181: Chapter 181 No Clocking In

The moment the Grey Net decrypted Rhine's encrypted letter, the firelight in Xinhuo Hall dimmed by an inch in unison.

It was not ordinary encrypted text. Every character looked as if it had been crushed by some heavy object; the edges were grey and dim. When they appeared on the interface, they were silent, without even a trace of energy fluctuation. Lu Chen stared at the last line, remaining silent for a long time without speaking.

"Where we are, ringing the bell is forbidden after dark."

Zhao Ye stood within the outer ring of light, his brows knotted together: "What does this mean? Is ringing a bell against the law?"

Bai Ya stood to the side, carrying the Patrol Crow Lamp, his face paler than usual. He had just returned from patrolling the Linhai Black Shore line, his eyes still laced with fine bloodshot veins. The small black-feathered lamp in his palm swayed gently; the flame inside did not leap upward but instead seemed to be pressed down by something invisible, clinging listlessly to the wick.

"It's not that ringing the bell is illegal." Bai Ya's voice was a bit hoarse. "It's that someone won't let the bell ring."

Shen Qinghe looked down at the fate-reflecting bronze bell - fragment in her palm.

The small bell was originally only the size of a knuckle, its bronze color darkened with age. After the two battles at the Court of No Return and Linhai, a faint trail of fire marks had appeared on the broken bell patterns. But at this moment, even that trail of fire marks was pressed down until it was almost invisible. She gently touched the body of the bell with her fingertip; there was no clear ring in her ears, only a very slight, dull pain — as if someone had stuffed cotton into the bell's chamber and then struck it through the cotton, making one's chest feel heavy and stifled.

She looked up: "It is suppressing the bell's rhythm."

Zero simultaneously pulled up the residual coordinates from Rhine's letter.

The coordinates were not within the territory, nor were they on any public nautical charts. Relying solely on the Linhai Fire Beacon, the remnants of the letter from Starry Sky Station, and Rhine's encrypted package, the Grey Net barely managed to outline a vague coastline. There were no city names there, only a stretch of coastline covered in black, as if someone had forcibly gouged it out of the map.

[Distant Sea Anomaly Zone.]

[Provisional Name: Clockless Shore.]

The moment the name appeared, the several eternal flames in the hall dimmed simultaneously.

Lin Zhao had just returned from a shift at the Qinghe settlement site, still smelling of rice porridge and disinfectant. Seeing the lights suddenly dim, he subconsciously took half a step back, then forced himself to stop.

Chen Jue, standing nearby, caught this and asked in a low voice: "Scared?"

Lin Zhao glanced at him: "Being scared and running away are two different things."

Chen Jue did not respond further.

In the center of the hall, the second voice message from Rhine was finally decrypted.

It was a woman's voice. Not young, but not old either, her Mandarin carried a deliberately polished flatness, as if every word had been weighed repeatedly in her heart — afraid of misspeaking, and even more afraid of being heard by something.

"My name is Rhine. Or rather, we are called Rhine."

"People here dare not ring bells after dark. It's not that clocks cannot run, it's that the sound of bells cannot ring. Alarm clocks, church bells, ship bells, mobile phone alerts—any sound that reminds people 'time is up' will send them into the Black Shore."

"The day you lit the Linhai lighthouse, that side saw you."

"And it also saw that bell shadow."

Zhao Ye's expression darkened: "Coming for us?"

Bai Ya scoffed, without any humor: "At least it's not us actively looking for trouble this time; trouble has learned to read a map and find us itself."

Rhine's voice continued, very soft, yet like shards of ice falling onto one's heart.

"Don't let the bell ring. Especially, do not let it ring at night."

"Seven people have already died on our side."

"The eighth one might be my turn."

The voice message ended, and the Grey Net interface was silent for two seconds.

Tang Zhiwei connected from the reality channel. In the background, people were moving boxes and urging on supplies; the noise was chaotic, but she had listened to the entire thing without missing a word.

"Can we go over there?"

Lu Chen looked toward the edge of the Fire Map.

The three points of Qinghe, Jiangbei, and Linhai had stabilized. The Black Shore branch line opened by the Patrol Crow Lamp had not yet completely extinguished, and the Spark Post Road was still in a low period after being forced open last time. Trans-oceanic support was absolutely impossible at the moment.

