One of the elves listened to the explanation and merely gave a faint "Oh."
"That was all divine punishment sent down to them by Elune."
Their tone was as calm as if they were discussing the weather.
Another elderly elf spirit gave a cold snort, their soul light fluctuating slightly: "They brought it upon themselves."
A few low murmurs of agreement echoed from the surroundings.
There was no anger, no sorrow.
There was only a kind of deep-seated... detachment and irony.
This reaction left Lin Gui stunned.
It was even more unbelievable for Clotina.
She floated forward slightly, her voice trembling: "Why... why would you say that?"
"The Elven Forest... isn't that the home of all elves?"
The scene from Shadowmoon City flashed through her mind—those heads of what appeared to be Highborne Elves inside the blood bag held by Shadow Blade Lynn.
A terrifying suspicion surfaced in her heart.
"What on earth happened during these years... to make you all so... toward the Elven Forest..."
She could not go on.
The surrounding elves fell into a deeper silence.
Only the glimmer of the moonlight moss flowed silently over their soul bodies.
Clotina's friend, the girl spirit named Lia, drifted gently to her side.
Lia reached out and made a phantom gesture of grasping Clotina's wrist.
"Clotina..."
Lia's voice was very light, yet it carried an exhaustion that did not match her age.
"Stop talking about the ‘Elven Forest.’"
"That place... was never our home."
Another young male spirit also approached and whispered, "You are a child of Elune, Clotina."
"But you were never... a child of the World Tree."
Lin Gui listened, his heart stirring.
Night Elves believed in the Moon Goddess Elune and the night itself.
The dark night granted tranquility, reflection, concealment, and sanctuary.
This was fundamentally different from the faith of the World Tree, which advocated nature, light, and growth.
In the past, these differences had been barely covered by the bond of the Elven Community.
But now, the rift was deep enough to show bone.
An elderly elf drifted closer slowly, his gaze landing on Lin Gui.
There was a final trace of hope in those eyes.
"Child..."
His voice was hoarse.
"Are our Nightkin outside... doing well?"
"How many... are still alive?"
In an instant, the eyes of every elf focused on him.
The long-suppressed longing finally surged out from those dull, indifferent eyes.
Lin Gui remained silent for a moment.
He needed to give an answer that was both true and would not trigger suspicion.
"...I’m not entirely sure either."
He bowed his head slightly, adding a fitting weight to his voice.
"I was sent to a human city-state to procure supplies."
"I was lucky... the city-state where I stayed was not passed over by ‘The Silent End.’"
"So... I survived."
He paused, then continued, "But my hometown... Deepwood Outpost, was swallowed up."
"Fortunately... my family was able to... survive in this form."
A wave of low sighs rose from the surroundings.
There was sympathy, but also the shared grief of those who had lost their kind.
Lin Gui raised his eyes, scanning the spectral faces.
"As for the other Night Elves..."
He went silent for a bit.
"I only heard... that Shadow Blade Lynn seemed to have become their clan chief."
"But the specific details..."
He shook his head gently.
"I’ve been hiding near the Bounty City and have had very little contact with our people."
The moment his words fell.
The entire area plunged into a deathly silence.
"Mad Blade... became the clan chief? That sinner!"
Clotina's soul-shadow trembled violently, her voice full of disbelief.
"Are you... are you lying to me?"
Lin Gui shrugged.
"No, that is indeed the truth."
He did know a bit about Shadow Blade Lynn’s affairs outside.
The source was mainly Theia.
Shadow Blade Lynn's return to the Elven Forest back then had caused quite a stir.
Theia had joined the fray to watch the excitement, witnessing the scene from a distance.
Later, during a chat, she had mentioned it to Lin Gui.
"I’ll never forget that scene."
Theia had been chewing on dried meat at the time, her expression rare in its gravity.
"Under the gaze of countless elves, she stood in the center of the World Tree Square."
