Chapter 268 - 153: "I, Zhang Damao, Have Discovered the New Continent.

Chapter 268: Chapter 153: "I, Zhang Damao, Have Discovered the New Continent.

"Let’s go take a look!"

Wang Mazi didn’t pick up the Ghost Stones right away. Instead, he boarded the ship and headed for the other islands to investigate.

One.

Two.

Three, four.

He scouted a full six of the nearest islands. Without exception, they were covered in destroyed human structures and vast numbers of Ghost Corpses. One could only imagine that long, long ago, an utterly terrifying Ghost Tide had swept over all the islands.

Perhaps it had even swept over the entire continent.

And these islands were merely forward outposts for this continent—the first to fall when the Ghost Tide struck.

...

"..."

Wang Mazi didn’t set foot on the continent. Though its coastline was faintly visible to the naked eye, that was only because of the clear weather. In reality, it was still a great distance away. He returned to the first island.

This was the continent’s very frontier.

And perhaps, the front line closest to the Ghost Tide.

He climbed to the top of a hill on the island.

From his vantage point,

he could see clearly that Ghost Corpses didn’t cover the entire island.

The vast majority of them were concentrated on the island’s north face.

The side facing away from the continent.

From this, he could deduce something.

The Ghost Tide had made landfall from the bottom of the sea and surged onto the island. An endless horde of Ghost Objects had left a trail of their own dead as they completely devoured this small, hopeless island.

’Is this the Eternal Night Continent?’

He wasn’t sure.

Maybe it was a new continent.

He’d never imagined another continent existed besides the Eternal Night Continent. He’d always assumed the Eternal Night Continent was the entire world—it was already vast enough. Before he met Chen Fan, he’d thought Jiangbei was the whole world.

Jiangbei was already huge.

There were so many places in Jiangbei he still hadn’t been to.

"Pavilion Master."

A trusted subordinate came up beside him, trembling. "Are we... Are we going back?"

"..."

Wang Mazi turned silently to face his men. Their eyes were filled with fear, and every one of them was wounded. The excitement from when they first set sail was completely gone. After the ordeal they had faced at sea, they had no desire for any more risks.

"We’re going back."

He didn’t hesitate in the slightest, nodding firmly. His voice was hoarse.

"We have to bring the news back."

"We’ll let the Domain Lord know about the existence of Hope Island. We’ll let him know that there might be a continent here, one that was wiped out by a Ghost Tide. There are vast quantities of Ghost Stones left here—enough to build an unbreakable Jiangbei Defense Line."

The men standing behind Wang Mazi kept their heads down, not reacting. They were afraid.

They didn’t want to brave the Thunderstorm Sea Realm again.

To get back,

they had to cross the Thunderstorm Sea Realm.

"Pavilion Master."

It was the same trusted subordinate again. He spoke in a low voice, "Ghost Objects devour Ghost Stones. Since the ones here haven’t been touched, it must mean there aren’t any Ghost Objects left on this ruined continent. It’s safe here. Maybe... we could..."

"Could what?"

"Stay here?"

Wang Mazi laughed. "You should’ve said so earlier! If you’d told me, I would’ve brought some women along before we set sail. What’s a bunch of rough guys like us going to do here? Besides, this island doesn’t look like it has any food. What would we eat?"

"Let’s try something."

"The Thunderstorm Sea Realm has to have an end, right? If we follow its edge, maybe we can bypass it and find our way home."

"Besides, if we managed to break through it once, we can definitely do it a second time."

"Pavilion Master!"

It was the same man from before. He looked up at Wang Mazi, his eyes red-rimmed. "I’ll just say it. If the Ghost Stones here were really so easy to take, the one who guarded Nameless Mountain back in the day would have taken them long ago. Why would they be left for us?"

"That Thunderstorm Sea Realm must be a deathtrap."

"We were lucky to get through it once."

"Can we really make it through a second time?"

"I even suspect we might already be dead. This isn’t some New Continent at all—it’s the Underworld! Or maybe we’ve all been poisoned and this is just a hallucination."

"Going back is a death sentence."

"Pavilion Master, I really don’t want to die. I..."

The man’s voice grew louder, bordering on hysterical as he neared a complete breakdown.

Before he could finish,

Wang Mazi stepped forward, chopping the back of his subordinate’s neck and knocking him out. He caught the man in his arms, then looked at his other ragged subordinates. After a long silence, he spoke in a raspy voice.

"A place that even he didn’t discover."

"We found it."

"Us!"

"Me, Wang Mazi, and all of you. We’ve performed a miracle."

"We have to go back. We *must* go back."

"We must bring this news back. The Ghost Stones here will guarantee the completion of the Jiangbei Defense Line. Don’t you want to have families? Don’t you want your children to grow up in a place safe from the corruption of Ghost Objects?"

"I swear."

"I will get you all back alive."

"If we made it through once, we can make it through again."

"Trust me."

The despair of the Thunderstorm Sea Realm had nearly shattered everyone’s resolve.

After a long while,

a man finally stepped forward, a wide grin spreading across his face.

"Pavilion Master."

"When we were setting out, the folks from the Logistics Pavilion had me fill out a personnel file. One of the questions was about the highlight moments of my life. I thought about it for a long time, then just wrote ’None’."

"I’ve lived my whole life in obscurity, without a single highlight to my name."

"I’m with you on this."

"If we make it back from this, I’m going to find those bastards in the Logistics Pavilion and make them record this as my highlight."

"I, Zhang Damao, discovered a New Continent."

"If I die, Pavilion Master, you have to go to the Logistics Pavilion for me and change my file."

"Don’t worry."

Wang Mazi’s eyes were slightly red as he bared his teeth in a grin. "When we get back, whoever makes it out alive will go to the Logistics Pavilion and get the files amended for all our brothers—including the ones who have already fallen."