Echoes of the Past C3

Chapter 3 — The Awakened One

The group moved through a vast and boundless world, its dim and even light revealing no discernible source.

The land around them resembled an endless plain—
Yet a closer look showed that the ground was nothing but mire.

Most of Highway 297 had been swallowed by the swamp, yet the water was not deep.
When stepping down, one could still feel the hardness of the submerged road surface.
Even in its deepest stretches, the swamp only reached the knee, making it possible to roughly follow the road’s buried direction.

Lan Zhao, distracted for a moment, stepped into a hollow and plunged deep into the mud.
He pitched forward uncontrollably, but Mena reacted swiftly and grabbed him.
“Watch your step!”

Lan Zhao regained balance with borrowed force and struggled to free his leg.
“Thanks.”

“When walking in a swamp, step lightly and lift lightly,” Bard relayed, glancing back as he waited for them.

“I rarely come into swamp zones. Not much experience,” Lan Zhao said with an embarrassed smile, then reassured Zhu En beside him, “I’m fine.”

Zhu En fixed his eyes on him.
“Stay close to me.”

“Alright.”
Lan Zhao met his gaze helplessly.
“I’m the one being careless. Always making you worry.”

Bard commented, “These brothers sure are close.”

Ase­li seemed to have a different opinion, but said nothing.

“Don’t be so tense,” Mena comforted.

Lan Zhao kept his lips pressed together the entire way, deeply unsettled.
Otherwise, he wouldn’t have stepped into the swamp so foolishly.

Mena assumed he was still bothered about the safe-word incident.
“Relax. Boss is clearer-headed than anyone. Otherwise we wouldn’t have made it out of the last echo-zone.
He’s just like that—once you’re used to him, you’ll find he’s incredibly reliable. Never once failed.”

But that wasn’t what troubled Lan Zhao.

He exhaled softly and followed the thread:
“What is Leader Li’s safe word? …Is it something sensitive?”

“Uh…”
Mena smiled lightly.
“It’s something everyone knows, but… best not ask. Knowing won’t make you any safer.”

Lan Zhao didn’t understand.

“Being tormented by a sane Boss, or being tormented by an out-of-control Boss—does it make any difference?”
Mena drifted ahead.

“……”

At some point, the air around them began to fill with drifting purple haze—
Growing thicker by the second.

“The swamp gas is getting heavier. We didn’t bring filters—we’ll have to detour.”
Bard pinched his nose, waiting for Li Wei’s decision.

“This way.”
Li Wei remained concise, stepping toward the swamp to the right of the road.

The group followed at once.
But the swamp gas seemed alive—circulating, weaving together, and gathering around them.

Their specialized boots allowed them to tread the swamp surface,
but with so many dangerous creatures below, lingering too long was risky.

“Something’s wrong,” Bard muttered warily.

Li Wei’s toe halted mid-step.
“Don’t move.”

Lan Zhao immediately tensed.
“What is it?”

Li Wei surveyed the still surface of the swamp.
“There’s a giant toad around us.”

At those words, the relaxed expressions vanished from Bard and Mena’s faces.

The giant toad—
Formally, the Reed Giant Toad.

Each swamp usually housed only one.
Though its name differed from the reed toad by only one character, their danger levels were worlds apart.

A normal reed toad was about the size of half a grown man and lived beneath reed clusters.
But the giant toad was more than ten times that size.
Unable to live under reeds, it roamed expansively.

Wherever it settled, it devoured every living creature nearby.
Then it stayed until new reeds grew from its skin.
Only once the reeds emerged above the swamp and it underwent an agonizing molt—
leaving the reeds behind—
did it move on.

Its shed skin fed the cluster and embedded within it hundreds of egg sacs.

When the young toads emerged and the reed thicket reached seven meters or more,
the area became the new domain of reed toads.

With its huge size, tough skin, acidic fluids, and gas that mimicked swamp fumes while lulling prey into sleep,
the giant toad had almost no natural predators.

“What do we do? Retreat?” Lan Zhao whispered.

Mena shook his head—do not move.

But remaining still meant the swamp would gradually pull them down.
For a moment, they were trapped—neither able to advance nor retreat.

Lan Zhao distracted himself by observing anything else—
He noticed Bard’s sleeve starting to split, as though his arm was swelling…

Meanwhile, Li Wei kept his gaze lowered, one hand resting loosely at his waist.

