Chapter 1860 - 1859: The ’Connection’ Between Two Worlds

Accompanied by the old voice, Anke raised his head and looked around at the vehicles, "But these are all big trucks for transporting goods. Driving them won’t make us fast."

"Did those attackers also use big trucks?" the old voice asked casually.

"Oh right!" Anke suddenly realized, "Those guys are coming to hijack the caravan, they must have off-road vehicles."

He glanced at the gloomy night, looked at the vultures circling in the sky, lowered his head, and began to search along the convoy.

"Old man, what do you think these people do, are they bandits?" As Anke walked, he glanced at the surrounding truck containers.

Every driver and co-driver inside the containers had been killed, leaving only dried blood on the driver’s seat.

The bright moonlight spilled from the sky, illuminating the silent dried crimson, appearing eerie and terrifying.

"What do you think?" The old voice asked.

"I feel like these people aren’t professional bandits," Anke scratched his head, "They clearly don’t have enough manpower, I haven’t seen the trucks they came in with. If they were robbing, at least they would keep the drivers to help transport the goods, and their actions and equipment seem more like professional mercenaries than bandits."

He paused slightly, "At least the bandits I’ve seen aren’t as formidable, bandits usually avoid mercenaries."

"If they’re professional mercenaries, why are they attacking these people?" The old voice asked slowly.

"I don’t know," Anke sighed, "It’s too complicated, maybe they were following some orders?"

While talking, he had already walked to the side and rear of the convoy, where a hillside revealed several off-road vehicles in his field of view.

"Found it," Anke quickly walked toward the off-road vehicles, "Looks like they came over that hillside."

Very soon, he walked up to the front off-road vehicle, opened the door, and started searching inside.

"What are you looking for?" The old voice asked with some curiosity.

"Guns!" Anke opened the rear door of the off-road vehicle and opened the neatly stacked plastic boxes inside.

Several clips appeared in his field of view.

He opened another longer box, and a rocket launcher appeared in his field of view.

"These guys are really well-equipped, lucky we acted quickly," seeing this, Anke took a slight breath, "Otherwise, they’d have us in pieces."

"Old man, do you recognize this," Anke opened a box revealing a bunch of short guns, "These are submachine guns."

Then he pointed to the long box, "This is a rocket launcher."

"Is there a difference?" The old voice asked.

"Submachine guns have a faster rate of fire but are less accurate, this rocket launcher is just a cannon," Anke closed the boxes one by one, "Did you have these during the Era of the Great Cataclysm?"

"No," the old voice said slowly, "We only had flintlock guns filled with gunpowder, and laser weapons dug out from ancient ruins."

"What do you mean?" Hearing this, Anke hesitated slightly, "You had laser weapons back then?"

"Before our era began, there was an even more advanced age, but that era was lost, leaving only ancient ruins from which powerful creations could sometimes be excavated," this time the old voice was puzzled, "Isn’t this what you’ve been trying? Haven’t you always called our era the Era of the Great Cataclysm? Since it’s a ’cataclysm,’ naturally there was a time before it wasn’t subjected to a ’cataclysm’."

"Is that right? Is that right?" Anke said awkwardly and stutteringly, "I’m not good with history, I only remember the Federation had the Era of the Great Cataclysm before it."

Saying this, he looked around trying to change the topic, "Did you have cars back then too?"

"Yes," the old voice said slowly, "Steam-powered cars, you know? They move wheels by generating steam from boiling water, and there’s a more precise type that runs on fuel, traveling much farther than steam cars, but few city-states mastered this technology, and suitable fuel was hard to find."

"That complicated, huh," Anke said slowly, "The Federation seems to run on electricity, liquid fuel cells are used outside the city for electricity generation."

He walked curiously to other off-road vehicles, opening their doors as he searched, "I thought you had nothing in your era, you’d have to travel by horseback or something."

"There were horses too," the old voice said slowly, "The technology was less primitive but generally similar, we were ancients, not primitives."

