Sound Curtain City in the Real Sound State is the third largest city in the Northern Continent. Viewed from a high altitude, this giant city looks like a regular square, with roads dividing the city into orderly parts. The headquarters of the Kalash family that Gongsun Ce and Qiluo went to was naturally located in the most developed center, while the other three members were lingering in the "lower right corner" near the airport.
Servais took a cone and was licking it mentally. The eldest lady couldn't help but remind her: "Miss Servais, isn't it too cool today..."
"Huh? Is there any?"
The female ranger's usual white magic-modified military uniform is already very revealing, and today's new outfit is even better. She wears sandals and sports shorts, and only wears a red and blue striped bikini and a small jacket on her upper body. , received a lot of attention and gifts from male passers-by along the way.
As he spoke, a drop of melted ice cream dripped from the edge of the cone and landed right next to the white ravine. Servais was about to reach out and wipe it, but Qin Qianbai quickly handed her a tissue. The female ranger wiped it nonchalantly and ate half of the cone in one bite: "This place is too depressing. If you don't wear any more clothes, I will be blown away by the air here." Suffocate to death.”
"Exhibitionists are exhibitionists, don't make excuses for your sexual fetishes." Rei Shigure rolled his eyes, "Is the Uzhong Art City still repressive?"
"Ah~ you guys really just came today?" Servais looked weird, "You can just sing a song and you'll know. Who wants to give it a try?"
The girls exchanged a look, and Qin Qianbai volunteered to take over the task of trying. She cleared her throat and sang an episode from an old cartoon: "The heart that chases tomorrow's love leaves a fiery trail.
Spread love and laughter to every corner..."
puff! puff!
Before the real sound phenomenon officially appeared, several muffled sounds like balloon deflation rang out all around. All the projection screens projected above the street suddenly changed, and the various colorful images faded away, replaced by orange triangle signs indicating warnings. Immediately afterwards, several gray prosthetic mechas fell from the sky, aiming their trumpet-shaped instruments at the surprised Qin Qianbai. A nervous female voice came from the leading mecha: "We are the Sound City Police Force. The system has detected unauthorized singing. To avoid misunderstanding, please show your personal audio-visual license!"
Dawn Knight was the first to step forward and explain: "I'm sorry for causing trouble. We are tourists who just arrived today."
The prosthetic policemen who were facing a formidable enemy suddenly relaxed a lot. The female captain spoke with a tone of blame: "How did you enter the city through what channel? Didn't you see the safety regulations?"
Rei Shigure frowned: "Huh? Your airport is full of luxury stores and video stores, and the screens are full of advertisements. Where are the precautions?"
"Those damn capitalists are messing with the broadcast schedule." The female captain cursed in a low voice, "Be careful, you all know the topography here, right? It is easy for laymen to sing at will, causing safety hazards, so be careful not to violate the rules. The next time you commit the crime again, you will be fined. If you do it more than three times, you will be jailed. For your own sake, don’t make any noise."
The cybernetic policemen left in annoyance, and the Dawn Knight deduced from their reactions that this was a common occurrence. Qin Qianbai was deeply shocked, held it in for a while and said, "Wow..."
"You see, without a permit you don't even have the freedom to speak out!" Servais said viciously, "I was fined 300 kilograms yesterday. The reason for the fine was 'causing excessive noise in public places' , Damn it, I’ll fine you every time I catch a robber and shoot him!”
"Can this place still have an artistic atmosphere?" Rei Shigure felt strange.
"I checked the local reports in the past three months and found that the singing accident rate in the Sound City suddenly increased about two months ago. Before this, the Sound City was not under martial law. This should be a measure taken by the local government to protect the safety of residents. emergency measures." Dawn Knight explained, "Miss Shigure raised a good question, how do local artists practice songs?"
"If your home is strong enough to have a protective force field, then you can close the door and sing freely at home. Otherwise, you can pay a high price to rent a special practice room and pay by the hour." Servais finished the ice cream in two or three mouthfuls and took the lead to walk away. , "There are more civilian options, come with me."
Servais got on the bus and took a group of people to the bustling area of the city. Alandia noticed that she did not look at the map when choosing the route, and she was obviously very familiar with the city's topography.
"Miss Servais, do you often come to Sound Curtain City?"
"No, the last time I came here was a few years ago." The ranger scratched his chin, very unsure, "I traveled here in the past two days to pick up a few errands, so I naturally took note of the terrain. "
"You have a pretty good memory..." Rei Shigure looked sideways. The female ranger looked proud: "That's right. Without this ability, I'm not a benchmark in the industry!"
Servais said it easily, but Rei Shigure knew how difficult it was. The size of Sound Curtain City is no less than that of the kingdom's capital, Superbia. Even though she was extremely intelligent as a manifestation magician, she could only clearly remember the topography of the inner city and a few places she often visited during missions when she was a hunter. When we arrive in unfamiliar suburbs and residential areas, we are still blinded.