"Somber, indifferent, radiating a kind of... rage suppressed to the extreme."
"Even though she didn't use any battle force, she made all the elves present feel like they couldn't breathe."
Theia remembered her ears being filled with the suppressed whispers of the elves.
Through those fragments of information, she had pieced together Shadow Blade Lynn's background.
Her tribe had been almost entirely wiped out during ‘The Silent End.’
This return was to gather the survivors who had managed to escape for various reasons.
Lin Gui recalled Theia’s description and spoke slowly.
"Shadow Blade Lynn rejoined the Elven Forest after ‘The Silent End.’"
"She subsequently declared herself the new clan chief of the Night Elves."
He paused, letting his voice slow down further.
"But a year later, she disappeared again."
"When she reappeared, it was in the Bounty City."
"She formed a pioneering team with the human Unyielding Spear Hant and the barbarian Blood Butcher Woodrow."
"They were attempting to complete a commission issued by the dwarves."
"To forge a route across the Wall of Sighs."
The surroundings were terrifyingly quiet.
All the elves held their breath as they listened.
Lin Gui raised his eyes and looked at Clotina.
His voice was calm, yet it was like a stone thrown into a deep pool.
"In the end..."
"She died inside."
The elder was silent for a moment before asking hoarsely, "When... when did she die?"
Lin Gui replied, "Ten years ago."
The surrounding Night Elf spirits fell into an even deeper silence.
Fluorescence shimmered on their soul bodies, reflecting faces filled with complex, indescribable emotions.
The elder slowly closed his eyes, his soul light flickering weakly.
"It’s because... Shadow Blade is dead..."
"Is that why they dare to be so brazen..."
Clotina could no longer hold back. Her soul body floated forward, her voice trembling.
"What on earth happened?!"
"What... what exactly did you see?!"
Her friend Lia remained silent for a long time.
Then, in a voice that was extremely light yet clearly audible to every spirit, she said:
"We saw..."
"The Highborne Elves seized our compatriots who had not yet passed away."
"And they... sold them to human hunters."
Clotina's soul body jolted violently.
She remembered the conversation of those hunters in Shadowmoon City and the brands on the foreheads of her caged kin.
"This... how is that possible..."
"How could they..."
Another middle-aged elven warrior took over, his voice suppressing cold fury.
"Over the past ten years, we have seen the same thing more than once."
"Elven warriors wearing the Crest of the Moonlight Royalty, escorting our chained kin."
"Trading with human hunters at the edge of the ruins."
"We wanted to stop them..."
He gave a bitter laugh, his soul light dimming.
"But most of those left in the Gloomlight Forest are the old, the weak, and mothers with children."
"The elite warriors were all sent to Deepwood Outpost and other border city-states."
"We... cannot even master soul force."
"We could only watch with our own eyes..."
Around them, the soul lights of the elven spirits fluctuated silently.
Anger, helplessness, despair.
Like an invisible tide, these emotions spread through this dead small city.
Lin Gui listened quietly, then suddenly spoke up.
"It’s not hard to understand."
All eyes turned to him.
Lin Gui’s tone was indifferent, as if analyzing a riddle that had nothing to do with him.
"The defeat ten years ago caused the Elven Forest to lose its core grain-producing city-states."
"The resource gap was massive."
"To survive and maintain a stable political landscape..."
"They either had to completely bow to the Alliance..."
"Or they had to turn to the black market. Just as you sent people to buy resources from humans, they bought grain and resources from the black market."
"And that requires a tremendous amount of funding."
He paused.
"Elven slaves command an astronomical price in the human market."
"It’s enough to cover such a deficit."
"And the Wall of Sighs..."
Lin Gui looked around.
"This place is practically a deadland. No civilians come here, and no elves would discover what they are doing."
"It is the ‘safest’ black market exchange."
He looked at the elder, his eyes showing no emotion.
"As for why they chose the Night Elves..."
"I believe you all know the specific reasons better than I do."
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