Hitzfeld finally convinced Xia Yibing and made her understand that this did not mean that she should completely abandon her vigilance, but that there was a balance in between.
"Let's try our best."
Hitzfeld hooked his fingers around the woman's body and rocked back and forth in the quilt, comforting her softly.
"It doesn't matter if you fail, I'm here anyway."
"I will always be with you."
"Aisun..." Xia Yibing looked at her, her eyes becoming more and more blurred and flickering.
why.
It turns out that there can be something so sweet in this world that can make people willingly sink into it.
She only felt that her body, her heart, and everything about her were surrounded by warm and soft love. She wished she could completely melt into it and never leave it for the rest of her life.
"Boom boom boom!"
There was a knock on the door a few steps away.
"Wake up girls."
"Oh my god, don't you see what time it is now?"
"Their hunting party has been gone for two hours, and I thought you would leave me behind and go with them!"
"It's Heidi."
Xia Yibing sat up immediately.
"She still has the nerve to say that about us... She knows more people here than we do, why doesn't she go and negotiate on her own?"
And she is Bing Lanluo.
Even though she acted perfectly in the past two days, and wore thick clothes and coats like everyone else while trudging on the journey, Xia Yibing knew very well that this female tree person could take off all her clothes without feeling cold.
In just a few words, she had labeled Heidi a "lazy bug".
What about being a guard...
Are there guards who urge their protected subjects to take risks while they themselves stay warm by the fire at home?
After packing up and taking Lily downstairs, the three of them did not see the man of the Bart family.
"Kulumu went hunting with them." Mani explained the situation after seeing them, "There are some breads left from last night. Can I heat them up for you?"
"Thank you then."
"You're welcome. You have to pay too."
Mani is still different from the real Sara people. For example, this sentence just now fully reveals her "directness" as a person from Binghu Town.
It was still dark outside, so the three of them sat down by the fire pit to keep warm. While waiting, they chatted with the hostess and tried to learn more about the situation.
"Ice water? Yes... the custom here is to have a glass of ice water when you wake up in the morning."
"Why? Of course it's because I'm very hot after a night of sleep... After I get dizzy from the heat, a glass of ice water is so refreshing~ It quenches my thirst and wakes me up. Ice water is the best drink here!"
I don't agree with this view...
Hitzfeld was secretly shocked, thinking that he was indeed a pure Ice Lake Town person, but he felt hot sleeping in the house!
"Where's Lulum?"
Xia Yibing looked around and asked, "Will she follow me up the mountain?"
"of course not."
Mani was flipping the pancakes and burst into laughter when she heard this.
"Although Lulum is young, I know she needs to learn to read and write as soon as possible."
"Yes... She is studying in the convent in the town now. No... There are no priests or nuns there, but there is a doctor who has lost his memory. He knows a lot and is willing to teach the children in the town."
After asking for a while, I learned that the monastery was originally built here by Sarath.
The building has a history of more than half a century. At the beginning, people were worried that the curse of the ice lake would spread from the snow-capped mountains and glaciers. As a result, they guarded it for a long time and found that there was no movement. In addition, due to the bitter cold in the Arctic, many Sara people believed that the people of Ice Lake Town were aliens and did not really treat them as compatriots. Gradually, no one came and the monastery was abandoned.
"That doctor rolled down the hill two years ago."
Marnie recalls.
"He can save people... he can teach... everyone respects him, but Geyeso always says he is an evil spirit, so Kurumu didn't mention it last night."
"Outsiders?"
Hitzfeld frowned slightly.
The only people who would come to a place like Binghu Town, apart from someone like her who is mentally ill and attracted by the unknown mystery, would probably be the businessmen.
But businessmen are the ones who know how to weigh the pros and cons the best. Without any benefits, why would anyone go up the mountain alone to take risks and then roll down in a mess?
She felt that this amnesiac doctor was very suspicious.
"Isn't Geyeso also very respected?"
Xia Yibing was still asking over there.
"You respect the ancient witch, but you don't listen to what the ancient witch says... He should have warned you not to get close to the doctor, right?"
"Indeed, we did." Marnie nodded. "We did try to keep our children away from the monastery, but Dr. Grimman has a unique charm..."
There was a "clang" sound.
Hitzfeld put the iron plate aside, widened his eyes and asked: "I'm sorry - can you please tell me again... his name is -"
"Dr. Grimman?"
Marnie was stunned.
"...Apart from that weird knowledge, he only remembered this southern name."
Dr. Grimman!
The more Hitzfeld listened, the wider his one-eyed gaze grew.
She clearly remembered that in Blackwood City, a group of people speculated that the leader of the underground area of the Eclipse Church in Blackwood who eventually escaped was Dr. Grimman!
Will it be the same person?
I came to Binghu Town two years ago... The timing was right...
But why did Griman come here?
Why did he lose his memory?
What kind of secret could allow him to suppress the evil and brutality in his bones and teach here to save people and atone for his sins, and what kind of weirdness could make him roll down from the snowy mountain?
Hitzfeld felt like her head was about to burst apart by countless doubts. She stood up immediately and planned to go to the monastery in the town to take a look.
After all, he is... a vicious and evil person of that level!
Although Lulum hadn't spoken to her yet, she didn't want the little girl to get hurt, so of course this matter had to be confirmed as soon as possible!
