"Recently, there have been heavy rains in the Naipuru Island area. Island residents are advised to pay attention to safety and be cautious when going to sea. Affected by the rainfall, the water level of Bailang River has risen to the highest point in ten years, and it will continue to rise..."
"Who wants to listen to this!"
Xiaojie angrily turned off the TV that was playing the Orange Islands midday news, muttering "Is this news or a weather forecast?" The girl on the other side also angrily smashed the keyboard a few times and pressed her forehead against the table.
"No, the official still hasn't released any news, and the live broadcast room has been closed." Xiaoling pointed to the screen, "The forum has exploded."
The golden retriever brother and sister looked at each other in despair, and in the end they all sighed like gas bombs.
Xiaojie: (Forcing a smile) "Hey, think on the bright side, there is no official notification, at least it means that no one was killed."
Xiaoling: (Smiling but not smiling) "Yes, yes, if only an arm or a leg is broken, no one will be killed."
Xiaojie: "..."
Xiaoling: "..."
"Alas!" x2
Lunch break is a rare time for the brother and sister who are busy with special training to surf the Internet. Unfortunately, there is no news from their friend now. After surfing the waves, the two of them became more and more depressed. They just felt that the desserts after the meal were no longer tasty. They muttered a 10,000-word attack on the Himi family for starting the competition, and in the end they had no choice but to look through their address books again.
"She is really the only friend of the Himi family that I know." Xiaoling threw away her phone helplessly, "And she lives in the main family in Fengyuan and has no idea what happened in Fengxue Mountain."
"I'm not as good as you. I only know the person in dad's photo - one-sided acquaintance." Xiaojie said dryly.
Xiaoling: "Oh, it's a good thing you grew up in the Orange Islands."
Xiaojie: "Hey, you don't even think about what kind of character our mother is."
Xiaoling: "..."
Xiaojie: "..."
"Alas!" x2
The brother and sister looked at the flickering screen in their hands and were silent for a moment.
"Himami" was no stranger to them - in the distant past, they had heard this surname countless times in that man's gleeful narration.
"If dad is still here..." The girl lowered her eyes and whispered softly unconsciously.
Xiaoling regretted the words as soon as she said them, and immediately shook her head to throw the useless and frustrating words out of her mind. She turned her head to look at her brother, and was stunned by the picture on his phone screen.
"Brother, how long has it been and you are still checking your friends' updates?" Xiaoling said in shock.
"No." Xiaojie tugged on his sister's clothes, "Tell me, can you..."
"What?" The girl leaned over.
The two of them looked at the text on the screen and the familiar sender, their eyes gradually brightened.
====================
At noon, the entrance square of Fengxue Villa.
"Why, are you scared now?" The silver-haired boy in black robe raised his chin arrogantly.
The leader of the young ice magicians - his name seems to be Nick - looked at the two adventurers who had been flirting with each other since just now, "Let me tell you first, the letter of challenge issued by our Himi family. But there’s never a time to withdraw.”
"You are insulting us - everyone knows that adventurers are the most heroic humans in the world." The girl in white immediately raised her chin higher in defiance, "At least they are braver than the so-called magicians. "
"Oh, you really dare to say that?"
"Why, is it normal for distinguished magicians to not dare to say something?"
The two sides were noisy and noisy, and the referee who was forced to come in couldn't even get a word in. After a while, he was pushed to the edge of the crowd and was spinning in circles.
During the quarrel, Asaki, the girl who had just been roped in by the Terashima siblings a few hours ago, quietly turned her head and gave them a questioning look.
——If the quarrel continues, a fight will begin. What will happen next?
The initiators of this dispute, Lijiu and Long Xing, looked at each other with anxiety in their eyes.
There was certainly a reason why they decided to piss off the entire young people in Snow Wind Villa - this was the first step in the plan of action decided during the discussion last night.
"I know that my request is too demanding." Luo Shan, the leader of Snow City, rubbed her temples and said tiredly, "The people of Snow Wind Villa have deep faith in Morton. Even if you tell the truth, I'm afraid you will only He is just regarded as a villain who stirs up dissension. Besides..."
