Chapter 303: Clearing the Haze of Yongwang Town
When the Innadri siege was opened, the map system was also opened.
But this map... is not one of those real-time refresh maps in traditional games that is so detailed that it even marks the locations of fixed refreshed BOSSes and prompts quest monsters. Instead, it is a hand-drawn coordinate map in the style of old movies - in fact, Yang Qiu used PS to make the official topographic map of this world into a hand-drawn style and then added it to the matrix.
The map only shows the terrain of mountains, rivers, and cities and villages are marked with dots. Things that are on the official map may not be on the player map, and things that are not on the official map will definitely not be on the player map.
You can only identify your own location, and can only see the little blue dots of yourself and your teammates/team members on the map. There are no instant refresh prompts for mission points, and there are no detailed street maps in towns. Players have complained about this countless times... but it just won't be changed.
The only thing that makes players feel better is that the maps loaded into the system allow players to add and modify them as well as personal logs, and the added and modified maps can also be shared with other players - in other words, players can complete the maps themselves.
Boss Ou Yan has shared the distribution map of the Tarantan monsters that he explored many times on the player forum. However, the monster spawning spots he found are all places where super experts can SOLO (solo) to maximize the benefits. Currently, there are not many people in the entire game who can use his shared map.
After seeing everyone helping their relatives and friends with professional tasks on the Blood Alliance channel, Tang Jia, who had left Boss Orange Cat and Boss European Sturgeon behind and ran back to help his childhood friend, discovered the small farm at the foot of the mountain. He immediately opened the area map and took a look... Sure enough, there was no building marked in this place on the map.
Manually adding this small farm that was not marked on the map, En Bu Zeng waved his hand and said, "Go and take a look."
Without her saying anything, Tang Jia had already ridden ahead, leaving the others far behind.
It was still a little while before dark, and workers were still working in the open space in front of the farm. Suddenly, they saw a group of ghosts running towards them. The workers, who were turning over the hay with pitchforks, were startled and hurriedly shouted to the farm: "Madam, the ghosts are coming!"
"Ghosts? Are they the ghosts in the town?" A strong woman came out of the cowshed with a broom in her hand. At first glance, she saw that the ghosts had already jumped over the workers who were turning the hay and ran happily into the farm...
The Farm at the Foot of the Mountain is a small civilian farm. The more than 100 acres of land reclaimed by the family are used to plant crops such as wheat, corn, potatoes, radishes, and vegetables. Corn and potatoes are the most planted, and vegetables are the least planted. Only a few acres of land are planted for family consumption, and a few acres of pasture are planted for raising cattle and pigs.
The family who ran the farm could not take care of so many fields, so they hired two workers from a nearby village. A while ago, someone from the town hall came to discuss hiring cheap spring plowing workers for the farmer, and since the farmer only had to pay half the money, he hired two more workers from the town to help.
The work on the farm was hard. According to local tradition, employers were obliged to provide two meals to workers who did heavy work. While the boss's wife was cleaning the cowshed, her daughter and daughter-in-law were busy in the kitchen, preparing dinner for the family and four workers.
The intrusion of more than twenty undead spirits disrupted the peace of this small farm. The farm daughter who went out to get firewood saw the undead spirits running all over the floor, screamed and fled back to the kitchen, slamming the door shut.
The lady boss was just about to remind her daughter not to provoke the ghosts when she saw her young and inexperienced daughter-in-law rushing out of the kitchen with a pair of fire tongs, trying to fight the ghosts...
Fortunately, the ghosts made a strange gesture to the daughter-in-law and then used their claws to knock away the fire tongs she was holding, went into the kitchen, took a look around, and then came out to search other places.
The proprietress dropped her broom and ran over, hugging her panicked daughter and daughter-in-law in one hand each, saying repeatedly, "Alright, alright, calm down. Didn't the militia come to warn you earlier? There will be undead looking for people. Just don't provoke them. They will leave after they've finished searching!"
The daughter was afraid of seeing these hideous skeletons and buried her face in her mother's arms.
The daughter-in-law's reaction was a little strange. She stared blankly at the undead coming in and out of her farm, looked back, turned her head away, and said to the boss lady with a strange expression: "Will they really leave after searching?"
The proprietress' heart trembled, and her arms that were hugging her daughter-in-law's shoulders involuntarily loosened.
