The life beneath the earth, with its humble traces, paints a lost map for this forgotten city.
Lin Yi's heart clenched, and a crazy idea exploded in his mind.
This isn't random biological activity; it's a clue!
A clue that has been buried for nearly a century!
He turned abruptly, rushed out of the archives, and headed straight for the city's data center.
"Get me all the construction records of the city's underground pipe network from thirty years ago, especially the old city renovation project in the eastern district!" His voice carried an unquestionable command, making all the staff present shudder.
Massive amounts of data were refreshed on the screen like a waterfall, and Lin Yi's eyes were as sharp as a hawk's, not missing a single corner.
Time ticked by, and just when everyone thought it was all in vain, he suddenly shouted, "Zoom in! This is it! Number 734-b, the record of sealing off abandoned air-raid shelter ventilation ducts!"
The files were retrieved, covered in the dust of time.
Thirty years ago, a construction team accidentally unearthed some things that "did not belong" to that era while sealing off an old ventilation shaft—some scattered, unidentifiable metal fragments and tattered tarpaulins.
But what truly caught Lin Yi's attention was a handwritten note at the end of the file, written in a hurried and frightened hand: "There seems to be an earlier structure deep inside, not shown in official drawings, possibly... a relic from ninety years ago."
Ninety years ago!
Lin Yi's pupils suddenly contracted.
He immediately cross-referenced the action logs of the "first generation of Night Listeners".
In that dark era shrouded in war and oblivion, a fragmented report with the highest level of encryption suddenly appeared before us.
The report mentions a project that has never been publicly acknowledged—"Underground Messenger".
It was a secret team composed of blind children, deaf people, and specially trained dogs.
In areas where urban communications are completely cut off, they are the only information lifeline, responsible for transporting "memory films" that encapsulate crucial intelligence.
They had no names, no unit numbers, and their routes of operation were never recorded in any official records.
They are shadows in the night, ghosts underground, completely erased by history.
Lin Yi's heart was pounding like a drum.
He took out the rusted copper bell with a remnant of a wheat ear stem that he had found in the abandoned shelter.
This is the key!
He took a deep breath, his knuckles gripping the copper bell, and gently tapped it on the metal floor of the data center with a peculiar and ancient rhythm—three short and two long syllables, known to the night listeners as the "broken note."
Thump, thump, thump...thump thump.
The sound wasn't loud, but it seemed to contain a mysterious penetrating power.
The moment the bell rang, seven red dots suddenly lit up on the city's holographic map!
Those were seven abandoned ventilation shafts long forgotten by the world. At this moment, faint beams of light emerged from the red dots, close to the ground and only thirty centimeters above it. Like ghosts, they meandered through the projection of the underground pipe network, eventually weaving together into a complete transmission network covering the entire eastern urban area!
The entire room fell silent.
Everyone was stunned by the miraculous scene before them.
This lifeblood hidden beneath the city, dormant for nearly a century, was awakened by a small copper bell!
"Prepare the car! Head to the No. 3 culvert in the East District!" Lin Yi's voice broke the silence. He grabbed the copper bell, his eyes burning with an unprecedented light.
The underground culvert in the East District is cold and damp, with the air filled with the smell of rust and decaying soil.
Lin Yi led a capable team, trudging through the mud.
The path of light appeared and disappeared beneath their feet, guiding their way.
At a collapse site blocked by boulders, the detector emitted a sharp beep.
"Dig it open!"
As the rubble was cleared away piece by piece, a rusted bronze plaque about half the size of a palm was revealed.
Lin Yi carefully brushed away the dirt, revealing a line of blurry inscriptions: "Ninety-Five - Messenger Group".
He turned the bronze plaque over; there were no words on the back, only a row of fine, cold raised dots.
It's Braille!
Lin Yi closed his eyes and traced the raised dots one by one with his fingertips.
"The road...is...under...your feet, not...on...the...list."
Just as his fingertips touched the last Braille dot, the transparent wheat ear in his palm, which had been silent all along, suddenly trembled violently!
Buzz—!
A soft ray of light shone through the ears of wheat, creating a moving image on the damp rock face.
The scene depicts a city engulfed in flames of war, reduced to ruins.
A thin, blind child, clutching a faint oil lamp tightly in his arms, is crawling laboriously among the broken walls and ruins.
Beside him, a black guide dog cautiously probed the way, a bright red knot on its neck particularly eye-catching.
Suddenly, a shell exploded not far away, and the blast wave knocked the boy to the ground.
The guide dog did not run away; instead, it rushed back immediately, shielding the boy and the oil lamp with its body, letting out a low growl.
That red string... Lin Yi's mind was struck like lightning!
He instantly remembered the group of old dogs under the bridge, and the lead dog had a worn-out, dark red rope around its neck!
I see!
He understood everything!
Those dogs are not just living memories; they are... they are descendants of those messenger dogs from back then!
The route home is no longer a simple memory, but rather an imprint etched deep into their very being!
"Contact the Disabled Persons' Federation immediately!" Lin Yi's voice trembled slightly with excitement. "I need to recruit seven visually impaired volunteers, who must have guide dogs! Get them here!"
The command was executed swiftly.
Half a day later, seven visually impaired people, each with a bewildered expression, were led to the site of the old culvert, accompanied by their guide dogs.
Lin Yi didn't explain much, nor did he turn on any lighting equipment. He simply handed them seven Rusty Bell Wheat Ears replicated with memory metal.
