Apocalypse Forecast

The next day, when Huai Shi awoke from the constant nightmares, he was still spitting out dog hair and couldn’t really get the taste out of his mouth.

Unexpectedly, he didn’t dream about that annoying ghost coming to drag him off to a funeral again.

It felt like waking up from a long nap in the afternoon, a mix of laziness and fatigue. His body, riddled with hidden injuries over the past few days, was finally getting some rest and quickly regaining energy.

Just, he didn’t know why he kept feeling stifled while sleeping.

Even though he only napped for a few hours, it felt as endlessly long as twenty-four hours of suffocation.

Meanwhile, in the room, the Skeleton was happily fiddling with "Lord of the Flies", like a kid playing with a tablet, trying out all sorts of random features.

It even learned voice control.

"Hey? Xiao Bei, play some music!"

The Fly King rolled its eyes on the cover: "No, thank you."

"Xiao Bei, show a picture!"

"Nope, goodbye."

The Skeleton wasn’t even annoyed and patiently said, "Xiao Bei, tell a story!"

Beelzebub, pestered all night by this curious baby, was on the verge of collapse and angrily cursed: "wdnmd, will you ever stop!"

The Skeleton was taken aback, then curiously asked, "What’s ’wdnmd’ mean?"

"..." Beelzebub was silent for a moment.

Feeling Huai Shi’s gaze full of reproach beside him, he felt more guilty, and coughed awkwardly, "Uh... it’s... it’s short for ’I need to master tape’!"

A sudden flash of inspiration hit him, and he started to ramble: "You see... you wanted to listen to music and stories, but my device is pretty old, can’t play tapes!"

"Oh!" The Skeleton’s voice suddenly enlightened, then curiously asked again, "What is tape? Is master tape its mother?"

"Oh my f**..."

Beelzebub’s steel cover twitched for a long time, nearly grinding its nonexistent teeth.

Already in tears.

How did I, the controlling intelligence of Osiris, end up as a parenting robot? It’s one thing if it were a kid, but this bonehead knows nothing...

For an entire night, from Current Circumstances to the Border, from everyday items to the internet, to various terminologies, the Skeleton nearly drove him insane with questions.

They think I’m an electronic dictionary!

Huai Shi looked at him with pity and gestured: Great job, I’ll add another thousand megabits to the broadband!

No choice, in a foreign land, alone and helpless, in this haunted place of Helios, it’s rare to have a local, no matter if he might be the Grandmaster pulling strings behind the scenes, but gotta unite a bit.

Otherwise, in blinded confusion, couldn’t tell what’s what.

After the Skeleton finally finished questioning, taking advantage of him cooking Little Rat Fish Ball, Huai Shi finally found a chance to speak.

He started probing for the news he wanted.

First and foremost, the crucial point, the escape pod.

"What’s that?"

The Skeleton scratched his skull with a crunchy sound, "Uncle-born what? Are you talking about my cousin? Dunno..."

After a long effort, Huai Shi finally explained clearly, the escape pod isn’t his relative, it’s the thing that can fly through space once you leave Helios...

"Oh oh oh, you mean those big iron eggs, right?"

The Skeleton suddenly realized, Huai Shi’s eyes lit up immediately, and then he saw Skeleton clap his hands and shrug: "No more! All gone!"

"What the hell?" Huai Shi’s vision went from bright to black in an instant.

"All gone?!"

"Yeah." The Skeleton nodded, "When I just woke up, I saw a lot of people rushing to the lower deck, pushing to get inside, but once they got in and flew for a bit, they all exploded... If you hadn’t said those were escape pods, I’d have thought they were fully automatic crematoriums!"

Automatic crematoriums, my ass!

Hearing the escape pods could be turned into bombs, how could Huai Shi not understand, those refugees probably fell into someone else’s trap!

But the question is, what exactly happened on Helios? What does Grandmaster Publius want to do?

Relying on this clueless Skeleton, couldn’t figure anything out!

His head was getting even balder.

But soon, after disappearing overnight, Tong Ji’s phantom returned, floating the words from the Book of Fate.

"This is also Alchemy, Huai Shi."

Huai Shi couldn’t help but roll his eyes.

What can’t be Alchemy? Everything can be Alchemy, you do Alchemy, he does silver, I do... iron, as long as you want, everyone can become a Grandmaster, right!

"Otherwise, what do you think Alchemy is?"

Tong Ji laughed, "It’s ’the last magic’ left behind by gods of the old era.

It’s a ritual operating based on the authority of gods, to put it simply, it’s not much different from sorcery. But it’s different because its subjects aren’t in the Current Circumstances, but in the Abyss itself."

"Huai Shi, Alchemy itself is a tool created by the gods to explore the mysteries of Hell!"

It’s an embodiment of disaster and miracle’s dual-sided nature, hence, whenever it involves converting disasters and miracles, it inevitably belongs to Alchemy.

Even the Stigma is a crystallization created by Alchemy.

Sublimators transcending the Sea of Silver, attaining their soul, isn’t that also an Alchemical reaction?

Tong Ji said lightly, "Now, before your eyes, is a miracle furnace rare on this whole realm, almost comparable to the great ceremony of the Tower of Babylon."