"Haha." Anke laughed awkwardly, he found a few boxes in the new off-road vehicle and carried them to the first vehicle.

"Are you collecting these ’guns’ and ’rocket launchers’?" The old voice asked slowly.

"Old man, since we want to enter the city, we need some money," Anke said while moving boxes and smiled, "Now is wartime, these things are hard currency, they can be directly exchanged for federal coins."

He moved quickly, and in the midst of talking, he had ransacked most of the off-road vehicles.

Some of the off-road vehicles had a lot, some only had one or two guns, but he ended up stuffing the front off-road vehicle full.

Then he got in the car, started the vehicle, and found a thin coat in the car to wear, "The weather’s getting colder."

"What season is it roughly now? Winter?" The old voice asked slowly,

"October, don’t know, autumn’s ending soon?" Anke scratched his head, "I don’t know how they define seasons."

While talking, he glanced at the rows of trucks around, "These things are just left here, what a pity."

Sighing, he fully started the vehicle.

"You’re not going to search?" The old voice asked slowly, "Perhaps there’s a lot of things from back then?"

"No matter how valuable, they’re not mine," Anke shook his head and laughed, "These are clearly from an official caravan, everything is declared. Once disconnected, the insurance company and City Defense Army will come looking, these things aren’t like the guns left in these off-road vehicles, those are my spoils."

Saying this, he paused slightly, suddenly realizing that the dark coffin was also one of the caravan’s ’goods.’

But that was beyond what he could manage, after all, the coffin could fly by itself, its fate wasn’t his to decide anymore.

If things are too complicated to think about, better not to think at all. He pressed on the gas, shouting loudly, "Old man, are you in the car?"

"Yes, you can set off." The dark small coffin hovered behind Anke and fell into the off-road vehicle.

Anke paused slightly, stopped thinking, and floored the gas pedal. The speeding off-road vehicle streaked across the hard ground, following the undulating slope, driving into the depths of the wilderness.

Within the Coffin of Time, He Ao silently sensed the changes around him.

Relying on his powerful soul, he could directly let his consciousness bypass the seal, perceiving the approximate scene within hundreds of meters. This perception was higher-dimensional, not as vividly colorful as seen with eyes.

He could also see further away, though increasingly blurred.

He could also sense the surface thoughts and ideas of the souls around him through contact.

Of course, he could also release power to attack, but this would impact his fusion progress and the unsealing process.

Moreover, the commotion would be huge; it’s alright in the wilderness, but in the city, it could make him a target.

But, these things are not really problems, what He Ao is more concerned with now is actually ’time’.

Anke didn’t lie, it’s already October now.

If He Ao remembers correctly, the last time he was in the dungeon world was around May.

Which means the dungeon world has experienced a complete ’interval’, about half a year’s time.

According to the rate of 1:24, it translates to about seven days in the Main World.

But the problem is, this time, the ’seven days’ in the Main World is not of normal flow rate, but the seven days after He Ao accelerated.

With the normal time flow rate, the Main World should have only passed a little over one day.

If the Main World and the dungeon world are completely independent in terms of time flow, with just proportional difference.

The normal flow time of the dungeon world should have only passed about twenty days, nearing a month.

But this time in the dungeon world, a full six months have truly passed.

This indicates there is some kind of connection between the time in the Main World and the dungeon world.

When time is accelerated in the Main World, time in the dungeon world accelerates too, hence the relative time gap between the two worlds is stable.

And most times, this occurs when there is some form of a ’hard link’ between the two worlds.

Just like when He Ao arrives at the Main World from the newly created world, causing interference between them, making the new world and Main World ’connected’ together.

"Old man, I haven’t asked your name yet?"

While He Ao was pondering, Anke, who was driving, suddenly asked.

"Denos." The elderly voice slowly resounded.

"Sounds like an ancient name," Anke laughed, "my name is Anke."