The adventurers certainly knew what she was worried about. The third elder, Morton, can use the jade bracelet to seize the magic power of his people at any time - this is equivalent to him controlling everyone's life, so naturally he cannot act rashly.
"Um..." Lijiu couldn't help but raise her hand, "Can't you find a way to get everyone to take off their bracelets first?"
"It's difficult." Roxanne shook her head.
According to Luo Shan, when the third elder gave the jade bracelets to the clan members, it happened to be the day when the new residence was built. He said that in order to celebrate the new life of Fengxue Villa, he would give everyone a bracelet made of magic crystal with protective functions, hoping that it would protect the clan members from illness and disaster, and from being intruded by monsters - he was deeply moved. The tribesmen were not willing to let the bracelets go away from their bodies at all. Gene once suggested insinuating that "at least take off the bracelets when you sleep", which made people angry.
——After all, the disaster of the "Warcraft attack" a year ago happened late at night.
"That's right... Even if we stalk and get one or two people to take off their bracelets, it won't be of any use. There are so many people in Fengxue Villa."
"Then why don't we just steal everyone's bracelets while they are asleep?"
"Or just break it into pieces?"
"Is there any anesthetic that can put the entire villa to sleep at once?"
The Terashima siblings are still giving bad ideas to each other. Xiao Ye rethought all the information she had obtained so far, and finally said before Luo Shan could not bear it any longer and beat someone up: "Lord Luo Shan, you have already investigated before. All the ice puppets in the old village rely on the magic power of the tribesmen of Snow Wind Villa. Active, right?”
"That's right." The leader of Xuecheng thought again and again, then put down his sandbag-sized fist for the time being, and answered the question of the only adventurer who was relatively reliable.
"I have a question." Xiaoye said, "There is a long distance between Fengxue Villa and the old village. How did the third elder transmit the magic power there?"
Upon hearing this, the Terashima siblings stopped outputting rubbish ideas in confusion.
"How to transmit it? Isn't it just a matter of time?"
"Just like Tesla's air transmission technology."
Night:"……"
Luo Shan: "..."
Seeing the face of the leader of Xuecheng turn from red to green and then to black, Xiaoye was afraid that she would raise her arms and ask people to drag out the two nonsense contestants and burn them to death as devils. She immediately said decisively: "Sorry, they were young. I’ve read too many fairy tales—at least I don’t think that such a large amount of magic power can be transmitted by a single person, right?”
Luo Shan's face flashed with colors for a while, and then she replied: "I know what you want to say."
The female leader in hunting attire pulled up a chair and sat down. "If you want to transmit magic power to the other side of the mountain, you must need a way and a carrier. Unfortunately, we have searched almost every corner of the mountain for this purpose, but there is still nothing. What clues can I find?”
As she spoke, she unfolded the brown paper roll on the table - it was a huge map of Fengxue Mountain. The undulating terrain, the types of vegetation, the settlements of Warcraft, and even the broken road signs that have been abandoned for many years - almost all details are meticulously drawn on the yellowed paper.
"Jean also secretly investigated at Snow Mountain Villa, and even sneaked into Morton's room, but he didn't find any device that can transmit magic power." Roxanne sighed, "If you want to start from here, I'm afraid I can't help. What's the matter?"
The Nanguo siblings frowned at the map that was longer than their height. After staring at it for a while, their eyes suddenly lit up.
"Will it be underground?"
"I understand! According to convention, Fengxue Mountain Villa must be built on the ground, right?"
"So the red crystal that the third elder has been looking for is——"
"The key to controlling the earth's veins!"
Night:"……"
Luo Shan: "..."
In order to save energy, the deaf adventurer and the leader of Snow City fell into a state of temporary deafness at the same time.
——Quan pretends he didn’t hear anything.
Xiao Ye sighed and threw all the heresy and nonsense out of her mind. She had used the power of waveguides to scan every corner of the villa in all directions. Even if there was any device buried underground, it would not be able to escape detection - in fact, there was nothing unusual in the land below the villa.
