【Summer Five】Iron City Wall

Not long after the alarm was lifted, residents began to come and go in various streets in the Eastern District.The ground was covered with a thick layer of hard ice, and the houses and buildings were covered with ice edges. The trees stood bare on both sides, and the branches were overwhelmed with holding the snow in their hands.

Those who returned from the furnace were mostly ragged and tired.The surviving family members were busy hugging their heads and crying; another group of people carried the dead bodies of their relatives in sacks and moved home step by step heavily. Their footprints were soaked in sweat, but there were no more tears.

The excavator roared to work, thawing the frozen street again; although the people passing by were in shock, their cheeks were already a little more rosy and angry.

Xia You's family is in good condition.The four struggled to remove the protective cover. The items underneath were not too cold, but they were a little cold to the touch.They moved the equipment underneath back into the house again, and lit the fire to dissipate the cold that engulfed the severe winter.

"It's over in the blink of an eye!" Wutiao exclaimed excitedly, poking his head out to look at the weather tower like a bare commander. The huge screen was hung with a light orange color, as if signaling the end of a disaster.

Xia You opened all the windows and let the cool breeze lift up the curtains, covering five heads and one face.He patted his companion with a triumphant smirk, and said, "The good show is yet to come."

"What?" Wutiao tore open the curtains on his face, dissatisfied, "What else can there be other than the new semester?"

Xia You: "Don't you ever celebrate festivals?"

So the silver-haired boy showed a look of sudden realization, opened his mouth to say something, paused for a few seconds, and then continued: "You mean the Brazier Festival? Don't be kidding, hanging a few lanterns and lighting a few lights can be called a celebration, so don't I Is there a holiday every day?"

The second half of the sentence touched Xia You's heart, and he almost couldn't help showing a smile: "I don't deny it. But this is the only festival that the iron city wall celebrates at the same time and the largest festival in a year. Almost all the drive armor exhibition halls in the city They will all be open for free, you don’t want to go?”

As soon as "driver armor" was mentioned, Gojo really became interested.Since listening to Hongshu's basic explanation, the extremely smart boys gradually had the idea of ​​touching more advanced finished products: if the exhibition hall in the city center can be opened to the public-this is definitely a golden opportunity.

As a result, Wutiao, who successfully took the bait, immediately began to look forward to the arrival of the Brazier Festival.Every morning, as soon as Xia You got up from the bed, I saw him rushing to the window, waiting for the excavators that were busy unblocking the seal to pass by alternately, and then opened his eyes wide to look at East Fifth Street to see if there were bright and conspicuous big signs there. red block.

——At the turn of winter and spring, the festival that belongs to all human beings inside the iron city wall has finally arrived.In order to celebrate the aftermath of the catastrophe and to welcome the early spring of the new year, all districts from the fifth district to the first district will put on the most lively and heroic gestures to drive away the pale and harsh winter.

When Xia Youchu was in the third district, every year the Brazier Festival was prepared quite grandly.Floats travel around the city for seven days, dazzling performances by singers and dancers on the main stage, an airship crossing the city, and the most grand and passionate fire feast.

In the fifth district, everything naturally shrank proportionally.Instead of floats, there are ordinary cars decorated with garlands and ribbons, and sometimes even a few bulldozers are pulled to make up the number; there are no stars on the simple stage, and anyone can pull up the microphone to sing wantonly, and the sound is deafening and spreads to thousands of households.Only the fire feast is the same as before: thousands of paper lanterns rise slowly from the center of the city, piercing the night sky.These flaming lanterns are really like sparks, and by burning themselves, they bring a momentary dawn to the long-cold world.

On the day of the festival, Minako and Hiroki go out with the boys all dressed up.They "luxuriously" sat in a car, drove from East Seventh Street to East First Street, and stopped in front of the dazzling celebration gate.

The wealthy businessmen in the five districts are only willing to bleed once during the Brazier Festival, laying shops around the entire East [-]st Street, building a temporary stage, and decorating the weather tower with lanterns, hanging colorfully like neon lights.Lanterns are hung on the four corners of the eaves, vendors are shouting enthusiastically, pedestrians wear strange ornaments on their heads, and floats blow their horns from the distant streets.

