Silence descends.
A deathly silence.
At the very first second of midnight on the seventh night, the whisper that had lasted for six days, like the heartbeat of the city, came to an abrupt end from the malt buds.
This sudden silence was more unsettling than any previous commotion.
Lin Yi's gaze was fixed on that plant.
The moment the sound disappeared, the stem of the malt bud, which was originally emerald green with a silvery sheen, turned completely transparent at a speed visible to the naked eye, like a tube of carefully carved crystal.
Inside the crystal, the light that had been flowing slowly suddenly accelerated, transforming into a surging golden river, each pulse releasing terrifying energy fluctuations.
Without the slightest hesitation, Lin Yi grabbed the black crystal oil lamp beside him and placed it steadily next to the malt bud.
"Buzz—"
With a slight resonance, the oil lamp flame was no longer a warm orange-yellow, but was instantly stripped of all its impurities, transforming into a pure, cold white flame.
The light projected onto the wall behind, and the familiar shadow of the door disappeared, replaced by a winding path made up of countless tiny points of light.
It is no longer an illusory shadow, but a path that seems to exist in reality, one end connected to the roots of the malt, and the other end piercing through the barriers of space, extending infinitely toward the silent ruins in the city.
"Citywide surveillance!" Lin Yi roared, and the tactical goggles in front of him instantly lit up, with dozens of surveillance feeds popping up simultaneously.
In the scene, every "wall whisper" plant scattered throughout the city ruins has silver veins on its leaves flashing intensely at the exact same frequency, and every rise and fall of the light is precisely synchronized with the pulsation of the light path.
They are no longer isolated individuals, but at this moment, they are fully awakened and connected into a huge neural network covering the entire city.
Just then, a voice, clearer and deeper than ever before, entered his mind directly from the depths of the earth.
That was Ivan's whisper, and for the first time, it was no longer a fragmented phrase, but a complete short sentence imbued with ancient wisdom.
"...Light...is...their...path..."
It felt as if a bolt of lightning had struck Lin Yi's heart, instantly dispelling all the fog!
He understood!
I understand completely now!
Those "travelers" who carry the city's memories are not made of flesh and blood; they cannot set foot on solid ground like living people.
But they can use "remembered light"—the ambient light and shadow that are etched into space at the moments when human emotions resonate most strongly—to construct a temporary passage that belongs only to them!
The black crystal oil lamp is the key to activating all of this!
It doesn't burn lamp oil, but rather the coordinates of memory and the intensity of emotion!
Lin Yi took a deep breath and took out the rusty ear of wheat from his pocket, which was the token of the Night Listener.
He imitated the unique code he remembered from the Night Listeners, tapping the ground three times with the tip of a wheat stalk at the starting point of the light path.
"Thump...thump...thump..."
Three muffled thuds, as if striking the eardrums of time and space.
The path, composed of points of light, trembled slightly, as if a giant beast had been awakened, stretching its limbs and emitting a deep response.
There was a response! His deduction was correct!
Without a moment's delay, Lin Yi moved like lightning, heading straight for the location he knew best and that caused him the most heartache—the old site of the burning letter station.
When he arrived, the sight before him made him gasp for breath.
On the scorched soil of the burning post station, a trail of footprints made of light spots suddenly appeared, clearly extending from the roots of the "Wall Language" plant not far away, and finally stopping in front of the wordless monument.
What made his pupils shrink even more was that every time a footprint lit up the ground, a fleeting, illusory afterimage would appear in the air—the figure of a young woman carrying an old square oil lamp, her steps slow and firm, just like his mother when she was young!
She has returned, following the path of light, back to the place she held fast to in her final moments.
Lin Yi's Adam's apple bobbed violently, but he forcibly suppressed the urge to rush forward.
He knew he couldn't touch her; any interference could cause this fragile path of light to collapse.
He simply walked forward silently and gently placed the black crystal oil lamp with a white flame burning in his hand at the end of the trail of light, directly in front of the monument.
The light is a coordinate, and also a call.
Moments later, a miracle occurred.
The trail of light-filled footprints seemed to have completed some kind of ritual, and began to slowly retreat, turning back step by step, until it finally disappeared completely at the roots of the "Wall Language" plant.
Lin Yi picked up the oil lamp from the ground, and the flame flickered gently, regaining its warm orange-yellow hue.
He glanced at the oil level under the wick and found that it hadn't been used at all!
His last doubts vanished.
Walking on light requires the dual support of "memory coordinates" and "emotional light source".
The former is location, the latter is energy.