In this case, the devices used to collect and transmit magic power can only exist on the ground.
The adventurer calmed down and began to recall everything he had seen since the night he entered Snow Wind Villa.
Under the starry sky, wooden houses are intertwined with cedars, and the lights seep out warmly from the windows, smearing the white snow. Tall stone pillars stand at the entrance of the villa, extending along the road into the valley, and the firelight illuminates the exquisite reliefs on them...
etc.
If there is something that can be seen everywhere in Fengxue Mountain Villa, almost everywhere, but has never been noticed by anyone——
Xiaoye's eyes followed the marks on the map. She pointed to a gray mark near a magical beast's habitat on the ice sheet, "Lord Roxanne, what is this mark?"
"Oh, that's a totem pole." Luo Shan glanced at the map and replied, "Our ancestors have lived in Fengxue Mountain for generations, and there are many totem poles built in the past left in many places. Maybe it's because they are inlaid with magic crystals. Monsters are often attracted there..."
Her voice trailed off. After the leader of Xuecheng was stunned for a while, he suddenly jumped up.
"you mean……!"
"Is it possible?" Xiaoye asked calmly.
"certainly!"
Luo Shan immediately took out the charcoal pencil and began to mark the position of each totem pole on the map.
"This is the most commonly used decoration in our Fengxue Mountain Villa... Damn it, it's so common, I never thought of it!"
She knew the entire map by heart and could write with astonishing speed. Soon, the positions of the totem poles were marked with black marks and connected to each other - eventually forming a huge network covering the entire Fengxue Mountain.
The leader of Xuecheng let out a sigh of relief and fell back on his chair.
"Yes, that's it."
The Terashima siblings watched Boss Beidou and Boss Luo Shan discussing heatedly sometimes, and sometimes understanding each other, and they felt that question marks were sweeping over their little heads. They struggled for a long time before they finally figured out what they had discovered, and then immediately threw themselves on the map with joy.
"In other words, as long as we destroy these stone pillars, the magic power of the people will not be passed on?"
"The ice puppet in the old village can't move, right?"
"That's true, but this is not a simple job." Luo Shan had already calmed down from her excitement. She clicked on the dense network on the map, "As you can see, if Morton really transforms all the totem poles on the mountain and makes them 'nodes' for transmitting magic power, then it is meaningless to destroy only one or two places. . Other parts of the network can easily replace the function of the damaged node."
"Besides, many totem poles on the ice sheet are near the habitats of monsters. Once they get close, they are likely to be attacked by monsters."
Lijiu nodded, finally feeling that she could follow along, "Since the third elder can command the ice-walking doll, maybe the monsters in the wild also have his spies?"
"You are right." Luo Shan said.
As soon as the words fell, the room fell into dead silence again.
"So... we can't act rashly to alert the snake, and we can't rush into Fengxue Villa and directly smash the pillars. Wouldn't we be back to square one?" Long Xing had a headache and wrinkled his features. "In the end, we still can't do anything. .”
"No, we still have a breaking point."
"Why?"
The Terashima siblings followed the position of Beidou's finger - he was pointing at the entrance of Snow Mountain Villa.
"Fengxue Villa is located in the center of a wind-sheltered valley, surrounded by mountains on three sides. Only the entrance side is relatively flat." Xiao Ye said, "The totem pole here is the hub connecting Fengxue Villa with the outside world. No matter which node the magic passes through, it flows through the network 'Every part of it must pass through here first."
"Ah, really." Lijiu opened her eyes wide.
She could still recall the shock she felt the first night she entered Fengxue Mountain - outside the tall stone pillars was a cold and windy night, and inside was a brightly lit fairy tale town. It turns out that the dividing line-like totem pole gate is the key point for the flow of magic power?
"But, there are many guards at the entrance of the villa, no matter day or night, right?" Lijiu asked in confusion, "We will definitely get beaten if we suddenly release a monster at the door."
"And it will definitely alarm the third elder." Long Xing added.
"I heard--"
Luo Shan longed out her tone.