Seconds later, Li Wei uttered a single word:

“Run.”

The instant the word fell, the ground beneath them collapsed.

Bard grabbed Ase­li and leapt back toward the exposed road.
Lan Zhao instinctively reached for Zhu En—but caught only air.
Even in that moment of crisis, he froze in shock.

“Why are you spacing out?!”
Mena yanked him back again.

As they all scattered in retreat, Li Wei alone remained still.

He drew a grappling-anchor gun from his waist and fired between his feet.

A deafening croak split the air—shaking their eardrums painfully.

Lan Zhao covered his ears and turned.
A giant toad burst from the swamp—mud spraying everywhere.
Its hide was a murky violet-brown, studded with wart-like nodules the size of fists, each stuffed with venom sacs.

Just as Li Wei was about to be swallowed whole,
he fired the anchor toward the road and used the force to vault cleanly out—landing with perfect balance.

The giant toad bit nothing but air.
It bellowed again in pain, for the anchor had embedded itself deep into its body—
striking the most lethal point.

To kill a giant toad, one had to wound it from within.
But that alone wasn’t enough.

Li Wei didn’t even disturb the hem of his coat.
“Mena.”

“Almost there!”
Mena’s eyes were shut tight, veins bulging on his forehead as though listening to the wind.

Lan Zhao wondered what was “almost there”—
Until he saw bubbles rapidly emerging across the swamp.
More and more, denser and denser—

They were worms.
Hundreds—no, thousands—of centipedal swamp worms converging on them.

Lan Zhao murmured,
“An Awakened One…”

Then realization struck.
Bard’s swelling arm earlier must have been the sign of beastification.

Though Mena had summoned the worm swarm, he was struggling to control them.
Some worms turned toward the group—
their countless legs inducing waves of nausea.

They were surrounded by a living sea of insects.

Sweat dripped down Mena’s face.
He strained to glance at Li Wei.

“Ase­li doesn’t like lots of bugs!!”
Ase­li hopped onto Bard’s back.
Bard, swinging his axe, hacked down several worms at once.

At that moment, Li Wei flicked his wrist and tossed the hundred-faced die upward.
It spun rapidly in the air.
He reversed his wrist and caught it on the back of his hand.

—No one saw what number it landed on.

Li Wei moved his lips—soundless words.

Instantly, the entire swarm shifted—
as if enthralled, every worm turned and charged toward the giant toad.

Orderly.
Swift.
Without hesitation.

One purpose only:
To kill the giant toad.

Then Li Wei calmly activated the anchor gun.
The anchor buried deep inside the giant toad tore back through its organs—
dragging chunks of flesh out through its mouth.
Blood arced through the air in a grotesque crimson bloom.

Ase­li jumped off Bard in time—
Bard did not.
He was drenched head to toe.

“Ase­li!!!”
He gagged, retching violently.
“You use me when it’s convenient and ditch me when it’s not?!”

The girl folded her hands behind her back innocently.
“Bard, don’t be mad.”

Humans couldn’t stand the stench—
but the worms loved it.
They grew even more frenzied.

The giant toad dove into the swamp to flee.
The worms plunged down after it instantly.

Soon the bubbles across the swamp stabilized—some twenty meters away.

The worms were much faster.
The toad had no hope of escaping digestion.

Only now did Lan Zhao realize—
Li Wei had prevented them from moving earlier so the toad would attack directly beneath them.

But giant toads were usually intelligent—
They sedated their prey first before striking.
The reckless behavior earlier was unlike them.
Much like the worms acting… under influence.

Whose Awakened ability was it?

Zhu En was also an Orderer, and Lan Zhao knew well—
the greatest strength of an Orderer was unmatched clarity of mind,
even in severely contaminated zones.

But the price was considerable:
fragile bodies and inability to awaken abilities.

Yet when Lan Zhao looked at Li Wei—
calm, poised, nothing frail about him—
a suspicion stirred.

These reversals…
They must be tied to Li Wei.

For Li Wei to command two Awakened Ones—
the girl Ase­li surely being one as well—
there was no chance Li Wei was merely a “normal” Orderer.

Perhaps the rumors were true—
that he possessed an exceptional, near-legendary Companion,
one that granted abilities no other Orderer had.

