Chapter 95 Scumbag Yang
Although the sugar-coated bullet that "Director Lu" threw at Yang Qiu this time had some problems in terms of wording and did not even make up an excuse, it was indeed much more down-to-earth than the previous attempt to hit someone with a thermal power generation production line:
Six sets of 100KW low-noise diesel generator sets replaced by state-owned mines - the factory price of a new generator of this specification is less than 30,000 yuan per set, and a second-hand one can be bought for around 20,000 yuan.
A Dongfeng truck (new car costs 220,000 yuan) loaded with diesel barrels (one barrel has 210 liters and one liter costs about 7 yuan).
Crawler hydraulic all-terrain excavators, scrapers, cranes, road rollers, etc. with an average price of 40,000 to 100,000 yuan.
To put it simply, it is to compress the tens of millions of sugar-coated bullets into millions...
Moreover, these sugar-coated bullets have an extremely naked and precise purpose: this batch of sugar-coated bullets are used to build roads.
Which road is being repaired?
The road from Exile Town to Westham deep in the Tarantan Wasteland.
Ji Tang personally joined the expedition team and walked this road. It took three days in the alien world to walk about 300 kilometers. Apparently, after this guy reported the situation, "Director Lu" believed that Yang Qiu, the mastermind behind the scenes, would need to start the road project...
And considering Ji Tang's habit of always poking around the Exile Town, Yang Qiu suspected that he might have discovered the open-pit coal mine ten kilometers east of Exile Town - ordinary players are still no match for the big rat blocking the town gate, but they can still get out of the town by acting as bait for each other, so it is not as difficult for Ji Tang to sneak out of the town as before.
In short, Yang Qiu was moved.
Although the teleportation array that can be used by living people has been prepared and hidden under the town halls of the two towns, it is very expensive to activate the teleportation array. Each teleportation consumes magic materials. It cannot be used as a means of transportation and can only be used to deal with emergencies.
This combination of punches from "Director Lu" really hit his weak spot...
Deep in the mountains of Province G, there is a research institute with a red sign.
After Professor Yin Zhengliang of the expert group sent the email, he watched the "game video" recorded by Ji Tang while patiently waiting for a reply from the "target".
The small town with electric poles at the gate confirmed the expert group's speculation that this planet disguised as a game does have a certain level of civilization and is not the primitive image seen when the vision was trapped in the Exile Town.
In addition to the use of electricity, while dismantling the interior compartments of the red-light district buildings, Ji Tang also secretly checked the wall building materials used by this alien civilization, flipped through newspapers and magazines left by someone unknown, and dismantled the bases of their wall clocks and table clocks...
Judging from the paper and printing technology of newspapers and magazines, the world's technology in these two areas is relatively mature. However, the cost of color printing should still be at a relatively high stage. Newspapers are still black and white, and magazines only use color on the cover and a few inside pages.
Many photos of people were published in the newspapers, indicating that the materials science of this civilization had also progressed to the stage of photosensitive materials.
The magazine contained color advertisements for four-wheel-drive vehicles and photos of airships and ocean-going ships, indicating that this civilization had reached the level of technology with steam power and most likely also had technology for internal combustion engines.
The parts of wall clocks and table clocks are quite precise, but there are still a considerable proportion of traces of manual work, which shows that the scale of industrialization in this world is not yet sufficient, and some watch parts still need to be manually polished by craftsmen.
The small number of metal products indicates that steel production is not high.
Glass products are relatively common, but the craftsmanship is relatively ordinary, and the technical level is probably similar to that of the United States in the early 20th century...
Ji Tang and his gaming companions took a lot of pictures while visiting the residential area. The daily utensils used by the townspeople were mainly made of wood, supplemented by glass products and pottery. Rubber products were very rare, and no porcelain was seen...
