It is said that until the end of the heavy rain season, Mrs. Oki did not return from the inner city.

This made Lady Ogiri's attendant, Kirimi, very uneasy.

She would have a period of time these days, wandering absentmindedly by the water's edge in the Xiahuai District. As always, the sun sprinkled endless waves on the water, and the oncoming sea breeze made people's faces ache. Kirimi turned around and leaned against the fence on one side. In the past few days, she has not worn that black robe again, but has changed into a small dress that she liked a long time ago. Her skirt fluttered in the wind, and she pressed down the hem of her skirt and set her eyes on the other side of the river.

On the other side of the river is still Sunset City, with its overlapping buildings.

Nothing has changed, everything is as it was.

The shadow of the sundial falls on the sunset river, like the hands of an eternal clock, slowly moving.

Through the channel of Mrs. Okiri, Kirimi also learned the information that the pursuers had returned to the court.

"Well, he might be dead......"

Kirimi left the river and walked back along the path.

Sunset City's market is ordinary, and it still spreads the grotesque news that I don't know who came out. Fish-sellers and greengrocers from the countryside laugh and argue, and petty theft is still everywhere. Xiahuai District is also ordinary. Except for the guards who cleaned calmly day after day, preparing to carry out the job to the end of their lives, the guards walked up and down tremblingly, thinking that the girl in the alley was suitable. Mr. De is also commonplace, busily traveling to distant places, making new notes on his own, and then returning in the drifting clouds of the sunset.

Madame de has been complaining a lot lately because she doesn't like to write. Mr. De often walked out of the door and stood comfortably on the edge of the fence on the second floor.

With the light of the sun that never sets, Mr. Tokuku saw Kirishi walking by. Kirumi didn't speak, and the middle-aged man also turned his head wordlessly.

The infinite setting sun dragged Lady Okiri's residence into a long black shadow. The coat of arms on the walls of the building is very clear.

Kirimi enters through the small door and arrives at the library inside the rock building, ready to carry out the day's homework, but unexpectedly sees her master, whom she hasn't seen for a long time. She was pleasantly surprised:

"Madame, you're back!"

Mrs. Ogiri is also ordinary. She wearily took off her coffin clothes, revealing her plump figure as a woman. She asked Kirimi to boil the water for the medicated bath so that she could make the medicated bath in her bedroom. The water in Mrs. Okiri's medicinal bath is very particular, and the ordinary people can't burn it if it's not Mrs. Okiri's hand-held church.

"Madam, why did Her Majesty summon you for so long for such a major project...... You look like you're having a good time. ”

Two hours later, Kirumi poured the viscous water from the medicated bath into a large bucket. The water emitted a series of steam upwards and rose to the ceiling window, covering the glass.

Lady Oki took off her clothes and drowned her body in the black muddy liquid. She closed her eyes and lay on the edge of the bucket, smiling.

"I'm doing something really big...... This matter is so important that I can't be at peace in the inner city, and I'm afraid that I won't be able to open my eyes at any time. ”

Kirimi spread out her lady's hair and washed it with soapy water in strands. Mrs. Oki said easily, and Kirimi was startled:

"Is it more important than the original healing of His Highness?"

"The status of the most important things cannot be measured against each other. But if you want to compare, Kirishi...... This matter is indeed much more important than taking care of His Highness. ”

Because now......

It is in the manufacture of a new Highness.

And I have no doubt that I am infinitely close to the very heart of Sunset City's secrets.

Lady Oki thought to herself, smiling without saying a word, and she gently flicked the water with her fingers, and the muddy water took on a dull neon sheen

"His Highness and the fugitives who kidnapped His Highness...... Were they all brought back? I've heard that the Protectors brought back two corpses...... Is that them? ”

Kirimi asked cautiously.

Lady Oki raised her head and stared at the sky above the skylight. The sky under the eternal setting sun was a fiery color, and the clouds that smeared it on were pink.

"That's what the pursuers reported."

Mrs. Oki said this, and stopped.

Kirimi's face instantly turned pale, and his head buzzed. She trembled and picked up another trace of Lady Okiri's and carefully wiped it. But in a moment, an uncomfortable whimper rose up her throat and almost made her scream. She pursed her lips and put up with her discomfort, thinking to herself that she would never want to talk about him again.

"But ......"

Mrs. Oki said:

"His Majesty recognized that the two bodies were fake, and that the Protectors had been deceived by the fugitives. Now they're going to go out again. ”

Before the words fell, the skylight roared with airflow.

Hearing this, Kirumi looked up and saw a large hot air balloon floating across the sky. Kirumi knew that it was a mobile device made using "gas that flies upwards all the time". This device is called a skyrise balloon and can only be used on a sunny day.

