Chapter 60: Sea of Roses under the Moonlight
Shortly after sunset, the large clock on the manor roof began to chime.
“Ding-dong—”
The crisp sound made people's hearts jump. The busy workers in the sea of flowers heard the bell and walked towards the pear blossom fence one after another, carrying tool buckets.
They passed by Xie Liang and his group and walked towards the open main gate of the manor.
Xie Liang looked through the fence and saw several unknown intruders who also wanted to follow in. As soon as they reached the gate, they were grabbed by the neck by the two guards guarding the door and thrown to the ground.
"Why don't we wait until dark and see if we can sneak in?" Xie Liang turned around and said to Xu He and the others.
Xu He nodded when he heard this, and took out two small crystal pears from his pocket and handed them to Xie Liang: "Here, they are quite sweet."
Xie Liang looked at him in surprise: "Uh... where did you get this from?"
Xu He said calmly, "I picked it nearby."
Unexpectedly, there are pear trees here besides roses. I guess Xu He knew that he was not full, so he went to pick them specially.
Xie Liang continued eating, the sweet pear juice flowing in his mouth. After eating two pears, his stomach finally stopped rumbling.
"Liu Hao and Zhang Minghui are probably also in a small bungalow nearby. Should we bring them along to join us?" Hong Guo asked Long Qingye.
"No need, it will be noisy if there are too many people." Long Qingye said.
"Okay." Hong Guo said, pointing to a place not far away: "Who are those people?"
Following Hongguo's pointing, several workers in blue overalls were using whips to drive away the nearby descenders. The people being driven away were running in different directions in panic.
It was not until the people with whips gradually approached that Xie Liang could clearly hear them shouting: "Go back to the dormitory!" No one dared to disobey. Wherever they went, the Adventers ran away in all directions.
Seeing them getting closer, Xie Liang hurriedly said, "Shall we go back to our respective places first? Then gather here at 11 o'clock tonight!"
"Will they count the number of people at night? If not, the four of us can squeeze in." Hong Guo said.
Xie Liang was a little worried: "Let's separate first and see how things go. It won't be too late for us to get together again later."
"Let's go." After saying that, Long Qingye pulled Xie Liang's sleeve and walked towards the dormitory.
Xu He was unhappy when he saw this. He took two steps forward and pulled Long Qingye's hand away. He said to Xie Liang, "Be careful."
"Well, don't worry, you two go back quickly." As Xie Liang finished speaking, the men with long whips had already walked behind them.
"Go back now!"
The man holding the whip cursed angrily and lashed the long whip in his hand at a slower-running descender behind Xie Liang. The man screamed in pain and ran away quickly, covering the bleeding whip wound.
"Let's go!" Hongguo shouted.
The four of them quickly ran away in two directions before the men with whips came over.
Not long after Xie Liang and Long Qingye returned to the dormitory, the female gardener came with two maids to count the number of people.
She called everyone to the lawn in front of the bungalow and signaled with her eyes to the maids who were carrying two large bags. The maids understood and took out bread from the bags and distributed it.
While the bread was being distributed, a bold man asked the maid, "What is our main purpose here?"
The maid looked at the man with empty eyes, like a walking corpse.
The man had no choice but to lower his voice and asked again: "What do you want us to do?"
The maid still looked confused and stared at him.
The man shook his head and said nothing more.
Soon, everyone was given two pieces of hard, dark bread.
Discussions gradually arose among the crowd:
"What the hell is bread!"
"That's right! If you hadn't told me it was bread, I would have thought it was a brick!"
"What about the water? They're not going to let us drink from the tap!"
"Dude, are you taking a trip? It's good enough to have tap water to drink."
"What's the mission, beautiful!"
However, neither of the two maids paid any attention to them.
Xie Liang, who was standing at the back of the line, also got two loaves of bread, which were indeed dark and hard, leaving no appetite at all.
After distributing the bread, the gardener said, "Tomorrow at eight o'clock, remember to gather at the open space by the iron pear flower fence. The housekeeper will be waiting for you there.
"Remember, the manor will ring the return bell at six o'clock in the evening. You must return here when you hear the bell." After saying this, she turned around and left with the two maids, ignoring the questions raised by the visitors.
As night fell, the entire manor was silent, with only the rustling sound of the wind blowing through the sea of roses. The cold moonlight sprinkled down, illuminating the manor as if it were daytime.
When Xie Liang and Long Qingye arrived at the agreed location, Xu He and Hong Guo were already waiting there.
It was already late at night. There was not a single light in the entire towering manor. It was dead silent, like a building forgotten by time.
The iron pear flower fence gate was open, just as it had been during the day. The main gate of the manor was closed, and the four of them walked around to the glazed eaves on the side wall.
Long Qingye glanced at Xu He and asked, "Climb up?"
