Noran in the Third Age

When Lynch regained his senses from the haze, what greeted his eyes was a lush expanse of green.

The four of them stood hand in hand, appearing in a sparse grove of trees.

Sunlight filtered through the canopy, casting dappled shadows. Breathing in the fresh air and listening to the distant calls of birds and small beasts echoing from deep within the woods, the surroundings felt utterly tranquil and serene.

Was this truly the memory of an uncontrolled mystery relic?

Lynch found it hard to believe for a moment. His previous two experiences of entering uncontrolled relics had left a deep impression on him.

The first time, he had opened his eyes only to nearly be torn apart as a sacrificial offering, and the second time, he had opened his eyes only to nearly be hung from a streetlight alongside everyone else.

He always felt that entering an uncontrolled relic without several dozen people ganging up to beat him down was somewhat abnormal.

However, during the pre-mission briefing a few days ago, Madam Dess, the occult specialist from the Church of Suffering, had explained that this was merely his misconception. In truth, the vast majority of relic memories featured a relatively calm buffer period; rarely was one thrust directly into a deathtrap right from the start.

This was tied to the nature of mystery relics. At their core, relics condensed when living beings harbored extreme terror toward a past event or a specific period in history, congealing the entire course of that memory into a relic. The so-called entire course spanned from the initial accumulation of dread to the event's ultimate conclusion, rather than capturing solely the pinnacle of terror.

For example, with the Gaze of the Ancient Flicker that had nearly done Lynch in back then, it had actually encompassed the entire process of the ancient city's citizens being slaughtered and sacrificed by the terror claws after its fall. Spanning from when the terror claw tribe ambushed the city and clashed with the garrison soldiers until the sacrifice was complete, the entire event had lasted thirteen hours. Yet when Lynch and Natalie entered, the relic had already been in an uncontrolled state for some time; the two of them just happened to catch the most perilous phase. One could only blame Lynch's exceptionally good luck.

Meanwhile, the relic in Chairman Grant's factory had originally been the enslaved workers' terrifying memories of the flesh workshop, spanning several years. Being strung up on lamp posts was an everyday occurrence, not exceptionally dangerous in the grand scheme of things. The genuinely lethal moment occurred during the final slave revolt, when the state apparatus enacted a bloody crackdown, ultimately wiping out all three hundred slaves and leaving their corpses lining the factory walls.

Sven's Blessing was different. Once this relic went out of control, its duration was exactly five days, and since the uncontrolled state had been artificially induced just this morning, time within the memory was still at the very beginning of the incident, meaning all factors were controllable.

Everything is well in hand. Those had been Madam Dess's exact words, which had made Lynch want to punch someone.

Yet she had not been wrong. The current environment was tranquil, and the chirping birds were ample proof of its safety.

“This is my first time entering a relic's memory. How magical,” Miss Diana remarked, tugging at her coarse cloth tunic. All four wore new clothes of decent quality, albeit in a quite ancient cut reconstructed by the Archaeological Association based on historical records. The count's daughter had never worn such novel attire before, finding it quite refreshing. “It really feels like stepping into another world in an instant. Everything feels so strange... Shall we begin?”

“Yeah.” Lynch unfolded a hand-drawn, simplified map of the city and checked it one last time. “Let's go. Stick to the plan. May all go smoothly.”

“May all go smoothly.”

The four nodded to one another. With Officer Natalie taking the lead, they cautiously approached the edge of the woods.

Beyond the tree line lay a dirt road crisscrossed with wheel ruts and footprints. Following the road twenty or thirty meters forward brought them to a low earthen city wall. Sprawling farmlands stretched outside the wall, where the vague silhouettes of toiling farmers could be seen in the fields. Inside the wall, clusters of rooftops were faintly visible, with thin plumes of cooking smoke curling upward from them.

The agricultural city of Noran.

“This is a frontier town in human territory, with a population of just over eight thousand,” Lynch whispered to the three ladies as he gazed from afar at this city that existed only in the Third Age. “Come on, let's head into the city first.”

With that, he stepped past Officer Natalie, walked out of the woods first, and stepped onto the dirt road.

