"Buzz buzz..."
Meteors returned, fireflies flew back, and thousands of spiritual light points flew high into the sky. Among them, lifelike human figures were vaguely visible. Among them, when Aunt Zhang floated into the air, he turned around and glanced at Bai Zhou, who was alone high up there.
But then her eyes moved and she saw Fang Xiaoxia walking towards Bai Zhou. Then a relieved smile appeared on her face and she waved towards Bai Zhou. was repairing shoes. When Elder Liu flew up, the crutch fell to the ground with a "clack", and in an instant it rotted, melted, and disappeared into the air. Uncle Xiang floated at the back, still holding a lunch box in his arms, but the lunch box was not too warm now.
Before flying high into the sky, Uncle Xiang stopped suddenly and looked back at Bai Zhou.
This smart kid who squatted in front of his Convenience Store waiting to pick up some discounted products and eat Four-Flavor Instant Noodles finally became an adult who was in charge of his own affairs, which they couldn't understand.
Who could have thought of this at the beginning of Evening City?
But... you suffered a lot, right?
He grinned and smiled at Bai Zhou from afar.
There is relief and distress in the smile.
He waved goodbye to Bai Zhou, turned around and disappeared into the broken night sky.
Not long after, Fang Xiaoxia also left with everyone while looking back reluctantly.
Bai Zhou stood there, watching the figures rising up one after another, gradually flying to the end of the deep night, and lining up in front of the crack. Before they left, they stood at the end of the night sky and bowed to Bai Zhou in the distance.
The movements were quite chaotic and not neat. Some people were grateful, while others were nervous.
After all, they know that they have done nothing. In fact, most of them feel that they can be awakened and saved by Bai Zhou. In those days, Bai Zhou was able to grow up in Evening City mainly because of himself.
But now, they have no other option.
They entrusted their fate to the hands of Bai Zhou.
Dots of light flashed in rows in the sky. There were no stars in the sky tonight for Evening City, and Blood Moon, which was surrounded by stars, also fell.
So, in the sky, those light spots that everyone turned into seemed to have become stars.
And the moon is on the ground.
The "moon", surrounded by the "stars" in the distance, is standing high above, watching those figures from a distance.
Until they walked in a row towards the dark chasm, moving from falsehood to reality.
"Are you really ready?"
Dr. Zhang came to Bai Zhou. She looked at Bai Zhou, with the camera she used to record her life still hanging on her chest.
"What?" Bai Zhou looked at Miss Doctor.
"Do you want to treat them? I will try my best. When the time comes, I may need your help."
Hearing this, Dr. Zhang shook his head, "Even I don't know what No. 27 Sanatorium has become in reality." "I only know that Xiao Zhou seems to have died inexplicably in reality, and I don't know what was arranged there before he died... But I have a feeling in the dark that maybe it is not peaceful there."
It's strange that there is peace...Bai Zhou was muttering in his heart.
Didn't "Pain Melon King" say it? He is waiting in reality.
Even if everyone returns to the hospital, they will probably remain in a painful vegetative state until the problem is completely solved.
But fortunately, before the so-called "Gu King" appears, no one from "above" will come.
Thanks to Dr. Zhang's letter, Bai Zhou came early enough and still had time.
"Also, I am very fierce in reality, so you have to be prepared."
Saying that, Dr. Zhang took a deep look at Bai Zhou.
"Everything there is up to you."
After the words fell, Miss Doctor turned around lightly and stood on her toes slightly, leaving Maiden with a back figure of Bai Zhou with her hands behind her back. She said:
"I'm optimistic about you."
Should it be said that Bai Zhou is the humanoid Charm Demon who always urges [Soothing] to wake up? Doctor's words from a close distance once again inexplicably shake Bai Zhou's mind, as if it has some special magic power.
Maiden's figure gradually became transparent, and her melancholy and compassionate temperament disappeared at this moment, and she even became a little cheerful.
A gust of wind blew by, and Maiden's figure disappeared.
With a "snap" sound, the camera Maiden always hung in front of his neck fell to the ground.
"Just leaving?"
"Huh?"
Bai Zhou bent down, picked up the camera and opened it to check.
The camera is extremely old, but it can still be used and opened normally.