At this time, it was an old witch who was yelling on the stage, so bent that she couldn't reach the microphone, but her voice was transmitted for ten miles, and no one could understand it.Below the stage, some people were joking with each other, encouraging others to go up to grab the mic to stop the old witch's weird and pleasant tune.The lanterns and lighting decorations rattled and trembled, as if someone was bending over to hold back a laugh. Sporadic laughter flowed into the warm and cold air, melting into a pool of warm water.

Wutiao listened carefully for a while, tilting his head, and said, "It's too loud and I can't hear it clearly, it should be in ancient Asiatic language. There are still people who can sing songs in this language these days?"

Xia You is used to this man's surprising words from time to time, and he never intends to explain for himself, so he replied flatly, "Is that so?"

"That's right, that's right." Wutiao clapped his hands, "Don't worry about it, anyway, this old woman's accent is terrible, it's not good to be misled."

He was also wearing thick cashmere gloves, only half of his fingers were exposed, and his fingertips were red from the cold.

Minako brought the boys to the center of the celebration and told them to meet here on time at twelve o'clock, don't forget to play.Seeing the two children nodding, she dragged Hong Shu to find a colleague and walked in another direction.

It’s not that the parents are not worried, but that Xia You and Wutiao must wear powered armor when they go out, and their IQs are ridiculously high; instead of worrying about being bullied by others, it’s more convenient to warn them to “don’t do anything casually”.

Leaving the guardian, Wutiao immediately jumped up and grabbed Xia You, calling out: "Exhibition hall! Go to the exhibition hall!" Xia You smiled helplessly, letting Wutiao drag his cuffs forward, his eyebrows and eyes were like a breeze Faint even though.

The exhibition hall was really brightly lit, and the people who came in and out of the door were all grown-ups, which made Wutiao and Xiayou stand out.They didn't care about other people's inquisitive expressions, and happily went in and walked around, carefully looking at the driven armor in all the display cabinets on the third floor.

Wutiao muttered to observe the parts and precision core at close range. Xia You took a hard notebook to write down the structure diagram and material list, and distractedly grabbed Wutiao from time to time to prevent him from getting too close to trigger the alarm.

After shopping for more than an hour, Xia You checked the time, called Wujo out of the museum, and returned to the lively celebration.The stage was replaced by a heavy metal band, the electric guitar and drums were deafeningly noisy, and the lead singer played a few bars of black voice like a showmanship, and passers-by heard it and complained that their brains hurt.

Wu Tiao was still a little dissatisfied at first, but after following Xia You for a few steps in the crowd, he was immediately captured by the roadside stall.A dollhouse owner called the two of them to stop, and asked them with a strong northern accent if they wanted to shoot a few shots to try their luck.Xia You glanced back and saw a half-new compound regulator on the prize shelf. After a moment of mental calculation, he realized that it was quite a deal, so he pulled five and walked over.

The boss smiled and handed them an air gun, pointed to the things on the shelf, and signaled them to try it.Xia You handed him two coins, picked up the air gun, reloaded it unskillfully, aimed at the powered armor, and paused for two or three seconds before pulling the trigger.

The frame vibrated, and the drive armor fell in response to the sound.The boss didn't seem to expect that he could win it so quickly, so he wrapped up the prize and handed it over in surprise, saying, "This is the third prize. Are you interested in winning the grand prize?"

A plush doll the size of a fingernail was placed on the deepest shelf. Xia You glanced at it twice, but was not interested, and was about to pick it up and leave.Before he could take a step, a childish "Mom, I want that!" suddenly came from beside him, quite like a kid begging for candies.

Xia You turned around and saw that it was indeed a little kid.She pursed her lips, stretched out her hands, and kept chanting, the young mother had no choice but to comfort her, and refused in a soft voice.

Xu Shi felt the adult's negation, the little girl held her mother's arm tightly, her eyes became more and more red, and she was about to cry when she opened her mouth.The mother was at a loss, but she knew that the kind of big prize was just for show, and ordinary people basically couldn't win it, so she was in a hurry.

Xia You hesitated for a moment, restrained her urge to go out, and picked up the air gun again.Aim, shoot, three shots in a row, missing the target every time.

He was a little irritable, and was about to raise the gun to try again, when suddenly two hands appeared on the pitch-black barrel.

