Novel Bin Chapter 197: A Small Drink (1)
Chapter 197: A Small Drink (1)
Dennis nodded and, in a show of understanding, extended his right hand as well.
The chief drew a symbol on Dennis's wrist, and his sentence was directly reduced by ten thousand years.
"This..."
"This is your reward. As long as you continue to provide effective clues, you'll be able to get out of your current situation quickly. You're talented, and we in the Wapeng city never bury talents."
Dennis nodded, his curiosity drawn to a corner of the desk.
There lay a library card.
In the Hive Mind space, Kanon had once shared the B-Series rules, stating that one needs a library card to enter the city library, and to get a library card, one must at least be a second-class citizen.
Gu Yi had mentioned the importance of the library. Maybe he could use this opportunity to explore the library?
"Chief, I have a request."
"What is it?"
"Could I borrow your library card?" Dennis pointed to the corner of the desk, "I can wait on reducing my sentence. I'd like to take a look at the library."
"Why is that?"
"I've always liked reading. As a third-class citizen, I don't really have any interesting leisure activities. The only place I can go for entertainment is the casino, and that's too boring."
"I see."
The Police Chief scratched his head, thinking it wasn't much of an issue.
As long as one has a library card, anyone can enter the library; they don't restrict access based on the citizen's class.
After thinking for a moment, the station master said, "Alright, take it. I haven't been going to the library much lately anyway."
"Thank you, chief!"
Dennis nodded, turned around, and left the office.
...
In the real world.
The armed conflict between the Dragon Country and neighboring countries was intensifying. At this point, aside from the strategy teams from various countries, very few people were paying attention to the strategies for the Weird world.
That night, Xi Wang was sleeping in the dormitory when she suddenly heard a harsh roaring sound from the sky.
Startled from her sleep, Xi Wang pushed open the window and looked up into the sky.
It looked like a massive meteor streaking across the western sky, but upon closer inspection, it was not a meteor but a missile.
The missile landed in the west, igniting half of the sky. It was a long time before Xi Wang heard the deafening explosion.
Xi Wang quickly picked up her phone and dialed Qu Kangping's number.
"Team leader."
"What's up?"
"I saw a missile in the sky." Xi Wang asked anxiously, "Is there really a war going on?"
Qu Kangping replied with a bitter laugh, "Bear Country couldn't hold out any longer and has now declared war on its neighboring countries, even resorting to using weapons of mass destruction. I didn't expect that we, being so far away, could see the explosion of a missile."
"Will it reach us here?"
"Hard to say. The public pressure is so great now, people aren't paying attention to the weird world anymore. Residents near the border have already started to move in large numbers, taking shelter in civil defense facilities."
"Has the weird power already started affecting our country?"
"Not just our country, but the whole of human society. This time, the weird power wants us to kill each other, which is more efficient than releasing weird creatures.
By the way, tell your subordinates that in a week, we'll be leaving the base to work in the air-raid shelters in the mountains. Tomorrow, everyone has to move all kinds of equipment from the base; the strategy meeting will be paused for a day."
"Um... understood, team leader." Xi Wang hung up the phone, muttering to herself, "What week, I bet it won't even take three days before I have to start working in a civil defense facility."
...
In the workshop behind the casino.
Gu Yi showed Er Gou a bit of creating something out of nothing, scaring Er Gou so much that his eyes bulged out, looking at Gu Yi in disbelief.
"Take it back."
With a wave of his hand, Gu Yi took everything on the ground back into the black orb, directly consuming nearly 50 points of his mental strength.
"Now can you believe me?"
"You're no ordinary person, how do you know so much?"
"Even if I explained, you wouldn't understand."
"Fine, let's forget it for now. Come here at 10 p.m tomorrow night with the thing, and I'll tell you what I've been doing every day."
Gu Yi nodded and silently returned to his room.
He had just lain down to recover some mental strength when he heard a knock at the door.
"Gu Wen, are you asleep?"
"Damn it..." Gu Yi cursed softly, "No, what's up?"
"Come out and have a few drinks with me."
"Crazy..."
Gu Yi shook his head but decided to go out after thinking it over.
Although he had just received Er Gou's verbal approval, the system hadn't indicated an increase in trust, suggesting Er Gou was still wary of him.
Gu Yi put on his coat and walked into the yard.
The two sat under the courtyard, with a small tea table between two stools, on which were placed two bottles of wine and some snacks.
"Sit down."
"Alright."
Gu Yi sat down on the stool, and Er Gou handed him a bottle of wine that was already open, but Er Gou didn't provide him with a wine glass.
Gu Yi glanced at Er Gou, who also didn't use a glass and directly drank from the bottle.
"Are you drinking water or wine?"
"Drinking wine straight from the bottle feels different."
They clinked bottles.
Gu Yi took a sip of wine and immediately felt refreshed; surprisingly, the drink had the effect of helping to restore mental strength. He couldn't resist and took a few more gulps.
"Tastes good, doesn't it?"
"Mm."
Both tried to find topics of conversation but seemed unable to.
"Can I ask you a question?"
"What?"
"Why do you offer such low prices to those people? Just twenty years to buy ores?" Gu Yi paused before adding, "If they get caught, they're sentenced to ten thousand years. The cost and the gain are completely disproportionate."
Er Gou laughed heartily, put down the bottle, and said leisurely, "You're from our school, yet you forgot the exam questions?"
"What?"
"Now let me ask you, would you trade your life for money?"
"No, I wouldn't, not for any amount."
"In today's era, sentences are like debts. We labor, we contribute, as if repaying a debt. Guess how many miners in the mine are trading their lives for money?
To save money on renting breathing apparatuses, they use the simplest helmets for protection. The slow ones die within a year, the quick ones in three days, all to earn an extra thirty to fifty years off their sentences."New n𝙤vel chapters are published on
"It's so hard, I'd rather die."
"Die? If only it were that simple."
These sentences don't just disappear into thin air.
Even after you die, they make your soul work, enduring tortures no less than when alive.
So, they'd rather exert every effort while alive to earn even a month off their sentence than to suffer endless torment after death.
Working in the mine, you're always working for someone else. But trading with me, you get real net income.
Elsewhere, a tiny mistake results in thousands to tens of thousands of years in sentences.
Walk too fast indoors, a thousand years.
Talk too much to a high-class citizen, a thousand years.
For wearing the wrong clothes, going to the wrong places, seeing what shouldn't be seen, a thousand years.
See, whatever you do, it's the same.
The standard of judgment is in 'His' hands, never leaving room for rebuttal.
In that case, it's better to earn a bit more. After all, trading sentence time is feasible under 'His' rules.
With me, they can enjoy temporary freedom, remove their heavy helmets, and freely dodge the rules, so they are very willing to trade with me, no matter how exorbitant the price.
In their eyes, freedom is the most valuable thing.
And only by my side, can they breathe freely.
You needn't pity them, nor reproach me. The world is just like this."