Keeper Program

"do we know each other?"

Enduring the rotten stench, Ed crawled into the cellar along the stubby ladders.It was muddy inside, only a glimmer of gloomy light flickered behind the wooden barrels piled with pickled vegetables and salted fish.

"Yes, ten years ago, in Xisang Workhouse. You must have lost your memory."

The voice just stated, not surprised or curious, as if everything had nothing to do with him.

Unknown in childhood, he was adopted in Xisang Workhouse, and later adopted by speculator Ludvik Waikelow——Ed remembered the personal files he saw when he was in the police station.

He does know me.

In the darkness, the candle has almost dried up, and the melted candle tears formed a small pool of irregular spots on the ground.And the figure reflected by the candle—thin, haggard, sallow with malnutrition, like a skeleton wrapped in human skin.

The young man in front of him had a disheveled beard, blond hair scruffy and thin like moldy hay, baggy and tattered clothes, and trousers stained with urine.

Those arms withered and curled up like stumps, at most only two fingers wide, as if they could be broken with a slight force.His right hand holding the paintbrush can only be lifted up to his chest with difficulty, while the left hand holding the palette hangs down above the navel, as ridiculous as a mouse standing upright.

If you don't look into his eyes, the whole scene is very tragic.

But his eyes—gold like his hair, but not so grassy and yellow, glistened with the richness of honey and gold.

The eyes were calm and indifferent, as if indifferent to their own tragedy.Just mirroring the painting in front of me.

The characters in the painting are distorted by the trembling arms, and the colors are distorted by the inferior paint, but the expression is imprinted on the canvas like an engraving printing——

Or loyalty, or cunning, or nobility, or hypocrisy... No one has ever portrayed true feelings on unreal shapes like this.

"My hair is blocking the view." His words didn't sound like pleading, but like condescending orders.

Well...how should I put it?Maybe because I'm an acquaintance, I speak more casually.

Ed deliberately let himself ignore Buck's rudeness, walked forward helplessly, and brushed his sheep's messy forehead to the sides.

"Much better." He nodded slightly, without thanking him.

"Ed, are you okay?"

Miss Quinn's voice came from outside the cellar, as if she was worried about herself.She slid down the ladder so fast that the rats in the corners fled in all directions when they fell to the ground.

"Please don't disturb me, miss, you've added unnecessary chaos to this small space." There was a strange sarcasm in his weak tone.

"No problem." Faced with such humiliation, Quinn replied with a sneer, "Stone Kuntu, where is this man? I'll leave immediately when I find out."

"I will. But you must stop barking and leave my studio. The light on you is too strong and violent, and it interferes with my color vision."

Buck said calmly, his eyes still fixed on the drawing board, and nothing could take him away from it.

It seems that he is not friendly to strangers either.

Ed stopped Quinn, and Buck's physical condition could not withstand any blow from her:

"You go out first, and leave this place to me. He knows me, so it's no problem." He persuaded with a very small voice, trying to calm Quinn's emotions.

"Heh... ok, let's go..."

Her smile became more ferocious, and her teeth became more pronounced.But in the end, she turned around.

But suddenly, she turned around again and kicked hard on the pile of wooden barrels containing pickled vegetables and salted fish——

All of a sudden, the world was turned upside down, and the barrels collapsed like dominoes, knocking down Buck's easel and slapping his paintings on the ground.The already foul-smelling air has added a bit of filth, which is unbearable.

After doing all this, Quinn walked away and slammed the cellar door back with a "bang".

"Uh, I'm sorry..."

Ed said while moving the wooden barrel pressed against the easel.He was very worried that Quinn's behavior would anger Buck and make him keep quiet about Mr. Kuntu's whereabouts.

"Why an apology? I fear her, she hates me, that's all. False respect means nothing."

However, Buck didn't seem to be angry, he just stood up silently, knelt on the ground, trying to help the easel up again.Ed was about to help him, but he smiled and said:

"You don't have to pretend to care about me anymore, old friend. Go to what you really want to do, at the sawmill in the western suburbs of Silvermist City, where there is a small sunflower field. Kuntu's family cemetery is in the sunflower field Further west, you can't go wrong."

"Buck..."

Ed didn't expect things to be so easy. He thought it would take him a long time to get Buck to tell the location of the Kuntu family's tomb.

Buck struggled to prop up the easel, and continued:

"There is also the elixir of relics. Kuntu and I mentioned his family's potion. He said that it would revive the memory of the carrion in his belly: 'Swallow black flesh and spit out colorful colors.'"

"...that's all I know. Stone Kuntu trusts me and thinks I'll keep his secret, he's a complete idiot."

Buck sneered, with sarcasm in his eyes.Ed shuddered at the dark indifference.

"you can go now."

He finally said, his eyes returned to the drawing board, like nails driven into the wall.

"Okay, take care."