The back of the hand is pale, the joints are distinct, and there are faintly purple blood vessels under it.Wujo just gently pulled the air gun out of Xia You's hand, unloaded and loaded it smoothly, and aimed at the doll in an extremely standard gun-holding posture.He didn't even purposely aim, but there was a real murderous intent bursting out from his fingertips to his shoulder and neck; but in an instant, his index finger pulled the trigger neatly.

"Bang!"——The bullet flew by in the wind, the shelf didn't move, only the palm-sized doll swayed back and forth, and slowly fell down.

Wujo didn't even look at it, he put down the air gun casually, and the aura full of shock disappeared immediately like an ebb tide.He hung it on Xia You's shoulder with a playful smile, and said, "It's done!"

The shop owner was a bit embarrassed, but after all, everyone was watching, so he could only reluctantly package the doll and hand it over to Xia You.

The girl who got her wish and her grateful mother drifted away, Xia You breathed a sigh of relief and turned to Wutiao.The latter was a little hairy when he saw it, and said, "Why are you looking at me? Didn't you want to give them the doll?"

Xia You didn't move, still staring at Wutiao, almost burning two holes in his face.Wutiao wanted to say something more, Xia You suddenly reached out and patted him on the shoulder, and said briskly: "The fire prayer feast is about to start, let's go buy something to eat."

So Wutiao, who was at a loss, followed Xia You out of the toy store and squeezed towards the weather tower where the crowd gathered.Xia You didn't stare at him anymore, and ran to the side to buy two skewers of spicy fish balls, braving the cold wind and taking a bite of each, gradually sweating a bit.

Wutiao didn't expect that this person wouldn't give it to him, and his eyes were so greedy.As soon as he was about to leave, the weather tower began to play a notification tone. The long bell echoed in the night sky, reminding residents to come and watch the fire feast.

The noise was endless, and the smoke and fire came together with the crowd, rendering the whole street into a colorful stream.The representatives stepped onto the high platform, lit the paper lanterns with the envoys of the Torchlight Society, and prayed silently under the witness of the oracle.

After the main light is lifted into the sky, there will be a thousand companion lights accompanying it.In this cruel and frozen land, human beings earn a living by themselves, and only a thousand sky lanterns can be used as sustenance to the gods: they pray that the flames that burn the iron city walls will never go out; they pray that the long night will be lit by dawn; Another miserable winter...

All the creatures present stared with bated breath, watching the envoy swiped down the ritual sword with a loud shout, the rope broke, and slowly released the bound sky lantern.I don’t know when the stage was replaced by a female singing, pure, ethereal and holy, like a breeze lingering in the church.

"Let it go!" The main light was released, and more than a thousand lanterns placed around Dongyi Street were also slowly raised, covering the crowd in dazzling firelight, and climbing up to the sky.They looked up at the sky lantern, their faces illuminated by the warm orange light, like a group of devout believers.

In a world divided by value, everything is good or bad, and only at this moment can they coexist.Regardless of the five districts and one district, they all looked at the night sky at the same moment, watching the sparks fly to the sky and reach the seat of the gods.

In the light of the prairie fire, Xia You couldn't help feeling excited.He was immersed in endless thoughts, and five very soft voices suddenly sounded in his ears.

He said: "I know you have been curious about my identity, but it's best not to try to speculate. Knowing too much will bring disaster. I don't trust you, but it takes some time... some time to arm yourself. In the past May never be buried, and I don't want it to stick its fangs at you."

"Before then, please believe in one thing: no matter what the situation is, I will never hurt you."

Xia You suddenly turned around, Wu Tiao still had a smile on his face, and he couldn't see his shape at all.But there are also dots of fire in those sky-like eyes, like a resolute and solemn promise.

He leaned over, and his breath fell very close to Xia You's neck.Xia You tensed his back stiffly, but Wu Tiao lowered his head and bit off the fish ball in his hand, wiped his mouth like a cat, and smiled contentedly.

The drum beat gradually sounded, deafening like thunder in the sky.Xia You was uncomfortably shaken by the sound, looked up at Wutiao, but heard the drums getting louder.

He rubbed the center of his brows irritably, and was about to speak when Fuzhi suddenly understood——

That was not the sound of a drum, but his own loud, fast, almost out-of-order heartbeat.

Winter goes to spring, and spring returns to winter; sky lanterns drift year after year, spreading fire to the earth and hoping to take root in the fields.

People are busy and full of enthusiasm; life waters the soil and creates fertile soil for God.