"Don't think about anything," his voice sounded particularly steady in the darkness, "just follow my rhythm and gently rock it."
He himself first raised the primitive copper bell and rang it the first time in a completely different, slow and long "rallying tune".
bite--
The crisp sound of the bell echoed through the culvert, far-reaching and lingering.
The seven volunteers also shook the replicas in their hands.
Ding... Ding... Ding...
The moment the seventh bell rang perfectly in sync with Lin Yi's bell, a sudden change occurred!
On the ground, the single-track light path that had been appearing and disappearing suddenly shone brightly, and next to it, another parallel light track appeared!
One high, one low, two tracks running in parallel!
On the high-speed rail, a blurry afterimage of a child is moving forward, his steps unsteady yet firm; on the low-speed rail, the shadow of a dog follows closely, step by step.
Their movements were perfectly synchronized with the flashing frequency of the light trails!
"Woof!" "Woof—"
Suddenly, the seven normally docile guide dogs broke free from their owners' leashes without warning and, like arrows released from a bow, raced along the canine trail!
They ran with such determination, as if a mission that had been dormant in their blood for a hundred years had been completely awakened at this moment!
Finally, they all stopped at the end of the light path, in front of the collapsed hole, and lay down, emitting low and sorrowful cries.
Everyone present was stunned by this scene.
This is no longer a simple recollection of memories; it is a bloodline resonance that spans nearly a century!
"The Messenger Group's memories are sealed in the form of 'physical memories'," Lin Yi murmured, a glimmer of understanding in his eyes. "They can only be activated through the actions of others of the same kind. The bell is the key, but footsteps... are the password to open the door."
An even bolder plan took shape in his mind—the "Step Frequency Resonance" plan.
He ordered the construction of seven special platforms at the seven endpoints of the messenger network throughout the city. These platforms had no lights or written descriptions, but were simply marked on the ground with the most basic symbols, depicting the unique rhythm of the messengers' footsteps.
He named them "Lightless Stands".
On the first day of the plan, an elderly veteran with white hair and a cane passed by a "lighthouse without lights" in the western district.
He stopped in his tracks, curious, and stared at the strange symbol on the ground—three short and one long—his gaze freezing instantly.
This rhythm... it's so familiar.
As if it were an instinct etched into his bones, he subconsciously lifted his foot and, following the instructions of the symbols, took three short and one long steps on the platform.
In an instant, a dazzling light spread out from beneath his feet like lightning, pointing straight into the distance!
In mid-air, a breathtaking scene suddenly appeared—in his youth, he was carrying a seriously wounded comrade on his back, frantically crossing the enemy's line of fire with such a pace in this very alley!
He never mentioned this memory to anyone, nor did he claim any merit.
He himself had almost forgotten that before becoming a regular soldier, he had been an outer contact member of the "Underground Messenger".
The veteran trembled violently, and tears streamed down his cloudy eyes.
The news spread like wildfire.
The next day, an elderly woman named Granny Chen approached Lin Yi.
She didn't say much, but with trembling hands, she unfolded a hand-drawn map atlas in pencil.
Those were all the routes around the shelter that she had drawn from memory when she was a child, marked with "dog path," "blind path," and "night path" in her childish handwriting.
Lin Yi's heart pounded again as he compared the map with the light path network.
These "informal paths," ignored by adults and only used by children and dogs, actually constitute the densest and most crucial capillaries in the entire optical path network!
"Back then..." Granny Chen's voice was hoarse and distant, "Those who took the main road all died. Those who survived... were all us who took the side paths."
In a single sentence, the cruelty and wisdom of that era are fully revealed.
Lin Yi remained silent for a long time before issuing a new order: "Move all the 'lighthouses without lamps' to these folk paths. From today onwards, they will no longer be called 'lighthouses without lamps,' they will be called—'nameless paths.'"
In the dead of night, the city fell asleep.
Lin Yi patrolled alone to the end of the most remote "nameless path" in the western district.
There was a mottled old wall, and at the corner of the wall, a wild wall-whispering flower was quietly blooming against the backdrop of the city's neon lights.
As he approached, he was horrified to discover that countless tiny, sand-like footprints had naturally appeared on the jade-white petals!
There were children's paws, dog paws, densely packed, layer upon layer, but none of them had left their names.
He reached out as if possessed and gently touched the petal with the transparent ear of wheat.
Buzz—!
Inside the ears of wheat, the footsteps that were originally a single rhythm suddenly became incredibly dense, light, and full of power!
The sounds of children running, their feet sinking into the mud, the crisp tapping of white canes on the ground, and the soft thud of dogs' paws on the stone slabs... thousands upon thousands of them, all flowing together like a river!
Immediately afterwards, a deep, muffled tremor came from the ground beneath their feet, as if thousands of footsteps were resonating simultaneously from the depths of the entire city!
Lin Yi slowly raised his head, his gaze piercing through the night, looking at the brightly lit city skyline in the distance.
Those filaments of light, invisible to the naked eye, were now clearer than ever before in his eyes.
They are no longer cold streams of data, but veins pulsating with life.
He murmured to himself, his voice filled with an indescribable awe and shock: "It turns out that the longest road is never walked by heroes... but by these nameless people, step by step, with their own bodies."
At this moment, what he saw was no longer an echo of the past, but a huge neural network covering the entire city, pulsating in real time.
Is this... the true pulse of this city?
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