"Beep! Beep! Beep...
Bai Zhou pressed the button and saw the photo records saved inside. The old picture on the screen flashed a few times. As expected, it was not much different from the photos hanging in her office.
There are some photos inside with recovered patients. Ms. Doctor, with a bright smile, stands as graceful as a small white flower.
Recording life... Miss Doctor, did you record this?
There are no separate selfies, and even the time of taking shown in the lower right corner of the most recent photo is two years ago.
It was only then that Bai Zhou recalled that the photos hanging in Ms. Doctor's office were a little more immature than they look now. Was it because she got busy later, or was it because this place was a dream and the record of reality was incomplete?
Just as I was thinking about it, the camera turned into translucent light spots, flying away with the wind and disappearing in Bai Zhou's hand.
He raised his head and looked at the night sky. Amid the howling wind and the top of the crumbling world, the swaying points of light were lining up to move out of the crack. Bai Zhou felt the pulling force of the crack on him, just like Blue Star pulled the moon and the sun pulled Blue Star. The complete reality pulled the broken falsehood.
But Bai Zhou left in no hurry.
The saber held in the palm of his hand never stopped buzzing. The developing Spirit-Name Secret Treasure was like a half-grown boy who could never have enough to eat. Even the temperature from the handle of the knife was getting warmer, like a dog squatting beside the rice bowl, eagerly waiting for the meal.
Cut off the spirit, kill the spirit, and eat the spirit.
As the [mental] attribute quasi-Spirit-Name Secret Treasure, Bai Zhou's Red-White Horse Saber, like himself, does not have so many bells and whistles such as mind control, hypnosis and brainwashing.
Some are the most extreme and decisive in killing, and...
Greed.
Adventurer unique Greed.
This knife is up to the owner.
The entire Evening City world is a dream and "spirit".
This is a great supplement for Red-White Horse Saber and cannot be wasted easily.
If you come here and go back without a full meal, doesn't it appear that Evening City is not treating guests well?
Buffet opening, have a great time! Have a great time!
"Buzz buzz!!!"
The saber vibrated with excitement and turned into thousands of broken blades.
"Boo! Boo hoo hoo"
Like falcons that escaped from their cages, they flew rapidly in all directions.
Bai Zhou's thoughts are attached to it. There are hundreds of fragments, and there are hundreds of perspectives. Bai Zhou can hardly handle it, it is dazzling.
His vision passed over the place where thousands of broken blades were swimming, and his whole body seemed to be divided into thousands of parts, each of which traveled around every corner of the city.
"Buzz!"
The broken blade flew over the broken and messy Civic Square.
The bonfire of the social opera went out, and charcoal was everywhere. Broken bowls of porcelain, uneaten candied haws, and a lost cloth shoe were scattered on the ground. The costumes of the stilt team were draped on the stools, and the red-faced and white-faced masks lay empty on the ground...
They had turned into translucent shadows, and when the broken blade passed by, they seemed to be agitated lake surface, slowly disappearing in the ripples.
"Buzz! Buzz! Buzz!"
The broken blade flew past the street lamps on the street, the locust tree next to Feilu Road, and past the buildings standing on Evening City.
The world is crumbling, and everything is shaking. All buildings and plants are like reflections in the water, shaking unsteadily, sometimes tangible and sometimes invisible.
But when the broken blade passed over them, the invisible chaos seemed to be erased by an eraser, leaving only the empty ground.
As the pieces of broken blades swallowed up these spiritual entities, a strange, vaguely green light gradually attached to each piece of broken blade.
This power seems to come from the same source as the rotten green Monster and the pain Gray Fog that Bai Zhou saw before, or it is an important part of Evening City - and now, they are being swallowed by the saber.
Gloomy "pain" flickers on the broken blades, as if quenching poison for them, but extracting this kind of power often requires a large amount of spiritually transformed buildings. If we continue at this pace, Bai Zhou estimates that by the time Thousand Blades splits up, Evening City will "eat" and digest the entire building.
I am afraid that more than one-third of the saber blades will have this strange characteristic attached to them.
In fact, this would be a significant improvement.
