned for her "new friend".

Vanna stopped near an intersection and silently sorted out her thoughts.

What kind of existence do I, a "stranger", exist in relation to the residents of this invisible city and the invisible travel companion beside me?
The moment this doubt arose, a trance even stronger than before suddenly struck her heart. Vanna suddenly felt her mind go blank for a moment, as if... she had forgotten something very important.

She raised her head in confusion, looking at the strange and desolate ruins. She vaguely remembered that she had noticed something "irrational" before, but now this sense of irrationality has disappeared.

"Would you like some fruit?" A voice suddenly came from the roadside nearby, interrupting Vanna's thoughts. The voice sounded like that of a gentle old woman. "They were delivered to the city this morning. They are fresh and thirst-quenching. You must have traveled a long way, right?"

Fanna looked in the direction of the sound and saw a pile of wooden boards and stones half-buried by yellow sand on the side of the road. A blurry black shadow was sitting in the ruins. The shadow stretched out his hand to her, like a vendor selling goods - a ball of yellow sand was blown away from the shadow's hand by the wind, and there was only sand on the wooden board in front of him.

Vanna blinked, and the black shadow disappeared in an instant.

She stood alone at the crossroads, with only the hollow sound of the wind in her ears. After a while, she realized that even the voice of the "invisible companion" had disappeared and had not been heard for a long time.

Fanna turned her head and looked in the direction where she last felt the other person's presence, and asked tentatively: "Are you still there?"

She got no response.

Some dust was picked up by the wind and fell from a nearby ruined wall. A familiar sound was heard in the wind and sand - ding, ding, ding...

Fanna placed the giant sword in her left hand and used her right hand to draw a familiar symbol on her chest - she couldn't remember the meaning of the symbol, but her body made this movement naturally. It seemed to be a habit she had developed a long time ago, some kind of... blessing action.

Then she carefully held the greatsword in her hand and walked deeper into the city.

She walked in the ruins for a long time. The wide and complex roads in the city seemed to have no end. Buildings and paths were buried in yellow sand everywhere. Even though the broken and collapsed buildings were buried in the sand, one could still vaguely see some of their former exquisite appearance.

Fanna suddenly thought - this might really be the most lively and prosperous city in the world. There were countless people living in this huge city, and countless busy caravans shuttling back and forth in the city, supplying it with supplies from all over the world and stories from afar.

But that was before it was abandoned.

Why was such a prosperous city abandoned? When was it abandoned? And in the end... why did I come here?

Vanna crossed a fork in the road and continued walking forward with questions popping up from time to time, but when she passed a building, she suddenly stopped.

A strange sound came from the wind, and then a piece of paper flew out from the wind and sand, swirling past her eyes, with words vaguely visible on the paper.

Paper? Is there any paper left in this sandstorm?

Vanna's heart moved, and her body reacted first - she grabbed the piece of paper that flew past her eyes, and then looked at its contents with astonishment.

It turned out to be a torn newspaper. The upper part of the paper still had words related to the newspaper title, while the lower part of the paper had many words that were worn and corroded. After carefully identifying it for a long time, Vanna finally found a relatively complete sentence:

"...a fire broke out in Plande, spreading from the upper city to the lower city. Many factories and neighborhoods were damaged in the fire, and residents were injured or killed..."

Fanna stared blankly at the words on the paper that seemed to have been baptized by the years. She was confused. After a long time, she finally had a question:
Where is Pland?
The next second, she saw the pieces of newspaper in her hand silently turned into yellow sand and drifted in the air with the wind.

Fanna stood there in a daze for a moment, brushed off the remaining sand and dust on her hands, and slowly walked forward.

After walking forward for a long time, she suddenly stopped in front of a building.

In the floating dust and mist, the appearance of the building seemed very abrupt, as if it had suddenly emerged from the wind and sand, standing somewhat incongruously among a pile of broken and collapsed building wreckage, like a giant beast, staring at Vanna silently.

It was a small church with multiple spires. Compared to a church, it was not grand in scale, but it looked particularly solemn.

It had obviously been abandoned, with mottled and cracked exterior walls, broken and scattered doors and windows, and fallen tiles on the roof. It looked like it had been abandoned for a long time, but compared to the surrounding ruins that had completely collapsed into a pile of broken bricks and tiles and buried by sand, it at least maintained the integrity of its main structure - and what caught Vanna's attention was that there was actually a small flower bed in front of the church.

The flower bed had also been damaged, with only some dead plants in it. But what was incredible was that there was not a grain of sand in the flower bed. Even in this place where yellow sand was everywhere and the wind never stopped blowing, the flower bed looked clean.

It was as if someone was still taking care of this broken flower bed and the withered plants inside.

Vanna stopped in front of the flower bed for a while, looked up at the dilapidated chapel, and after a brief hesitation, walked forward.

The moment she stepped through the church door, she felt something changed - the eternal heat in the desert seemed to be instantly isolated from another world, and the next second, she saw bright lights in front of her.

The church looked ruined for who knows how many years from the outside, but its interior was surprisingly clean and tidy, with the doors, windows and roof intact. Bright lights illuminated the entire main hall, and rows of empty wooden benches were neatly arranged in the hall. At the end of the benches was a tall pulpit - lights shone down from above the wooden pulpit, bathing it in soft light.

Vanna frowned, vaguely feeling that this place was familiar.

She had seen it, or at least heard of it.

But she couldn't remember. She couldn't even remember what kind of life she had experienced before she stepped into this endless desert.

She gripped the sword tightly and walked in the aisle in the middle of the hall. After checking the surrounding environment, she finally stopped in front of a bench.

She had been walking for so long that she felt she needed to sit down and rest, if only for a few minutes.

She sat down on the bench. The old chair creaked slightly. She took a long breath and felt that her joints were like the old chair, creaking under the weight after being filled with sand.

Then, she suddenly heard a slight breathing sound.

There was a man sitting next to her.

Vanna turned around suddenly.

She was a young nun wearing a black church robe and looked about the same age as Vanna. She sat quietly beside her with her head lowered, as if she was praying devoutly.

A person! A visible, real person?!
Vanna had almost forgotten the last time she saw "another person". In all her memories, she seemed to have been traveling on an endless journey, with only sand and strange sounds to accompany her. She had even begun to feel that the world was like this and that she was the only "human" in the world, but now... she saw a person!

The excitement was hard to suppress, and at the same time, a subtle sense of confusion and familiarity emerged in her heart. Vanna subconsciously said: "You are..."

"You have stayed here too long, sister," the young nun who was praying suddenly raised her head and interrupted Vanna's words. She looked at the latter calmly, "Ashes, it is easy to be assimilated by ashes."

(End of this chapter)