Xu He didn't respond. He drew out a black sword with dragon pattern from behind and said to Xie Liang, "Rope."
Xie Liang quickly took out a bundle of rope from his bag and handed it to him: "Be careful."
Xu He took the rope, jumped up with the black sword, took a few steps parallel to the wall, and suddenly thrust the sword into the wall.
The black sword collided with the stone wall, sparking tiny sparks and leaving a groove in the stone wall. Xu He didn't insert the sword into it for a while.
Xu He fell back to the ground, and some gravel fell with him, hitting the head and eyebrows of Long Qingye, who was closest to him.
Long Qingye brushed off the lime on his eyebrows and said angrily, "Xu, can you do it?"
Xu He looked up at the damaged wall and said to them, "Move aside."
After trying twice, Xu He finally inserted the black sword firmly into the hard stone wall.
Then, he stepped on the black sword and jumped onto the glazed eaves, and then let down the rope.
Xie Liang pulled the rope and said to Hong Guo, "You go up first."
Xu He pulled Long Qingye and Hong Guo up one by one.
When it was Xie Liang's turn, he tied the rope around his waist and pulled out Xu He's black sword.
Xie Liang stood on the glazed eaves and couldn't help holding his breath when he saw the sea of roses under the moonlight - it was a beautiful scenery he had never seen before, as if he was in a dream.
Under the bright moonlight, the mountains in the distance are stacked layer upon layer, and ahead is a vast sea of roses. The flowers seem to be dancing in the wind, and seem to be whispering to each other.
The moonlight in the sky was slowly shining, and the cotton candy-like pink clouds echoed with the fiery red roses on the ground. The breeze with the scent of roses kept blowing across the tip of Xie Liang's nose, and Xie Liang was almost intoxicated.
Looking at the rose bushes in the distance, Xie Liang always felt that it was a little unnatural.
Until I heard Hongguo next to me say, "The wind isn't that strong tonight."
"What did you say?" Xie Liang asked back.
Hongguo smoothed the collar of his suit and said, "I said, the wind isn't that strong tonight, but my scarf is gone!"
After listening to her, Xie Liang looked at the sea of roses again and finally realized something was wrong: "Look! What are those!"
"Where is it? I can't see clearly!" Hongguo has mild myopia and can't see clearly.
Xie Liang pointed at the path leading to the rose field: "There! See? What are those black dots? They're moving!"
"It looks like a living thing." Xu He said softly from the side.
"Yes, there are quite a few of them." Long Qingye said.
Hong Guo rubbed her eyes hard, but still couldn't see the black spot the three people were talking about. She had to give up and said, "Okay, I guess I need to get glasses when I get home."
Hong Guo: "By the way, we're not here to see the scenery, are we?"
Xie Liang looked at the wall above the eaves. Above it was a high wall with no climbing points.
"There's not much room to climb on this wall, so it might be difficult to get up there," Xie Liang said.
Long Qingye looked up and around, then said, "If you want to get in, you either have to pass the test or find a way through the gate."
The manor was rectangular, with tall, steep walls on all four sides. There were no windows, only glazed eaves sticking out. They were too far from the top of the wall to climb up, and even Xu He could only shake his head helplessly.
"Let's go to the main gate and try to find a way to break in." Hong Guo said.
Xie Liang: "I just checked, there's no one guarding there."
By moonlight, they walked back towards the main gate of the manor.
Just as I walked near the flower bed in front of the main gate, a series of "clicking" sounds came from a flower bed in front of the main gate.
The rose bushes in the flower bed were swaying as if something was eating inside them.
Xie Liang and his group stopped and hid behind one of the flower beds, looking at the swaying flowers.
At this time, three descenders sneaked through the iron fence and walked straight to the two stone doors at the main entrance. It seemed that they were also here to investigate clues to the mission.
One of them looked around for a while, and after confirming that there was no one there, he was about to raise his hand to knock on the door.
Another person noticed something was wrong. "Wait." He pointed at the swaying flowers in the flowerbed and shuddered, "What... is that?"
"Look how scared you are! What else could it be? At most, it's a wild cat out looking for food at night." As the man spoke, he pushed the two tightly closed stone doors with his hands, but the doors didn't budge.
"Why don't we go back? It's very dangerous at night." said the man who had been silent.
The person shaking the door was not giving up. He grabbed the metal ring embedded in the door and hit the door panel, making a dull thud.
"Where is there no danger? If we fail to complete the mission, even more..."
Before he could finish his words, something suddenly rushed out of the flower bed and knocked him to the ground. The man screamed like a pig being slaughtered, and with his screams, the flowers in several nearby flower beds began to tremble.
Xie Liang looked closely and saw that a piece of the man's arm had been bitten off by several small creatures that looked like skeletons, and blood was dripping all over the ground.
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