The daughter-in-law said nothing more. She slowly squatted down, held her head with her hands, and looked numbly at the dead bodies on the farm.
The proprietress stared at her daughter-in-law's back in horror for a long time, then hugged her daughter tightly with both hands.
"Mom, where are Dad and brother?" the little daughter who was hugged tightly asked in a soft voice.
The proprietress said nothing.
The husband and eldest son had hurried out earlier. The proprietress saw with her own eyes that her husband stuffed the family's cash box into his backpack, and then stuffed a few clothes into it. He called his eldest son, and left without saying a word to her and her daughter.
Subconsciously, the proprietress turned her gaze to the easternmost side of the farm, the warehouse which was a bit far away from the other buildings.
The boss's wife wasn't very clear about what her husband and eldest son did in the warehouse...or maybe she didn't want to find out.
She only knew that sometimes, her husband and eldest son would bring some food to the warehouse, and the amount of food would be larger, not enough for two people to eat.
The proprietress's hands began to tremble slightly, and she subconsciously hugged her daughter tighter.
Some undead walked into the warehouse.
The time the undead stayed in the warehouse seemed extremely long to the proprietress.
The undead ghost finally came out. The jaw of its terrifying skull face kept opening and closing, and it waved its arms vigorously to greet its companions, seeming to be very excited.
Some of the undead ran towards the warehouse, and some walked towards the farm owner's house.
"What? What are you doing?"
Four strong hired workers were captured by the undead. The confused workers tried to resist, but they were no match for the undead and were quickly pinned down and tied up.
Another undead ghost walked towards the proprietress and her two companions, stretched out his bone claws, and rudely separated the proprietress and her daughter. He looked at the young daughter, ignored her, and only tied up the proprietress and the daughter-in-law who was squatting on the ground.
"No! Let my mother go!" The little daughter who was pushed aside rushed over crying.
"Eileen! Be sensible ! Go back into the house!" The proprietress did not struggle, but endured the pain and scolded her little daughter.
Irene, who was less than ten years old, had no idea what was going on. She only knew that something terrible was going to happen in her home, so she rushed forward to save her mother regardless of anything.
"Eileen!" The proprietress was in great pain and couldn't hold back her tears. She was reluctant to drive her daughter away, but she was also afraid that the undead would take her daughter away with her.
"Fuck... what is this NPC doing?" A player grabbed Irene's collar and dragged her away, complaining to his friends, "Why do they arrange a family scene for a quest? Are they asking players to play the villain's role?"
The friend was also troubled by the crying and screaming little girl NPC: "Is there some plot that we haven't triggered yet?"
"Probably." En Buzeng came out of the room next door and pointed at the four hired workers tied up next to him. "Those guys don't look like the male owner. Their clothes are not of the same standard as the farm owner's. They are probably workers or something. The male owner might have run away."
"What the hell, there is such a thing!" The players who were doing the quest together were all shocked. "A mere NPC would not stay where it is and wait for the players to catch it, but would run away?!"
"Perhaps this mission is not something that can be completed by a group of people." En Buzeng held up the photo frame he found in the house. "This should be a family photo. There are two men in this family who ran away. I will inform other teams doing the mission. It depends on luck which team can encounter these two 'main culprits'."
As he said that, En Bu Zeng stopped caring about the "arrest scene" and shared the appearance of the two male NPCs who had escaped in the family photo in the Blood Alliance channel. He then opened his friend list and copied and sent it to all the online wizard players who had come to Everlook to complete their professional quests...
The list of nurse players is full of nurses. When Entropy Does Not Increase was sent out to a group of people, almost all the player teams doing tasks in Yongwang Town received the message.
"It's around this point in the eastern suburbs, right? Our group will be here soon!"
"Damn, our group is on the diagonal line!"
"We are too far away, so we won't come over. There seems to be a hidden mission here, and we are looking for clues..."
While Entropy But Zeng was communicating with the wizard players who were doing the same quest, Tang Jia and his companions had already successfully brought the quest target, the young boy Brook, and several other NPCs who were not included in the quest requirements out of the warehouse basement.
