Under the bright sunshine, the warm spring breeze blows gently, the blue sky is like a wash, and the blossoming white clouds are fluttering leisurely.

Thorne looked at the undulating Great Sword Mark Mountains in the distance, watching the peaks towering into the clouds, watching the flowers blooming in the mountains and blooming in the wind, listening to the gentle voices from the depths of the green shade. Birdsong.

He just stood with his hands behind his back, quietly bathing in the spring breeze, letting the warm sun shine on his cheeks, and letting the breeze lift his messy long hair.

At this moment, although the depressing journey of the Underdark flashed frequently in his mind, when he returned to the surface world again, the heavy memories were as if the deep darkness was dispelled by the light, and they were moving at a speed visible to the naked eye. It melted quickly, so that his calm heart couldn't have a single ripple.

"The surface world is better, although there is light and darkness, but at least there is hope, and the dark area is simply a valley of the shadow of death, filled with countless inexplicable nightmares." Thorne looked at the blurred upper city and lower city. The scene, couldn't help but sigh with emotion.

It is said that many people who escape the Underdark and return to the surface world will undergo a major transformation, because their eyes have seen the shadows of the Underdark, they have witnessed the inescapable doomsday, and even the weak will go mad.

Thorne smiled involuntarily, obviously, he was not such a person, and then prepared to speed up and walk forward.

Suddenly, when he was about to walk, he found that the chattering figure behind him became very quiet, and he didn't mean to move his footsteps.

So he turned around and walked towards Sigrid, looking at the little girl's dazed expression at a wild flower, and asked tentatively, "Why, are you hurt?"

At this time, Sigrid was still dressed simply and plainly, dressed in a pure black adventure outfit, holding a sheathed long sword in her arms, her slightly curly blond hair swaying in the breeze, swaying her slightly sad and delicate face It was clearly presented in front of Thorne's eyes.

"No, it's just that I haven't seen the sun for hundreds of years. After a long absence, I feel a little... how should I put it, it's very uncomfortable. It feels like I'm home."

Sigrid raised her head and smiled at Thorne perfunctorily, then returned to her original appearance, and rudely grabbed the wildflowers around her and played with it casually.

"Just get used to it. If there's nothing wrong, let's go." Thorne glanced at her and didn't know how to answer, so instead of asking, he left a sentence and turned and left.

Seeing this, Sigrid looked at Thorne's back with a slight smile, threw the wildflowers in her hands, and followed with cheerful steps.

Not long after walking, the two came to the sword mound overgrown with weeds.

Thorne looked at a long sword hidden in the weeds, listened to the sound of the sword groaning slightly, and stood silent for a long time in the grass.

Under Sigrid's strange gaze, he turned and walked towards a ten-meter-tall statue not far away, whose whole body was entangled with green vines, and was eroded by wind and sand, making it blurry.

According to the goblin wizard Malvasia, the occupation of the owner of this sculpture is one of the three basic occupations in the Nine Swords inheritance system: War Blade (Sword of Military Road).

As for the sharp blades buried in the Sword Tomb, they were all the sidearms left by the Sword Saints who died in battle. Their purpose here is to guard the shadow cracks that can be connected to the Fallen Shadow Underworld.

Thorne solemnly bowed to the sculpture and the tombs behind it, turned and continued on.

"Do you know this person?" Sigrid looked at the vague face of the sculpture, feeling a little familiar, but she couldn't tell where she had seen it, so she caught up with Thorne and walked side by side with him.

"I don't know." Thorne replied casually.

"Then why do you still salute him?" Sigrid asked again.

"Be in awe." Thorne slowed down, thought of a fairly appropriate word, and said, "Because their strength terrifies me, and their deeds deserve my respect, that's all."

This is the so-called reverence, Thorne secretly sighed, reverence is like a bottom line that always warns him that no matter what he does, he must be worthy of his conscience.

No matter who, once there is no reverence, they do not know how to respect and fear, they often become unscrupulous, do whatever they want, say whatever they want, do whatever they want, and even be lawless.

"Oh..." Sigrid nodded in understanding.