Because they can naturally affect the enemy's emotions when wielding the sword, inflict pain, annoyance and other negative effects on the opponent, and awaken certain memories that the opponent does not want to think of -
Just like the gray light spots carried by the rotten green Monster and the Gray Fog released.
In Bai Zhou's understanding, isn't this just quenching the poison on the knife?
Temper the poison of extraordinary pain to Spirit-Name Secret Treasure.
I always feel that there is something wrong with a blade that is not quenched. Bai Zhou used to occasionally worry about this problem. Unfortunately, ordinary poison is not worthy of Extraordinary Weapon, let alone an accurate Spirit-Name Secret Treasure.
It's fine now.
When this sword is promoted to Spirit-Name Secret Treasure in the future, will its real name be called... the Sad Soul Sword?
But if based on what Bai Zhou has seen now, what Thousand Blades has experienced, and the scenes where Evening City's dreams have been shattered one after another, it seems that it would not be a bad idea to call it a powerful sword. "Buzz..."
But soon, Bai Zhou's expression became weird again.
The pain of Evening City seems to have imprinted the voice left by Monster.
When this poison occurs in the enemy's body, that person will not only feel severe pain and boundless troubles, but also hear some kind of Monster roaring recording loudly looping in his heart:
"Feel the pain! Feel the pain! Feel the pain! Feel the pain...
Bai Zhou had a weird expression and was shuddering at the same time.
Very evil.
Magic knife!
"Ta... ta-ta-ta!"
At this time, rapid and panicked footsteps sounded in my ears.
Bai Zhou looked up and saw an eleven or twelve year old child running out of the alley.
"Mom, Mom, where are you?" The child cried as he ran, stumbling and stumbling, with snot bubbles popping out of his nose. "I... will never sleep in again!"
The world is crumbling, and the children are frightened.
Then, he met Bai Zhou.
"Don't worry, no one will leave you."
Bai Zhou patted the young boy's head and said, "Your mother and everyone else went to participate in the social drama."
"When you look at it, isn't it right there?"
As he spoke, Bai Zhou raised his hand and pointed to the shining end of the sky.
The child looked towards the sky in the direction of Bai Zhou, and his eyes were in a daze without realizing it.
"You, big brother, who are you?"
He turned his head and looked up at Bai Zhou's face, his timid eyes filled with curiosity.
"Me?" Bai Zhou's eyes blinked twice.
He seemed to have answered the same question before.
But this time, Bai Zhou didn't say anything more "Evening City, Bai Zhou".
He looked at the turbulent Evening City, looked at the mess on the familiar Civic Square, looked at the nervous and curious eyes of the children, and suddenly and inexplicably remembered the Comic Strip he had read when he was a child, as well as those longing stories.
Then, Bai Zhou leaned over and squatted down, looked straight at the child in front of him, and said seriously:
"I'm just a Adventurer passing by Evening City."
As he said this, he patted the child in front of him on the shoulder and said, "Go and find your mother and the adults."
In the blink of an eye, as if he felt a call from the sky, the child's figure began to glow, turning into a translucent form and taking off into the sky. "Thank you, big brother Adventurer who was passing by!"
In the crisp gratitude, the last Evening City resident returned to the sky.
In other words, it is the penultimate one.
"Clatter..."
The Civic Square under the feet gradually shattered into nothingness in the distortion before long, but the queue in the sky was not over yet, and the buffet of Thousand Blades was still in progress.
While Bai Zhou controlled Thousand Blades, it flew through every corner of the city, while jumping up and down to the alley next door.
At this moment, in his perception...
The broken blade passed through the alley of Corner Street. There was a faded poster posted in the alley. The words "I will spend the long years with you" could not be read clearly for a long time. There was only a piece of white paper pasted on the wall, crumpled and swaying in the wind.
Broken Blade flew into Black Robe Youth Training Corps's classroom. The line "Tomorrow will be better" on the blackboard was flying like dragons and phoenixes. The kite drawn with chalk on the blackboard in the back seemed to have been originally drawn by Bai Zhou.
The broken blade cut across the school Sports Field. The bare flagpole had no flag hanging on it, the basketball stand was crooked, and there was a deflated basketball hanging on the basket, which swayed when the wind blew.