"Although the Snow Wind Villa no longer allows Warcraft to enter, if there are travelers with Warcraft who want to stay overnight, they will still warmly entertain them."
The Terashima siblings nodded blankly - we know, we were living there a few days ago.
"As you know, in this kingdom, when two people have a conflict, dueling is a very common way to resolve the conflict." The leader of Snow City laughed, "And to be fair, when an animal tamer duels with a magician, there are Quan can use his own magical beasts to assist in the battle. In the past, we set up a special dueling arena in the center of the villa; but in the new Snow Wind Villa, due to the regulations prohibiting the entry of magical beasts, the arena was moved outside the villa to the square next to the entrance."
The siblings suddenly realized, "It's the square where the deer carts were parked when we came here, right?"
Beidou clapped his hands and turned his attention to the Nanguo siblings who were eager to try.
"Lijiu, Longxing. I have a task for you."
According to the original plan, the siblings first made a gesture of breaking up with Beidou and broke away from the "betrayer" camp in order to take action in Snow Mountain Villa and wait for the opportunity to lobby other contestants to increase their teammates. Then, they need to cause conflicts in the villa and try to get the angered Himi tribe members to initiate a duel to reduce the possibility of the three elders becoming suspicious.
They did all this well. Now that both sides have gathered in the square, they are about to decide on the rules of the duel and start the fight. However, the key figure is missing - in the plan, Beidou was supposed to sneak into the adventurer camp at this moment, pretend to miss during the duel, and smash Broken the totem pole at the door.
Boss, where are you? We can't do this inhuman operation of blowing up several pillars at the same time with one blow! !
On the surface, the Terashima siblings are angry and righteous, but in fact they are already complaining inwardly.
Before splitting up, Xiaoye explained the reason why the duel was scheduled for noon the next day - her explanation was too long. Lijiu and Longxing were confused after a night of brainstorming tactics and could only barely remember something like There are annoying people who want to disrupt the game. The boss will work with the NPCs of the Himi family to drive away the troublemakers in the morning.
Precisely because they still had this matter to talk about, they deliberately found a room without cameras to talk. At that time, Lijiu imagined that the audience would be confused tomorrow because they missed a key part of the plot. After the game, they would have to read the comments and comments for fun.
Now that I think about it, is it because there are so many and powerful people who come to cause trouble? Like the business rivals of the Himi family?
Nick's scrutinizing gaze made Lijiu quickly restrain her mind and stop guessing about what was there and what was not. Fortunately, in order to prevent accidents, before leaving, the boss also gave instructions on what to do if he failed to arrive on time.
The girl turned sideways and gave Long Xing a look. The younger brother, who was in the same mind, understood immediately, and while the girls were arguing in front of him, he grabbed his two teammates and slipped away quietly.
After a whole day of questions, the audience in the live broadcast room, who had missed a key plot and was extremely confused, had already been confused by their inexplicable actions - or maybe they were shocked by the high-decibel quarrel. Seeing that someone had left the team, netizens whose ears were damaged all switched channels and switched to Terashima Ryuusei's live broadcast room.
They saw the young man from the southern country dragging his friends all the way into the elder's mansion. They were not afraid of the suspicious eyes of the guards, and broke into the third elder's office under the guise of handing in a task.
Before the third elder, who was working at the desk, could see clearly whether the person in front of him was a man or a woman, Long Xing took a deep breath and shouted loudly:
"You are so ungrateful that you want to kill the Great Elder, he is your father!!!"
Third Elder: "..."
Guard of the Elder's Mansion: "..."
Long Xing’s two companions: “…”
Audience in the live broadcast room: "...???"
At this time, the situation was completely out of control. The third elder who suddenly had a new father had no time to react and was dragged out by an angry Long Xing.
The boy from the southern country gave full play to his talent and vividly acted as a second fool who believed in the nonsense of the first elder. He pulled the third elder and shouted that he wanted him to kowtow to the first elder to apologize. The poor third elder had been busy writing papers for a long time and neglected to exercise. He couldn't resist the combined strength of the three young men and was forcibly dragged out of the gate of the elder's mansion.
