Chapter 1004 Hot Soup
Baby, come back and have a bowl of hot soup when you are tired. "In a trance, my mother's voice came from the depths of my memory, intertwined with the sound of the mountain breeze blowing through the wind chimes.
In the laboratory late at night, Liang Lu's exclamation broke the silence. Under the microscope, the newly cultivated night-scented fungus hyphae are automatically arranged into the pattern of "Hetu". What's more amazing is that they will have similar emotional reactions to sound waves of different frequencies. "These are not ordinary fungi at all," Liang Lu's glasses glowed blue, "They are like the nerve endings of the earth veins, recording every destruction and protection of mankind." Qi Tongwei thoughtfully called up the earth vein monitoring data from three years ago. The waveforms of those crisis moments actually had a subtle resonance with the melody of his mother's song.
On the eve of the winter solstice, Qi Tongwei received an anonymous package. When he opened it, he found an ancient bronze phoenix flute. The patterns on the flute were exactly the same as the dragon and phoenix totems in the museum. When he tried to play it, all the equipment in the monitoring station suddenly started automatically. On the holographic map, the global earth vein network lit up with golden veins, forming a huge phoenix wings pattern. Even more bizarre was that his mother, who was thousands of miles away, suddenly hummed the long-lost phoenix flute song clearly in her sleep.
This mysterious phenomenon has sparked heated discussions around the world, but the capital group has taken the opportunity to launch a "spiritual development of the earth veins" project. They have built giant dragon and phoenix sculptures in various places, but in fact they are covering up the illegal exploitation of earth vein energy. Qi Tongwei led the team to conduct a secret visit and found Shang Dynasty oracle bones engraved with curse runes deep in the foundation of a construction site - a warning of three thousand years, which unexpectedly echoes the greed of modern times.
The conflict broke out at the spring equinox. When the capital group's drilling machine was about to touch the core of the earth vein, the new locust tree in Dongjiang Village suddenly glowed. Qi Tongwei stood on the top of the tree crown wearing a bronze phoenix flute, and the sound waves he played perfectly matched the frequency of the earth vein. A miracle happened: the drill bit of the drilling machine twisted into the shape of a phoenix tail feather, all electronic devices played the mother's song "Phoenix Seeking Phoenix" in a loop, and those greedy decision makers actually saw the scene of themselves running in the fields as children in a trance.
After this contest, the protection of earth veins was written into international law. Dongjiang Village built the "Heaven and Earth String Song" Ecological College, where children not only learn quantum physics but also recite the "Classic of Mountains and Seas". Qi Tongwei erected a double-sided sculpture in the college square: one side is a scientist wearing dinosaur gloves, and the other side is an ancient man playing a phoenix flute. Every Qingming Festival, he would take his students to his parents' graves and talk about how science and metaphysics complement each other on this land among the newly planted night-scented mushrooms.
Ten years later, in late autumn, Qi Tongwei stood in front of the centenary rings of the new locust tree. The dragon and phoenix totems on the bark have been eroded by time, but they are becoming clearer. He opened the latest "Notes on Earth Veins" and wrote on the title page: "The sky is vast, the wilderness is boundless, and the shadows of locust trees are reflected in the wind. The so-called great way is not in the clouds, but in the songs of mothers, in the graffiti of children, and in every sincere dialogue with the land."
The mountain breeze swept across the dome of the monitoring center again, and the dragon and phoenix totems in the astronomical telescope were still flowing in the starry sky.
Suddenly, there was a slight "crack" sound from the treetops, and a locust leaf with ice crystals hanging on it fell on the cover page of the notebook, staining the word "沧" in "风过槐影见沧世" ("Wind passes through the locust tree shadow, revealing vicissitudes of life") into light blue.
"Professor Qi!" Lin Xia's shout startled the night owl perched on the locust tree. The young man stumbled over holding a holographic projector, the lens of which was covered with white frost. "The Antarctic expedition team has sent back urgent data. The network of earth veins under the Ross Ice Shelf has shown abnormal fluctuations!" When Qi Tongwei stood up, the hem of his cotton jacket swept across the newly emerged night-scented fungi at the roots of the tree. The hyphae were spreading in the shape of the Big Dipper, with translucent spore sacs on the top, glowing with the luster of mother-of-pearl in the moonlight.
The dome of the monitoring center slowly rose, and the lens of the astronomical telescope automatically turned toward the South Pole. On the holographic map, the emerald color that originally represented the health of the earth veins was being eaten away by the strange indigo, like ink smudged on rice paper. Qi Tongwei put the bronze phoenix flute to his lips, and the moment the sound waves he played resonated with the frequency of the earth veins, the screen suddenly flickered, and a blurry picture jumped out: deep in the ice field, a giant mechanical arm was mining some kind of crystal emitting dim light, and the operation interface was printed with a deformed dragon and phoenix totem.
"It's them." Liang Lu's voice came from behind. The once capable scientist now has gray hair. She checked the latest post on the dark web forum. In the encrypted video uploaded by an anonymous user, a senior executive of a multinational group held up a diamond-studded dragon and phoenix totem wine glass: "Earth vein energy is about to become the oil of the new era." The scene cuts to the laboratory, and the cells in the culture dish grow scale-like structures after being exposed to the earth vein extract.
Qi Tongwei dug his nails deep into his palms, and the old wound from blocking the energy capsule explosion with bare hands ten years ago suddenly burned. He recalled the dream last night: his mother was sitting in front of the old stove, baking sugar cakes, and blood-colored dragon and phoenix patterns appeared on the edge of the iron pot amid the crackling of firewood. At this moment, the new locust tree suddenly made a low hum, and the totem on the bark oozed golden juice, which gathered into a stream on the ground and meandered along the ground veins to the distance.
The crisis of the Antarctic ice shelf broke out in full force seventy-two hours later. When the expedition team tried to stabilize the ground veins with a sonic device, the ice suddenly cracked into spider-web-like cracks, and countless dragon-shaped creatures composed of ice crystals emerged from them. These beings, which were embodied by the energy of the ground veins, had eyes burning with dark blue flames. Wherever they went, steel machinery was instantly frozen into powder. Satellite images showed that the geomagnetic field of the entire Antarctic continent was rapidly deflecting, as if the earth's magnetic field was experiencing a violent "earthquake."
Qi Tongwei led the team to set off overnight. Their icebreaker was sailing among the floating ice, and the cabin was filled with canvas soaked with night-scented fungus spores. When the ship entered the dangerous area, the dragon and phoenix totem sculpture on the bow suddenly vibrated, and the sprayed mist condensed in the air into ancient seal characters: "Dragons fight in the wild, their blood is dark yellow." At this time, on the radar screen, hundreds of unidentified objects were approaching with a trajectory that violated the laws of physics.
At the edge of the ice crack, Qi Tongwei discovered the shocking truth. The mined crystal core was actually an ancient frozen "earth vein egg", with dragon and phoenix patterns on its surface similar to the DNA double helix. And those ice crystal creatures were the defense mechanism spontaneously formed by the earth vein to protect the core. "They are digging the heart of the earth!" Qi Tongwei blew the phoenix flute, and the sound waves vibrated the ice layer. The sleeping earth vein egg glowed, and a roar similar to a heartbeat came from the crack.
In times of crisis, earth guardians from all over the world take action simultaneously. The natives of the Amazon rainforest light special incense, and the smoke outlines a giant phoenix in the sky; the monks in the Himalayas ring the thousand-year-old bronze bell, and the sound waves penetrate the clouds;