This energy is not physical combustion, but a manifestation of emotional resonance!
Verification is required!
His figure disappeared into the night again, his next target—the crack in the outer wall of the municipal hospital.
That was a place where wartime nurses would briefly rest, and also a corner where many people left their last hope and despair.
Lin Yi did not use his own black crystal oil lamp, but instead lit a brand new, ordinary oil lamp and placed it in an inconspicuous corner under the crack—according to the information, that was where an old nurse used to stand most often.
He retreated into the shadows and waited quietly.
That night, a miniature drone that had been monitoring the area captured an astonishing scene with pinpoint accuracy.
A series of blurry, light-like footprints silently emerged from the ground, meandering and stopping in front of the new lamp.
A few seconds later, the outline of a translucent glass bottle containing liquid medicine slowly condensed in the air next to the footprint, hovered quietly for three seconds, and then dissipated like smoke.
The next morning, the retired nurse happened to pass by the place with the help of volunteers.
She walked to the crack, then suddenly stopped, pointing blankly at the corner, muttering to herself, "How strange... I think I remember, my dad used to leave his medicine bottle here and tell me not to forget to take it..."
The volunteer looked stunned, while Lin Yi, in the distance, slowly clenched his fist.
It's done!
He immediately launched the long-planned operation, codenamed "Light-Guarding Vigil"!
The plan was simple yet bold: to have rigorously trained volunteers keep watch with lights all night at the seven most important historical sites in the city.
They were instructed not to talk, not to move, and not even to have any significant emotional fluctuations; they were simply required to maintain the absolute stability of the light source, like statues.
The first night passed peacefully.
On the third night, the light paths at several ruins began to solidify.
On the fifth night, something unexpected happened!
At the ruins of the Third Middle School's playground, the light path that originally only extended on the ground suddenly stretched upwards without warning, like a glowing vine, instantly connecting to the top of the abandoned clock tower in the distance!
Immediately afterwards, a series of much smaller light spots raced along the light path, and faint echoes of children's laughter could be heard in the air.
One of the young students on night watch was a former student of this school.
As he watched the trail of footprints heading towards the clock tower, his eyes instantly welled up with tears. He suddenly knelt down and reached out his hand uncontrollably.
Just below his palm, a light footprint happened to pass by.
"!"
The student shuddered, an expression of disbelief crossing his face.
The moment the light passed through his palm, it left a real, warm mark!
Lin Yi, far away in the command center, saw the sudden spike in heart rate through the student's physiological indicator monitor. He calmly wrote a line in the log: "Record: Tactile feedback has appeared."
The seventh night, the night of the final battle.
As the midnight bell rang once again in people's hearts, Lin Yi stood at the highest point of the city, looking down at everything below.
"boom--"
As if receiving the final command, the light paths of the ruins throughout the city, no longer seven, were illuminated to their fullest extent at the same time!
These light paths stretched and intertwined wildly in the air, eventually converging into a huge net of light covering the entire dome, like a dazzling galaxy hanging down from the heavens, enveloping the entire ruined city.
At the center of the light network, the transparent malt bud finally bloomed in its final moments.
The flower buds unfolded silently, layer by layer, each petal as thin as a cicada's wing and as bright as a star.
The moment it fully bloomed, a thick pillar of light, woven from countless runes and spirals of light and shadow, shot fiercely into the sky from the heart of the flower, tearing through the night and piercing the clouds!
Lin Yi suddenly looked up, his pupils reflecting the earth-shattering scene.
He saw it.
Deep within the clouds illuminated by beams of light, countless figures composed of points of light emerged.
They were of all ages, men and women, dressed in clothes from different eras, yet they walked hand in hand, moving slowly forward.
Their steps were perfectly synchronized, each step echoing the rhythm of the emergency assembly bells from the wartime period that Lin Yi remembered so vividly.
They are the entirety of this city's memory, the return of all the departed.
Lin Yi slowly took out the rusty wheat ear from his pocket. It was slightly warm and resonated with the light net that filled the sky.
He gazed at the pillar of light and asked softly, almost in a whisper:
"You...you're back?"
As soon as the words were spoken, countless overlapping yet exceptionally clear whispers came from within the pillar of light that pierced through the heavens and earth, as if transcending the boundary between life and death, resounding directly into the depths of everyone's soul.
"We...we never left."
At the same time, the ancient will from the deepest part of the earth, Ivan's whisper, like the tolling of an ancient bell, gave a final summary of this operation and opened a brand new chapter for Lin Yi.
"Unit 95... The journey home has begun... The next leg... is to be named by you."
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