Ed left an unspeakable gaze, he climbed the stairs and left Buck's dark studio.

"Have you found the location?" Seeing that Quinn was still angry and silent, Father Dylan, who was pinching his nose, continued.

After that, he covered his mouth and took a deep breath, for fear that the flies lingering around him would take the opportunity to fly in.

"Yes, the lumberyard in the western suburbs. Kuntu probably took the potion and is performing some kind of dangerous ritual. Shall we call some more support?"

"No. The three of us can handle it."

Quinn replied in a deep voice.It can be seen from the last incident that she has never been very interested in "team action".

"If it's just a one-person ceremony, the threat wouldn't be too great, not to mention Mr. Kuntu isn't even a Beyonder. With a third-level Extraordinary and quasi-level-three Extraordinary present, I think it's enough to deal with most emergencies. "Dylan also gave his own analysis.

Miss Quinn's crystallization level should be between the second and third levels, on the verge of transformation.So Father Dylan should be a genuine third-level Extraordinary?

"OK then……"

Ed nodded in agreement.No one knows what consequences Kuntu's ceremony will cause, and it is necessary to go to the scene as soon as possible to deal with it so that the damage can be minimized.

He has always been curious about the strength of a more advanced Extraordinary, maybe he will be lucky enough to witness it today...

……

Before the invention of steam power, people could only rely on waterwheels for sawn timber production.The industrial revolution made the location of the sawmill no longer have geographical restrictions. The steam engine with hundreds of horsepower drove the sawmill to decompose the logs into timber, and then transported them to the city along the railway.

Walking west along the sawmill, the roar of steam gradually dissipated in the wind, and they soon found the sunflower field.At this time, the sunflowers have just sprouted and are far from being in full bloom.The upright stalks sway slightly in the wind, like an endless dream.

The sunflower is the national flower of the Kingdom of Lyria and the family crest of the Royal Horian family.

Ed thought again of Buck's sunflowers, the twisting, swirling balls of bright yellow liquid fire.Exudes ancient and frenzied vitality, just like the reflection of the sun.

"By the way, you said that the painter without arms knew you, is that true?" Dylan interrupted his thoughts.

"Maybe. I have limited memory of past events."

"What do you think of him? Is he really as talented as Kuntu's diary said?"

"Buck is indeed talented, but he is also terrifying. There is no subtext in his language, and he will directly project his thoughts into words, which scares me." Ed frowned.

"What's the subtext?" Quinn asked suddenly.

"Let's say a young guy wants to sleep with a pretty girl." Dylan said with a wicked smirk on his face, "He'll compliment the girl on her taste, her kindness, how much he wants to spend the rest of his life with her and grow old together .But we all know that he just wants to sleep with that girl."

Under Quinn's contemptuous gaze, he had no choice but to finish his conclusion in a solemn tone:

"But if he opened his mouth and said what he really thinks, it would definitely shock everyone."

"That's right. That's why no agent wants to deal with Buck." Ed commented, "He can't deal with anyone, except a lunatic like him."

"I think it's because the backyard is too stinky." Dylan said with disgust.

The cemetery of the Kuntu family was originally protected by a tall old stone wall, but now it is empty and ruined.They entered the cemetery without even opening the door.

All that remains of the rather artistic stone statue is a dilapidated body, like a soul in agony.The stone door of the tomb is closed tightly, and some mysterious and colorful unknown thing is like a fish at the bottom of a pond, surging inside.

Quinn tried to push the stone door open, but with all her strength and trembling teeth, the stone door couldn't move half a step.Then she pierced the sharp butterfly-wing jackknife into the crack of the door, trying to forcefully pry the stone door open, but only made a gap in the stone door.

"Did the 'Great Painter' tell you how to open this damn door?" In the end, she could only look at Ed helplessly.

"He didn't..." Ed repeatedly recalled every word Buck said, and suddenly realized:

"Wait, I see."

He walked to the stone gate and whispered softly:

'Swallow black flesh and spit out colorful colors. '

boom -

After a loud noise that didn't sound like a machine, the stone door burst open.Ed reached out and sent the one-eyed spider into the tomb, and his consciousness drilled into it:

The passage is straight and elongated, like a staircase leading to hell.The bottom of the stairs was covered with mossy, iridescent slime that squirmed, grew, and seemed to have life.

Mr. Kuntu's desperate and crazy eyes were deeply sunken into the eye sockets, and his tongue was swollen and black, protruding from the copper-colored lips.His clothes and hands are stained with oil paint, becoming vivid and surreal, like a person in a painting.

And the dreamy and rich colors like oil paints are slowly gushing out from his eyes, nostrils, ears and throat...

In the direction where his eyes are facing is a work that is hung on an easel but framed in a rectangular frame.

In the portrait, a woman stares at Mr. Kuntu with calm tender love...

【wuxiax.com】official website: www.wuxiax.com