The broken blade flew over Uncle Xiang's Convenience Store, over Aunt Zhang's usual vegetable market, over Elder Liu's shoe repair stall...
Convenience Store The shelves are full of products to welcome customers to visit next time. The empty stalls in the vegetable market are waiting to be filled tomorrow. The neatly arranged shoe repair tools in the shoe repair stall are waiting for the owner to return.
Bai Zhou saw the tree he climbed when he was a child, with a broken kite still stuck on the branch; he saw the breakfast stall he passed by every day when he went to school, and he also saw the candy shop he always envied but didn't dare to enter.
Those familiar memories all flashed past Bai Zhou's eyes as the fragments passed through the city.
Memories came to my mind and became clearer.
Just like a movie played backwards, everything is the most familiar look from the past. Even a drop of water evaporating here may be a drop of tears shed by Bai Zhou back then.
"Goodbye, Evening City."
Bai Zhou says a final farewell to this city from the bottom of my heart.
In the past, Bai Zhou always missed Evening City every time he encountered difficulties, as if all problems could be solved as long as he returned to Evening City. In the past, Evening City was not that good, and his memories were full of beautiful and quiet filters.
But when he really returned to Evening City, he found that the trouble was more than he imagined. He really couldn't miss Evening City anymore, because he had lost this qualification... Fate gave him a chance to return to Evening City but he cut it off with his own hands, so from now on he could only stride forward heartlessly. This place only carries his past, but people always rush towards the future to find their new Homeland.
The boy has really missed this place all the time, but in fact this place no longer exists. It turns out that today's Tinghai has long become the new Evening City for him. He has built new bonds there and tried to bring his elders from the same hometown there.
Just like he was looking for spring with all his heart, when Ge Ran looked back, he realized that he had actually been sitting in the spring wind for a long time.
"The world I grew up in was indeed not fun at all."
Bai Zhou looked at the empty bluestone street in front of him and said softly:
"But please protect me, please protect me from screwing up."
"Buzz! Buzz buzz!"
A sudden abnormal warning from a broken blade made Bai Zhou frown and regain his senses.
His thoughts were focused on the broken blade, and he saw what happened to the broken blade.
The broken blade that was supposed to fly across the corner of the city suddenly stopped at this moment, stopping in front of a seemingly ordinary millstone.
Bai Zhou knows this place. There used to be a mill here a long time ago, and there is a story about it. That story always impresses Bai Zhou. Legend has it that Brave One once pulled out Village Entrance Sword in the Millstone and became Destined Miller.
But last I heard that he was kidnapped by Black Robe Enforcement Team because he took his subordinate Millstone Knights to monopolize Mill Business.
So the mill closed down and the houses were knocked down, leaving only this millstone standing here, weathering the wind and rain, like a famous tourist site.
The millstone is covered with mottled traces of time, making it look ordinary no matter how you look at it.
But, now...??
The world is crumbling, everything is becoming blurred, turning from tangible to intangible, and the chaotic state makes it easier for the Shattered Blade to swallow it.
Why isn't anything changing here?
In this mill ruins, not only the millstone in the middle, but also the ground near the millstone is as normal, which is in sharp contrast to the crumbling, distorted and blurred world around it, as if there is an invisible barrier covering it.
It's too ordinary, and it is undoubtedly the biggest abnormality at this time!
even
"Buzz buzz..."
Bai Zhou heard the buzzing of the broken blade, and he sensed... sensed some kind of instinctive fear coming from an accurate Spirit-Name Secret Treasure. Great terror!
Absolute horror!
But, how could this be?
Isn't this the gathering place of everyone's spirits at Evening City? Is it the product of everyone's dreams put together?
Everything is obviously false, so how could there be something here... something so terrifying that even Spirit-Name Secret Treasure would be frightened?
Does this exist in everyone's spiritual world, or does this kind of anomaly exist in the real Evening City?
Just as he was thinking about it, Bai Zhou carefully observed it for a while, and the invisible barrier seemed to have disappeared.
The mill where the millstone is located begins to look like the surroundings, like a disturbed projection, distorting, blurring, and gradually returning to nothingness.
The millstone also began to disintegrate on its own. The stone millstone peeled off layer by layer like a dragon fruit being pulled apart, revealing something hidden inside the millstone...