In the biting wind and snow, the third elder looked at the drone that was shooting 360-degree shots of his face, and calmly made a decision in his heart.
Next time... "In order to increase the laughter of the show, guards are not allowed to interfere when a specific plot is triggered", this unfortunate rule should be cancelled.
Not far after being dragged to the street, the third elder noticed unusual movement in the distance. He asked the tribesmen on the roadside, and when he heard that the young people in the tribe challenged the adventurers to a duel, a look of anger immediately appeared on his face.
"Nonsense!"
He waved his hand coldly - at this point, the priority of the plot finally overshadowed the funny scenes. The guards were ordered to rescue the third elder from the hands of the southern boys and rushed to the place of duel together.
When the third elder arrived at the entrance square of Fengxue Villa, the quarrel between the two groups of people had already reached a fever pitch, and the guy who was about to steal them started to use force. It wasn't until the middle-aged man repeatedly announced with an angry face that he was prohibited from interfering with the adventurers' work, and the duel was terminated, that the young magicians of the Himi family headed by Nick reluctantly put down their staffs.
"They were obviously the ones who provoked me first." Nick muttered dissatisfiedly.
Guards had surrounded the square, and both sides had to disperse temporarily. Lijiu heard Nick's complaints keenly. She sneered and lowered her voice: "Didn't you say that your Himi family never withdraws its declaration of war? Are you giving in?"
"You...!" Nick glared angrily at this adventurous adventurer.
"Do you dare to meet here at twelve o'clock tonight?"
Nick was stunned when he heard this.
Fengxue Villa has always had a curfew, and no one is allowed to go out after sunset. Although the naughty teenagers would occasionally sneak out to play with their friends... But running outside the villa in the middle of the night and having to fight with someone?
Nick couldn't help but hesitate when he thought about how many beatings he would receive if this was exposed.
"I knew you didn't dare." The girl seemed to just ask casually, glanced at Nick contemptuously, and then started to hug her companion with a smile, "Did you hear that, according to the rules, we win without a fight? Why don’t you open a bottle of soda to celebrate?”
The young man's eyes suddenly turned red with anger.
He grabbed Lijiu's wrist and said word by word: "No problem, see you at twelve o'clock, that's settled!"
The crowd dispersed, and the snow-covered entrance square returned to its usual silence. Only a few teams of guards patrolled back and forth in front of the door, scanning everyone who approached the door.
The adventurers who caused the trouble had already taken advantage of the chaos and fled, and would regroup when the appointed time came. Lijiu, who spoke harsher words than anyone else and ran away faster than anyone else, pulled her brother and ran wildly. She finally breathed a sigh of relief when she hid beside a haystack in the backyard of a house.
"Oh my god, it's so exciting."
"My heart almost jumped out of my chest."
The two chatted face to face for a long time, and finally calmed down their messy mood.
Lijiu opened her mouth and was about to ask, "So what happened to the boss?" when goose feather-like snowflakes fell from the sky and accurately fell into her mouth.
She hurriedly pouted for a long time, then raised her head and looked at the sky in surprise, "Why is it snowing again?"
Long Xing stretched out his hand to wipe away the snowflakes that fell on the tip of his nose, "Just don't be as big as yesterday. We still have to hurry."
"Before going up the mountain, I checked the weather forecast on Naipulu Island. It said it might rain for a whole week. We escaped a disaster on the mountain, at least it doesn't snow every day."
"Well, could it be the sequelae of the Lugia sea incident a few days ago..."
The two of them patted the snowflakes on their cloaks and walked away while chatting.
At this time, deep in the distant rift valley, in a small cave eroded by floods——
Like stars in the middle of the night, the crystal blue light quietly lights up in the darkness.
====================
small theater:
During the whole snowstorm battle, the third elder who had three fathers, seven mothers, a grandfather and half a wife: I hate it!
====================
New chapter delivered! I finally paid off my debt and I am free!
It’s really hard to control the word count. I wrote more than 6,000 words as I continued… So can this chapter be regarded as a two-in-one chapter for this month and next month? (Quietly)
