Chapter 85 Injured Civilians
No one doesn't like youth.
It’s just that some people like the vitality, possibilities and creativity of youth, while others just like youth itself.
The latter can be divided into two categories. The first category sees youth as a plaything or a consumer good, while the second category sees youth as capital—don’t get me wrong, not the kind of capital that can make a profit, but the kind of capital that can be used to indulge in pleasure.
The first type of people are keen on pulling young fools into their dirty social circles, and teasing and toying with these young fools with money, power, force, and even cost-free sweet talk.
The second category is mostly young people, most of whom believe that there are only two stages in life, namely adolescence and youth. They believe without any reason that only teenagers are qualified to pursue their dreams and to indulge themselves without restraint. They love to laugh at strangers older than themselves as "old women" and "greasy middle-aged men", as if they will never live to the age of the people they laugh at. Interestingly, some of these people overlap with the group regarded as playthings by the first category.
In the general environment of China, these two types of people can only party behind masks; regardless of whether a healthy human society can completely prohibit the objectification, trading, and discrimination of their own kind, at least in terms of clear rules and within the scope of the principles of public order and good morals recognized by the general public, such behavior is not allowed and will be punished by society.
But in a human society that is not so sound, and even has leaks everywhere... these two types of people have the conditions to do whatever they want and can even get by better than ordinary lawful citizens.
Westham was not "financially well-off" from the beginning. Although the main street in the town was built magnificently, the incomplete city wall exposed the fact that this town was just a nouveau riche - the two-person-high city wall could only cover the old town area, and the main street in the town, which was only expanded in recent decades, had no city walls, but was instead served by a sturdy brothel complex.
This kind of makeshift external defense of the town... is enough for Westram, which is located in an inland area, has no large rivers around it, and does not border any other countries. If it only needs to defend against wild beasts, rare wandering monsters, and bandit groups, it does not really need a strong and thick wall.
The "Elegant Fantasy" club, which is more magnificent than the "Golden Coast", is a huge building with a four-story main building and two three-story auxiliary buildings. The three buildings are connected by a high wall in a triangular shape, which is higher than the city wall of Westram. There is also a circle of barbed wire covered with iron nails above the wall. If Ossirian, Lika, and the young Brook were trapped in this club, there would be no possibility of escape.
Westham's waiters privately called the "Elegant Fantasy" club a prison and the club's owner Garcia Green a tyrant. When Green himself learned of these two titles by chance, he was not angry, but happily rewarded the waiter who let the secret out with two silver coins.
Green likes the nickname "Tyrant" and is glad that he holds such a special position in the hospitality community.
Garcia Green was a coachman for a viscount for six years.
Don't underestimate this seemingly humble position of coachman. In fact, the person who is closest to those distinguished gentlemen who can influence others' lives with just one word, and who is qualified to share the secrets that gentlemen are willing to share... apart from the valet, is the coachman.
Green, who had been diligently driving the Baron to his different lovers' residences for six consecutive years and keeping the secret, was fortunately given the opportunity to be "sent out" when the Viscount needed to earn some extra money so that he could have the financial resources to get close to a countess.
This ambitious young man, who was only in his twenties, had the right to control the viscount's private money. He left the capital of the Rhine Kingdom and came to Westerm in the remote south. While providing the viscount with a steady stream of "affair funds" for many years, he quietly established his own... "kingdom".
Garcia Green never cared about whether it was valuable and meaningful .
He only cares about one thing, that in the "Elegant Dream" with 42 thugs, 19 waiters and 271 waiters, he is the "king".
At five o'clock in the morning, when most people have already fallen asleep, the "elegant and dreamy" King's Game has just begun.
The basement on the first floor below the main building is Green's "entertainment venue". The cold blue brick floor is always filled with stagnant water mixed with blood, tears, snot, and even some strange body fluids.
Green sat on the armrest sofa next to the coffee table, holding a glass of red wine, and observed with great interest a man and a woman who were tied to a stone pillar opposite the coffee table.
The man was very strong, and his upper body covered with whip marks and trembling muscles revealed his identity... He was one of the elegant and dreamy thugs.
In comparison, the woman looked a little weak. Her face was sunken under her messy long hair, and her skin had become loose. She couldn't even stand when she was tied up, and her whole body tilted to the other side.
"I'm sorry... Mr. Green, I didn't mean it... forgive me..." The thug was very afraid of Green's gaze, and he kept begging while trembling.
He himself had carried several bodies out of the basement, and he knew too well what it meant to be brought down there.