Servais doesn't spend much more time in Sound Curtain City than they do. In this little time, can a ranger clearly memorize the topography of this city? Even by the standards of the elites of the Impermanence Association, this memory is really ridiculously good, not as good as someone who often forgets things.
Rei Shigure thought of the other party's strange "immortal" state and Jago's instructions, and decided not to say anything that would irritate the other party. A group of people took the bus with the ranger for about 20 minutes and arrived in front of a large building that looked like a gymnasium. Many young people carrying musical instruments gathered around the main entrance of the building. Most of them looked depressed. An angry girl shouted loudly at the door: "I made a reservation a month in advance, why are you not letting me in!!"
The gatekeeper is a middle-aged man with a big belly, with a look of impatience on his face: "Starting from last week, the Sound Screen City has implemented new regulations. Without a professional certificate of level 4 or above, you cannot enter public practice venues. Your license level is not enough, take the exam. .”
"The registration fee for one test is 6,000 kilograms, and I will test you X*&%!" The girl yelled in anger. The middle-aged man squinted and reminded: "Control the volume. If you speak louder, you will be fined."
"If you don't let me go, I won't let you go. At worst, I'll go to the church to practice!"
The girl lowered her voice in frustration and angrily led the band members away. Servais was amazed and said to them: "Here, the current situation of Sound Curtain City. If you have a certificate and want to perform, you have to make a reservation. The low-level certificate is useless. The higher the level of the exam, the more fees you have to pay. The exam is very difficult. .”
"Where is the church?" Qin Qianbai asked.
"The church does have a safe and cheap protective force field. The problem is that the church doesn't have that much free space and funds for enthusiasts to study art, so if you want to go to the church, you can only wait in line..."
Qin Qianbai looked along Servais's fingertips and saw a long queue coming around the corner of the next intersection. The girl and her companions were at the end of the queue. The roadside projection screen displayed vivid propaganda images, but there was no sound.
"Another thriving local art is pantomime." The ranger said coldly.
Qin Qianbai looked at this colorful metropolis and the silent people in it, and felt that his vision was covered with a heavy and gloomy gray. The depressing atmosphere was like the sky before a rainy day. People on the ground could not interfere in any way and had no choice but to let it bring bad mood to everyone.
·
Jin Kalash brought Gongsun Ce to his private office. Before entering, a female staff member just walked away with her back to them. Her long wavy hair looked familiar to Gongsun Ce.
Gongsun Ce entered the office, sat down on the leather chair, and said first, "Mr. Jin, I don't quite understand what you are talking about."
Jin seemed to find it very interesting: "Mr. Gongsun, in the eyes of others like us, the purpose of your trip is astonishingly clear. You have never concealed your purpose from the beginning. What else is there to hide now?"
The hint of something in Jin's words made Gongsun Ce a little confused. He thought that the old man's expression was close to saying "I know you know the big secret", but the problem was that he really didn't know the inside story. It would be hard for him to tell others that in fact, three of the five people on our boat were coming to Hezhong for the first time. I even read the history of Hezhong on the first night of your visit, and I didn’t know anything about it. If you really want to say that, then the failure of the negotiation is a small matter, and not getting more information is a big problem.
Therefore, Gongsun Ce remained calm and composed, and only put on a mysterious smile: "I would like to hear Mr. Jin's opinion."
"I don't mind being an honest man for once." Jin propped up his chin with both hands, and looked at the expression on Gongsun Ce's face with shrewd old eyes under his glasses, "Your first stop is the Xuanci State, where you will go straight to the place as soon as you land. You found her; you followed her closely until the second 'accidental encounter' in the Wood Machine State; and then in the Blade Rain State, the third encounter allowed you to fight side by side and establish friendship; when the mysterious figure disappeared The rangers came to the Real Sound State, and your spaceship immediately arrived at the Sound Curtain City - the plan to investigate Gaius is just a cover on the surface, isn't your real purpose just to confront this man hidden in the dark side of history? Are you in contact with the Immortal, Mr. Gongsun?”
"Oh..." Gongsun Ce smiled enigmatically, feeling even more ridiculous in his heart.
Jin's suspicion was reasonable, but only the crew knew that there was no plan at all for the Daystar's voyage: their destination was all chosen by the two idiot women in Cangdu. There is no big bullshit big secret or big plan here. It was simply a headless fly flying around and happened to draw the treasure map. If Jago hadn’t explained last time that they couldn’t even detect Servais’s peculiarity, it would have been a coincidence. I've only encountered it many times...
……accidental?
wrong! Gongsun Ce suddenly woke up. How could it be an accident? The Northern Continent is an extremely vast land, and the distance between the Gorgeous Magnetic State and the Blade Rain State is enough to fill up a half island. Even if Servais was on a pilgrimage like them, they shouldn't have met so many times in a short period of time.