Saying this, he spoke slowly, "Old man, you saved my life, I’ll help you find your Kovotra, how does that sound? After finding your city, I’ll leave immediately, I won’t assist with anything else you need, I have some matters, quite important, and I probably can’t afford much delay on the road."

"Alright." He Ao replied calmly.

"Thank you, Old Denos!" Anke said excitedly.

"It’s Denos." He Ao calmly corrected.

"Alright, Old Denos." Anke said with a slight awkwardness.

The silent night spread from afar, engulfing the distant off-road vehicle.

Hyenas and vultures descended from the sky and began to feast in the blood.

And after an unknown period, the stars and the bright moon broke through the dark night, illuminating this quiet land.

Light beams cut through the night sky, quickly stopping before this convoy.

Bang bang bang—

The abrupt machine gunfire swept through the night, dispersing the hyenas and vultures on the ground.

Several fully armed mercenaries jumped off the off-road vehicle behind the light, illuminating the desolate ground with flashlights.

They meticulously shone lights on each vehicle, eventually stopping in front of the truck with the totally torn-open cargo hold.

The mercenaries exchanged glances, quickly climbed onto the cargo hold floor, turned on flashlights, and moved toward the wooden crate placed in the center of the cargo hold.

They raised flashlights, shining into the crate.

What met their eyes was only soft wood shavings and a sunken area that seemed to have held something before.

They raised their heads, exchanged glances.

Boom—

At this moment, a flare lit up not far away.

Several mercenaries exchanged glances, immediately jumped off the cargo hold, and walked over.

Soon, they met the mercenary who lit the signal flares, who shone the flashlight upon fresh tire tracks on the ground.

The lead mercenary raised his head and fired an illumination flare into the sky.

The intense light instantly illuminated the ground, revealing the long tire tracks that stretched into the depths of the wilderness.

——

"Holy shoot, holy shoot, we’ve arrived, old man, we’ve finally arrived!" Sitting at the driver’s seat, Anke raised his head, looking at the city covered by faint light in the night ahead, enclosed by high walls.

He placed one hand on the vehicle’s central control screen showing an offline map while carefully matching the annotations on the map, "This should be West Carter! After this huge detour, we’ve finally arrived!"

"You don’t know how to read the compass and map," the old voice spoke in the void, "how did you find your way in the wilderness?"

"Not exactly can’t read them," Anke said with some awkwardness, "just not very skilled, I’ve hardly ever left the city before, whenever I left the city, I followed the large troops, earlier after I... gained freedom, I followed the trade routes, if lucky meeting a caravan, I would work as a free guard, in exchange for a ride."

"Would those caravans accept ’outsiders’ like you with unknown origins? Weren’t they afraid you were a spy for bandits?" He Ao asked with some confusion.

"Of course they wouldn’t, most caravans wouldn’t, but there were some who would, though very few," Anke sighed, "if truly running into ones that wouldn’t, sometimes I would find a chance while they were resting, sneak under the truck and hitch a ride."

"You were quite lucky then, managing to traverse safely in the wilderness." He Ao remarked.

"Not really lucky," Anke sighed, "wasn’t it just running into those mercenaries earlier, without your help, old man, I’d really be dead."

As they spoke, the off-road vehicle was already near the city gates, from afar they could see the neatly arranged City Defense Army, mechanical defense cannons placed on the ground, and a large number of security instruments.

"It seems there’s a security checkpoint ahead, so many people, are they all soldiers?" He Ao asked calmly, "You have so many weapons, can you get in?"

"It’s no problem," Anke took a deep breath and laughed, "West Carter, I’ve actually visited before, I have a special trick, trust me."

Saying this, he directly drove the off-road vehicle, stopping before the checkpoint.

"Stop," the City Defense Army guarding the checkpoint halted the vehicle, walked to the car door and quickly shouted, "Driver and passenger get out of the car, separate from the vehicle for security inspection."

The guards around, originally somewhat drowsy, instantly woke up, gripping their Gauss Rifles, turned to look at the ’off-road vehicle’ that arrived in the dead of night.