Then the two stopped talking. Under the leadership of Thorne, they found a winding path hidden in the bushes and walked along the path to the ruins of the ancient castle.

However, at the moment of arriving at the ruined castle, Thorne found several busy figures, which made his calm expression fluctuate.

The tauren Alistar is working hard to clear the collapsed walls in the ruins, and a pair of iron fists hammered the ruins walls into small pieces.

The orc sword saint Kutaig and his student half-elf Lando tacitly cooperated and threw the large and small stones decomposed by the tauren towards the outside of the castle.

The last mind flayer Vel'Koz in a robe and an octopus head hummed a peasant's ditty while using his magic power to manipulate things like bricks and fine pebbles, cleaning them all up.

"This..." Thorne and Sigrid looked at each other with puzzled looks in their eyes.

Looking at the surrounding environment, the two felt as if they had come to the construction site.

"What are you doing?" Thorne stepped forward and asked aloud before everyone found him.

The tauren Alistar is the one he promised the other party to help him find a territory on the surface for the development of their tauren race and gather the clansmen in the dark area, and the tauren would not violate his own moral bottom line. dispatch.

However, it is a pity that this Niu brother is a bit miserable, and now he is still a bare commander...

But Thorne has already negotiated with Evelyn in the Royal City of Rezim in advance. As long as he finds a tauren slave in the arena, he will try to help him pay attention to it, and then spend money to buy it.

After collecting a certain amount of money, the goblin caravan named Charlotte will help send it to the ruined city.

As for the other octopus brother named Velks, because this guy's race belongs to the mind flayer that makes people talk about it.

In order to prevent accidents, Thorne signed a contract with him. While providing the other party with magical knowledge, the octopus brother will serve him for 50 years.

So, the two came to the underground ruins with the gray dwarves under the **** of Sigrid.

"Boss Thorne is back." Alistar's cannon-like voice sounded first.

Then he walked over to Kutaig, regardless of whether the other party agreed or not, and put his dirty arm on the other's shoulder, placing his weight on one foot, and rhythmically tapping the ground with the other foot. , then grinned:

"It was Miss Andrina who said that our brothers should clean up this place and prepare to rebuild this castle."

"Rebuilding this castle?" Thorne froze for a moment, then smiled again, nodded to several people, and stopped talking.

It was his recent idea to rebuild the castle, because behind the castle there were sealed shadow cracks and passages leading to the ground, so someone must be sent to guard it.

After all, no one can guarantee that dangerous subterranean monsters will emerge from the crack leading to the Underdark.

The reconstruction of this ancient castle, in addition to being habitable for people, will also play a role of covering and guarding.

He didn't expect that the other party would go with him, but he didn't know if Andrina had greeted Lilia. After all, no matter what, the other party was the leader of Shangcheng District.

"There are not more than a hundred gray dwarves in the city of ruins. You also called them up. These guys are also very good at building houses." Thorne walked to a few people, as if remembering something, so he reminded them.

"Yes, yes, how could I forget them." Kutaig frowned and shook off the tauren's arm on his shoulders, nodded and said, "If you don't remind me, I plan to go to Horn Town and call someone over. helped."

"Don't be so troublesome, don't forget to go to the lower city to buy more wine, after all, these dwarves are a group of wine barrels."

Thorne reminded again, and then briefly communicated with everyone for a while, and then left the ruined castle with Sigrid.

Then he took Sigrid, who was always asking questions, like a curious baby, through two tree-lined paths in Uptown. As he passed the training ground, Thorne found sitting in the shade watching The half-elf girl Lilia of the field trainer.

"You're back." Lilia was the first to spot the two figures, so she walked over to Thorne and looked at him softly.

"Well, I'm back, nothing major has happened recently." Thorne smiled back at the girl in front of him and asked.

A few days ago, Andrina told him about the Hrukh Hobgoblin sending assassins to harass the town of Falls.

Since two Tier 3 rangers from the Temple of Merika were in charge of warning and reconnaissance, these annoying assassins roamed all the intersections in the town of Falls, targeting the singles.