They were already very close to the city gates. Farmers and peasant women heading out to work or deliver meals passed by from time to time. None of them showed any strong reaction upon seeing the four, merely eyeing these decently dressed outsiders with curious glances from a distance.

Lynch felt a slight relief. Their attire had raised no suspicions; at least they had cleared the first hurdle and wouldn't be barred from entering the city.

One's range of activity within a relic was limited. This particular relic was restricted to a two-hundred-meter radius around the city; venturing any further would trigger memory chaos, likely casting them directly into the depths of the Dreamlands. Therefore, if they failed to enter the city, they would be stuck hiding in the woods for five days, forced to face hundreds of ghouls head-on. Forget planting the grass—they would be lucky just to survive.

Several soldiers stood at the city gates, surprisingly all clad in leather armor and bearing sharp metal swords. The moment they spotted the four strangers approaching, they grew vigilant at once. Though they did not draw their swords, they stepped forward to block the entrance.

“@#￥! #@￥!”

It was a completely unintelligible tongue. However, Judy had already stepped forward and fluently spoken the exact same language, sounding even smoother than the soldiers themselves.

Lynch chuckled inwardly. As expected of an expert in ancient texts who claimed to be fluent in listening, speaking, reading, and writing over forty ancient languages. She was leagues ahead of an academic slacker like him, which was precisely one of the reasons he had asked Judy for help.

Sure enough, after a few exchanges, the soldiers relaxed. Chuckling, they greeted Lynch and the other two, exchanged a few more words of caution with Judy, and then waved them through.

Lynch promptly put on the air of someone of high standing, strolling languidly through the gates. Only after stepping inside did he breathe a sigh of relief. “What were they saying?”

“I stuck to the plan and told them you are foreigners who came to Noran to sell grain.” The spark of vitality had returned to Judy's eyes, indicating her true self had surfaced. Looking at Lynch, she praised, “You're really impressive. Just as you predicted, they became extraordinarily warm and hospitable, and they even told me quite a bit about the city.”

“Oh?”

“There really aren't any inns in town, but we don't have to stay in those two abandoned buildings like that Dess woman suggested either. Five households here have relatively spacious accommodations and rent them out to visiting travelers for short stays. They even marked them on the map for me. Look.”

“Oh?” A pleasant surprise. During the two prior tests conducted by the Church of Suffering, they had holed up in two abandoned buildings for five days, rarely interacting with the residents in the memory, so they had no idea such an option existed. “What else did they say?”

“They also warned us to be careful and preferably stay indoors at night. Someone recently spotted massive claw marks nearby, likely left behind by ghouls. They're worried a small pack of ghouls might be lurking around and might kill their big foreign clients.”

“There's definitely no small pack lurking nearby—what's lurking is a massive horde,” Lynch sighed. “Cooking smoke is already rising, and evening is approaching. Let's get settled first and just pick one of those houses to stay in.”

“If we are going to stay in a native resident's home, there's one thing I must remind you of, Lynch.”

Lynch blinked, looking at the lady officer who had spoken with a puzzled expression.

“When suppressing a relic, try to avoid having too much interaction with the people inside it.”

“What's the reason? Will it alter the course of the memory?”

“There's no need to worry about that. Relics aren't afraid of interference; the issue is that it isn't good for the suppressors,” Officer Natalie said solemnly. “You must remember that every single one of them died long ago. They are nothing more than memories. Do not harbor any sympathy for them under any circumstances. Far too many mystery hunters tried to save people inside memories and ended up trapped within relics forever. We cannot save anyone, and saving them is utterly meaningless.”

“Yes, I've heard of that too,” Miss Diana agreed. “Occasionally, people develop emotional attachments to the figures in a relic's memory. Some have even entered and exited a relic repeatedly just to see that person over and over, until they finally died inside its memory.”

Lynch pursed his lips and said earnestly, “I haven't begun reading the memory yet and don't know the suppression conditions, but I have a feeling that fulfilling them might require integrating into city life, which is why I wanted to prepare in advance. Don't worry, I've taken your advice to heart and won't make that mistake.”

The two nodded in agreement, and only then did the four head toward this ancient city where they would spend the next few days.