That is, he ...... The fugitives aren't dead yet? ”

"Maybe that's the case...... "Lady Ogiri turned her eyes, and caught a glimpse of Kiriti, "What, are you happy?" It's strong. ”

Kirumi quickly reduced his strength and said:

"I'm not, I don't...... I'm very angry, or guilty, right now...... The city protectors can't even do this little thing, and they have failed His Majesty and Sunset City...... This is not good! ”

She said and spoke, grinning and smiling.

"That's true."

Mrs. Oki turned her head and knew that the little girl's heart had flown away like Lichuan's heart. She closed her eyes, half-asleep, too lazy to say anything more.

At that time, dozens of skyrise balloons floated above the southern foothills of the Daling Mountain Range, and each skyrise balloon had soldiers holding long-range strange objects.

Each of these soldiers was guaranteed to kill the fugitives the moment they saw them. Large pieces of white paper are stuffed into a special glass bottle, and when they are taken out, they are already flying. The paper birds flapped their wings and scattered into the mountains, acting as eyes and ears for searching.

At that time, several paper birds flew over the head of the "long-legged serpent", and at that moment, the giant snake seemed to lose interest in the huge skeleton and walked among the mountains again. The whole earth was shaking. All the rocks are rocking.

"To avoid the 'Perched Dragon', we just need to find His Highness."

The commander of the Protector said.

The dragon is the official name of Sunset City's official name for the strange beast that appeared in the Daling Mountains.

As for the huge skeleton, in the eyes of Sunset City's officials, it should be the ancestor of the dragon.

"Is the Celestial Mirror's lock in effect?"

The Scout with the telescope replied:

"I couldn't find them, and I couldn't find the light of the mirror."

The Guardian Legionnaires knew that things were getting irretrievably sour, and that the fugitives might have left Sunset City's sphere of influence.

"You can't! Gotta get them back! ”

The Commander of the First Legion contorted his face and slammed his fist into the map he had just surveyed in the camp at the foot of the mountain. When His Majesty recognized the corpse, His Majesty personally said that one of the most important strange things in Sunset City was in His Highness's body. He had been with His Majesty the longest time, so he naturally knew what this thing was.

The city guards have exhausted their means, and they have invested at least twenty or more strange objects, and even used some strange objects whose functions have not yet been fully discovered, such as an ant box. Just write the appearance and name of the person you want to find on the ant box, the ants in the ant box...... It looks like an ant...... They will crawl out and search the whole land for them.

Ants search the earth indiscriminately, so they crawl onto strange beasts, which is at risk of angering them.

The dispatch of the city protector has become the most fashionable topic in Sunset City in a short period of time. The panic in the inner city makes the people of the outer city feel happy.

This joke they can tell until the next city festival.

They didn't dare to mock them openly, not because they would break the law, but because the passing guards would take advantage of the offense in their language and blackmail them. But people are at ease, and they turn every private room into a tavern, and all the dimly lit alleys can have gambling stalls. A large number of people began to bet on this gamble, guessing if this highness could be recovered. If it can't be recovered, will His Highness come back on his own?

At that time, several young men gave up all their savings, saying that they would bet that the fugitives would not be caught, and that they would one day return. Seeing the appearance of this group of children, countless people from all walks of life raised their wine glasses happily and laughed, saying that they would toast to Sunset City, which never sets.

There are also people who don't know what happened, asking around who escaped, and why did the city protectors be so angry? There will be bored women standing on the street leaning against the door of the alley, beckoning customers, telling them that the inventor of Sunset City had fled, and that it was the heir appointed by the crown who had fled with him.

Every day, people who don't know where to get the news tell the bustling people in the outer city that the city guards are all day and night, and all the means are quietly unanswered.

"Yo, who's going to tell me what the Protectors have done? Did you catch those two fugitives? ”

"I know, I know, they only disturbed the birds of the mountains, and the birds of the Daling Mountains flew here!" The birds stopped on the bricks and tiles, looked at the group of people who didn't know what to say, and when the eyes of the group of industrial and commercial drunken customers turned, they hurriedly took off. Immediately, someone took out (claiming to be) a treasured ancestral statue to bet.

"What bet?"

"They won't be caught! It's obvious. ”

"Do you want to make a second bet? Do you think they'll be able to come back? ”

"Then you can't come back!"

The Shinsui family's dock had been banned from discussion, but the people on board happily began to tell the story of the fugitives who did not know who had made it up for the hundredth time from their narrow beds.

Gu Chuan, who was already famous, and His Royal Highness, who was originally unknown, had extremely loud reputations.

The guards searched all over the Daling Mountains, shouting angrily, and the gamblers who were too young to do so hoped that they would be caught quickly.

