The Record of Unusual Creatures

Panda Novel

Looking at the still-smoking crater before her, Vivian in her torn garments sighed. “So this was how I landed on Earth… I have no recollection of it at all.”

Hao Ren looked at Vivian, who had now regained her memories. “It seems like you were dazed for quite a bit after you landed. You probably even roamed far to the north. You started to pen your diary from there.”

Vivian smiled as she looked at her dress. She had no idea where it came from but was pretty sure that was not how she had dressed up. Her initial getup was the same as those godslayers, based on the treacherous army’s uniform. However, the particular dress she had on was not the same as the uniforms those traitors wore. Perhaps it was from Purgatory. Despite having magical protection, she had traveled through a dimensional rift to reach Earth. Plus, she was nicely burned when she entered the atmosphere. Her dress was in tatters, she was in a sorry state.

“Did you bring any of these?” Vivian pointed at herself. “I need to change.”

“Oh, of course.” Hao Ren pulled out one of Vivian’s casual wear from his Dimensional Pocket.

“I came prepared…”

…

A few moments later, the two stood side by side on the grassland and looked at the dimensional rift that had engulfed the skies.

The Mesopotamian gods were “wrapped” in a semi-translucent energy bubble alongside a host of broken buildings towards the far side of the earth, and around them, many tiny rifts opened as a group of half-man and half-wolf beings were shot out in a daze across the land.

“No wonder the werewolves had proliferated that widely, they were simply shot out randomly when they arrived huh…” Vivian said. “Oh, I see the Blood Clans… Did one of them just fall into my crater?”

“So you back in those days must have seen a vampire smashing face first before you and came to think of yourself as one of them?”

“Can’t help it. I was a naïve child back then.” Vivian smiled. “That was the first time I saw something similar to me, and of course, I assumed that it was my kin… My form back then was not even stable yet, and had just gone with that subconsciously.”

“Well thank goodness your form had not stabilized in Purgatory. Humanoids are fine, it’ll be all over if you become one of those tentacles on the planet.”

The rift in the sky looks slightly smaller now and some of Yggdrasil’s tendrils were leaving the surface. While many of the landing vessels were still being disgorged, it was apparent that the disembarkation process was coming to an end. The rolling thunders too had slackened, and the energy flares fading. As these unusual phenomena faded away, the sky soon stabilized again, and the stars reappeared.

After a full day of “landings”, night had fallen.

On the ground, the animals which could have escaped had already run away, and those who could not all fell to the extreme heat and radiation. The forest afar was still ablaze and the strong winds helped to fan the fire and set a few hills around them on fire. A few unlucky survivors fell into the sea of flames, and as their bodies could not withstand the fire, their short journey into the other dimension ended abruptly. And even for those who had survived the landings, many will perish. Perish on a planet that they could not adapt to.

Yggdrasil was powerless against this. As a hyperspace fortress, she had already sent her cargo to the best available location, and their subsequent survival was up to themselves.

Only a small crew stayed behind on Asgard within Yggdrasil. And they were known Norse Gods at a later age.

The tendrils were slowly withdrawn and Hao Ren gazed upon the rift in the sky, the flames in the distance, and the disappearing nine great realms before sighing. “So this is the first day of the Age of Mythology.”

“Yes, this is it.”

“So, this backtrack is the starting point of everything?” Hao Ren turned around and looked at the “vampire lady” beside him. An unreal feeling started welling within him. He had actually managed to get to this point and found Vivian at the point where she had arrived on Earth 10,000 years ago. So this is the end of this journey? Is this the last backtrack? Is there nothing else left?”

Vivian looked at Hao Ren in the eyes. “Yes, this is the last stop. You are at the end of your journey. And my start as the being known as Vivian Ancesta.

Hao Ren blinked, still slightly dazed as he looked around. “But what of the ‘battle’ you mentioned? The one deep within your consciousness?”

“You are right in the center of it. It’s just that these memories were blocking your vision… Do you want to see it? How the deepest part of this consciousness look like?”

Hao Ren felt that he was prepared and nodded firmly. “Let me see.”

Vivian gave a gentle acknowledgment and the entire background collapsed.

The sky shattered like broken glass and the hills and the fire in the distance turned to dust. Every color faded with the rapid change as darkness swarmed from all directions and within a few breathes later, it had totally replaced the vibrant “real world”.

