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墨書 Inktalez
Zhou Liangzhang wanted to intervene, but was met with a slap from the County Magistrate. "Get lost! I won't wade through this murky water!"
Once the sound of hooves faded away, the Mad Old Woman's spindle fell to the ground with a thud. Lin Dahe picked it up and noticed that the wooden surface was engraved with a pattern identical to that on the County Magistrate's jade pendant. The system interface flickered wildly: [Key Character Connection Confirmed: County Magistrate is the former Household Department Clerk, transferred away in the First Year of Chongzhen.]
The One-Armed Veteran suddenly pulled Lin Dahe aside. "Look at the waterway!"
From deep within the tunnel came the sound of rushing water. The group dashed inside, only to find the last layer of rock wall cracking, cool mist spraying out—an underground river! The Mad Old Woman's song was not nonsense; it contained a code documenting the hydrological network!
"It's open!" Cui Xiaoman cheered as she scooped up a pool of clear water, but suddenly froze. "Why is there blood in this water?"
Lin Dahe leaned closer and indeed saw several strands of blood floating in the clear stream. Following the source, he found the Mad Old Woman quietly leaning against the rock wall, fresh blood oozing from her mouth and dripping into the water. In her hand, she tightly clutched a half-bloodied copper plate—perfectly matching with the piece held by the One-Armed Veteran.
"Yan Zhou Wei... Relief Commissioner..." Old Soldier read aloud the combined title, tears glistening in his single eye. "She is the widow of the escort officer from back then!"
The Mad Old Woman's funeral was held on a morning filled with falling locust flowers. As the One-Armed Veteran placed the now complete copper plate into her coffin, Lin Dahe noticed traces of rock dust still lodged beneath her fingernails—evidence of three days and nights spent tirelessly digging.
"The Dragon King is angry!" Aunt Ma's sharp voice suddenly pierced through the mournful music. "Disturbing the dragon vein will bring retribution!"
In the funeral procession, Aunt Wang stumbled slightly, nearly dropping the offerings she was carrying. Lin Dahe then realized that there were significantly fewer villagers than expected who had come to help.
After the ceremony concluded, he made his way to the village well and saw several women using clay pots to collect the last few scoops of murky water. The water level had dropped another three fingers since yesterday, and new cracks were visible on the exposed part of the well wall.
"Seventh Uncle." Lin Dahe stopped an elderly man leaning on a cane. "Where are Li Zhuang's people? They promised to come help fix the water channel yesterday..."
Seventh Uncle's cane struck heavily into the ground. "Zhou Liangzhang came by last night and said we angered the Dragon King by digging this well." The old man lowered his voice. "Li Zhuang lost seventeen people to starvation during last year's drought; they believe in these things..."
The countdown on the system interface had reached [65:12:43], and less than a quarter of the underground waterway was completed. Lin Dahe crouched at the edge of the well, running his fingers over those cracks—wait, these patterns seemed systematic?
He sprinted home and dug out half a sheet of rice paper he hadn’t used before, making a rubbing of the well wall’s patterns. Holding it up to the sunlight, he was astonished to find that the winding cracks resembled those engraved on the Mad Old Woman's spindle by seventy percent!
"This can't be naturally formed..." Lin Dahe grabbed a bamboo tube and some cowhide and rushed back to the well.
The midday sun blazed down mercilessly. In front of a dozen villagers, Lin Dahe covered one end of the bamboo tube with cowhide and secured it tightly with twine to create a makeshift water pressure gauge. As he slowly submerged it into the well, he noticed that as water pressure pushed against it, the cowhide slightly caved in, producing an echoing "gurgle" from within.
"See that?" He pointed at the twine markings on the outside of the bamboo tube. "For every foot it drops, pressure decreases by three parts." He then gestured towards the west. "But over there in that newly dug exploratory pit, the water level is even higher than in this well!"
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