The two people in the center of the whirlpool couldn't hear all the calls, and only continued to follow the wind in the veins of salt crystals.

There were many outlets for the salt crystal veins, and they saw valleys, cliffs, and bones left by animals of unknown ages.

But when they wanted to go out, they could always see the dragon strolling by.

They couldn't see the dragon's eyes, but it covered the skin of the rocks, and there were many small pits, and the inside of the pits was dark and bottomless. Gu Chuan often looked at each other, and found that there was still brilliance on his face, so he retreated into the ground.

The unexpected, intricate beneath the mountains, with their infinite number of paths, reminded them of the remnants of a tribe or kingdom of the Toelesss deeper in the dungeon. Some roads are already blocked. Some of the blockages were dug by their hands, and the roads were formed again.

"Where are we going?"

Chu Yun asked.

"I don't know!" Gu Chuan replied, "But it's because I don't know...... That's why it's so exciting, isn't it? How boring it would be if you knew everything from the beginning! ”

Hatsuun thought it was indeed like this.

There is no life underground, but there is no shortage of food in the mountains. They killed several kinds of beasts, from which they chose a suitable hard skin that was not afraid of water, and after removing the hair, they used the leather with tendons and straw ropes to make two simple backpacks as carrying tools.

The surplus hides were made into two small soft hats, which they wore on the top of their heads to shelter from the sun and rain.

When they reached the depths of the mountains, the dragon disappeared from nowhere.

The aurora of the Celestial Mirror had long since stopped, and their faces no longer glowed.

"I don't think we're going to have to walk the tunnels underground."

They climbed to the top of a mountain, where Sunset City could not be seen, only other mountains at the end of the view, with endless clouds floating on the edge of the mountain.

And in the clouds, the sun that never sets only shows a small crimson edge, crumbling between the mountains and the mountains. The twilight is vast, and the bald rocks are shrouded in a deep silence, and the last rays of the sun shine in the infinite calm twilight.

"Chu Yun, you say, the sun, is it setting a little bit on the side of Sunset City?"

Gu Chuan brought up this question again that he had already said.

Hatsuun blinked, remembering the descriptions of the Rizhao River by many people in the inner city.

They all call Sunset City the last place where the sun sets.

"Seems like so."

So the sun...... Will it fall or will it not fall?

But assuming that the sun really doesn't set, then no one knows that the sun will set...... And who spread the idea that the sun will set?

This pair of dependent sons and daughters meditated silently on the heights of the world.

To the east is a plateau, and to the west is bare rocks. They did not hesitate, but went in the direction indicated by the compass, and in a time that no one had calculated, they passed through a dark taiga, and over a swamp of corrosive acid, over seven mountains, and over six rivers that flowed through the mountains.

As we continue to move southward, the world is getting darker and the temperature is cooling. The bitter wind blows from the end of the mountains, and it is an environment that Sunset City has never seen before.

"It's colder than the solar term of Bailu......"

Chu Yun grabbed his clothes tightly, Gu Chuan walked for a day, and it was time to get tired. So they found a cave, and they went into the cave and lit a fire, spread dry grass and branches, and spent the night in the cave.

When Gu Chuan woke up, Chu Yun was not by his side, but stood at the mouth of the cave, as if looking in the direction of Sunset City from afar.

"Are you missing your hometown?"

The young man brushed his teeth with a soft branch dipped in salt, and said to the girl as he walked over to Hatsuun's side.

Who knew that Chu Yun's complexion was entangled to the extreme. She hurriedly said:

"No, it's not...... Look there! See the direction the sun sets! ”

"What else could it be? Is the sun completely down? ”

Gu Chuan raised his head, stood on tiptoe, and just glanced at it, and the branch in his hand slipped down in astonishment, hitting the rock and making a sound.

The sun had disappeared from the end of this shapeless celestial body, hidden in the darkness that no one could see. Now where the sun is, there is a crescent crescent that bends like nothing, gently opening up on the edge of the earth, as if it is about to rise.

The light of the crescent moon was sprinkled on the silent branches and rocks, and on them.

"That's what you said before...... The moon? What kind of place have we been......"

Hatsukumo's eyes widened, trying to look for the shadows of the stars next to the moon.

To her disappointment, in this deep dark blue world, only the crescent moon showed half of its horns at the bottom of the mountains.

The black mountains seemed to be in an eternal dream, without any sound. The icy night breeze kept blowing against the young man who was as tough as a rock.

Gu Chuan stretched out his right hand to the moon in confusion, and said for a long time:

"We may have arrived, farther away than where the sun never sets."

The law of day has failed, and this is the corner where eternal night begins.