A head.
In other words, a skull, but closer to some extremely delicate Art Piece.
1 Crystal Skull!
Its entire body is crystal clear, as if it were carved from crystal, and its craftsmanship is so exquisite that it definitely doesn't look like a creation that should exist in the human world.
When the light passes through its surroundings, it forms a faint flowing halo around it, which is beautiful, exquisite and at the same time gives people a noble and aloof feeling.
It's as if... if it wasn't an alien craft, it should be an ancient skull left by a god!
Somehow, when Bai Zhou saw it for the first time, he felt vigilance and horror in his heart, and at the same time, he subconsciously and inexplicably had a rather strange feeling of intimacy.
At this moment, the skull is floating quietly in the air, with empty eye sockets, as if it is looking at Bai Zhou.
It's like...
There is some vague and mysterious connection between this skull and him. It has always been here, waiting to be discovered by him?
The next moment
"Boom!!!"
Bai Zhou, who was half a city away, felt like something suddenly exploded deep in his brain!
It seemed as if countless and weighty information flooded into his mind, and Bai Zhou's body shook violently. Blood flowed from his nose, the corners of his eyes became moist, and bright red blood flowed from his mouth, nose and ears.
In a daze, Bai Zhou saw...
He saw "himself" sitting on the tall Throne made of ice, with countless crystal-like Undead skeletons kneeling and guarding under the Throne.
Then, he held Crystal Skull in both hands and slowly put the skulls on his head one by one like a crown!!
The grand sound shook the heart more than thunder, and rumbled in Bai Zhou's ears.
It says:
"You come"
"Put it on me!"
"Put me on and go contain that damn...[Brain in a Vat]!"
Then, there was a bang
The light and shadow shattered, and all the fragments of the picture and the torrent of information condensed, turning into a string of coordinates in the depths of Bai Zhou's mind. The coordinates were alive and dynamic, and the numbers were beating every moment, which seemed to indicate that the coordinates were moving.
Then.
"Buzz..."
The skull hanging in mid-air disappeared from sight. Like the fragments peeled off from the millstone, like all the objects around it, it was gradually digested in distortion and returned to the original blank state.
Then, Bai Zhou had some kind of enlightenment in his heart.
This strange and terrifying Crystal Skull is probably the same as Uncle Xiang's grocery store and Elder Liu's shoe repair stall. What appears here is just a projection. The real skull has been hidden in Evening City, hidden under the ruins of Evening City!
However, just a projection can make quasi-Spirit-Name Secret Treasure instinctively awe and timid;...
Evening City, how many years have you hidden this Ghostly Things?
Where did it come from?
"Coordinates...?"
Bai Zhou senses the dynamic coordinates deep in the mind that are always changing in real time.
In just this moment, the coordinate numbers changed from (1988, 5924, 5378)
It became (1977,2818, 2875).
At this moment, he couldn't help but think of the question and answer he had with Major Luo when he had just passed the test of [F-1120, Legacy of Blood Thirst]: [Evening City, has it really been completely destroyed?]
[Even if you go back there, you won't find anything familiar.]
[Evening City is already in ruins, and its coordinates are in chaos. In the absence of a new anchor point, we cannot locate its location.] Regarding this issue, Bai Zhou later asked Crow.
The ruins of Evening City are dynamic and constantly flowing on the edge of the Reflection Ruins Realm, making them difficult to capture and locate.
In fact, this is also the reason why Tinghai Authorities needed Evening City to repeatedly position 138 times.
After becoming ruins, Evening City's "movements" became more frequent. To the Reflection Ruins Realm, these ruins were like a little water vapor flowing between the circulation of heaven and earth.
Therefore, Bai Zhou has long given up the idea of looking for the ruins of Evening City in the short term.
Until now
A series of extremely clear dynamic coordinates were imprinted on his mind!
There are the ruins of Evening City.
I'm afraid that's also where the skull is buried!
There is a high probability that he is not really hiding inside the millstone, but it may be somewhere deep under the mill where the mill is located!
Bai Zhou can feel that Crystal Skull is longing for it.
Eager to be discovered.
Also longing for a brain.
