Ashes Of Deep Sea

Chapter 814: Chapter 811: The End of the Sandstorm

The history books say that the “mad poet” Puman, who lived hundreds of years ago, was someone who touched upon forbidden truths yet by a stroke of luck, survived. There are also legends that describe how this eccentric poet would often get lost in Dreamscape, claiming to have traversed various timelines and visited all sorts of bizarre realms within his dreams.

This mad poet left behind countless chapters that astounded generations to come. His literary talent was dazzling; even in the early days of his career, his graceful yet profound verses had conquered even the most critical commentators in the City-State. However, at the end of his brief life, his poetry began to transform—his words increasingly depicted strange and grotesque things, filled with unsettling metaphors and the delirious ramblings of a madman that almost sounded prophetic. He incessantly tried to tell the world about things that did not exist in reality, even bordering on blasphemy, and thus he became a character that was both lamented and feared.

Those who once praised him withdrew; those who admired him began to regard him as a dangerous individual. The administrators of the Deep Sea Church attempted to engage with him but could not find anything substantial in his writings that carried the power to corrupt or blaspheme.

The final chapter of this talented yet insane poet is yet another mystery in the eyes of the world—some say he was imprisoned by the Church and eventually died quietly in an asylum on a secluded island. Others swear that he lived on, even until a certain winter in 1842. These people insist that they saw the poet that year: he was standing on the infamous cliff of Frost, strikingly similar to the portraits left in books, holding paper and pen for jotting down his verses.

And a so-called “Caretaker”, who claimed to have taken care of Puman in the last years of his life and witnessed the poor man’s ultimate fate, described it in his autobiography:

Puman ultimately got lost in his bizarre Dreamscape—this poet wandered through each of his dreams, drawing experiences to turn them into his lavish yet eerie verses. He finally sunk into a distant dream from which he did not wish to awake, and on a sunny morning, the poet disappeared from his bed, leaving behind only a short poem on his nightstand.

Fenna walked forward, to the spot where the eccentric man had last vanished. She bent down to pick up the crumpled scroll and pencil before the wind could whisk them away.

She furrowed her brow, seeming somewhat puzzled, and then she unfolded the paper, staring blankly at the sentence recorded on it—

“…I have seen it, the sunlight has retreated, in the night’s embrace, all things fall into tranquility… That ship sails in from the sky, the stars a curtain, bestowing upon the earthly realm the boon of eternal slumber… In silence, in stillness, in sleep, rest now, as the departed embrace the dead world…”