NOVGO.NET Chapter 519: A Shadow That Follows
Chapter 519: Chapter 519: A Shadow That Follows
When the first ray of morning sunlight slipped into the bedroom, Luca had already been awake for a while.
After a full night’s rest, his energy was completely restored.
“Your condition should be mostly recovered by now, right? If everything feels fine, let’s head out,” Luca asked Sophia directly.
“My condition has fully recovered.”
After confirming that Sophia was indeed fine, Luca left their lodging without hesitation.
He didn’t bother Lucas any further.
Dragon Bone City was already bustling in the early morning—
especially the district where he currently lived.
Most of the residents had already begun their day, and the soldiers were preparing for their training.
After weaving through the lively streets for about fifteen minutes, he finally left Dragon Bone City.
The path to the Dusk Wharf was a narrow trail that sat right beside the main Dragon Bone City avenue.
Although the two roads were extremely close, the moment Luca stepped onto the small trail, he immediately sensed something different in the air.
The temperature around him seemed to be dropping rapidly.
“Do you feel that shift in temperature? Is this normal?”
Luca asked Sophia silently in his mind.
He didn’t speak aloud—he felt that caution was necessary.
“The temperature is indeed changing around us, but I’m not sensing any abnormal energy fluctuations,”
Sophia replied, though her tone held little confidence.
She truly sensed no strange energy—but she also couldn’t identify the cause of the sudden chill.
Under circumstances like this, Luca chose not to press her further.
All he could do was quicken his pace and reach Dusk Wharf as soon as possible.
As he moved faster along the trail, the air grew colder and colder.
From the bushes on either side of the path came rustling sounds—like small creatures moving through the undergrowth.
Unintentionally, Luca caught sight of a shadow beneath the trees up ahead from the corner of his eye.
Through the authority of darkness, he sensed a hidden presence lurking around him—
an enemy concealed somewhere close by.
This enemy’s strength was difficult to judge.
They were hiding extremely well.
Even with the partial dominion over darkness granted to him by the goddess of the night, he still couldn’t pinpoint exactly where the person was concealed.
The presence of such a mysterious figure made Luca extremely uneasy.
Even so, he didn’t show any obvious reaction.
He simply continued moving quickly toward Dusk Wharf, just as he had before.
Half an hour later, Luca finally arrived at the Dusk Wharf.
Just as the book had described, even in the early morning, the entire wharf was shrouded in a layer of orange twilight.
The whole place looked dilapidated, with several rotten, decaying boats still moored there.
“This isn’t exactly the same as what the book described. The book said Dusk Wharf was full of monsters—creatures that would attack anyone who approached, illuminated by that orange twilight. Am I still not close enough? Do I need to actually step onto the wharf itself?”
Staring at the eerily quiet Dusk Wharf, Luca muttered to himself.
He did this deliberately—to confuse the mysterious figure lurking around him who still refused to reveal himself.
After pretending to hesitate for a moment, he finally walked toward the wharf’s wooden pier.
At the start of the pier, the morning sunlight and the orange twilight formed a sharp dividing line.
The moment Luca stepped across that line, he felt an unusual force sweep across his body.
At the same time, everything within his field of vision began to change unnaturally.
The dilapidated wharf—previously drowned in orange twilight—suddenly looked completely renewed.
All the boats were now intact and brand-new, and every structure around the wharf had become freshly restored.
Instinctively, he turned around.
At the exit of the Dusk Wharf, right at the border where the two different lights met, he caught a glimpse of a blurred figure flashing past.
“He didn’t follow me into the wharf!”
Luca made the judgment instantly.
If the mysterious figure had stepped into the Dusk Wharf with him, Luca would have been able to see him at once.
Crossing that dividing line caused the light to shift in strange ways, throwing shadows from all kinds of angles.
With his authority over darkness, Luca could have used those shadows to see the mysterious person’s true appearance.
“Since you don’t dare come in, that means—for now—you’re not a threat to me.”
For Luca, his foremost goal was to complete the task of clearing the Dusk Wharf.
Although the sudden appearance of this mysterious figure had put some pressure on him, as long as the man posed no direct threat, Luca couldn’t act rashly.
