Divine Flame Crystal

Chapter 649: Unlocking the Innovation of the Different World Continent

During the third drum corps rally, Wen Qi suddenly leaped out from behind the lantern stand, clutching an old iron hook. "If you ban the lanterns, I'll ban your hooks!" He finally showed his resolve, hooking it so crookedly that it just deflected the dart by an inch. The chain snarled in the weeds, tying himself up. Wen Qi turned and grinned at Ilio. "What do you call that?"

Elio's imagination suddenly became excited: "Pull the dog leash."

Celine covered her forehead and said, "... Never mind, let's just call it this."

Carlon Wooden Leg "Ding": "Next time, bid first and then tighten."

The wind was rounded by the water, the drums were caught in the seams of the piles, and the submersible lights pressed the paddles down. After the third round, the sound waves of the wind and drum team only stirred up the weeds on the shore, and the small circle of the ferry center was as stable as a marble tabletop.

"Retreat." Atlantis quickly calculated the cost and decisively withdrew. He silently memorized in his mind: "Water Law" - hateful.

During the post-battle investigation, the white ash scales suddenly jumped. The scales leaned neither toward wish nor toward sin, like a spring that had been pricked and then released. Valerian looked toward the rear of the column. Ali, the salt vendor, was shuffling back, his eyes evasive.

"name?"

"Ari."

"I wish my sins have been recorded, so what should I do now?"

Ali gritted his teeth and pulled out a piece of oil-paper from his pocket. "...This is the flag-carrying route they gave me. They said that as long as I secretly mark the location of 'Water Returns to the Well', then... I will be able to pass."

The Libra star suddenly fell towards the sin side, almost touching the scale ring.

Reinhardt took a step forward, veins bulging on the back of his hand. Ilio instinctively tightened his grip on the wheel. Cyrus's eyes were like a sword about to be unsheathed.

"Delay the burning." Valerian raised his scepter. "Ask for a wish first."

Ali's tears fell. "I'm willing to change! I'm willing to take this itinerary to the gate of their camp and burn it in public! I'm willing to protect two people over the tide—no, two isn't enough, I need four!"

The white ash scale trembled on the side of the sin, but still sank.

"A vow of redemption is not enough." Valerian looked at him. "If you burn now, the fire will backfire—not on you, but on our path. Delay the burning: guard the four for three days, sing for three nights, and then re-judge. If you show even the slightest intention of moving the lamp within three days, you will be burned immediately; if you hold on, the scales will be restored and the judgment will be repeated."

Ah Li knelt beside the well and placed the oil paper under the empty chalice. "I will protect you, I will sing, I... I will sing out my fear, and let the water in the well bear my sins!"

Mara placed her hand over the rim of the cup and whispered, "We'll wait for you by the well."

At that moment, Ilio understood that “delayed burning” was not just talk: it meant to hold the fire in the bones, and wait until the right moment came before burning what needed to be burned.

At night, the submersible lights shone like four steady stars in the water. Wen Qi sat by the stake, pulling the weeds from the top of the lampshade every quarter of an hour, muttering, "The lamp is not tired, the lamp is not tired..." Ilio counted the beats with him, Celine occasionally tapped the stake with the flat of her knife to give a subtle tap, Carlon's wooden leg gave a pat on the head, and Mara sang "The Recital" to the children's noses:

"In—willing—guard—"

The tide sounded just right: "Be—willing—keep—retreat."

On the morning of the second day after the low-tide crossing, the wooden sign prohibiting lights was removed, and two small words unexpectedly appeared on the back: "Fear of pain." It was the unfinished confession of the sign's author. Mara was silent for a moment, then copied the two words into the album: "Those who fear pain are prone to moving lights; give them a place to light and teach them to keep watch."

The ferry is back, the route is restored, the white stone is carved deep, and the water is peaceful. Cyrus puts away the "not too bright but very stable" flag: "**The road is back."

Ilio drew the location of "Water Returning to the Well" on the town map, and next to it, he wrote: "The wind stirs the air, but the water remains stable." Wen Qi, though he knew few words, did learn the three characters "在, 願, 守" (to be in, to wish, to keep). He went home and scratched on the door lintel, creating three crooked strokes. His wife looked at it and laughed, "What do you mean by that?" Wen Qi replied seriously, "It means order."

A cold wind from the Seven Fingers Wilds, carrying the scent of salt, seeped into the tent. Rantis turned the drum skin over and stretched it again, whispering to his commander, "They've tied the song to the well and the water; turning off the lights didn't work, moving the white stone didn't work, the wind drum was submerged."

Xingluo didn't sit down. He half leaned beside Xiaohei, tapping the silver bell with his fingers: one, two, three, four.

"Make the wind stronger," he said, "and make them deaf."

Atlantis was stunned: "...so big that even water can be disturbed?"

