Divine Flame Crystal

Monica plunged headfirst into the turbulent current, her shoulders and elbows covered in spangled bone fragments. Her folding leaf-shaped external soul bones resembled a breathing suit of armor. She lifted a stumbling elderly woman and, with her bone wings spread, landed steadily back at the retreat line. She turned and shouted to the sergeant, "Protect the first group to retreat to the valley side. Don't block the road outside the village! Bone Team, hold the second line. Anyone who dares to stray in my path will have their bones ripped apart!"

Isabel's hands trembled. The fallen divine power surrounded the edge of the well like a thin shell of black gold. The starlight pressed against it, and it cracked. She pressed back again. Pandora raised her hand, and lines of blood stretched from her fingertips, temporarily closing the cracks in the shell like sutures. At the seventh stitch, her hand paused slightly, and a little blood oozed from the corner of her mouth.

Xingluo glanced sideways: "It's my turn."

"You go stop him." Pandora didn't look at him, but said coldly, "I'll sew."

Arnold crouched behind a collapsed section of the courtyard wall, his shadow spreading like a tide toward the edge of the well. His eyes were red as if on fire, and his teeth were clenched so tightly that they made a clattering sound. "I'll stab you again, deeper."

"Don't." Xingluo intercepted his shadow in mid-air, his eyes as cold as ice. "He's just reaching out now. If you stab him with your knife, it will only force him to look up."

Arnold fiercely retracted the shadow line, sweat running down his forehead: "You are the only one who can order me around. Just this once."

The God of Light's vision spread like a thin net, weighing down every living being. The voice fell again, like distant thunder, yet also like a whisper close to the ear: "Mortal, you repeat your failure. Your obsession has cost the world 1,342 breaths."

Xingluo looked up. The hand in the well had already raised its wrist above the edge. The Bone of Holy Light hummed in the air, like countless fine needles brushing against the skin. Xingluo placed her hand on Xiao Hei's horn, and her fingertips gently plucked the silver bell.

The first sound, gather.

The dragons' breathing inexplicably aligned a fraction of an inch. Orros's thunder waist felt as if someone had pressed it, and the rhythm of the thunder pressure retreated into the belly of the cloud, leaving a small gap on the ground. Nicholas tilted his wing spine slightly, silently, and addressed the center of the village with an ancient dragon ritual—not to Xingluo, but to "the earth to be protected."

The second sound, disperse.

The Fire Crown Wings spread out along the upwind vent outside the village. Orros, carrying lightning pressure, circled to the right. The Sky Wings, higher up, spread a veil, blocking the sharp beams of light bursting from the well. Luo Luo's voice echoed in Xing Luo's mind. Her shadow peeked out from the edge of the "Xingyuan Record," her eyes gleaming like freshly oiled obsidian. "I'm correcting the displacement line. I've used half of my buffer capsule to absorb the jitter in your timing. If it shakes any more, I'll vomit."

"Hold on." Xingluo only had time to reply in his heart, and then the rune pen drew down, "Freeze the battle line, half a breath."

The air paused. The "wrist bone" that was arching outward paused for a moment, as if someone had pressed its upward button. Isabel's black and gold ring took this opportunity to close an inch again. Pandora exhaled softly and finished the last stitch. She looked up at Xingluo. She didn't smile, but her eyes softened a little.

As the freeze lifted, the holy light suddenly rebounded, like someone punching the same spot three times. The earth cracked with a crisp sound, and the walls of several stone alleys collapsed simultaneously. A little boy was thrown from his mother's arms, about to be hit by a flying pillar, when a young man from the Moonfall Blade suddenly appeared in mid-air, scooped the child up in his arms, and vanished again. The next moment, he landed thirty steps away, holding the child, breathlessly, "Report, I'm a foot off..."

"That's right." Luo Luo exhaled forcefully, "I pulled it back for you. Remember to write me a thank you letter."

"Thank you, Miss!" The young man grinned at the black book in the distance, but his smile was so frightened that it looked like crying.

The God of Light laughed again. His smile was seamless, like a straight line descending from the sky. "You are digging for meaningless courage. Xingluo, call my name, kneel, and teach them obedience."

Xingluo suddenly smiled, then stopped smiling completely: "Have you asked me?"

He lifted the rune pen, and the entire village space shifted slightly, like a page of a book being opened. "Three breaths of reverse flow," he said to himself. In an instant, the previously torn roof ridge "returned" to its pre-falling state. The dust from the three lanes of the village flowed back through the air, falling back into the cracks in the mortar. The scattered sparks swam into the fire like fish. After three breaths, reality snapped back together, and the thin black gold shell around the wellhead held on for two more inches.

"Two more inches is a life." Isabel whispered, veins popping out on the back of her hand. "Thank you."

"Don't say it." Pandora's eyebrows were tightly pressed together, and all the blood was collected into her fingertips. "If you say anything, I will have to sew it up."

Monica buckled the last set of leaf bones onto the shoulder blade of an old mercenary and whispered, "Listen to my command. Try to charge once, but retreat when you see the white light. Don't gamble with it."

"Got it." The old mercenary's eyes didn't have the youthful impatience, only a deep look. His bone boots stepped on the ground, making a low muffled sound, and he rushed out of the alley, like a short and fierce gun, shooting into the wind. The white light reflected in his face, and his bone wings folded, and he slammed himself to the ground. The bone boots nailed him into the mud with a "click". The white light passed over his head, singed a few hairs. Monica opened her hands and clenched them in the air, and the bone hinge "retracted", and she pulled him out of the brakes: "Very good, you didn't waste time."

"I prefer to give my life to liquor." The old mercenary laughed, and there was actually a hint of alcohol in his smile.

Arnold coughed up a mouthful of blood and swallowed it back. He licked the corner of his mouth and looked at Xingluo out of the corner of his eye: "Where do you want me to hold down?"

"Suppress their fear." Xingluo didn't look at him, her hands kept writing, "So that they can't see their own weakness."

"You're quite good at employing people." Arnold smiled, a little wildly, "But I've never followed the wrong person in my life."

The God of Light stopped testing His "hand" and stood up. Or rather, He allowed this "standing up" to occur within everyone's hearts. The ancient seal extending down from the well's edge snapped in three layers in an instant. The ancient words carved into the stone seemed to have been washed clean by water, leaving only a few gray streaks. He lowered his head and glanced at the well, as if looking at an old object: "You thought that by confining me to the countryside, I would forget the sky."

Xingluo put his hand on Xiao Hei's horn. Before the third bell rang, he whispered, "Xiao Hei."

Dragon Eyes glanced at him through the wind. He didn't attempt to unleash the combined attack waves. Instead, he leaned his back against Xiao Hei's neck, thrusting his shoulder blades and dragon scales hard, as if nailing himself to the dragon's body. His voice was low, but it carried through the scales into the dragon's bones: "Follow me, charge!"