What if the person hiding all this time was someone sent by the Crimson King to monitor him?
If he behaved abnormally, it could very well cause serious trouble for his future dealings with the Crimson King.
After sorting out his thoughts, Luca immediately began searching for traces of the monsters within Dusk Wharf.
According to the information Andrea had provided, as well as the records in the Great Library, some of the monsters in the Dusk Wharf would actively attack.
But the vast majority preferred to hide in the shadows.
The greatest danger when moving through the Dusk Wharf was the passage of time.
Because the entire wharf was enveloped by the power of twilight, the flow of time here differed drastically from other places.
In some areas, time flowed more slowly—entering such zones would leave one barely able to move.
In other areas, time passed extremely quickly, and stepping into these zones could cause one’s lifespan to drain away in an instant.
Although Luca now possessed the authority of darkness and could sense differences in the flow of time to some extent, he still had to remain cautious.
After all, the Dusk Wharf was still under the curse of the goddess of the night.
If that curse restricted his authority over darkness, he might very well meet a disastrous end.
And so, Luca began moving cautiously through the wharf.
He first inspected the pier.
As the passage leading outward, the pier was naturally the most crucial part.
If deadly traps were hidden on the pier, he might not be able to escape safely even after completing his task.
Moreover, in most situations, the edges of a dangerous area tended to be the safest zones.
He could use this secure zone to familiarize himself with the internal conditions of the Dusk Wharf.
As Luca moved across the pier, ripples suddenly appeared on the water beneath it.
In the next instant, countless tentacles surged upward from below, whipping toward him at high speed.
The tentacles were swift, but against Luca—who had been prepared from the start—such an attack stood no chance of succeeding.
The moment the tentacles appeared, he immediately tightened his grip on the Dragon-Slayer Greatsword.
Although the Dragon-Slayer Greatsword wasn’t especially effective against tentacles, these tentacles themselves weren’t particularly strong either.
With a single strike, Luca sliced all of them apart.
The severed tentacles fell onto the pier, only to be absorbed by it moments later.
“Could the pier itself be part of a monster? But if that’s true, why hasn’t it attacked me?”
Seeing this, Luca couldn’t help feeling slightly puzzled.
Just then, the entire pier suddenly began to shake violently.
In the next instant, the pier abruptly lifted upward.
Sensing something was wrong, Luca immediately sprang away from it.
Only when he leapt into the river did he realize that the entire pier had transformed into a massive centipede-like monster.
What had attacked him earlier weren’t tentacles at all—they had been the legs of this centipede creature.
At the far end of the “pier,” two enormous spheres emitting a yellow glow suddenly appeared.
They resembled two yellow eyes, glaring directly at Luca.
“You should have attacked me the moment I stepped into the Dusk Wharf! You’ve already missed your only chance of success!”
Even when facing such a massive monster, Luca felt no fear.
In fact, he had felt more uneasy before any monsters showed up.
To him, in a dangerous zone, not encountering monsters was the most unsettling thing.
Once the monsters revealed themselves, all he needed to do was focus solely on the fight.
For someone like Luca, who had experienced countless battles, combat was actually the simplest part.
The truly difficult parts were the schemes and betrayals between allies and enemies—and solving the puzzles behind them.
The towering centipede-like pier lunged downward toward him.
Luca dove beneath the surface of the water.
“I have to use the water to slow its attacks!”
He swam quickly toward the boats docked at the wharf.
In his mind, if the pier was a monster, then the boats might also be monsters.
And if that was true, he naturally hoped they would fight each other.
As he reached the edge of the boats, every vessel at the wharf suddenly began to move.
They transformed into crab-shaped monsters, each one scuttling toward him.
Taking advantage of the chaos, Luca slipped into the middle of the crab-like creatures.
Their movements were far too slow to obstruct him.
The pier-monster charging at him showed no restraint whatsoever.
A moment later, it collided head-on with the cluster of transformed boat-monsters.
Using the opening, Luca swam to the other side.
Nearly half of the monsters that had once been boats were crushed instantly, and one of the large yellow glowing spheres on the pier-monster’s head was destroyed in the impact.
Watching the scene unfold, Luca smiled and said,
“Monsters are monsters. Not an ounce of intelligence among them.”