The believers of the Church of Light were not afraid of death. Even when they saw the corpses of their companions falling, they still rushed forward recklessly.
Charles hung upside down on the top of the cave with a powder barrel in his mouth, waiting for some opportunity.
When the explosions were most frequent, he spread his wings and flew towards the distant crack.
At this time, only a few tentacles on the huge flesh shield machine had been blown away, and the body was full of pits and holes. The dazzling sunlight shone through the wounds. Three of the six thick insect legs supporting the body had been broken. Although the wounds were still healing, the speed had obviously slowed down.
But in order to achieve this goal, most of the believers of light have died, and there are only two airships left, floating precariously in the sky.
Seeing hope of reaching the surface, Charles flapped his flesh wings and rushed towards the big hole in the flesh shield.
Just after he crawled out of the disk of flesh and blood, there was a sudden light in front of him. The bright sunlight made his whole body sting, and he came up.
Just at this moment, Charles suddenly felt a pain in his foot.
He looked down and saw a small, slimy white praying mantis piercing his calf with its sickle.
Charles kicked it away with his left foot and looked behind the flesh shield machine.
Clusters of white eggs were piled on it, shaking from time to time. It turned out that these things were the mantis's hatchery!
"Whoosh" a ball of fire ignited Charles' calf, and Charles' heart skipped a beat. Oh no, his rubber jacket was torn!
Seeing the flames spreading rapidly towards his body, Charles did not dare to delay. He quickly changed back into human form and rushed towards the back of the shield machine.
When he turned into human form, he quickly used the black blade to dig out the large piece of burning flesh and blood, and the crisis of being burned to ashes was finally over.
Charles looked around, grabbed the bomb and limped towards the nearest thick leg of the tunnel boring machine.
This thing has a strong recovery ability, and we must get rid of it before we can go to the surface safely.
As if sensing what Charles was going to do, the eggs on the back of the tunnel boring machine quickly burst, and various underdeveloped and deformed mantises struggled towards Charles.
But these underdeveloped monsters were no match for Charles. He quickly dealt with them with a single move of his knife.
"Hiss, hiss, hiss" the fuse was lit, and Charles quickly climbed up the cliff with his prosthetic limb and the black blade in one hand.
"Boom!" With a violent tremor below, the fourth insect leg was blown off. The shield machine could no longer hold on and fell towards the sea below.
Just as its huge body began to tilt, a barbed tentacle as thick as a telephone pole shot out from its flesh and went straight towards Charles' vest.
Charles' keen hearing allowed him to hear the sound behind him. He used all his strength to move to the left, but it was too late. The tentacle pierced into Charles' prosthesis like a spear.
A huge force pulled Charles down along with the tunnel boring machine.
Watching the blue above his head getting farther and farther away, Charles clenched his teeth, grabbed the black-bladed knife and thrust it horizontally into the cliff wall.
"Swish!" Charles' body collapsed instantly, the sound of flesh tearing was heard, and a pain that almost made him faint came from his left arm. The prosthesis was connected to various things in his body and was pulled out forcibly.
Charles, holding the black blade with one hand, was staggering.
He exerted force with his fingers, turned around quickly, and his feet were firmly on the back of the knife.
Charles took off his belt tremblingly and quickly tied the wound on his shoulder tightly.
"Ha... ha... ha..." Charles, leaning against the cliff, gasped for breath. Looking up at the blue still there, he laughed, with a mad laugh.
Just when Charles was about to take a short rest before climbing up, an airship with its airbag half deflated came up from below, wobbling.
There were three people standing alone on the half of the deck. Charles looked at them, put his feet on the black blade, and jumped over directly.
Grabbing a man and sucking his blood, Charles pointed to the sky, signaling to continue flying upwards.
When the blood thirst in his body disappeared, Charles held the edge of the boat with his hands and gasped for breath.
"Governor, so many people died. Is it worth it?"
Charles glanced at him, the rubber jacket prevented him from seeing the man's features, nor the emotions on his face.
"Don't worry, it's all worth it. As long as we find the place of light, I will ask the God of Light to take their souls back to the kingdom of God."
No one on the deck spoke any more. The airship slowly floated upwards.
The blue in the sky grew bigger and bigger, and Charles could even see white clouds.
"What a nice weather today." Charles couldn't hide the smile on his face.
As he got closer to the cave entrance, Charles discovered that there seemed to be a city outside, with tall buildings that were leaning all around the cave entrance.
The towering buildings blocked some of the sunlight, but Charles could already see part of the scorching fireball in the sky, so familiar and so pure.
The airship was still climbing, but it couldn't hold out for long. "Puff~" the deflated airbag began to leak.
"Hurry, hurry over to the building!" Charles said nervously.