The very next moment, the darkness receded like the tide and Hao Ren found himself standing on a desert. Beneath him was an endless stream of sand, while the sky was dark with no signs of the stars or other celestial bodies. While the dark skies roiled, the area was still lit by an unknown source of light.

Hao Ren looked at the sky for a good while before realizing that the dark sky was nothing but an upside down desert!

The whole place is a god damn desert!

“Is this your… deepest consciousness?”

Hao Ren was surprised as he saw this dark and barren world and had to ask.

“You’re surprised by how barren it is?” Vivian could, of course, understand Hao Ren’s reaction as she smiled. “Don’t worry. It’s not normally like this. But to fight that thing for control, I had to focus everything into combat and my consciousness ended up like this. While it may look barren, it is the most ‘economical’ of state, and this empty consciousness is effective against any corruption…”

As Vivian said she led Hao Ren forward. They soon went on top a mound and along the way, Hao Ren asked. “So that battle…”

He noticed that Vivian was at ease and he wondered if the battle within the deepest part of her consciousness had already ended.

“I’ve mentioned it before. This is a battle that is very difficult to describe. Before your last backtrack, the battle had no end and was actually in a standby state. But when you found the last piece of me, the battle was decided.”

Soon they had gotten up onto the tallest sand mound and the moment Hao Ren looked down, he forgot to breathe.

The yellow dune was drowning in blood and the flats below the mound blood-soaked battlefield as many odd-shaped corpses laying on the ground. Their bodies were bizarre. To put in simple terms, they were like children doodles that came to life and randomly combined together.

However, these twisted monsters were not the main characters of this battlefield, the real ones had Hao Ren gulped hard. Because in between the monsters were… Vivians.

They were covered in blood but did not look like they were dead. It seemed like the Malevolences were standing in every corner of the battlefield like a wax statue. As Hao Ren turned towards them, they too looked up and at him in sync.

Over ten emotionless eyes…

“F*ck me!”

“Don’t worry.” Vivian smiled. “They are harmless now.”

“Are those the Malevolences?” Hao Ren looked at the mass-produced Vivians. “And you say they are… harmless?” So why am I getting goosebumps looking at them?”

“Ugh… they may look scary but you’ll get used to it.” Vivian sniggered drily. “Now their activities are all under my control, as I have managed to resolve the ‘root cause’ of their madness.”

Hao Ren immediately perked up as he heard the word “root cause” as the whole mess was caused by it. The corruption in Vivian’s spirit, the spiritual virus, the coalescing of negative energy, the dark primordial powers, or what you wanna call it. Simply throwing negative descriptions will pretty much describe the thing, but it was the cause of Vivian’s spiritual corruption and leading to the Malevolences being born, and caused the whole dimensional distortion. Has it already been resolved?

“What did it look like?” Hao Ren asked, nervously.

Vivian did not say a word and only pointed towards the center of the battlefield.

Hao Ren saw the thing. It stood silently at the center of the blood-soaked ground amid the pile of bodies. The monsters and Malevolences existed because of it, but its shape disappointed Hao Ren a little, as he thought that a thing capable of invoking such a monumental event should have been terrifying. But in truth…

It was a dark red crystal, about a men’s height, half a meter thick. That was it.

“This… is the cause of your splits and deep sleep?” Hao Ren came to the center of the battlefield as he inspected the crystal with a disappointed look. “It doesn’t look all that special…”

“Don’t be fooled by its shape. As this is my consciousness, everything needs to have a form for you to see it. Its current shape is not because it actually looked like that, it’s more to my lack of creativity.”

Hao Ren had been listening intently before the bombshell at the end almost sending him head first onto the crystal. “Don’t go admitting that so casually!”

“What’s there to be embarrassed about? Vivian retorted matter-of-factly. “Doggie isn’t here anyway.”

Wow, this old hag had already fallen that far down that she only retains a shred of dignity before a husky?

Hao Ren had no idea how to respond to that and forced himself to shift his attention to the red crystal pillar. He touched the surface curiously. “What is this actually?”

“I’m not too sure myself. But I’ve studied it a bit earlier and noticed…”

As Vivian said she touched the crystal with her finger.

The next moment, the crystal pillar lit up and like a projector, displayed a massive three-dimensional image.

It was an unfamiliar space.

“No sh*t, a star map?”.