It's longing... longing to shelter the so-called [Brain in a Vat]!
"Brain in a Vat... what?"
Bai Zhou's heart moved.
Almost instinctively, he felt that this word was similar to "Daydream".
Could it be related to the disappearance of Major Luo?
Bai Zhou's heart beat faster. He vaguely felt that the harvest from this exploration of the dream Evening City might have far exceeded his imagination. He was thinking about it.
"Rumble, rumble..."
Thousand Blades's devouring of the world is coming to an end, and the queue at the end of the night sky is almost over. There are only a few light spots twinkling like stars in the dome. The earthquake on the ground is getting stronger and stronger, and the world is flickering in distortion, like a film and television program with poor signal.
Evening City will fall.
It's time to go.
Bai Zhou stands at the end of the corner alley, with Bluestone Pavement crisscrossing in front of him and behind him.
In this familiar corner alley, there is a blue rabbit statue squatting at the street entrance, which looks like a melancholy human figure. It is curled up there, with one hand raising its empty finger in front of it, which looks a bit weird in the night.
But Bai Zhou is very familiar with it, because whenever Bai Zhou felt wronged as a child, he would go to it for a hug.
The blue paint has long been mottled and faded. In the past, the height of its raised fingers was always the same as Bai Zhou's head, as if saying that the next Protagonist is you.
But now, the little hand raised by the big rabbit couldn't even hold the boy's hand.
The boy has really grown up.
Dolls on the street, painted ducks on the wall, faded posters, and the vague outline of a big wheel, a waist twister and a seesaw in the distance...Bai Zhou stood at the end of the long bluestone street, looking at the quiet everything that was the same as in the past, and it felt like going back to the past in a trance.
But there is no one here anymore.
Obviously the appearance is still the same, but the feeling brought to me by the little duck, rabbit and seesaw is far different from before. Even the wall that was high back then seems pitifully short now.
... Nevertheless, Bai Zhou is still grateful for the half-day reception.
Whether it is a glorious savior hero or a trapped beast in a desperate situation, everyone should return to their hometown to rest for a while.
After returning to Evening City, although it only lasted half a day, Bai Zhou, who had been in a hurry, found a rare moment of peace in his impatient mind. The previous confusion and anxiety about Major Luo seemed to have found half of the answer here.
It's time to set off again.
Return to Tinghai.
Take everyone home.
"Buzz"
The cracks in the sky spread, from the sky to the earth, swallowing the world, and also moving towards Bai Zhou.
Across the vast darkness, Bai Zhou vaguely saw the dilapidated hospital, and vaguely seemed to understand why Dr. Zhang said that before. But these were all within Bai Zhou's expectations.
"Crack" sound.
Like an egg breaking its shell.
The false world has come to an end.
Before being overwhelmed by the real darkness, Bai Zhou looked back for the last time and glanced at the trembling bluestone long street behind him.
Bai Zhou knows that after this farewell, we will never see the complete Evening City, the complete corner alley again.
For some reason, after thinking about this, Bai Zhou's eyes Deity brightened up, and his temperament became vaguely clearer and purer, as if he had invisibly broken free from some shackles of the past.
"..."
Even the spirituality in his body seemed to be more active.
When a Adventurer is determined to start again and head towards a better future - it is the moment when they usher in growth and transformation. "Evening City, goodbye!"
Bai Zhou recited in his heart, his mood was indescribable, not heavy, but definitely not happy either.
Rather than saying goodbye to Evening City, it is better to say goodbye to the past.
Let the past sink into the dark night, and the longing for the past finally breaks through at this moment. Tomorrow will always come, and he will write the prologue with his own hand.
"Wow"
The darkness swallows everything, the sound is loud, and everything becomes invisible.
Bai Zhou, who was swallowed by the darkness, his last movement was suddenly frozen in the moment when he waved his hand behind him without looking back.
I would like to bid farewell to his childhood, which was an unforgettable time with minor hardships.
His waving movements are extremely handsome, and he has the familiar look of a real man who doesn't look at the explosion.
However, Bai Zhou knows that time never stops, and he should be satisfied to be able to temporarily stop in the gentle past.
Please continue your life without Perfect
Adventurer.