Catalog of the Lost - a searing epic

The change of times seems to all of us to happen in an instant, like an old man looking back on his own life, even if it is about 20 years long.

The death of King Naza marked the end of his time, and later people regarded his era as the age of lightlessness, and his name became the most insulting abuse of a person for a period of time, King Naza had no grave, and his body was thrown into a wasteland by one of Morelliano's soldiers after his death, and King Naza's life came to an end.

The

people of the Imperial Kingdom welcomed back their approved king, welcoming him back to Moreliano from the far north, and even after his defeat in the Three Kings Rivalry, he remained popular and respected, recognized, and crowned the title of the greatest king of all time.

The era of law led by King Faro came, and the law and system changed the originally chaotic society, restrained the exploitation of the lower classes by the merchant groups, carried out a series of severe measures to crack down on crime, and then greatly encouraged the labor of the people, temporarily changing taxes from coins to commodities or grain, and returning coins above the market value according to the amount handed in.

The activities of the Black Flag were completely restrained at the beginning of the Law Age, and the killers lost by the 'hunt' did not have any effect on the Black Flag under the circumstances of the time, because the Black Flag at that time was completely uncommissioned and could not be accepted, and the middlemen hid in order to avoid the pursuit of the Imperial soldiers, and the former acquaintances were almost wiped out by the King of Faro.

Coming to Black Flag's side again, Jack later heard that of the killers who survived the hunt, only three people, including him, left the stronghold after the hunt, and the rest fought a bloody battle with Nameless separately, and in the end none survived.

Essentially, Black Flags are similar to a chamber of commerce-like running organization, and they also need money to keep the organization running.

The

advent of the age of the law was almost a devastating blow to the Black Flag, Jack thought that the Black Flag would be destroyed after integrating into this era, he felt free at that moment, the murderous organization that bothered him and bound him finally ceased to exist, but then he faced infinite emptiness and confusion, and the sudden freedom became his problem, and for a long time afterward, he even began to miss Black Flag.

It was an incomparably long time of wandering, Jack wandered through the land of the imperial kingdom in confusion, stayed for a while wherever he went, and inquired about the news of the Black Flag countless times during the journey, but the Black Flag was still nowhere to be heard, as if he had never appeared in this world.

Occasionally, Jack joins a caravan of bards as a bodyguard, who are hard to see in the lightless age, in the current age of the Law, and meet the ranks of other bards on the way, when the bards will hold a banquet, which is their own sense of ritual, the banquet is indispensable for wine and good stories, they drink and dance, share stories that can be told, for an age when even books cannot record real history, they verbally praise real history。

There

were three such feasts in Jack's memory, the first of which took place in his first year of joining the caravan, and the bards sang of the slaughter of Corsobia, the light of the capital city of Morelliano, the stability of the age of the Law, the king who loved the people, and the rebellion of the barbarians in the north.

The second time occurred in the third year, when the caravans stopped recounting the past, and talked about the fortresses of the northern barbarians, the envoys of the true gods who traveled through the imperial kingdom, the prosperous city of Lulu, the once-in-a-decade famine, and the self-defense counterattack against the invasion of the kingdom.

The last time took place in the fourth year, when Jack was about to leave the caravan, the bards were in a worse state than they had been at the beginning of the age of the Law, and even the wine, which was more important to them than life, had now become a tool to dispel their sorrows, and there were no longer stories worth passing on by word of mouth, only the actions of the lowly nobles, and the attitude of the respected kings of yesteryear towards what they did.

Even though the age of the Law had lasted for three years, Jack had not adapted to it, he had survived the chaos of the previous age for so long that his eyes could not see the prosperity and happiness, but only the chaos of the lightless age.

More and

more people are sleeping on the streets, and a large number of displaced beggars have organized mountains of beggars to feed their children during the worst of the famine, and those who live in towns and villages are no longer exploited by merchants, but aristocrats with more power and voice.

The

age of the law, which people were singing about, seemed to Jack to be a different kind of lightless age.

But this journey is not meaningless for Jack, he gradually finds his long-lost self, no longer looking for news of the Black Flag, but wants to find a place of his own, where there is no famine, no war, no vicious nobles, a village built only by kind and simple people, where there is isolation, there is no need to worry about food and clothing, and every day can be spent in laughter.

Jack once told the bards the place he wanted to find, and the bards called the place he wanted to go to called the ideal country, which was a fairy tale that only existed in dreams, and it was a place that everyone longed for, but unfortunately, the ideal country did not exist in reality, and even if it really existed, as they lived in this kind of world, they were not qualified to go to the ideal country.

Jack didn't believe what the bards said at first, and he didn't want the self he had finally found to be a non-existent dream, so he asked a lot of people, but they all got the same answers.

"Ideal Township is just a dream, but it can only be a dream, and it's not bad to dream occasionally, but in this world, let's think about how to live first. "

Jack was disappointed, but what he was disappointed was not the yearning for the ideal township, but the numbness of the people around him, no one had ever seen the ideal township, so he decided that the place must not exist, and he firmly believed that the only ones who would not be tolerated by the ideal township would be those who gave up the ideal township, and he would definitely find there.

In a fit of rage, Jack said goodbye to them, left the caravan that had accompanied him for four years, and set out alone on the road to find his ideal home.

He once dived deep into the mountains, and once took a boat deep into the sea, but he had no choice but to return after encountering a fog that could not be seen.

After leaving the caravan, he was lonely, just like when he had just left the Black Flag, he walked alone on the land of the Imperial Kingdom, perhaps because he was sheltered by the caravan all the year round, so that he forgot that survival is not a simple thing, when he was still a killer in the past, he could get a small amount of remuneration by relying on the commission of the Black Flag, and when he was in the caravan, he could also drive away the robbers in exchange for a bite to eat, but now, although he still has some money, there are places everywhere in this land where there is no way to exchange money for food.

In order to survive, Jack had to steal and rob, and his athletic skills allowed him to escape the pursuit of the soldiers many times, and even the wanted warrant was only his back, which he often did in the town or village, but after leaving the village, even if he stole or robbed, there was not much normal food.

Once, Jack was so hungry that he snatched a cooking pot from the fleeing procession, and ran for a long, long time with it, until he was sure to stay away from them completely, he didn't stop until he was sure to get rid of them completely, and opened the pot to taste the cooked food, and through the wooden board that covered the mouth of the pot, he smelled the aroma of meat, but after taking the wooden board, he couldn't help but spit it out for a while, and the hungry water and stomach acid spit into the pot together.

It was the sole of a foot, and it was the sole of a child's foot, and Jack saw human flesh cooked for the first time, and the sight reminded him of a festering corpse, and the floating grease in the soup reminded him of maggots born on corpses, and he trembled with fear by the sight of murder for many years, and finally passed out.

Jack vaguely remembered that he felt like he had knocked over the pot of soup, that he could vaguely feel his teeth chewing, and then that his whole body was moving, then the sound of wheels rolling on the dirt pit floor, and finally the sun.

Jack's eyes were stinged by the sunlight, and he could only squint a slit, and between the gaps in his eyes he saw a person who seemed to be radiating light, and he remembered what the bard said about the afterlife, it is said that people go to heaven after death, and when the time comes, angels with white wings will guide them to heaven, and the sudden sound of a child's laughter in his ears makes him feel that he has really gone to heaven.

"Is this the ideal town?".

Jack was desperate to make sure that this was indeed heaven and that he was dead, but the answer he received made him almost hopeless.

"This is the Nu Gate Hall, my name is Zwei, and I am the lord of the Nu Gate Hall. "

Sure enough, there is no reality in the ideal township, and I have no qualifications to go to heaven.