The airship used the last bit of its power to send the four people to a hole in the wall of a tall building at the edge of the gap, inside which was a dusty stairwell.
"Wait." Richard suddenly paused. He took out a crown covered with colorful gems from his pocket, looked at it, and put it back.
"What's this?"
"What kind of gift do you bring? Is it for girls?"
"It's okay. She's obsessed with money. She likes anything that's valuable. Let's go."
"Go this way." Charles led the four people and stumbled towards the rooftop.
The building was crooked, and so were the stairs. As the numbers at the stairs grew bigger, Charles' heartbeat grew faster.
Suddenly he stopped and the red gate of the rooftop was less than three meters in front of him.
The door was not locked, and by pushing it open he could return to the surface.
Charles stretched out his hand and then pulled it back, an indescribable feeling of fear surged in his heart.
He suddenly felt an urge in his heart, and subconsciously wanted to return to the Earthsea, to Hope Island, and be with his crew.
"Brother... Brothers, we're all going home, it's okay, we're not afraid, we're not afraid, let's go together." Richard's trembling voice appeared in his mind.
Charles took a few deep breaths and put his hand on the door handle.
Three... Two... One! The two personalities controlled their arms together to twist the door handle. The door opened with a click, and the dazzling light in the air shot into Charles' eyes.
When he saw clearly the bright light source in the sky, he was stunned.
That wasn't the sun. That thing in the sky was more like a large ring made of the same material as the sun.
In the center of the ring are suspended some tangram-like blocks, which are connected to each other to form a giant white triangle.
"Wuwuwu~!!" The three believers of light behind Charles rushed up to the tilted rooftop, crawled on the ground and cried bitterly to that thing.
"Great God of Light, your lost people have finally found you!!!"
"Almighty God, please accept my soul! Please let me join your kingdom of God!!"
That is not the sun, that is the God of Light believed in by the Church of Light.
Charles looked around blankly. The surrounding rock walls were painted with blue paint and dotted with some white clouds. The blue he saw before was just the paint on the rock walls.
This is not the surface at all. It is just a hole dug by the Foundation on the dome for living. It is still underground, and he did not walk out.
Charles knelt on the ground with his knees weak. There seemed to be something hard to describe in his eyes. Slowly his expression twisted and a sound came out from the depths of his throat.
That was not crying, it was a choking sound of trying to suppress the cry. Charles couldn't hold it back so he started coughing. He covered his neck with his hands and his face turned red.
The coughing sound also escaped from my throat, turning into a wail that was almost a scream, like the cry of a dying bird in a cold winter night.
"Why... Why!! What on earth do you want me to do!!! I'm just going home!! Why!!"
As Charles roared, saliva mixed with tears formed a silk thread and dripped onto the thick dust on the rooftop.
Suddenly, Charles' body moved. He first took out the crown and threw it hard on the ground. Then he took out a handful of glass bottles from his arms. That was the potion used to make the personality disappear.
"Hahaha!! Sure! Charles, you stay in this crappy place by yourself. I don't want to play anymore!!"
After Richard finished speaking, he tilted his head back and drank the medicine in the glass bottle.
Halfway through the potion, the hand holding the bottle dropped, and Charles felt empty in his heart, as if something had disappeared.
Charles, who was crying, laughed. He reached out and took out another bottle.
Among the followers of the Church of Light who were crawling on the ground, Charles stood up and unscrewed the bottle cap with his teeth.
He raised the bottle towards the huge dazzling ring in the sky. "I don't care what you are. Cheers, long live the sun god! I wish I'll be reborn into a good family."
The bright ring in the sky flashed for a moment, and a soft female voice came over. "Dawn One is telling the time for all citizens of the New Territories. It is now 12:00 p.m."
Charles smiled nervously, raised his head and was about to drink, but suddenly his body began to shake, and then his hand loosened, and the bottle fell to the ground with a snap and shattered into pieces.
"ph" "ngluimglw" "nafhfutaR" "lyeh wgah" "nagl fhtagn" the anxious murmur appeared in Charles' ears again.
As the whispering sound appeared, Charles saw his fingers transform into octopus tentacles covered with eyeballs.
Irregular organs began to grow all over his body, including crab-claw-like limbs, black spheres that swelled like bubbles, and triangular, deformed eyeballs that stared wide like fish.
"Haha, interesting. Are you all here together?" The mutated Charles walked to the side while laughing crazily.
There was the edge of the roof, and outside was the gap he had just climbed out of.
Without any hesitation, Charles jumped.
The wind whistled in Charles' ears, and all the eyes on Charles' body opened slightly. Various scenes on the surface and the sea flashed quickly before his eyes.
But in one moment, nothing mattered.
(End of this chapter)