Garcia Green smiled, put down his wine glass, picked up the horsewhip, and pointed it at the half-dead woman: "Look at Xibel, she can't resist even if you give her cow urine, and you were so 'careless' that you didn't notice that she had stopped taking the fattening drug... Tell me, Ben, how many copper coins is your apology worth?"
Ben shuddered and closed his eyes in pain.
"If you feel pity for some pretty young waitress, I can understand..." Green came out from behind the coffee table with a whip in hand, stood in front of Ben, tilted his head, and said strangely, "But you actually broke the rules for this kind of stuff. Tell me, Ben, are you still mentally normal? Will you suddenly go crazy like those people in the church said?"
Ban's expression suddenly changed.
In order to deter people and prevent them from having any contact with cultists, most churches use the most severe form of burning at the stake to punish those who are out of control.
Ben's face turned pale, and he dared not hide anything anymore. He stammered out the reason: "No, no, Mr. Green, actually...actually...Sibel is almost old enough, I, I just...don't want Sibel to spend the last six months--"
After all, Westerm is an official town under the Rhine Kingdom. Although all countries in this world, including the Rhine Kingdom, have a tacit unspoken rule that criminal law applies to lower-level officials but not to higher-level officials... at least on the surface, gentlemen with power have to behave like decent people.
For example, everyone knew that Westham's hospitality came from unknown sources, was beyond his control, and he did not receive any benefits, no salary or pension, and even three meals a day could not be guaranteed. However, the gentlemen still "implemented" a few seemingly humane "labor guarantees" for these poor people on paper.
One of them is that if the hostess working in special industries in Westham has worked for ten years or is over the age of twenty-six, the owners of the entertainment venue must terminate the "work contract".
Whether this regulation helps the hosts see the dawn of freedom or facilitates the owners to reasonably and legally discard and dispose of "bad assets" is not the point... In short, being able to break away from the "boss" can at least prevent the hosts from being forced to continue taking fattening agents that are extremely harmful to their health and are supposed to be used for livestock, and they may hope to live to be over 30 years old.
Sibel was indeed almost twenty-six years old, at least that was what her "contract" (indenture) said.
When Garcia Green heard this explanation, he was stunned for a moment, and then burst into laughter.
"Lady of the Gold Coin, Ben, I never dreamed that I would have such a pure and kind little boy like you under my command!" Green, who was laughing till tears came out, covered his stomach with one hand and waved the whip with the other hand, hitting Ben's body covered with whip marks. "You deserve the praise, dear Ben, this is my reward for you, do you like it? Ah? Do you like it?"
Ben, sweating profusely from the pain, clenched his teeth and dared not scream.
When the "King's Game" is in progress, if the king states the reward and the person who receives it dares to show resistance, he will definitely not have a good ending.
Green swung the whip more than ten times in a row until he was a little out of breath and stopped.
Before Ben, who was about to faint from the pain, found him gasping for breath... Green turned around seemingly easily, returned to the sofa behind the coffee table, sat down, hid his slightly trembling right hand under the coffee table, and picked up the wine glass with his left hand.
This nasty man, while hiding his panting by drinking, looked at Ben through the glass with eyes full of jealousy.
He was over forty, and his physical strength and stamina were far surpassed by someone like Ban who was only thirty years old.
Only by wantonly trampling on these young and vibrant lives can he find some balance.
Suddenly, there were messy footsteps on the basement stairs.
Among the hundreds of employees of "Elegant Dream", only one person dared to disturb Green when he was relaxing - the top receptionist, Phoebe, who was only 19 years old.
It was indeed the blonde, blue-eyed, stunningly beautiful Phoebe who pushed open the iron door of the basement. She ran in in a panic wearing only a sexy nightgown. There was only Green in her eyes, and she could not see Ben who was covered in blood and Sibel who was half-dead.
"Oh no, Garcia, something terrible happened up there!" Phoebe hugged Green's arm, her expression and movements natural and intimate, as if the relationship between them was not just that of a boss and an employee. "I, I heard a lot of people running around and shouting, it seems like something happened!"
Green liked this kind of young fool who couldn't even understand his own position after being given a few benefits and who self-righteously thought he was different from others. He said gently: "Don't be nervous, dear, you stay here first, don't go anywhere, I'll go upstairs and take a look first."
Fei Bi nodded obediently, and her eyes were full of admiration as she watched Green leave.
She was beautiful and young, and with her age and experience, it was impossible for her to tell whether Garcia's "extra tenderness" towards her was just a play or he was truly moved by her beautiful original capital.
After Green left, Sibel finally dared to move.
Garcia Green, who calls himself the king, has no interest in wasting his energy on trash like Sibel, but Ben's experience also scared the poor woman.