Considering the poor living conditions in Westham Town, the expert group believes that the top of the world's pyramid is probably similar to the Western developed countries on Earth in the early twentieth century, but the general public is still living in Asia, the Middle East, Latin America, and Africa from the to the nineteenth century - in the words of the Chinese people who like to talk about revolution and politics the most, it is a turbulent society with a serious split between the top and the bottom, sharp social contradictions that are likely to further intensify, and major changes that may occur at any time.
Therefore, after brainstorming, the expert group members, whose average age is in their 30s and 40s and 80% of them were born in the 1980s, believed that this was a good opportunity to test whether the "target" and Lord Yang in the "game" were Chinese.
As long as one is a native Chinese, and encounters such "troubled times" and has the objective conditions to participate in the competition (backed by the Earth, able to trick players into doing hard labor, able to transport supplies across dimensions, and does not mind official intervention and handing over the power of Westham Town to the legitimate Ji Tang), there must be only one thought in one's mind: build high walls and store up food!
The Tarantan Wasteland is as big as half of G Province. Although there are many hills, swamps and forests, there are also many plains. Any of them can be made into good fields if you clean them up. It would be easy and cheap to build a small granary!
Lord Yang asked the players to attack Westram (huge mistake), a place where there is no hemp industry, so he must be going for the population (labor force)!
There are land and people. If Lord Yang is a qualified Chinese, he must build roads and farm!
So the expert group cautiously threw out this rural road engineering-level combination gift package… It’s not that they can’t give a better one, but given that the “target” had rejected it without hesitation last time, most members of the expert group thought it would be better to be conservative; after all, they were just building a 300-kilometer dirt road that could be used for traffic, so there was no need for those high-tech gadgets.
As Professor Yin Zhengliang was stroking his chin and pondering the portrait of the people of Westham town taken by Ji Tang, a "ding" sound came from the computer.
"There's a response!" The professor rubbed his hands excitedly and opened the email...
Then his smile froze...
"What's wrong? How did the other side respond?" The expert group member next to him leaned over curiously.
Then the corners of the mouth of this expert who was born in the 1980s also began to twitch...
This time, the "target" did not refuse and accepted their big gift package.
But the "target" didn't mean to take it for free, and said that he would send four kilograms of gold to thank the expert group...
Four kilograms of gold, at the current international gold price, even if the gold from another world is not that pure, is enough to pay for the rural road-level gift package that they worked so hard to come up with...
"Hey - this guy!" The young man born in the 1980s crossed his arms in annoyance. "Does this guy welcome our intervention or refuse our intervention? Why is his attitude so ambiguous?"
"Scumbag!" The female expert group member sitting opposite also leaned over the table and stretched her head to look at Professor Yin Zhengliang's screen. She said unhappily, "This guy just wants benefits, but he refuses to admit that he has been treated well. He doesn't take the initiative, refuses, or take responsibility. He is just a scumbag!"
Young man: “…Really.”
"It's really despicable." Professor Yin Zhengliang dragged the email to the bottom, took a look at the content at the back, and couldn't help but say this.
At the end of the email was the first transaction request sent to them by the “target”.
The content was that they hoped to exchange a batch of high-quality wood with its source not marked for 300 kilometers of railway rails and green-skinned carriages purchased domestically - they were not satisfied with just building roads, they also wanted to start building railways, train conductor training, station construction, etc., and it would be best if all the follow-up tasks were taken care of completely.
Others don't know where the "target" wood comes from, so how can they not know? That's all the wood that their Chinese compatriots have worked hard to cut down for a few game coins and numerical rewards!
You deceived our compatriots into working as coolies, and then used the wood stained with our compatriots' blood and sweat to exchange for railways. Are you still human?
Not to mention the gold, which was also obtained by our Chinese compatriots through hard work... uh, collection!
"At least we can be sure... Lord Yang or the 'target', at least one of them must be Chinese." Professor Yin Zhengliang said with a smile.