Of course, no one had ever seen Li Wei’s Companion.
Or rather—
anyone who had… was dead.

One rule in the Survival Codex was marked in red:

Never approach an Orderer’s Companion.
Never look upon it directly.

“What a pity,” Bard said, gazing where the toad had died.
“It’s full of useful parts.”

“Dad would love its skin!” Ase­li added.

“Then why don’t you two dig it up,” Mena remarked.

“Dig it up!” Ase­li echoed.

“We’re leaving.”
Li Wei increased his pace, subtly pulling farther away from Bard.
“The worms will need at least three days to digest the giant toad. We’ll come back later.”

“Listen to Boss!”
Ase­li followed happily.

Bard wiped his face and retched again.

“You smell like you bathed in a month-old rotten black-rat stew,”
Mena said with relish.

Bard grinned viciously and lunged in for a bear hug.

“DON’T TOUCH ME YOU—!!”

Lan Zhao couldn’t help laughing and quickly followed the group.
When he turned to pull Zhu En along, he noticed the latter’s pallor.
“Are you feeling unwell?”

Zhu En matched every stereotype of an Orderer—
thin, fragile, quietly pitiable.
Yet he still forced a shake of the head.
“I’m fine. It’s nothing.”

“Want me to carry you?”

“No need…”

Mena, dodging Bard’s “magical attacks,” reassured,
“It’s fine! Probably just the giant toad’s gas.
We didn’t breathe in much—once we leave the area we’ll be okay—”

With the worms lured away, the rest of the path became unusually smooth.

Mena was loud, talkative, and capable of chatting with anyone about anything.
The atmosphere grew strangely lively—
so much so that Lan Zhao began to feel they weren’t headed toward a deadly shelter,
but out sightseeing.

Along the way they passed more swallowed ruins.
Lan Zhao finally asked,
“What used to be here?”

There were countless swamps in the world—
but this one was clearly new.

Bard answered,
“Yija Fortress. Early Collapse.
It fell not long after the Light came.”

When the Light first spilled from the sky,
Yija Fortress was engulfed.
No one remembered what happened inside—
only that corpses soon piled like mountains.
Then dissolved swiftly under Shadow Pollution,
corroding the land.
Humidity and viscosity surged—
bringing endless rain that the earth could no longer absorb.

Over time,
the entire fortress transformed into a new swamp.

Within mere centuries,
a once-mighty fortress had been devoured.
All that remained were the fragments they now saw.

A quiet sorrow settled over Lan Zhao.

Humanity had battled Shadow Pollution for millennia—
always barely holding balance.
Until the sky split open and the Light descended—
and Light and Shadow began fighting like beasts claiming territory.

Humans became the only casualties in a war between gods.

“Still… at least we won the final battle.”

“What difference does winning make?”

The Light Pollution had awakened the sleeping Ones.
Humanity spent centuries fighting them,
finally forcing them back into slumber near the Collapse’s end—
but at crippling cost.
Civilization regressed; populations thinned;
the surface became littered with echo-zones—
flares of lingering contamination.

Zhu En interrupted softly:
“We’re here.”

Before them was the “pile of rusted cars” mentioned in the broadcast—
stacked high along one side of the canyon, blocking any view of an entrance.

“This doesn’t look like a canyon entrance,” Mena muttered.
“Is there really a path beyond?”

Li Wei stepped forward.
He approached the nearest wreck, and with a sharp clang拔,
tore the rusted car door clean off.
Then he bent down and slipped inside without a word.

“Boss!” Ase­li hurried after him.

Bard remembered his duties and asked the newcomers,
“Remember Survival Rule Five?”

“Of course,” Lan Zhao recited,
“When in contaminated areas, trust nothing you see or hear, except the Orderer.”

“Good. So once we’re in there, Boss’s orders outrank everything.”

“Zhu En is an Orderer too,” Lan Zhao hesitated.
“We could listen to him also…”

At that, Mena turned, suddenly stern.
“Survival Codex—Rule One Hundred:
If there are two or more Orderers on the team,
and one of them is Leader Li,
his orders come first.”

Lan Zhao blinked.
“The Survival Codex only has ninety-nine rules.”

“Ah—caught! I’ll have the oversight council add Rule One Hundred when we get back.”
Mena waved it off, then added seriously,
“Even if I made that one up, it’s the truth.
Just follow it.”