NOVEL ONLINE FREE Chapter 21: Chapter 21
The plum rain in 2048 is thicker than in previous years. When Xiao Nuan's delivery truck broke down outside the beacon network monitoring center, the sausage icon on the dashboard was flashing three times per second. The orange mark on the wrist was oozing with cold sweat, forming a strange resonance with the red alarm jumping on the monitoring screen - 89% of the 1,378 beacon nodes in the world have fallen into emotional data disorder, and the most serious node in North America is the sausage beacon that continues to release cold data from the laboratory in 1998.
"It's the time anchor of the silver chain that's backfiring." The holographic projection of Ice Point emerged from the delivery box, with unstable blue light on the edge of the popsicle mark. "The silver chain that Li Xiaoming forcibly left behind in 2025 is like a hot sausage skewer, piercing the Möbius ring balance of the beacon network." He pointed to the eye of the storm on the big screen: "The center of the emotional vortex in the Asian region is in Professor Kai's old laboratory."
The iron door of the laboratory was condensed into an ice shell by emotional data, and a circle of transparent sausage casing was wrapped around the door handle, with countless crying faces of Kai Lan embedded in it - the one who broke the silver bracelet in 1998, lost the beacon in 2025, and watched Nuan Nuan run away in 2030. Xiao Nuan took out the emergency sausage in the incubator, and the Möbius ring on the sausage casing was rotating in the opposite direction, forming a counter-vortex with the sausage casing on the door handle.
[The barrage suddenly exploded into a snow screen]
"!! Detected overlapping memories of Kailan in multiple time and space"
"The refrigerator in the laboratory is emitting white mist with the smell of grilled sausages"
"Look at the ice stick mark of the ice point - it's melting!"
A hand suddenly stretched out from the white mist and grabbed Xiao Nuan's wrist. It was Li Xiaoming in 2025. His silver chain had grown together with his wrist bone, and the "KL" at the buckle was corroded into a black hole by emotional data. "The beacon is devouring all warm memories." His voice was a mixture of the youthful voice of 1998 and the old tone of 2048. "I should have returned the silver chain to Kailan that day, and shouldn't have dreamed of using sausage oil to retain time."
The freezer in the laboratory suddenly exploded, and the 365 memory popsicles frozen inside were all melting. Every drop of ice water reflected the regrets of different time and space: Professor Kai's unspoken "I'm sorry", Li Xiaoming's love letter hidden under the sausage machine, and the first sausage that Nuannuan lost when she was ten years old. The most dazzling thing was a transparent popsicle, in which floated a picture that Xiaonuan had never seen before - Kailan in 2035 was throwing the silver chain into the drum of the sausage machine.
"The core of the emotional storm is the unfinished farewell." Xiaonuan suddenly broke the silver chain rubbing on her wrist. The moment the orange mark was torn, all the melted popsicle water suddenly flowed back, spelling out the sausage beacon startup screen in 1998 on the ceiling. Only then did she understand that the disorder of the beacon network was not caused by the silver chain, but by the regrets of all time and space, all shouting out the unspoken "goodbye" through the storm.
The holographic projection of the freezing point began to flicker, and the popsicle mark was being gnawed by emotional data: "Someone must enter the eye of the storm and rewrite the anchor point of the beacon with the warmest memory." His mechanical arm suddenly pointed to the metal box in the wreckage of the freezer, "Professor Kai has a backup plan - the first burnt sausage casing in 1998 can absorb all unfinished emotions."
The moment the metal box was opened, the burnt sausage casing suddenly came alive, like a hot silver chain wrapped around Xiao Nuan's wrist. She saw Professor Kai in 1998 stuffing the silver chain into the sausage, seventeen-year-old Kai Lan crying, and the teenager Li Xiaoming secretly stuffing the broken bracelet pieces into his incubator. These images drilled into the mark along the sausage casing, forming a closed loop with the silver chain in 2025 and the vortex in 2048.
[The barrage suddenly went silent for three seconds, then burst into warm light]
"… It turns out that Li Xiaoming's frostbite marks were caused by crushing the bracelet pieces back then"
"The day Kailan threw away the silver chain, the sausage roaster was playing "Happy Birthday""
"Look at the eye of the storm - all regrets are turning into sausage aroma!"
The emotional storm suddenly turned, and the red alarm turned into a golden data stream. Each beacon node was playing its own warm memories: the homeless man in the North American node was distributing sausages to stray cats, the old man in the European node was putting sticky notes on the sausage roaster, and in the laboratory in the Asian region, Li Xiaoming and Kailan in all time and space were saying "I remember" at the same time.
Xiao Nuan's orange mark healed again, and the burnt sausage casing on her wrist turned into a translucent silver chain, and the "KL" at the buckle was covered by the abbreviation "XM+KL+NN + Xiao Nuan". The holographic projection of Ice Point stabilized, and a burnt sausage mark appeared in the popsicle mark: "The beacon network is being reconstructed. Now each node is bidirectional - it can transmit warmth and accept regrets." The global beacon icons on the monitoring screen have all turned into a new pattern of sausages and popsicles. Xiao Nuan's delivery car started automatically, and the emergency sausage in the incubator, the Mobius ring on the casing finally rotated forward, and Professor Kai's handwriting appeared on the surface: "The best beacon is never perfect warmth, but a heart that dares to pass on even with burn marks." The plum rain outside the car window turned into a sausage-scented fog. Xiao Nuan saw Li Xiaoming in 2025 standing at the door of the laboratory, and the silver chain was peeling off his wrist, turning into sausage flowers all over the sky. In the beacon monitoring center in the distance, a new line of small words was added at the bottom of the big screen: "Aftermath of the emotional storm: The global beacon network has learned to grow warmth in regrets, and the current online node is 1378+∞."