Steampunk Era: Mad Abield

Heading north from New Hangzhou, you will pass through the largest Dark Zone—Old Shanghai.

Speaking of this city, Malin’s records are of the night view of The Bund, the bustling temple fairs, tasty crab shell buns with sesame and peppermint creams, and those headache-inducing housing prices.

It is said that in the era before the Great Destruction, this massive city had turned the entire triangular area into a metropolis. Because of this, when Chaos arrived, too many innocents were transformed and twisted, and the Union Army deployed all seven Thainan corps in the East Asia region to the battle of saving civilians, with the third and fifth corps responsible for Old Shanghai.

Within a three-day countdown, they rescued more than seven million civilians. In the most desperate battle at the end, they alongside the armed citizens who volunteered to stay behind called in a hydrogen bomb to directly strike the teleport channel that was opening. They succeeded, and the channel was closed.

To this day, the massive nuclear explosion point beneath sea level in the center of Old Shanghai is the city’s testament to resilience.

The third and fifth corps were removed from the Union army because of this battle, until the Union itself was forgotten. Now, in the outskirts of Old Shanghai, you can occasionally see those soldiers wandering around in tattered power armor.

Malin has seen those Lost Souls more than once—these deceased soldiers won’t attack humans; even today, they continue to slaughter all the Chaos and different kind.

When these Lost Souls see Malin, they first assume a defensive posture, perhaps due to Malin’s identity—Malin’s paternal bloodline originates from beyond the realm, which is hard for ordinary people to recognize (even now, many believe Malin’s paternal or maternal lineage is a Domestic Fairy, as when this race was created, except for height, their appearance was somewhat different.), but they can confirm Malin’s identity using the Soul Fire in their eye sockets.

However, no attack comes; they will promptly confirm Malin’s maternal appearance, and then leave in silence.

"These Lost Souls are the biggest guarantee in this Dark Zone, according to the Legendary who can dive. At the epicenter, even now those Lost Souls are still battling Chaos from the broken fissure."

The words filled Malin’s heart with respect—these are the greatest warriors on this planet, the most reassuring presence, even after so long, even though they have become like this.

Of course, besides the Lost Souls, there are some stragglers in this area, mostly the Bleeding Ghosts, which is why the outskirts of this Dark Zone are surrounded by retired adventurers formed into squads. Most of them are injured adventurers, who after healing, received prosthetic replacements, then joined the patrol team of this area.

They are armed to the teeth; generally, a few Bleeding Ghosts can’t even get close to them.