On the long street, Ghost Hand smokes his pipe in silence. Laughter and laughter flowed in the air, but the air around the benches froze, like a cold winter, making the homeless man who was limp on the ground shiver.

"Excuse me, how do you get to Luther Street?" someone seemed to be lost behind him, blankly asking passers-by, and finally asking Ghost Hand.

The ghost hand didn't lose his temper in the irritability, but he didn't have the interest to look back and answer. Just smoked his pipe in silence and pointed to the right.

"Ah, thank you!"

The passers-by got an answer and went happily.

The smashing continued, but until the group had thoroughly searched the hotel from the attic to the cellar, and found no place to hide a single white-haired child and his dog......

Finally, Ghost Hand walked into the hotel, looked around at the devastated front desk, and his eyes were cloudy: "Did someone say something?"

"I swear, he's not here...... He's really not here anymore!"

The proprietress who was tied up and slapped several times choked up: "He checked out half an hour ago......! I really don't know, I don't know anything!"

"In other words, it's empty again?"

The ghost hand put down his pipe, and the wall was covered with cigarette ash, and his voice was cold: "You tell me that we passed by that damn child?"

Soon, the homeless man, who wanted to escape, had his legs broken and dragged into a dilapidated hotel.

"Sir, I didn't expect it to be my business! I swear!" the homeless man pleaded in pain: "Bypass me, I didn't deceive Mr. Shaman, I really didn't ......"

Ghost Hand put down his pipe and stared coldly at the homeless man who was pressed to the floor. The homeless man's voice grew weaker and weaker, and at last he was speechless.

His eyes were full of despair.

"Actually, I know that it was just a small mistake, and I can't blame you. ”

The ghost hand crouched down and pressed his hand on the homeless man's right eye, his cloudy pupils full of regret: "But alas, I'm not like the police in Scotland Yard...... Reasonable. ”

Syllable!

Something is broken.

......

"Thousands of calculations, I missed two points. ”

On the street, Ye Qingxuan, who was dragging a dilapidated suitcase, muttered dejectedly: "The first didn't count the entrance exam and the actual test, and the second didn't count the ......."

He lowered his head, looked at the crystal ball in his hand, and wanted to cry without tears:

"Why is this broken ether ball so expensive!"

In Ye Qingxuan's hand, a fist-sized crystal ball flickered and reflected the bright light of the street lamp. In the noisy voices, a little irregular light flashed in the crystal ball from time to time.

Like fine silver dust, it is constantly living and dying and gathering in the crystal, and after looking at it for a long time, it makes people feel dizzying.

This is one of the most commonly used measuring tools among musicians: the ether sphere.

What appears to be a solid crystal ball is nothing more than an extremely thin and hard shell that is instantly shaped using high temperatures. Both the refractive index and the thickness have harsh rules that bordering nitpicking, and the interior is inscribed with runes and infused with pure aether, capable of reacting to any tiny sound.

In Ye Qingxuan's hands, this is a civilian item sold in the store, which is the most basic type for musician apprentices to practice. The service life is about four months, which has already consumed almost all of Ye Qingxuan's money. It is said that there are more high-spec ether balls and measuring tools in the military and musicians' societies.

That's not something that money can buy anymore.

As for 'how to communicate with the ether', isn't the most suitable introductory material for him in his hands?

He stroked the note that the wolf flute had given him and sighed softly.

Even so, it's still very difficult.

To this day, musicians are rare in the human world, even if every book tells you that if you want to communicate with the aether, you just need to chant runes.

The runes of the notes, which are the basis of all musical scores and powers, have come from years of human exploration and research, and they are composed of complex basic syllables, which are awkward and obscure, and difficult to recite.

More than half of them were transcribed by ether of the world's voices.

From runes to bars, from bars to movements, to the end of the complete score. In the long process of exploration, mankind has developed a complete system, divided into seven branches and hundreds of specializations.

It's just that in the notes of the wolf flute, only three basic notes are recorded, which are three of the branch introductory basics. They are the 'extraction' of the change school, the 'peace' of the forbidden faction, and the 'bestiality' of the summoning school.

As long as you can master any of them, you will be able to pass the test.

It's just that Ye Qingxuan didn't have the confidence to complete this seemingly simple test within ten days.

In particular, this is Avalon, and in order to prevent the sound from causing a massive Aether commotion, the entire city is shrouded in the Aether Suppression Barrier from beginning to end.

This barrier is like a sieve, completely suppressing the aetheric interference caused by ninety-nine percent of the noise, and only syllables close to the standard can produce an effect.

After all, not many ordinary people dare to have anything to do with the Aether, and people are more afraid of the Aether in their hearts.

Whether it is the notes of the wolf flute or any musician's book, on the cover of them will be a line of precepts written by the first pope, and that black precept is engraved in the heart of every person, from birth to death, never forgotten.

- Fear of the ether.

－

Thanks to the history of the church, Ye Qingxuan was able to have a more comprehensive understanding of the current world - after all, for human beings, nine-tenths of the entire world is an unopened dark area.