At the moment when Brook, who had been illegally detained for several days, was brought back to the light of day, all the wizard players who were doing quests in Everlook Town received a quest update notification:
"The Mage player's professional quest "Finding Brooke" has been updated"
"The team led by player Entropy has successfully rescued the young boy Brooke who was kidnapped by the Darnell family."
"The principal offender, Darnell, and his accomplice, Darnell's son, are still at large. Undead warriors, please continue your efforts and bring them to justice."
"The Mage player's professional quest "Clearing the Haze of Everlook" has been triggered."
"The Undead Warriors have successfully taken down two dens of evil lurking in Everlook: the Foot of the Mountain Farm and the Horseshoe Bar."
"The town hall has obtained more clues and discovered more crimes hidden deep in Everlook Town."
The text content of the side quest "Sweeping the Haze of Everlook" is N times more than the main quest "Finding Brooke", and the number of words is so long that it needs to be folded ...
By clicking on the foldable, players can see two pages of NPC names, residences, and long-term haunts - all of which are what Yang Qiu found out from Dennis Frank's interrogation.
Anyway, there are so many player teams in Yongwang Town at this moment, so Yang Qiu simply handed over the work of arresting people to the players...
A large number of side quests that can earn territory reputation and game coins have appeared, and the players who were wandering aimlessly in Yongwang Town with their relatives and friends were very surprised.
"As expected of a wizard, his professional quests are more awesome than those of other professions!"
"Damn it, why don't walkers get this kind of treatment for their professional tasks? The authorities are actually discriminating against people based on their profession!"
…Despite their complaints, many small groups of players who had already started to slack off still actively moved and rushed to the nearest hiding place of the mission target…
The Entropy No Increase team rescued Brook, and as usual, they wrecked the farm at the foot of the mountain. Unfortunately, this farm was just for show, and it was poor inside, and the income was not as good as the Horseshoe Bar that their team found. The players who didn't make much extra money were very unhappy, and they took the six "NPC criminals" and took Brook and others to the town hall, cursing.
During the days that Brook and his four companions were detained, they were simply drugged and made to sleep every day. The undead fed them low-level alchemical potions and they woke up. They did not suffer much, and it was not a problem for them to keep up with the undead who were on their way with the "trophy NPC".
Brooke saw the farm's little daughter, Irene, crying and stumbling behind her captured mother and sister-in-law, and he couldn't bear it and picked up the little girl on his back.
"Brother, why did you arrest my mother?" Irene sobbed while lying on Brooke's back.
"Because your father and brother tricked us into coming here and locked us up under your warehouse, and then they wanted to sell us." Brooke, who was carrying Eileen on his back, was also very resentful.
"My dad and my brother did this?" Irene was so shocked that she forgot to cry, "Why?"
"How would we know?" Brooke didn't know whether to laugh or cry.
Seeing that the young men were easy to talk to, the four hired workers who were tied up and led in a row by the undead spirits spoke up bravely: "Young men, can you please say something for us? We are just hired to help on the farm. We have never seen you. We have no idea what Boss Daniel has done."
"My brother and I were introduced to the farm at the foot of the mountain by the town hall last month. We were really wronged!"
Brooke was brought up by Sister Zhao after all. He didn't even vent his anger on the farmer's daughter, so he certainly wouldn't vent his anger on the innocent hired worker. He comforted her, "Don't worry, as long as you're not involved in this, you'll be fine. The undead are only responsible for arresting people, and the interrogation and judgment are the business of the town hall. Lord Barton is from the town hall, and he won't wrongly accuse the innocent. You just need to explain it to the sheriff, and you can go home."
The four workers were very grateful and hurried to thank Brooke.
Brooke thought he would have to spend more time talking to appease them, but he was surprised that they accepted his argument so quickly... He had worked at the grassroots level with Sister Zhao and knew that people always like to understand problems from their own perspective and common sense, and it is difficult for them to accept different opinions and suggestions. Often the most basic and simplest policies have to be explained repeatedly before people can understand and accept them.
After thinking about it carefully, Brooke found that this seemed understandable... It was not because his words were so influential, but because Patton, the lord of Everlook Town, had gained the trust of the locals - the four workers who were accidentally implicated believed that Patton would not punish them arbitrarily.
"Well, you did a good job." Brook muttered softly. After being kidnapped in the territory under his own charge, Brook must have some opinions about Patton in his heart.
