# Chapter 1751: Connecting the Dots
After talking about some unrelated topics, Xu Huo finally asked about the connection between this treasure of the town and "Ember."
"This involves the naming process of our town here," the tour guide said. "Originally, this place was just a small town. For a small town, you can just pick any name and use it. But back then, a large number of amber fossils were discovered, and it looked like we were about to strike it rich, so everyone suggested coming up with a nice name."
"There were so many names listed at the time. While everyone was undecided, a man named Enbo discovered a very large piece of amber, putting the town on the map. Everyone decided to use his name as the town name. But the old town mayor at the time was a bit hard of hearing, and somehow wrote it down as Ember. Since it was already written, everyone just went along with it."
"That's way too careless," the short man couldn't help but sigh softly.
"Everyone was happy back then, so they didn't care about those small details," the tour guide waved his hand. "But the succeeding town mayor also thought the name was too casual, which is why they renamed it after the purple amber appeared. Jiusang was the name of the first person to discover the purple amber."
How to put it, this experience sounded a bit bizarre, but it had a certain persuasiveness. Then the tour guide took them to see the paper documents preserved by the city government — these paper documents had been publicly displayed as a tourist attraction for over a decade. They stated that the town was named after the first person to discover large amber.
But the records wrote "Enbo," and there was no documentation about the accidental shift from "Enbo" to "Ember" that the tour guide mentioned.
Quite a few people came to see these paper documents, and the tour guide's explanation was widely circulated. However, the evidence wasn't sufficient. After seeing them, the vast majority of people became even more convinced that the people of Jiusang City were lying, forcibly twisting "Enbo" into "Ember" just because they shared one character, all to attract tourists.
"I swear what I'm saying is absolutely true..."
"I swear what I'm saying is absolutely true. If I'm lying, may my whole family die!"
Before the tour guide's oath was finished, another tour guide less than ten meters away was swearing to guests, his desperate posture as if to say that anyone who didn't believe him would be defying heaven itself.
"It's just to make money, no need to drag your whole family into it," a tourist patted that tour guide's shoulder.
Laughter erupted all around.
The tour guide standing next to Xu Huo couldn't continue either. He gave an awkward smile and prepared to take them to the "witness testimony" segment.
The first part was physical evidence, and next came witness testimony. Jiusang City had plenty of elderly people. The ones they mainly wanted to visit were those who had worked in the town government at the time.
Compared to physical evidence, everyone was more interested in hearing what the witnesses had to say, so there were even more people here. By the time Xu Huo and the others arrived, the room was packed with players.
Among them were two or three people they had seen before in Dingding Flower Town, but Xu Huo had changed his appearance and physique multiple times, so those who had seen him before couldn't recognize him anymore. As fellow players, everyone was both companions and competitors, so as soon as he entered, many people secretly sized him up. Only after a few seconds did someone make room for him to get in.
They let him in, but the tour guide and ordinary people could only wait in the yard outside the door.
Xu Huo leaned against the wall, listening to the elderly people talk about the origin of the name "Ember."
There was no doubt that the name "Ember" came from the first person to discover large amber fossils. The small town back then was nowhere near its current size, surrounded by mountains. During the later city expansion, some small hills that weren't difficult to level were bulldozed, but the places that gave rise to the names "Ember" and "Jiusang" were still preserved, now still popular tourist spots. However, the mountain that produced purple amber collapsed fifty years ago and was left unattended until the "Ember Maiden" craze started over a decade ago, when locals and outsiders reopened that mountain.
Of course, these mines that once produced amber fossils were still popular tourist attractions, but the locals weren't very interested anymore.
All of this was about "Ember," but no matter how much they talked, they never mentioned "Maiden."
The players had props and instruments for detecting lies. They might not always work on players, but they worked perfectly on ordinary people. So the people of Jiusang City couldn't tell lies, nor could they fabricate a "maiden." Whether it was mining ore, final polishing of amber, or sales transactions, all of it was done by adults with certain experience. Minors had nothing to do with it. At most, they would sneak in to play, but accidents were rare. The only time it caused a big stir was when a group of children got into a fight inside the mine, beating each other black and blue. Among those involved, there weren't many women who could be counted. Even those who were maidens at the time now had children and grandchildren. They had never had any interaction with Master Solan in their lives, so naturally, there was no way to know whether the "Ember Maiden" had anything to do with them.
As for the man named "Enbo," he died very early. His residence was also bulldozed during the later city expansion, leaving no trace.
Xu Huo listened to this history and checked the timeline. Old Mr. Yue had said that the old neighbor Ember Town of Funiu Village was also a poor place back then. The label "poor place" should have remained when Xixi Duolaiti disappeared. Building a big city wasn't easy, and mining amber fossils couldn't be done overnight. So "Ember Town" should have existed for a while until several years later when purple amber was discovered and it was renamed "Jiusang."
Although the timeline couldn't be pinpointed exactly, it generally matched up. What was more noteworthy was that "Ember Town" wasn't wealthy before the name change, so there must have been many people leaving their hometowns to find work elsewhere. And compared to the honest and well-behaved amber mines of "Ember Town," gemstone mine accidents in other places were far more numerous.
If that was the case, then Xixi Duolaiti's disappearance was very likely related to "Ember Town."
Without knowing the details of the mine accidents, the revenge of the victims' families and those in the know against the district government and mining groups, the mining groups' targeted suppression of some victims' families, and the government's deliberate secrecy regarding Xixi Duolaiti's disappearance delayed by ten to twenty years, it would be very difficult to connect all this information.
"Ember" might refer to "Ember Town," and "Maiden" might refer to "Xixi Duolaiti." If Enbo or certain people from Ember Town were avengers like the blind old woman, then the two weren't impossible to cooperate with. As for why Master Solan was involved, it was either because of her father or because of the blind old woman who treated her like a granddaughter. These seemingly unrelated people and events, scattered across the map, were now connected through the hidden thread of "man-made mining disasters." (Chapter End)