Researchers all over the world use the four colors when labeling maps.

The hinterland is white, which represents the sparse density of the aether and can be inhabited by humans on a large scale, followed by yellow, where some high-pitched noises can cause accidents, and red, where loud noises are forbidden...... As for black, it is a terrible forbidden place outside the frontier world.

There, the slightest cough is said to have a terrifying chain reaction like an avalanche.

In the border cities of the Red Zone, shouting is not even allowed to speak, people are only allowed to whisper, and they are called the Quiet Zone. People who have not been to borders and beyond borders cannot understand the pain and fear.

Although the Dark Ages have only been over for three hundred years, countless cities and villages have been destroyed by the Aether uprising...... Over the years, natural disasters have become a nightmare that haunts the hearts of every human being.

Because of this, there must be a place for a church in a human settlement, not only for spiritual beliefs, but also because the church will use special technology to dilute the density of the ether when building a church to ensure the safety of a certain area.

Because of the mastery of communicating with the aether and manipulating the aether, musicians will be respected and feared.

For the advancement and development of technology, musicians have also been paying a huge price.

It is said that a hundred years ago, in order to make it easier to communicate with the Aether, all schools chose to establish academies on the border. But the elimination rate and casualty rate were so high that some schools were considering moving back into the hinterland - at least so that students wouldn't lose their heads or be wrenched by the aether vortex for mispronouncing a syllable.

From ancient times to the present, becoming a musician has been a dangerous business, and its difficulty in getting started is second to none. Therefore, Ye Qingxuan is thinking about ...... Wouldn't it be too difficult to learn a rune in ten days?

－

Late at night, Luther Street, empty bus stop platform.

I haven't seen it for a few years, and this place is still like what Ye Qingxuan remembers. At night, there are few pedestrians, but there are always two lights, and there is a bench to lie on. The temperature of the summer night is not enough to freeze people, and the wind is still within the tolerance range.

This is Midtown, and the surrounding area is safe, and as long as you don't dress like a beggar, the patrol police won't chase you away. Rather than squeezing those rotten shacks with beggars, this is really a good place to go after living on the streets.

Moreover, it is also convenient for him to flip through his notes.

Although he knew the contents of the notes by heart on the way to London, he decided to read them again. The 'extraction' of the School of Change had been abandoned by him in the first place.

Its sensitivity to the ether is too demanding, and with Ye Qingxuan's current near-blind sense, even if it succeeds, it will only be unable to control the runes and be extracted into a dried corpse, right?

The 'bestiality' of the summoning school was the clearest in the description of the notes, but it sounded like a beast roaring, and the six basic syllables could not be connected together at all, making Ye Qingxuan unable to grasp the point.

Only the 'peace' of the forbidden faction seems to be the easiest to learn, but it contains dozens of basic syllables! It can be seen from this that the forbidden faction has the highest entry difficulty among the seven factions. Ye Qingxuan really didn't have confidence in his talent.

There is no choice but to try one by one.

"First, take a deep breath......"

Ye Qingxuan sat on the bench and nibbled on the last dry food. By the light, he flipped through the booklet in his hand: "The muscles of the larynx relax, feel the expansion of the heart, and then exhale slowly, the tongue slightly against the teeth......"

Following the 'little tricks' taught in the book, he uttered the 'ξ' syllable with great anticipation...... Hmm, how is it like being stabbed?

Of course, the ether ball did not react.

He pouted, always feeling that something was wrong. The teenager tried again with hope...... This time it didn't look like someone had been stabbed, it looked like a flock of ducks quacking.

The ether ball is still unresponsive.

“......”

Ye Qingxuan took a deep breath and comforted himself: "It must be that I am insincere." Be sincere, be sincere, and don't be cranky. ”

Lao Fei lay on the bench, squinting at this second goods, and quickly retracted his gaze and continued to sleep.

"Whoa...... No, still no. ”

"Uh-huh, hmm, why is there still no response......"

"Oooh......"

In the long summer night, Ye Qingxuan wasted three hours before he realized that perhaps he was particularly incompatible with this syllable. Maybe it would be better to change the syllable.

Next, the ether proves with silence that changing syllables is not good at all.

"Oooh oh!!"

"Ahh

"Yo Yo ......"

No matter how Ye Qingxuan tried, the ether ball still had no response, and in the end, Ye Qingxuan, who had a sore throat, couldn't help but slam the booklet in his hand to the ground angrily: "Is there a mistake?!What the hell is this!"

Ye Qingxuan glared at the ether ball angrily, as if he wanted to see a flower, but no matter how he stared, the crystal ball remained immobile and did not give any reaction.

"Is it broken?"

He shook to be sure, but at that moment, the ether ball lit up.

"Huh?!"

Like the light of a firefly, the glitter in the ether ball faintly lit up and went out, like silver powder wafting in liquid. Immediately after, countless flashes of light appeared like stars, and irregular whirls flickered, illuminating Ye Qingxuan's stunned face.

"What's going on?"

He looked around in astonishment, and there was a strange smell in the wind.

Faint laughter rang out from afar.

Something is coming.