The young man nodded first, then his eyes lit up: "Wait, Lord Yang has touched that batch of gold, right? Then can't we collect his biological samples?"
Professor Yin Zhengliang shook his head and sighed: "Since one of these two people is Chinese, it is unlikely that they will give us this opportunity... The gold will most likely be re-smelted before it can be in our hands."
Why do experts always mean experts? Professor Yin Zhengliang, who has studied criminal psychology for a lifetime, knows the tricks of bad guys very well. Two days later, the gold they received was indeed a large pile of gold ingots...
Yang Qiu didn't care what the expert group thought about him. He settled the business that was scheduled to be delivered within three months through emails with "Director Lu". He leisurely ate noodles, drank happy water, and then put on his robe and returned to the other world.
Ji Tang is already online, wandering around the Westham Town Hall with a group of friends.
Yang Ying, the older sister who has become a semi-professional gamer, is very interested in the sheriff. She is asking the reliable genius student En Bu Zeng what the punishment will be if she fails to be a good sheriff. En Bu Zeng seems to have noticed something and contrary to his usual behavior, he does not support Yang Ying. Instead, he asks Ji Tang indirectly about his plan...
Yang Qiu stared at the non-increasing entropy in the matrix for a while... and didn't care much about the girl's reaction.
Some players are likely to discover the truth of this game, and Yang Qiu is mentally prepared for this.
Anyway, no matter what evidence the players find, he will just stick to his guns and refuse to give in - even if it's a top student like Entropy But Zeng, without the support of the country, it's impossible for him to find any solid evidence just by searching around in the game.
Even if players really discover that "Another World" is actually a real other world, that doesn't matter. If they don't abide by the game contract that is automatically confirmed when logging in, do things that violate the production team's regulations, and fail to play the role of "undead", Yang Qiu will directly ban them.
As long as Yang Qiu posts an announcement after banning an account that "Player XX has violated the contract and is banned, and places in the internal beta test will be re-drawn", all cloud players on the entire network will work hard to promote the banning policy, and there will definitely be no one criticizing the shady dealings of the game - it's very stable!
After scanning the online players as he did in the past and confirming that there was nothing unusual, Yang Qiu immersed himself in meditation.
After the engineering equipment from "Director Lu" is delivered, he will have to prepare to build a road from Westram to Exile Town.
Labor is not a problem. Not to mention the two thousand laborers detained by the militia, it is not difficult to recruit workers locally since there are no decent industries.
The trouble is the safety issue during road construction.
Why don't the noble landlords in this world like to reclaim wasteland like the local landlords in feudal China?
Of course it’s because the wild is too dangerous - in addition to the wild beasts that were common in ancient China, there are also many unscientific monsters and demons roaming the wilds of this world.
The player expeditionary force encountered monsters all the way from Exile Town, but Yang Qiu had not made any arrangements for the monsters in advance...
If we were to replace the player team with an ordinary caravan, they would have been injured and had to turn back halfway...
In other words, wherever the road construction team goes, the undead army, who are not afraid of pain or death and rush forward screaming "WAKAKAKA" when they see monsters, must follow, otherwise the consequences will be unimaginable.
Yang Qiu must quickly sprint to the great magician realm and expand the number of players.
It was five in the morning of November 1st, Earth time, and nine in the morning, in the other world.
The mornings in August dawned very early. In Area A of the resettlement site (formerly the Elegant Dream Club), the young men and women who had been completely relaxed for a few days got up early, took the daily necessities issued by the new lords and gathered in the yard to wash up, clean their living areas, and wash their changed clothes.
Four days have passed since the new owner of Westram Territory was replaced (in the alien world time). Both the townspeople and the young men and women who were resettled have become accustomed to life ruled by the new lord - humans are naturally adaptable, and the new lord has not introduced any other measures that would arouse public resentment except closing the red-light district, hiring townspeople to clean the streets, and purchasing and selling affordable supplies.
