Leaving the city

The next day, at noon.

Smack!

Feeling the pain in his backside, Lu Li slowly opened his eyes.

A Piao was sitting on top of him. "Still not getting up? The sun's already shining on your butt!"

Still groggy, Lu Li nodded off for a moment before asking, "Where are we going today?"

"Out of the city."

"Huh?" Lu Li looked baffled. "What for?"

"I thought it over carefully last night. The tokens and Pass the Magistrate of Jinzhou gave us were probably meant to guide us out of the city."

A Piao hadn't slept very well last night. After all, they were strangers in an unfamiliar place, and she wasn't as carefree as Lu Li.

Besides the Pass, there were also those tokens.

Mangosteen wasn't a fruit native to Jinzhou. Perhaps they would need to investigate somewhere like the port.

As for the Leaf, Bai Zhi had said at the Research Institute yesterday that it bore traces of Remnant frequency fluctuations, so they would have to leave the city to investigate that too.

"Like how they led us to the Frontier yesterday?"

A Piao nodded.

Lu Li gave an awkward smile. "How about I sit this one out... I'm not the person the Magistrate of Jinzhou is looking for, anyway."

"Huh?!" At his words, A Piao pressed her full weight down on Lu Li.

"Ow-fine, I'll go! Happy now?"

A Piao snorted and climbed off Lu Li.

"That's more like it. Hurry up and get ready. Didn't Chixia say she'd treat us to a meal?"

Panhua Restaurant.

"Over here!"

A short distance away, Chixia waved to Lu Li and A Piao.

"Chixia, Yangyang! It's only been a few hours, but I've missed you so much!" Lu Li took their hands and spoke with deep affection.

Chixia laughed. "Don't be so dramatic. Come on, sit down."

Once they had ordered, Chixia asked, "Any plans for today?"

"Oh, right. Yesterday, you said you'd figured out the Sugar Ball and the Sundial. So that just leaves the strange Leaf and the perfectly ordinary mangosteen?"

"Who would've thought a quick stop at the Research Institute would solve two of them? Is A Piao just that smart, or did the Magistrate really not mean to make things difficult?"

"We're planning to leave the city and investigate the clues," A Piao said.

"Leave the city?" Chixia looked at Lu Li. "Are you going too?"

If Lu Li stayed in Jinzhou, she had been hoping to take him along on patrol.

"Chixia, I'm being forced!" Lu Li said, looking utterly defeated.

He had originally wanted to explore Jinzhou today and learn about the local customs so he could put his grand money-making plan into motion.

Chixia laughed. "Well, in that case, I can't come along. I don't want to be late for duty. You two had better take good care of A Piao. She's an honored guest of Jinzhou now."

Lu Li smacked his lips. "Haven't you got that backward? You should be protecting me. I'm just an ordinary civilian who couldn't even hurt a fly!"

Yangyang chuckled softly. "You may not be the person the Magistrate is looking for, but judging by what you did yesterday, you're anything but ordinary."

Lu Li looked thoroughly forlorn. "Perhaps this is what they mean by the capable having to do more."

Chixia teased him. "Honestly, one little compliment and it goes straight to your head."

Yangyang looked at A Piao. "As for the mangosteen... it isn't native to Jinzhou, so it should have been shipped into Jinzhou City through the port. Perhaps we should start by tracing its source?"

"And for the Leaf, Bai Zhi said yesterday that it bore traces of Remnant frequency fluctuations. The tree it grew on should be somewhere near a Tacet Field. We could look there first."

"A Tacet Field?" Lu Li asked. "You mean the place where that Crownless was yesterday?"

Yangyang nodded. "That's the Tacet Field closest to Jinzhou City, but not every Remnant that forms in a Tacet Field is a Crownless."

Lu Li suddenly raised his hand. "I have a question!"

Everyone turned to look at him.

"Do Remnants kill each other?"

Yangyang nodded. "Of course. Remnants devour one another to grow stronger, and some fight over territory."

"I see."

From the sound of it, he could use this trip out of the city to train the Rocksteady Guardian and see whether there were any other Remnants he could absorb along the way.

System, can I absorb other Remnants if the Rocksteady Guardian defeats them?

[Ding! Of course... not!]

[After your Echo defeats another Remnant, your Echo will devour it to strengthen itself. You can only absorb Remnants you defeat personally.]

So that's how it works... Looks like I'll still have to steal the kills. I wonder if Comrade's Hammer can take them out with one shot each. I can give it a try once we're out of the city...

Yangyang looked at A Piao. "It seems you already had a plan. Do you think the remaining tokens must be guiding us out of the city?"

"Actually, besides the two tokens and the Pass, I also have a memory from before you woke me."

"I remember being in the Star Sea. I saw a black-haired girl, and she said some things to me that made no sense."

"Then I saw myself hanging upside down over the Skysea. The sound string on the back of my hand fell onto a stretch of land. It seemed to be the place where I woke up."

Yangyang looked thoughtful. "The Star Sea... a black-haired girl... hanging upside down over the Skysea... a sound string emerging from the Tacet Mark on the back of your hand..."

"The closest places in that direction are Yunling Valley and the Norfall Barrens. You've never mentioned any of this before, A Piao."

"I thought it was only a dream," A Piao explained.

But after everything she had experienced yesterday, she had suddenly remembered it.

"The Skysea and sound strings do exist. And from your description, A Piao, the land where the sound string fell was indeed Yunling Valley and the Norfall Barrens."

"Perhaps... it wasn't a dream."

"Perhaps finding that girl is the key to recovering A Piao's memories. Setting aside the information the Magistrate of Jinzhou provided, one of the places your dream points to is the Norfall Barrens."

"It was the battlefield of the Threnodian War, the birthplace of the Tacet Discord tide, and it's also where the Midnight Rangers' frontline base is located."

"We're going to a battlefield?" Lu Li asked hesitantly.

Noticing Lu Li's concern, A Piao draped an arm around his shoulders and said breezily, "Don't worry. I'll protect you."

"If we're heading to the front line, I think I might need to buy a weapon," Lu Li said. "I do have a special gun, but it isn't very reliable."

Comrade's Hammer needed frequent reloading, making it very unreliable.

Sending his Echo out to fight was an option, but if he really did get into a fight, his own safety still had to come first. After all, he wasn't some superhuman rookie Trainer.

Although this trip out of the city was only meant to uncover clues, all their current leads pointed toward the frontline base in the Norfall Barrens.

Lu Li didn't believe the Magistrate was sending A Piao to the front line for fun. He had a feeling there would be fighting ahead, perhaps even a war.

He had been born in a beautiful, safe country in his previous life, but he still understood the cruelty of war, let alone in a world where Remnants appeared so frequently.

"For weapons... we could go to the Fabrication Station. Uncle Wei sells some there."

A Piao nodded. "Let's go together. Once we've bought a weapon, we'll head out of the city."