Echo was sitting at the top of the castle – on the roof of the watchtower, from where she could see the whole town.
She had asked Lightning to take her up, and when the sun went down, the little girl would come back to send her down. Now, Lightning should be on the way to Longsong Stronghold.
Today's weather was very good, the sun shone brightly on the earth, and the distant river was like a shining silk, slowly flowing west, dividing the green leaves and snow into two parts. Lying in the sun, she felt that her whole body was surrounded by a soft warmth, unlike the scorching sun in the Southernmost Region, where the hot light easily hurt her skin.
The wind was also very different, she thought, there were many kinds of wind in the mainland kingdom, there was the slightly salty sea breeze in the Port of Clearwater, there was the hot and humid monsoon wind in King's City, there was the bone-chilling north wind in the Impassable Mountain Range, and now there was the breeze with the fragrance of the earth in Border Town. In any case, the wind here was pure and single. But in Iron Sand City, it was either hot and windless, or overwhelming storms. The wind was visible. The whistling airflow was mixed with pebbles and gravel, like a giant black beast sweeping over. At this time, it was necessary to hide in a house, or any place that could avoid the wind. Standing against the wind would only lead to death.
Echo gently exhaled, now that she thought about it, it had been nearly four years since she left Iron Sand City. Osha clan was unfortunately defeated in the struggle for power, and after her father surrendered, he was still killed by the enemy. She had witnessed all this and wanted to rush up and die together with the enemy, but she was hit from behind.
She didn't know how many people in the clan were still alive after four years.
Before she was sold as a slave to the Port of Clearwater, she had heard that the Osha clan had violated the agreement of the holy duel, and that the clansmen who were spurned by the Three Gods would be banished to the Endless Cape, never to return to the Iron Sand City. But Echo knew that all of this was a conspiracy of the Iron Whip clan. They smeared the whip with black oil that flowed from the ground, and once it was ignited, even water couldn't extinguish it. It was this trick that caused her brother, the strongest warrior in the clan, to be burned alive during the duel, leading to chaos in the team formation.
Other than the boiling yellow sand in the Endless Cape, there was only the eternal pillar of fire and the ocean that was even more violent than Mother Earth. The people of the Sand Nation who went there would soon turn into bones, and their fates would be even more miserable than those who had become slaves.
After Echo awakened as an Oracle, she was also known as a witch in the mainland kingdom. She had also thought of revenge, but her ability was useless in simulating voices. No matter how much she begged the three gods, the gods did not give her a decree. After living in the Port of Clearwater for half a year, she came to understand that the God's Envoy was favored by the Three Gods, but it was just a lie that the Mojins used to deceive themselves. Within the jurisdiction of the Four Kingdoms, the Oracles were all targets of the Church. From that day onwards, Huiyin had completely given up all hope of revenge.
At this moment, thick smoke suddenly rose in the distance. She looked towards the east bank of the Redwater River, only to see a flickering green flame passing through the woods. The black smoke from the burning trees and the white mist from the evaporation of the snow mixed together, forming a gray column of smoke on the horizon.
It was Anna's green flames.
When they first arrived here, Vendy briefly introduced Anna and Nana to her sisters. At that time, Echo was very envious of Anna's ability. Freely manipulating flames, a high temperature that could melt swords … If she had such a strong power when she was in the Iron Sand City, no one in the Iron Whip clan would have survived.
Echo shook her head, now it was meaningless to think about these things, compared to her clansmen who were likely to be buried in the yellow sand, she was still alive and lucky. Since His Royal Highness was willing to accept her, then all she could do was to work hard to complete His Royal Highness's orders.
She cleared her throat and began to hum a song according to His Royal Highness's request.
It was a cheerful song, His Royal Highness had only hummed it once, but she had completely remembered the whole tune.
Music was no stranger to Echo, when she was taught as a superior slave, she had to master the skills of seductive dancing and provocative singing. But His Royal Highness's song was completely different … It was very rhythmic, full of a burst of vitality, especially when he asked her to imitate the sound of a flute to play this piece of music. Every note seemed to be beating, making people unable to help but want to dance with it.
The difficulty was to add drums and strings while the song was progressing. It was the first time for Echo to simulate three kinds of sounds at the same time, and to overlap them. She had never thought that music could be played like this!
At first, it was difficult for her to ensure that the drums would not disrupt the rhythm of the flute, so she tried to follow His Royal Highness's suggestion, using her hands or feet to beat the beat, gradually fusing the two kinds of sounds together.
After a few days of practice, Echo gradually mastered this method of imitation.
After trying it out a few times, she stood up and decided to add the last string music.
As the music played, Echo found that the minor had changed again. If the cheerful flute formed its body, and the impassioned drums gave it its bones, then the string music at the end, which seemed to be embellished, gave the song a soul. She stepped on the beat, again and again, so that the three instruments completely merged into one, the sound became higher and higher, and finally she could not help but sing –
*****
"My attack power is higher than yours, so I won."
Roland put the last card on the table, and Soroya, who was sitting opposite him, covered her face and suddenly made a low cry.
"One more game," she thought for a moment, and gathered the cards again, "This time let me choose your ten cards."
"Ahem," the Prince coughed, "It's getting late, I still have something to do, you go find someone else to play with."
After making a roughly enough set of cards, the next step was copying. With the template in front of her, Soroya's drawing speed was comparable to a printer. Soon, Roland got a few copies of the same Gwent cards.
So, Soroya became his first opponent.
After the rules of the game were clearly explained, a card battle began. During the battle, he found that the witches' ability to accept was indeed higher than that of ordinary people. Soroya quickly figured out how to play cards. In the next few rounds, although Roland could still win, he had to use a special set of cards. Now, seeing the other party ask to draw cards for him, he shamefully refused.
"Okay," Soroya put the cards in her pocket and ran out of the door. At this moment, a cheerful and melodious music came from outside the window. She stopped in her tracks and ran back. She leaned against the window and peeked out. "Is that Huiyin?"
"Well, it seems that she has completely mastered it." Roland sat back in his chair, enjoying the familiar music.
The First Army of Border Town would soon enter the comprehensive maneuver stage. Unlike standing on the wall and shooting, the comprehensive maneuver would be carried out in the wild, requiring the troops to keep orderly while marching – this was also the basic part of the line up to be shot. In order to make the soldiers' footsteps consistent, they needed to rely on drums or slogans to direct everyone's pace. Now that he had a witch who could simulate mixed sounds, he simply learned from the British and directly used the infantry marching song.
Compared to a simple drum, the marching song not only controlled the marching speed of the troops, but also effectively boosted the morale of the troops. Of course, the most famous marching song during the line up to be shot was the "March of the Grenadiers", but Roland only knew its name, he didn't remember the complete tune.
But this wasn't a problem for him, there was a song that was based on the "March of the Grenadiers", and it was widely spread throughout the country during the War of Resistance. And its melody was familiar to almost everyone, it was the famous "Guerrilla Song".
When Soroya turned her head, she heard the Prince following the song, softly humming. It was a language she had never heard before, it was clean and neat, perfectly matching the rhythm of the song.
"We are all sharpshooters,"
"Every bullet destroys an enemy,"
"We are all flying soldiers,"
"Even if the mountains are high and the rivers are deep!"
"In the dense woods,"
"Everywhere we arrange our comrades' camps,"
"On the high hills,"
"With our countless brothers."
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