There was nothing wrong with Jin's statement. Putting aside the treatment time of driving and changing the route to the Cold Steel State specifically for the peace talks, they were just traveling in pursuit of the ranger Servais. The Morning Star even encountered an unsolicited visit from Servais on the first day they arrived in Hezhong, but before today they didn't notice any sense of inconsistency... No one raised any doubts!
The more Gongsun Ce thought about it, the more he felt chilly in his heart, not only because he discovered the "obstacle" in his mind, but also because this method of disrupting audio and video was so familiar that it made people panic. The thought in his heart only lasted for a moment. In reality, Gongsun Ce just said a meaningful "Oh". He slightly restrained his smile and said seriously: "I didn't expect you couldn't 'discover' her... I thought the Kalash family It will be very advantageous in this regard.”
A hint of joy flashed in Jin's eyes, and Gongsun Ce did not ignore this detail.
"The power of the totem is too far away from that of the Monarch Dragon. We will never be able to catch up with the eyes of the Nether Dragon. But as you can imagine, we relied on the sound to leave a little more information... which can only be interpreted by the family. Information." Jin Zhengse said, "I think you need this information, and accordingly I want to know her hiding mechanism, or other secrets you know."
It was obvious that Jin thought he was able to track Servais thanks to the Eyes of the Netherworld. It was no secret that Zero Island had rescued the Hidden Gods in advance.
Gongsun Ce was thinking about a response plan when he suddenly frowned. He knocked on the table hard and said coldly: "It seems that your family is not sincere to us."
·
A few minutes ago, Bei Continent Real Sound Media Company, 45th floor.
If it weren't for the regular flashing signs on the corridor wall, Qiluo would have thought she was in the green space outside the building. The entire floor is covered with fine green plants, and the air is as fresh as the forest after the rain in the Living Mountain State. As far as the eye can see, there are only rare and rare grasses and bright flowers. Ariel led her to sit down at the pavilion in the middle of the garden. Qiluo found that the tables, chairs and teacups here all had a familiar texture.
"What exquisite wood furniture."
"I like the natural and fresh smell of wooden instruments. Whenever the Dadalion family launches a new product, they will send me a set."
Ariel sat down on a high stool. Her figure was already slender. The high stool made Qiluo raise her eyes slightly. The purple-haired female star blinked her eyes as she spoke, and her long eyelashes trembled slightly, making her eyes even more stunning. Qiluo still has some small feelings of comparison, and she can't help but feel a little frustrated when she sees this. She is indeed a female star from a big family, and she can win people's hearts in the blink of an eye.
"Sorry, I forgot that you were from the Sky City. Maybe you prefer a bar or a dance hall? There are similar facilities on the 34th floor."
Ariel's words awakened her from worrying about gains and losses, and Qiluo quickly shook her head: "No, no, this place is very good! I was thinking that I should bring a CD so that I can get your autograph."
"You are so funny." Ariel smiled lightly, "We are likely to become enemies, aren't we? Maybe Mr. Gongsun and my father will declare the failure of the negotiation soon. Why are you keeping the signature of the enemy?"
"Hostility in stance doesn't hinder artistic aspirations." Qiluo said seriously, "Even in the era of the secret war ten years ago, people in the empire would still listen to the songs of Hezhong."
"Haha... I understand why you are so popular. You are really a lovely girl." Ariel leaned forward and got closer to Qiluo, "I remember you officially debuted four years ago, Miss Qi Jingxuan ?”
Qiluo was shocked. She didn't expect that this person she met for the first time would suddenly say her real name. The girl was a little panicked for a moment: "Why would you..."
"Name? A stage name is just a name given to fans. Why do you bring it into your life?" Ariel said, "I am not so powerful as to know the real name of every singer. I know this name because I Always paying attention to you."
"Ah!" Qiluo was very surprised, "Have you heard of my song?"
"From your debut album "Stars" to "Qiluo" which was released at the end of March, I have listened to every song of yours." Ariel looked at her with a smile, "Every time I listen to you sing, I feel like you I feel a wave of sincere admiration.”
Qiluo looked at those beautiful eyes, and a chill suddenly flashed in her heart. The purple-haired woman looked friendly, but she felt like she was looking at a beautiful cheetah. The leopard was lying lazily on the stone, but its eyes were fixed on the prey, waiting for the best opportunity to jump out and bite the weak ones. flesh and blood. She subconsciously felt that she should not continue this topic, and hurriedly said: "I think-"
Before Qiluo could finish her words, the woman's next words made her shiver.
"What I admire the most is that you have the courage to publish such a clumsy and ugly tune and shamelessly call yourself a singer."
(Note: The song Xiaoqian sings in this chapter is "Turbo", which comes from Macross 7)
(End of chapter)