Especially after the new lord released more than 200 militiamen yesterday, the townspeople's resentment towards the new lord became even lower - although some of the families of the militiamen who had not been released were still indignant, it took a lot of courage to connect with each other and go to the town hall to ask for an explanation in front of those scary skeletons running around the town.
Not to mention... yesterday, the new lord, Mr. Charles Rex, posted a notice in front of the town hall, announcing that the new mayor would be a skeleton, and also posted a photo of the undead mayor...
It is difficult for the townspeople to tell the difference between the undead mayor in the photo and the skeletons running around the streets. Everyone looks like the mayor. It is better not to mention their conflicted mentality.
The townspeople’s reactions have nothing to do with the young men and women living in the two .
No need to entertain guests, no need to worry about being abused by bad customers, no need to be forced to take fattening drugs, and being treated like a human being, who would care whether the new mayor is undead or not?
Ms. Shirley likes her current life very much. She cuts off her long nails and long hair that she carefully maintained to please men. She squats by the pool with young girls in the early morning sun to wash clothes and sheets. She doesn't care if her fingers are wrinkled. When hanging them to dry, they can laugh at each other without any grudges for not washing the stains on the sheets clean.
When Ji Tang and Rex walked into the courtyard of the resettlement site in Area A, they saw from a distance dozens of young women laughing and playing around the pool. Even though they couldn't understand their conversation, they could feel their relaxation.
"Good day, Mr. Rex!"
"Good day! Mr. Dead!"
Seeing the new lord coming in, Ms. Shirley stood up and waved hello energetically.
"Good day, Shirley, good day, girls." Rex also smiled and waved back.
No one living in the resettlement center dislikes Mr. Rex.
He cares about everyone's lives, is considerate of everyone's emotions, and treats everyone gently. After just a few days of getting along, he has remembered many people's names.
When these young men and women learned that this gentle yet powerful gentleman was the new lord of Westham, they no longer doubted the promise he had made to everyone when he smashed the sign of the club.
"Let me introduce to you all. This is the new mayor of Westham, Ji Tang." Rex pointed at Ji Tang who came with him and said with a smile, "Mayor Ji Tang hopes to recruit some administrative clerks to work for the town hall. Girls, are you interested?"
The ladies who were chattering in low voices and looking at Ji Tang curiously suddenly became silent.
"Mr. Rex, what did you say?" Ms. Shirley suspected that she had heard it wrong and stammered.
"I mean, our new mayor hopes to recruit administrative clerks to work for the town hall and serve the townspeople." Rex said happily, "Mayor Ji Tang learned that many of our girls can read, so he wanted to try his luck and see if there are any kind and brave girls willing to help out in the town hall."
Rex has always admired Ji Tang, the undead. He was extremely happy that Ji Tang had become the mayor of the undead town and was working with him. He took the initiative to tell him that he hoped to find young men and women to serve as clerks, which was exactly what Rex wanted. He had been racking his brains these days about how to arrange a way out for these young people, and Ji Tang had directly considered it ahead of him.
Ji Tang couldn't understand other people's language, but he could understand Rex's words. When Rex introduced the situation, he stood aside calmly, waiting for Rex to bring people to him...
The organization decided to recruit clerks from those who used to work in special industries after careful consideration. The reason was not entirely from a humanitarian perspective of helping people in special industries find new jobs, but for practical purposes:
First of all, the illiteracy rate in this world is quite terrible. Less than half of the "senior NPCs" can read (except Hal, Tuttle, Pansy and Rex, only Anthony who used to be a tailor and Jerome who used to be a knight's squire can read), not to mention the common people.
In contrast, the literacy rate of male and female waiters in high-end clubs is much higher than that of ordinary people - because these people need to receive middle and upper class clients, who at least need to be able to read newspapers and talk to guests about gossip and anecdotes in the newspapers.
Of course, no matter how small the town of Westham is, there are middle-class families, such as small business owners who run shops and workshops. The overall cultural level of these people is definitely higher than that of the literate waiters.