After all, who could have imagined that a local man who had worked hard as a commoner to build up a small farm-sized business would do something so outrageous?
Patton had been in a stalemate with the proprietress of the Horseshoe Bar for the entire afternoon without getting any confession. Just as he was getting very annoyed, the undead brought the captured Brooke and the prisoner's family to the town hall to exchange for reputation and undead coins.
Barton: “…”
Barton was thinking about what he had done that day when Brooke walked up to him with the little daughter of the Daniel family and threw him a big problem: "All the adults in the Daniel family are probably implicated, but the child is definitely innocent. Now that his family can't go home, what should be done with the child?"
Barton cast his gaze on the child who was cowering behind Brook, and then looked at Brook who seemed to be relied upon by the child.
...Is it okay for the victim to develop a relationship with the perpetrator's family? Is he reading some cheesy romance novel?
"——What's that look in your eyes?! I'm still a child! I don't have as many dirty thoughts as you adults!" Brooke shouted.
Although Brooke is fifteen years old and can have a relationship, it is impossible for him to date a nine-year-old child! And he will also hold grudges, and not taking his anger out on others is already the limit!
"Okay, I'll take care of this kid." Barton didn't bother with the little brat and led Irene over. "What about you? Do you want to go back to the City Hall or continue your mission?"
"I have to go to the City Hall to meet Ms. Zhao." Brooke said, "Please arrange a car for me."
Barton understood that he meant the mission had been completed, and asked quickly, "How do you need my cooperation?"
Brooke waved his hand and said, "Don't think about it. You will probably be too busy for a long time."
Barton: “…”Did you guys secretly accomplish something big behind my back?
Barton, who was extremely curious, also knew that he should not ask too many questions about things that he should not ask. Anyway, he would know what he wanted to know. He arranged for several security guards to send Brooke and his group away, and first took the young prisoner's family member Irene to the logistics department and handed her over to the care of the aunts, and then interrogated the prisoners brought back by the dead that night.
After separate questioning and cross-comparison of their testimonies, it was confirmed that the four employees had nothing to do with the crime committed by the Daniel family. They were released on the spot and asked to register with the Civil Affairs Department and queue up again to be assigned work.
It cannot be said that Daniel's wife and daughter-in-law are completely unrelated.
"I, I... I do know that he is doing something bad." The proprietress of the farm at the foot of the mountain was so frightened by the bloodstains that had been cleaned on the floor in the interrogation room where Old Jack and the bartender had been interrogated during the day that she confessed without much struggle.
"The farm's business is in a terrible state. I think... he may have run out of options." After saying just a few words, the proprietress covered her face and started crying.
When the farm was being built, the boss's husband, Daniel, was financially well off and ambitiously built two two-story buildings for his family to live in, and also built several warehouses, cow sheds, and pig pens, and hired a dozen workers to open up the land.
Unfortunately... after all, commoners do not have as much capital as the nobles, and irrigation projects are not something that can be completed by a single commoner family. They cannot reclaim as much wasteland as they can like on farms run by nobles - the land near water resources has long become villages, and ordinary people cannot occupy it - and the reclamation work has to stop when the scale reaches more than a hundred acres.
More than a hundred acres of land can improve the living conditions of most farmers to a level that exceeds that of urban residents, but it is far from enough for those who pursue a superior life as a farmer. Sometimes the output from the land is not even enough to maintain the operation of the farm - if the pigs and cows get sick or the crops are not harvested well one year, the farmers have to pay the workers' wages.
Barton listened to the proprietress's story, but his expression did not change much.
When the proprietress was tired of crying, Barton slowly shook his head and said, “Do you know how many families in Yongwang Town are living below the poverty line?”
"The poverty line drawn by the city hall refers to families with an annual income of less than five gold coins, and a total annual income of less than fifty silver coins. Such families cannot guarantee two meals a day for half a year. Even during the winter festival, they need to find work, otherwise the whole family will go hungry."
"There are nearly 3,000 families like this in Yongwang Town, with more than 14,000 people. In other words... nearly 50% of the families in Yongwang are in extreme poverty."
"When I came to Everlook as the lord, it was after the winter celebration. The weather was a bit cold during that time. In the first two days after I arrived, a family lost a child because their mud house collapsed. Later, another child froze to death because they lacked means to keep warm."