This attitude made Mani confused.
Fearing that she would be excited, Hitzfeld did not dare to tell her the truth immediately. Marnie just thought that they were the most devout believers of yang, and went to the monastery to "pray and see God."
“There’s nothing to see there…”
She told them before leaving.
"For many years...no one has taken care of it, and many places are in a state of disrepair."
"After Dr. Grimman arrived, some people started to clean up the place, but it still didn't work. The auditorium is leaking a bit!"
But we weren't there for church.
After knowing the direction and saying goodbye to Marnie, the three of them walked towards the monastery with flashlights, talking about Griman all the way. Even Heidi was curious and wanted to know more.
"So, that guy might be an amnesiac."
Heidi groaned.
"That's really not appropriate to tell her mother."
"The conditions at Bart's house are not good."
In the cold wind, Hitzfeld looked at some shirtless men who had walked out of their homes and were leisurely shoveling snow at their doorsteps.
In contrast, Kurumu was going out hunting.
He is not young anymore, and it is easy to tell from the comparison that his family is in financial difficulty.
Even so, I am still willing to prepare the most sumptuous and delicious dishes for them.
Thinking of this, Hitzfeld quietly quickened his pace.
Chapter 23: Complete Amnesiac (Two in One)
Although people have always said that Binghu Town is small, to be fair, it is not easy to build a town that can accommodate 20,000 people in such a cold and harsh place.
If you think about it, some deserted villages in the south have only a few hundred people. Binghu Town is equivalent to almost a hundred such villages. So it doesn't seem strange to walk in such a settlement for half an hour without reaching the destination.
"I am silly."
Stopping on the side of the road and rubbing his knees, Hitzfeld took the initiative to admit his mistake.
"We should have rented a sleigh."
The roads in the town were paved with black pine, and the snow had hardened and was very slippery. It was really unwise to choose to travel on foot.
Just now, when I saw those big guys coming out to shovel the snow, I should have guessed what the road conditions were like here... This was indeed my mistake. I remembered that Xia seemed to have brought a folding sled in the box.
"It's okay." Xia Yibing said beside him with a straight face, trying not to laugh. "At worst, I can massage your feet when I get back."
It's not just because he's happy that he has a legitimate excuse to play with Hitzfeld's feet. Another reason is that Hitzfeld usually presents himself as a wise and mature person, and it's so rare for him to make mistakes like this and admit that he's a fool.
The beauty of contrast, isn't it?
I can now put the theories that Aisuen taught me to use!
Hitzfeld didn't know that Xia Yibing had completely misinterpreted the aesthetic theory she had expressed. She continued to walk for more than ten minutes, enduring the soreness in her legs and feet. Finally, they found the monastery in Binghu Town.
It was a small building with a courtyard. As for its height, it was difficult to see clearly due to the lack of light in the polar night. I could only vaguely glimpse some reflections of metal objects on the top. Based on this, I guessed that it was about 3-4 stories high.
Could the metal reflection be a clock?
Hitzfeld tried to trace its outline in his visual field.
No... Mani said that this place has been in ruins for a long time. If no one takes care of the bell tower, the metal bell cannot hang for so long. The reflection is more likely to be the circular cross on the top of the house. The circular cross is a necessary symbol of religious places.
As they got closer, Xia Yibing shone the flashlight directly at the building, which confirmed Hitzfeld's previous guess - there was a circular cross on the top of the four-story tower, and the bronze bell on the tower had long disappeared.
"Ahem!" Heidi coughed. "It's very rude to shine a light on the church like this..."
"Really?" Xia Yibing obviously didn't take the advice to heart. She said, "Then I'll light it faster," but the flashlight was still swinging around everywhere.
There's nothing we can do about it. Who can blame this place for having such poor infrastructure and a lack of roadside lighting?
There were streetlights in Binghu Town, but most of them were just for show. The vigorous electrical revolution in Sarah's country had not spread here at all, and the most effective lighting method they had seen along the way was the coal lamps hanging on the doors of each house.
Thanks to these coal lamps, otherwise they wouldn't even be able to get going. Xia Yibing cursed the departments in charge of the Northland in her heart while looking around the front yard of the building.
The front yard wasn't much to look at, as whatever normally would have been in there was now covered in a thick layer of snow.
The only things that could be seen were a few pine trees that had broken through the snow and some messy footprints at the entrance to the front yard.
"We may be late." Xia Yibing said in a low voice, staring at the footprints.
Identifying shoe prints is one of the basic skills in this job. She could tell that the most recently added footprints were all heading outwards.
Walking outside, there were mostly small shoe prints, and it was easy to deduce that the children inside had finished their classes. In other words, Lulum had most likely left.
"Really?" Heidi immediately looked behind her. "Then why didn't we meet them when we came here?"
"A sled." Xia Yibing shone the light towards the middle of the road, where she could see several deep and obvious marks. "There are also canine footprints... The children should be picked up by a special sled. Lulumu might have already reached her home."
Then they must have taken another route.
Hitzfeld thought to herself that she thought the sled would be similar to a school bus.
There were many children on the bus, and of course it was impossible to take care of only Lulum and take the shortest route to Bart's house. That's why they didn't meet each other. The sled needed to send each child home in turn.
"Then we're not too late," Hitzfeld said from behind his mask. "What we want to talk to him about is not something that should be known to others."