Sibel, who had not eaten or drunk anything for the whole day, could not even cry after seeing Ben's miserable condition. He could only apologize softly in a low voice.
Ben shook his head and turned away, not looking at her.
Sibel licked his cracked lips, raised his eyelids to look at the kettle on the coffee table, and felt even thirstier.
"Fei Bi... Fei Bi, can you give me some water? I beg you..." With a glimmer of hope, Xibel mustered up the courage to beg the young head waiter behind the coffee table.
Fei Bi turned her head to look at her, picked up the kettle and poured a glass of water, then stood up and walked around the coffee table.
When Xibel tried to raise her head to drink water... Feifei splashed the water in the cup on her face.
"Here, drink." Fei Bi raised her chin contemptuously and shook the cup.
Xibel stared at her blankly, the fire in his eyes gradually extinguished, and he returned to his previous half-dead and numb state.
Ben turned around and looked at Sibel, who was trembling slightly, then turned his gaze to the top-ranked girl, Phoebe, who sat back on the sofa and proudly raised her feet.
"You shouldn't do this." Ben tried to hold back, but couldn't help but speak out. "I've been serving Mr. Green for nine years. In those nine years, I've seen many popular top girls like you. Do you know what happened to them later?"
Phoebe glanced at the disheveled Ben with disgust. She had no interest in paying attention to this idiot who had unknowingly angered Garcia. She rolled her eyes and turned away.
"you--"
Before Ban could say something, there was a chaotic "click, click" sound coming from the direction of the iron gate.
Before the three people in the basement could react to what the strange sound meant, the iron door of the basement was kicked open.
“Who… Aaaaaaaaaah!!”
Just as Phoebe was about to get angry, she jumped up as if her butt was stabbed by a needle and ran to the other end of the basement screaming.
Rushing into the basement were several skeletons holding sharp blades and wearing strange fish-scale armor!
"Ms. Gold Coin! Ms. Gold Coin!" When Ban saw the skeletons clearly, he didn't care about the pain from the whip marks on his body. He screamed and struggled hard.
Xibel's reaction was the most direct. The moment the skeletons rushed in, she fainted silently...
These skeletons, which looked like the gods of death and were filled with murderous intent,... behaved very strangely.
After seeing the three people in the basement, they did not rush towards them as the screaming Fei Bi and Ben imagined. Instead, they stopped where they were and, under the suspicious attention of Fei Bi and Ben, they exchanged "KABAKBAKABA" sounds...
"Fuck! Why are there only civilians? Where's the boss? Where's the elite monster?"
"It's poisonous, right?! They hid it in such a deep basement and didn't even give it a chance to spawn a boss. What a stupid planner!"
"I'm really convinced. I might as well continue looting the room!"
Several players cursed and cast identification spells on the three NPCs in the basement with a glimmer of hope.
"Ah! The necklace worn by that female NPC can be identified, and the system recycling price is eighty copper coins!" One of them raised his hand and pointed at Fei Bi in surprise.
"Wait a minute, this is a civilian. Is it okay to rob civilians?" another person asked hurriedly.
"Why don't we just terminate the process when the system tells us not to do it?" The player who identified Fei Bi didn't care about anything else and strode towards Fei Bi who was hiding in the corner.
Fei Bi was terrified and ran towards Ban with a shrill scream...
Before she could reach her destination, she was caught up by the player.
The player who grabbed Fei Bi's arm stretched out his hand to break the necklace on Fei Bi's neck, snatched the pure gold pendant weighing more than ten grams, and said to his friends in surprise: "Huh? I can snatch it! The system didn't send out a warning!"
As he said this, the player shook off Phoebe, who was howling like a pig about to be slaughtered, and happily returned to the team...
Fei Bi, who had returned to life, was stunned for a long time.
"This is 'Injured Civilian'. How much is the reward for treating civilians?" The player who used the identification spell on the class turned around and asked his companion.
"It seems to depend on the severity of the injury, with a minimum of twenty and a maximum of one hundred," said another player.
"At least twenty points of territory reputation. That's fine, it's worth it." The player said, pulling out a few small cylinders from his waist bag.
After becoming a pharmacist, you can get a set of "Basic Potion Tools", which are the most basic herbal processing tools.
This small steel bottle for medicine was also given by the pharmacist mentor. It is a product of modern industrial assembly lines. It was originally used to store chemical gases. It is very cheap to make and has even been used for other purposes by some unscrupulous businessmen... I will not go into details here.
Ban, who was unable to break free from his bondage, looked extremely desperate when he was approached by the players.
