I loaded the Mysticism panel.

Chapter 203 That's how it should be done

The remaining resealing work took more than three hours.

Mr. Hutton was severely exhausted, but he insisted on completing the complete replication and resealing of all rings from the sixth to the ninth, and added an extra new node to target reverse infiltration.

Throughout the process, Mrs. McNeil was in charge of activation, while Ms. Maud and Mr. Spence filled in the wax and applied silver powder.

Wentworth and Lieutenant Colonel Odd stood guard on the outer edge, watching out for any further incidents at the bottom of the pit.

Richard held up his camera the whole time, photographing every step of the process.

After the sealing was completed, the entire nine stone rings lit up again, forming a more secure "manhole cover" than before.

Lieutenant Colonel Odd checked it over.

"This year's wave is fiercer than in previous years."

The cave fell silent for a moment.

"Fall back, take the men up."

The post-war cleanup began.

There were quite a few things that could be processed inside the corpse of the responder.

The scattered response groups also left behind patches of remnants woven from death sounds on the stone slab, which Maud scraped into a porcelain jar bit by bit with a silver spoon and sealed it.

What was most surprising was that one of the "harmony" members in that response group was actually caught red-handed.

The group leader brought the person over.

He was a man whose age was hard to guess; his miner's clothes were covered in coal dust, and his high cheekbones supported a layer of sallow skin.

His hands were tied behind his back, and his knees buckled, causing him to kneel on the stone slab in an overly submissive posture.

It neither struggled nor trembled, and even its breathing was as even as if it were sleeping.

Wentworth led the man to the brightest spot.

The head of the inspection team looked very unwell.

The weakened state of that [Moon Nail - Reflection] hadn't even passed when the slash from the flank drained the last bit of his burst potential.

But that wasn't the reason why his complexion was the worst.

The body of the second team leader was just covered by his comrades' coats and carried up to the iron cage for the well.

Wentworth hasn't said a word since the body was covered up.

He simply walked over and squatted down in front of the survivor, very close.

"Who ordered you to do this?"

The singer looked up, his eyes lingered on his face for a moment, and his lips moved.

"Who ordered you to do this?"

He was repeating the question.

What made Richard's neck hairs stand on end was that voice.

When he opened his mouth to harmonize, he used Wentworth's voice.

The same somber tone, the same cold indifference tinged with anger.

Even the slight hoarse vibrato at the end of the note, caused by fatigue, was captured perfectly.

It was as if Wentworth was interrogating himself through a face.

"What is your motive?" Mrs. McNeil asked in a different phrasing.

The person in harmony turned their head and looked at her.

"That's how it should be done."

This time, he used Mrs. McNeil's voice.

"Why should we do this?"

"That's how it should be done."

Do you even know what you're doing?

They laughed in unison.

He laughed and threw that sentence back at him verbatim.

Do you even know what you're doing?

Wentworth placed his hand on Harmony's shoulder, his five fingers digging directly into the flesh.

He gripped the flesh on his shoulder so tightly that it deformed and made a squeaking sound.

But the man's face didn't change at all, and he didn't even blink.

"I'll ask you one more time," Wentworth said, his entire hand gripping the metal. "What are you going to nail to the core?"

Harmony did not answer this question.

His head slowly turned to the side.

It leaned towards the little horse that was still squatting on the ground not far away, looking lost and dejected.

"Little Horse, stay close to me!"

That was the voice of the second group leader.

Xiao Ma suddenly raised his head, his face still wet with tears.

"Group……"

"Shut up!"

The group leader rushed over, covered Xiao Ma's mouth with his hand, and pulled him back several steps, shoulder to shoulder.

"Don't answer!" she whispered, the old scar on her brow bone trembling.

"That's not him! He's dead! Did you hear me? He's dead!"

Xiao Ma froze on the spot, clutching the piece of cloth torn from the second group leader's coat, tears welling up in his eyes.

Richard stood in the innermost circle, his chest tight with anxiety.

The second group leader had been dead for less than half a day; his death murmurs had not yet faded and still lingered in this space.

This harmony followed the lingering grief in the hearts of everyone present.

They preserved the deceased's voice exactly as it was and used it as the dullest yet most ruthless knife.

It doesn't even need to understand what sorrow is; it simply reflects sorrow back in its own shape.

Mrs. McNeil reached out and held Wentworth down.

"You won't get anything out of me even if you keep asking like this until dawn."

"let me."

She knelt down in front of He Sheng, took a pinch of salt from her suitcase, and sprinkled it on the stone slab in front of the man's knees.

Then he took out a piece of charcoal that had been sharpened to a very fine point and drew a closing symbol on the salt.

"Let me ask it another way."

The medium stopped asking questions verbally.

She stretched out her right hand, hovering it an inch in front of He Sheng's forehead, and closed her eyes.

Richard used his spiritual vision to look over there.