But... with the Chinese style, if they have to choose between the local middle class whose butts may not be on the Tarantan side and the former special industry practitioners whose butts are definitely on the Tarantan side, they will definitely not choose the former.
Ms. Shirley was stunned, and the other girls had a similar reaction.
Many of them knew what a clerk in the town hall did... they had received many administrative clerks from Westram or Innadri who came here specifically for fun.
Not to mention that they had never heard of women being allowed to be administrative clerks - and yet, they actually wanted to recruit from among them?!
"Shirley, you're not interested?" Rex knew what they were shocked about, and pretended to be disappointed, "That's bad. I just boasted to Mayor Ji Tang that I know where there are some very outstanding ladies who can definitely help him..."
"This, I, I..." Ms. Shirley panicked. God knows how much she wanted to nod and get this job that would allow her to live with her head held high, but she really had no confidence in herself.
Rex acted pitiful and looked at a lady with a little foam on her face: "Sibel, what about you?"
Xibel was startled: "Ah...ah? Me, me?"
Before Westram was liberated by the players, Sibel was imprisoned for several days by his former boss. He was badly injured and only recovered a little in the past few days. He was still very thin and looked like he would fall to the ground if the wind blew. When he was suddenly asked about it by the lord, he was so excited that his body trembled.
"Yes, I heard about you from Ben." Rex said softly, "You grew up in a convent, the nuns taught you to read, and you used to be a teacher for orphans. I think you are very suitable for this job. What do you think?"
Xibel's face flushed red.
She was indeed adopted and raised in a convent, and she did serve as a teacher to the children.
That was the happiest time in her life... until she turned eighteen, when her natural beauty blossomed like a rose, completely changing her life and forcing her to face seemingly endless pain and torture over and over again.
"I..." Sibel clutched her skirt tightly, trembling as she mustered up the courage to say, "I...I really want this job, Mr. Rex...please, please give me this chance."
The timid Sibel is actually a person who has the courage to survive even if he has to struggle miserably.
Shirley shuddered. She was inspired by Sibel's courage. Fearing she would lose the chance, she rushed to say, "Mr. Rex, if possible, I would also like to give it a try."
These two took the lead, and several literate ladies plucked up the courage to raise their hands...
Half an hour later, Ji Tang happily led more than 20 young men and women who were literate and obedient to leave the resettlement site and took them to the town hall for centralized training...
The real explanation for the option to recruit NPCs in the player's mayor's authority is that the "NPCs" recruited by the player who are willing to board Tarantan's ship and are determined to be sailors can be temporarily pulled into the branding matrix.
These "temporary NPCs" have very low authority, cannot issue tasks, have no personal reputation, and don't even have a player panel. Apart from removing language barriers, they have no additional functions and are marginal elements in the matrix.
To explain it from a religious perspective, they are believers who are there to make up the numbers... they don't give you the power of faith nor do they need your faith, you can come and go as you please.
After bringing these nervous young men and women into the town hall, Ji Tang took out a box and issued them "work permits" - azalea badges that could be worn on the chest.
The azalea badges given to the two player mayors by Lord Yang were engraved with spiritual imprints that could connect to the brand matrix - not the permanent spells in the player's skeleton and the soul of a "high-level NPC", but time-limited imprints that required one year to complete.
Shirley, Sibel and others received the badges and saw the undead mayor making a "KABAKABA" sound and gesturing in front of his chest with his bone claws. They looked at each other and tentatively pinned the badges on their bodies.
"...Can you understand what I'm saying?"
Ms. Shirley, who had just pinned the badge on her chest, suddenly looked up and looked at the undead mayor in surprise.
"Do you understand what I say?" Ji Tang patiently confirmed again.
Ms. Shirley opened her mouth wide…
It turns out that the "KABAKABA" sound made by the dead is a language?!