"I'm not blowing water." Xingluo looked at the river, "I'm blowing people—blowing so hard that he can't hear himself."

That afternoon, a curtain wind formation was erected at the southeastern entrance of Qizhiye: dozens of silver curtains, folding like fans, took advantage of the terrain. Magicians used wind patterns to connect the curtains, forming the body. The drummers stopped beating drums and instead played the wind. The wind did not hit directly, but instead swung, narrowed, and rushed—specifically blowing into the ear canals.

The first gust of wind brought no pain to those who crossed the river, but confusion: not in their steps, but in their hearts and ears. Children covered their ears, the elderly squinted their eyes, and the chorus's alto voice rose and fell.

"It's wind deafness." Valerian frowned. "It's not broken eardrums, it's broken ears."

"Change your senses," Mara said beforehand. "Don't rely on your ears, rely on—"

"Bones," Cyrus echoed her.

Bone-to-bone slapping. Everyone in the inner ring presses their fingers against the junction of their sternum and skull, using the micro-vibration of the bone lamp to strike the slap directly against their bones. In the outer ring, the hilts of their knives lightly touch the acromion, and ten people form a line, connecting their shoulders with the hilts, and the slap is passed from shoulder to shoulder.

"Children, don't you know?" Carolan picked up the two babies and put their backs together, so that their backs were touching.

"Wen Qi doesn't know how to do it?" Ilio tied a rope to Wen Qi and the light stand, and then wrapped the rope around his shoulders, chest, and ribs. He tightened and loosened the rope to shoot. Wen Qi laughed: "What do you call this?"

Celine thought for a moment and said, "Call her Shuanpai."

This is a group of people with innovative spirit. It seems that the blockade of the gods has been cracked after the Starfall destroyed the Demigod Bloodline Legion.

The second gust of the curtain wind came, disturbing the ear canal but stabilizing the bone canal. The outer ring's "shoulder pat" moved the chorus into the skeleton, and the wind deafness only blew over the ear skin, not into the bone.

"The third gust of wind will circle around my feet." Atlantis pinched his fingers.

"Lift up the road," Cyrus whispered.

Hubert immediately ordered his men to raise the white stone and the pan well by half a finger, and put linen cloth on the wooden stakes as a buffer. The beating went from the bones to the shoulders, from the shoulders to the feet, then from the feet to the cloth, and then to the well - as if adding a kind of shock absorber to the "beat".

Xingluo saw from afar that Du Xinren put the hilt of his knife against his shoulder, tied a paddle with a rope on his back, and put a cloth under his feet. He couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief: "This continent is not without the power of innovation."

The adjutant asked, "Should we increase the output of the wind element?"

"No." Xingluo hung the bell back on Xiao Hei's head. "You can't keep blowing it." He gently touched Xiao Hei's head, as if comforting a sensitive child. "But the deafness will remain in the heart. The next step is to beat them."

They robbed people of their money (salt, flour, and lamps) along the way, buried fake stones under white stones (which were hollow and would change shape when stepped on), set up a candy stall in front of the children's singing house (to make children buy candy and sing crookedly), and lured ferrymen to steal lamp oil with high prices (to leave the lamp space empty).

The adjutant was stunned: "This... looks like something from the market..."

"Order against order." Xingluo said, "It's not gods fighting gods, it's people fighting people. Remember, we are all human, and sometimes human methods are enough."

Three days later, two of Varn's gray seals were lost: one for a lamp and one for salt. The thief didn't get more than ten miles before being pulled out from the crowd by Celine using the "well-returning step."

"name?"

"Don't ask, just beat him." someone else shouted.

"Name?" Celine insisted, tapping his shoulder lightly with the flat of her knife.

"...Liao San."

"willing?"

"I don't want to starve to death."

"crime?"

"greedy."

The white ash scale tilted steadily. Celine did not kill immediately, but turned the blade back and gave the sentence of "late burning".

"Make up your vow: Protect the oil for three nights, and protect the salt for three days. If you cannot protect it, you will be burned immediately; if you can protect it, you will die slowly."

Liao San knelt down. Others were dissatisfied: "This kind of thief——"

Carlon wooden leg "du": "The seal needs people to guard it, and people need to be managed by the seal." He put "thief" before "people", and the meaning was clear: arrest the people first.

There were even more tricks at the Children's Singing House. A candy stall was set up, filled with candy drawings, and the children were fascinated. Mara closed her stall, but instead of throwing away the candy, she distributed it to the children: if they sang a line correctly, they got one; if they sang incorrectly, they still got the candy, but it came out later. The children soon discovered that to get candy, they didn't cry, but kept the beat.

Elio grinned like a squirrel. "Sew greed into the law."

Valerian nodded. "Man-Song-Blood-Bone-Law, plus one more: 'Chapter.' A chapter is not a rigid rule, but a rope to hold a heart that wants to escape."