Mrs. McNeill's ether is searching for his real name.

A person's real name is the nail that "nails" that person to themselves.

Ordinary mediums only need to touch on the edge of a person's real name.

Then you can follow it to reveal the person's background, thoughts, and hidden things, layer by layer.

But Mrs. McNeil's finger went around and around in that circle.

Her brows slowly furrowed.

"no."

"What's missing?" Wentworth asked.

"His real name has been stolen." The medium opened his eyes.

"They dug it up very cleanly, leaving not even a stub. This must be the work of the Echo Society. I wonder what level of people are behind it."

She closed her eyes again, and this time she tried to call out to the person.

She called out a very common male name.

He responded with a soft "Mmm."

She called out another completely unrelated name, and it responded again.

She called out five or six completely unrelated names, and the person responded to each one.

Mrs. McNeil moved her finger down and stopped at the position of Harmony's heart.

There's something here.

She had Ms. Maud hand her a silver dagger, which she used to pierce the pad of Harmony's left index finger.

Blood flowed out.

But unlike the blood of a living person, that blood didn't darken or thicken when exposed to cold.

It remained an excessively bright red, trickling down between my fingers and pooling in a small puddle on the salt talisman, refusing to solidify.

Mrs. McNeil stared at the pool of blood for a long time.

"The blood pact is the same one as the one on that responding leader."

"Is he also an anchor point?"

"It's half." The medium covered the pool of blood with salt.

"The first one is the core one, and he is the one that is kept in reserve."

If the leader makes a mistake before the core is driven into the pit, then it will be his turn to take over.

She stood up and looked down at the serene-faced singer who was still kneeling on the ground.

"From the day he was picked up by the Echoes, he had already been turning himself into something."

Even if we don't do anything to him today, he'll give himself up on his own in a few days.

Wentworth was still unwilling to give up.

He went around behind He Sheng, leaned down, and shouted almost into the man's ear:

"What are you after? You people, you've emptied yourselves out, what are you after all!"

The harmony did not respond with Wentworth's voice.

They didn't use Mrs. McNeill's, the second group leader's either.

This time, he used a dry and calm voice that no one had ever heard before.

That was probably the last bit of sound this person had left.

"That's how it should be done."

"Why should they?"

"That's how it should be done."

"Who told you that you should?"

Richard had lost count of how many times he had been asked.

The smile on that person's face never faded from beginning to end.

"It's no use." Mrs. McNeil finally stopped the interrogation.

"He can only respond now, he won't speak first anymore."

"Interrogating someone who responds to others is like interrogating a recording."

"You'll never hear an echo speak its own words in your entire life."

"I know, but I have to ask anyway."

Wentworth stood up, his knees making a soft crack.

Richard then understood.

His questions just now weren't meant to get any answers; they were just routine.

The body of the second team leader was right next to him. As the team leader, he had to make this gesture for everyone present to see, especially for the new recruits.

Even if it's just going through this set of questions from beginning to end.

The cleanup work is complete.

The process of ascending to the surface is a mirror image of descending into the well.

The iron cage rose section by section.

This time, no one called to them.

The thing at the bottom of the pit was just pushed back in by Lieutenant Colonel Ode with the help of a master, and it's temporarily silent.

But the posture of everyone inside the iron cage, with salt under their tongues, remained unchanged.

No one dared to speak up beforehand.

Richard held the freshly replaced salt in his mouth, watching the silver flakes on the well wall recede section by section.

It was very quiet inside the iron cage, except for the creaking of the iron chains and wheels.

When the iron cage reached the top, Lieutenant Colonel Odd was the first to step out. It was already completely dark outside.

Almost simultaneously, everyone inside the iron cage spat out the grain of salt from under their tongues.

The air outside the shaft was cold and damp.

The western suburban mining area is now emitting thicker smoke than usual, from burning buildings.

The mining riots have been suppressed with an iron fist.

Police officers and the militia they brought in used batons and gun butts to push back the thousands of workers who were shouting in unison.

More dead people are appearing on the streets.

Richard stood at the shaft opening, gazing into the distance at the direction from which smoke was rising.

He recalled the landscape scene that Mrs. McNeil had woven before the battle.

The upper and lower levels were two separate battlefields, both ending with a brutal crushing defeat.

Lieutenant Colonel Ode's squad carried the second squad leader's body onto the vehicle.

Little Ma followed behind, looking completely lost.

The female group leader with the scar on her brow bone helped Xiao Ma into the car.

"Stop clutching that piece of cloth."

Richard watched as the vehicle carrying the body of the second squad leader slowly drove away from the shaft entrance.

Wentworth walked over.

"Let's chat for a bit."

The two walked along the abandoned dirt road outside the shaft for a while.

Wentworth stopped when he reached a place where he couldn't hear anyone else talking.

"Thanks for that needle in the well."