It caused panic in the whole town, which was the main reason why he was so eager to come back.

Since the hobgoblins like to harass the waterfall so much, Thorne feels that he should also go to the Serenity Forest and brush the hobgoblins as dungeons, so that they can also feel what it is like to be squatted frequently.

"As long as we stay out of the town, we won't encounter any danger, but this is not the way to go." Lilia said to Thorne with a slightly worried look.

"It's okay, I will solve this problem soon, trust me." Thorne smiled and comforted.

"Yeah." Lilia reached out and brushed away the hair covering her face, showing a slight smile at Thorne.

"Then I'll go first." Thorne wanted to reach out and rub Lilia's hair, thinking that it was inappropriate, and held back.

"Hey!" However, he just took two steps when he was directly stopped by Sigrid behind him.

"Do you have anything else to do?" Thorne looked at the little girl with a headache.

"I've already arrived at Waterfall Town. Why don't you take me to the streets of Xiacheng for a walk, why do you keep leading me into the depths of the woods?"

Sigrid looked at the surrounding dense jungle and the hidden tree houses, and then stood on tiptoe to look in the direction of the lower city, with a very dissatisfied tone.

"Don't make a mistake, I just promised to take you to the waterfall town, but I didn't say I would go shopping with you. If you want to play, you can just go down by yourself. If you have children, you need adults to watch. ." Thorne recalled his experience with the other party in the lighthouse town, and refused directly.

"I'm your guest, don't you have any hospitality at all?" Sigaret, who was rejected, held a sheathed long sword and paced back and forth beside Thorne, retorting without showing weakness:

"You are too unscrupulous, think about it for yourself, you go to my castle, how do I treat you, you have the Underdark, how do I treat you."

"..."

Thorne, who was at a loss, was speechless and stood in the same place, not knowing how to justify it.

Noticing the change in Thorne's expression, Lilia chuckled lightly, walked to Sigrid's side, and said, "This little sister, I'm Lilia, the leader of Upper Town, or I'll go with you. What do you think of playing in the city?"

"Of course." Sigrid immediately took Lilia's hand and responded to her inner joy and agreement.

Then she glanced at Thorne again and complained: "You think I want you to be with me so much, I like to put on a paralyzed face all day."

After saying that, he took Lilia and walked towards the lower city.

Seeing the two leaving, Thorne breathed a sigh of relief, so he stood there and watched the training of the half-elves for a while, then turned and walked towards the log cabin by the waterfall.

The reason for going there is mainly because of the distance of the cabin and the location of the tower, so that he can be teleported back through the teleportation circle.

Thorne walked along the tree-lined path, and when he came to the edge of the waterfall, a low, vibrato melody floated in the rushing water:

The breath of spring pervades in recovery,

The slightest spring rain nourishes life,

The soft spring breeze dispels the haze again,

Such a thing is justified,

So our hope is sprouting.

...

So Thorne immediately turned his gaze to the low figure in the pool, and when he saw a half-elf bard in a pale green lace jacket, a dome hat, and a harp in his arms, he immediately recognized out the identity of the other party.

The half-elf bard in front of him was the player named Gilt he met at the Temple of Merika, but to his surprise, the other party came to the town of waterfalls.

Thorne glanced at the empty fish basket beside Gilt, and a lifeless fishing rod by the water's edge.

After thinking about it, he finally held back his footsteps and did not choose to disturb the other party's creative inspiration.

Then he looked up at the high tower on the west cliff, and directly activated the teleportation array to disappear without a trace.

When Thorne appeared through the teleportation formation on the twelfth floor of the tower, a figure that impressed him was already guarding him.

"You're back?" Andrina's beautiful eyes as bright as water exuded a clear dim light and a touching smile when she looked at Thorne.

"Well." Thorne smiled slightly, looked around, and found that she was the only one, so he took her directly into his arms, sniffed the familiar smell, and enjoyed a moment of tranquility.

"You said it's not a gluttonous body, look where your hands have gone." Andrina buried her head in Thorne's arms and whispered.

…………