"In addition, three people died of starvation and freezing, one in the town and two in the countryside, a mother and son."
Barton paused, and as the proprietress looked up in astonishment, he spoke word by word: "I wanted to know why the mother and son died of hunger and cold, so I went to collect their bodies... I found that there was not even a grain of corn in the food jar at the mother's home."
"Their life shouldn't have been so difficult. They had two mu and six fen of land, the walls of their house were painted thickly, and they could even afford to raise pigs."
"But in the year that the mother was pregnant, her husband was kidnapped when he came to the town to buy salt. No one knew where he was sold to. After she gave birth to the child, she searched many places with the child but couldn't find her husband."
"When her child was three years old, someone said that they saw a man who looked like her husband on the Newin farm, so she went to look for him... He was indeed her husband, but he had been sold to the Newin farm. Because her husband was strong and knew how to do farm work, his value was very high, eight gold coins. It was more than the value of some pretty little girls."
"That mother can't come up with eight gold coins."
"When her family was complete, it would take her two or three years to save up this amount of money. After she lost her husband, it became even harder for her to save up."
After telling this mother's story, Patton stopped and looked at the proprietress quietly.
The proprietress lowered her head.
"I always heard people say that the husband was abducted by outsiders. Outsiders are not good people. People in the town warn each other to avoid dealing with outsiders. Otherwise, if something goes wrong, a family will be ruined." Barton said quietly, "But even if everyone in Yongwang Town is so wary of outsiders, it is inevitable that some people will lose their family members."
The proprietress covered her face with her hands, lowered her head and cried loudly: "I'm sorry... Master, I'm so sorry..."
Barton looked away, stood up and walked out of the interrogation room.
Coming out of the interrogation room, Barton took a deep breath.
"You can live a peaceful life, but you insist on doing unnecessary things!"
He had absolutely no sympathy for Daniel's family. It was OK that they were young and ignorant, but as adults, eating the flesh and blood of others, weren't they afraid of dying?
"Patton, more undead are coming!" An operator ran over and called him.
"Here I come!" Patton cheered up and strode out of the security department where the prisoners were held.
That night, the town hall of Yongwang Town was brightly lit and never sleeps.
The Innadeli City Hall, dozens of miles away, was also very busy, and was even busier than Yongwang Town.
"Have the people been sent out to seal up Frank's house?"
"People from the Public Security Department have already gone!"
"Does the Transport Department have any spare carriages? We don't have enough carriages to transport people to Frank's estate!"
"There really are no more carriages! Rex's carriage has been pulled in to make up the number!"
"If we hire a few more clerks, we will have to take over all the farms of the Frank family. You only give me two people, and you expect me to finish this job until next year?!"
"Frank's family has another factory in the North City factory area..."
"For the sake of Lady Gold, stop pushing me! Someone call Westram and borrow someone!"
Brook and his friends rushed back from Everlook. As soon as they entered the city hall, they felt the vigorous vitality of this new regime, which was no less than that of the undead...
When the group was going upstairs, an operator who was passing by grabbed the tallest and strongest guy among Brook's friends and dragged him away without saying a word. The young man who was captured shouted that he was not from the City Hall, but he was unable to escape.
When Brooke successfully arrived at Ms. Zhao's governor's office on the rooftop, he was left with only a companion who looked as young as he did and was obviously not yet an adult.
"Is it always like this here?" Brook's friend grabbed his arm, trembling.
This group tried every means to rescue Brook's companions after they were cheated by the caravan, but some of them ran away while looking for ways to rescue them, leaving only four teenagers who were hard to find a mercenary group or adventure team to take them in. They finally met Brook and were taken by him to do a very risky investigation mission for several months. This was their first appearance in the city hall.
"Occasionally, people are not usually this grumpy. Everyone is very kind." Brooke consoled his friend and pushed open the door of the administrator's office.
"Brook? You're just in time!"
Before Brooke could see the situation inside the house, Rex, who was about to come out of the house, looked at him with surprise, and unceremoniously reached out and grabbed the thin shoulder of the young Brooke and led him out: "My stenographer has been borrowed, come and help."
"Wait wait wait - I have important information to report to Ms. Zhao!" Brooke struggled hard and pointed at the only remaining friend, "He, he can read too! He writes very fast!"
Friend: “?!”