The death-like skeleton walked up to him and stood still, raising the steel knife.
Ben was horrified and his eyes widened in unwillingness.
The gleaming steel knife neatly cut the ropes that bound him.
The skeleton put the steel knife back into his waist, unscrewed the small steel bottle, poured out a pungent thick liquid mixed with a lot of unknown substances, dipped it with his finger bones, and smeared it on his wound...
class:"?!"
Ben didn't even bother to call the gold coin lady, nor did he forget to run away. He stared blankly at the skull who was carefully applying smears on his wounds.
Not all of the guests who come to Westham for fun are law-abiding citizens. From time to time, thugs like Ban have to fight with the people brought by the guests and are very familiar with the smell of hemostatic drugs.
An ordinary hemostatic drug was applied to his body by a skeleton that was definitely not ordinary. This matter... Ben really couldn't understand it. He was completely confused...
Ban's external injuries were easy to deal with, but the unconscious Xibel caused trouble for the other two players.
"Weak civilians... How the hell do we solve this? Give them medicine?"
“I don’t know!”
"Can you feel the pulse or ask questions to see what symptoms this NPC has?"
"Brother, I studied computer science!"
The player who was earning territory reputation by taking classes turned around and said, "Give them some food and drink. The NPCs that Master Miaobishenghua and his men rescued just need a few good meals and they'll be fine."
"No! Who would bring food with them when they come to attack the city?"
The player who stole the Fei Pi pendant said, "Why don't we just leave it here first and come back to retrieve it. Didn't the bosses say that we are few in number, so we should first capture those who can resist and then start the task of rescuing civilians, otherwise we won't be able to take care of both ends."
"That's fine." The two players said as they lifted Xibel up and placed him on the sofa.
After the players who applied the medicine received the reputation reward, the four of them left behind the confused Ban & Fei Bi and left on their own...
The four skeletons left for a long time before Ben and Phoebe, the two who were able to move, moved and crawled to the door to look around.
The stairwell was empty; the skeletons were indeed gone.
Fei Bi picked up her skirt and ran without saying a word. She wanted to find Garcia. Only Garcia, who represented absolute authority and power in her mind, could give her a sense of security.
Ban didn't care where Fei Bi went. He went back to the room, found his shirt, put it on, carried the unconscious Xibel on his back, and ran away.
...This is probably the area that players are most likely to neglect. They don't think that the civilian NPCs waiting for their rescue will run away. Even the two military strategists Miaobishenghua and Entropybutseng think that the civilian NPCs will stay where they are and wait for them to come back and rescue them.
Of course, the civilians who were identified as harmless really couldn't run away. Ben ran out of the basement sweating profusely. Before he left the elegant and dreamy courtyard, he saw a group of skeletons running past on the street outside.
As they ran, the skeletons made noisy and excited "KABAKABA" sounds.
Ben was so scared that he fell back to the main building...
He didn't know where Garcia Green had gone, nor did he know where his brothers were. The entire "Elegant Dream" was eerily quiet. He walked around the corridor on the first floor of the main building with Sibel on his back like a headless fly, but he didn't see a single person.
What's even weirder is that the halls and corridors are in a mess, but there's no sign of a battle. Instead, it looks like they've been visited by thieves...
"What on earth happened?" Ben was confused. After hesitating for a moment, he pushed open the door of the room near the hall.
There is someone in the room.
There were more than a dozen male and female waiters huddled inside, hugging each other and looking in the direction of the door in horror.
When they found that it was Ben who opened the door, these people were visibly relieved.
Ben scanned the group and found a waitress who was about the same age as Sibel and whom he had secretly helped. "Kelly, what happened?"
"Close the door first." Kelly said anxiously.
Ben quickly closed the door with his foot and signaled the waiters to give up the sofa and put Xibel down.
Next, the waiters and waitresses pieced together for Ben what happened on this terrifying night...
"The undead invaded through the window? The guests and the men were tied up and robbed by the undead?" Ben was stunned.
The waiters and waitresses nodded in shock, "It's true. I was terribly scared at the time... The undead didn't care about us, but we didn't dare to stay in the room."
Kelly added: "We wanted to go out, but there were more undead outside, so we had to hide in the empty private room."
"What about Green?" Ben asked the question that concerned him most.
"Mr. Green... resisted the undead and was chopped by them." Kelly swallowed her saliva and said with fear, "This is the first time I've seen the undead be so ferocious. Their previous methods were obviously relatively mild. Please don't attack the undead, Ben, you can't imagine how terrifying they are when they really attack the living!"