"We won't go directly," Lu Chen said.

Zhao Ye frowned: "Then how do we save them?"

Lu Chen did not answer immediately.

He saw that deep within the three-city fire map, the unformed bell shadow floated gently but did not ring. It seemed to understand that it absolutely must not make a sound at this moment.

Thus, Lu Chen raised his hand, his fingertips landing on the remnants of the bell shadow, and pressed down gently.

"Hide the sound first."

Bai Ya looked up: "Hide the bell?"

"Hide the ringing."

Lu Chen looked at the Patrol Crow Lamp in his hand, his tone steady: "The Crow Shadow can travel paths that sound cannot reach."

Bai Ya paused, then looked down at the lamp in his palm. The flame within the wick finally straightened into a line, like a bird that had just shaken its wings dry after the rain, regaining its spirit.

"Fine." Bai Ya sighed, his tone helpless. "I knew it; nothing good ever comes from taking this lamp."

Lin Zhao suddenly spoke up: "What about Qinghe?"

Everyone looked at him.

He was not questioning them, but looking at the Fire Map very seriously, his knuckles tightening slightly: "If the other side is coming for the bell shadow, all fire points in the three cities will be tested. Bai Ya is going to chase the signal from the distant sea; Zhao Ye and Officer Shen may not be able to make it to every location in time. The settlement sites, hospitals, and Safe Houses are all still relying on the Lamp-Keeping Zone to hold up."

He spoke a bit quickly, and only after finishing did he realize the hall had gone quiet. His ears grew slightly warm, but he did not step back even half a step.

Zhao Ye glanced at him: "If you have something to say, just say it."

Lin Zhao was silent for half a second.

"I will guard the outer perimeter of Qinghe."

Chen Jue almost blurted out, "Can you do it?" but swallowed the words back.

Lin Zhao saw this and instead smiled: "I don't know if I can do it either."

"But someone has to try."

Lu Chen looked at him, not speaking immediately.

A faint firelight fell from the central stele and landed on the side of Lin Zhao's wrist. It was not a new instrument, nor an official upgrade of authority, but a heavier, more stable Guardian Lamp mark, like placing a solid brick beneath his feet.

[Lin Zhao: Temporary weighting of the Guardian Lamp path.]

[Mission: Guarding the boundary of the Qinghe outer perimeter.]

Lin Zhao looked down at the faint light on his wrist, his Adam's apple bobbing.

"Understood."

Almost at the same time, in reality, the shop windows of an old clock street in the east of Qinghe suddenly lit up.

All the old clocks in the shop that had been stopped for over a decade simultaneously moved their hands to eight o'clock at night.

The next second, mobile phone alerts across the entire street rang out in unison.

Tang Zhiwei quickly listed the risk points on the reality level: Qinghe had the old clock street, Jiangbei had the old broadcast lines for the Liu Bridge station services, and Linhai had the navigation beacon bells and the port scheduling System. Every single one was tied to "time is up," "timekeeping," or "returning to port." Previously, these were just gears of city operations; now, someone had quietly sprinkled black sand into the gaps of those gears.

News also came from Gu Xingzhou: the evening study bells at several schools had inexplicably false alarms, the hospital scheduling System popped up non-existent shift handover reminders, and a fire station even received a dispatch order that had been expired for three years. None of it was fatal, but it was like an invisible hand, gently testing the edges of the three cities, waiting to see which place would fall into chaos first.

Lu Chen did not place everything on the core members. He had Tang Zhiwei cut off all automatic reminder Systems in public areas, had Gu Xingzhou notify key units in the three cities to switch to manual confirmation, and had Xu Minglan remove all alarm clocks and ticking devices from the medical area.

It was not because these things were already fatal; it was because Torch had finally learned — before the anomaly could reach out, to pry its fingers open one by one.

He divided all the returned information into three categories: reality risks that could be handled immediately were given to Gu Xingzhou and Tang Zhiwei; the distant sea signals that could be observed but not touched were given to Bai Ya; and the parts that would directly affect the bell shadow were temporarily suppressed in the deepest part of Xinhuo Hall.

After the classification was complete, the three-city fire map was finally no longer being dragged around by the same fear.

But the bell of the clock street still struck once, gently.

It was as dull as a sigh.