The two were quite familiar with each other, but didn’t talk much about this topic. After a while, Mr. Wei got up to leave, and the lecturer saw him to the door. When he returned to the office, a Cultist walked over from the side door, saying sympathetically, "He’s here again."
The lecturer handed over the money to him to deal with, "Deposit it into the public account."
The Cultist, while working, couldn’t help but say, "What’s the use of this? These people have been dead for more than a hundred years. Why buy small snacks... Moreover, this money can’t be used on the dead at all."
The lecturer gave him a warning glance, "Keep your mouth shut."
The Cultist grudgingly finished the task and stord out of the office.
The lecturer shook his head helplessly and returned to his desk to complete his work.
But soon after, the office door opened again, and the lecturer went out, found the Cultist who was angrily pulling weeds, and sighed, "How many tis have I told you, but you still don’t rember."
The Cultist didn’t look back when he heard his voice, but angrily said, "Aren’t all the people in the Cult our brothers and sisters? Why deceive them? The large amounts of money donated by Believers every year are actually used to train Players. No one cares about the deceased. I secretly went to check last ti, it’s been a long ti since anyone cleaned there. Mr. Wei still wants to buy food to pay respects to them... If he knew that his years of persistence amounted to nothing, I don’t know how heartbroken he would be!"
"This is not about deceiving them, but giving them spiritual consolation," the lecturer said. "Telling him the truth will only cause him more pain."
"I don’t understand, it’s such a small thing, just do it properly," the Believer said. "Why use this thod to deceive both the living and the dead!"
The young Believer clearly began to doubt his faith. At this ti, the lecturer said, "Do you know who these deceased people were?"
"I do," the Believer glanced back at him, "You’ve told , they were people who died in the mines and had no relatives, we’ve been worshipping them all this ti, but for such a long ti now, the Cult doesn’t pay attention to them, why not just stop caring for them altogether?"
"These are the spiritual foundation of Seventeen Facets," the lecturer said. "We are inseparable from Halesmite, and besides, it’s only been a hundred years, mory hasn’t faded, how could these people be totally erased?"
The Believer couldn’t accept this reason, "Could it be that what the people at Hales say is also false? Hales wouldn’t be what it is today without the sacrifices of these people, right?"
The lecturer didn’t answer this question. The Believer insisted for a while before giving up and said dispiritedly, "I get it, it’s because people from more than a hundred years ago, so have lived until now, while others have already died..."
He didn’t get an answer, but Mr. Wei, who was still at the lecture hall, uttered vague information, "...there’s no need for them to die, their sacrifices were aningless."
This over a hundred-year-old man’s eyes were moist, but under Xu Huo’s guise as the "lecturer", he didn’t reveal more valuable information.
However, through checking both sides, Xu Huo could confirm one thing, the Hales Group had secretly prepared a cetery for those unnad accident victims more than a hundred years ago and had been worshipping them to this day. It was probably out of guilt that the inford ensured "Seventeen Facets" grew and selectively inford so Cult mbers about the worship—such as the lecturer.
People like Mr. Wei, who were aware of the truth behind the mining accidents, were certainly a minority. Besides, with Mr. Wei’s words that the victims’ "sacrifices" were aningless, it signified that the Hales Group’s upper echelon deliberately staged the mining accidents to achieve a certain goal that turned out pointless, so out of imnse guilt, they quietly buried and paid respects to them. But as the young believer said, people who knew over a hundred years ago were certainly not abundant, and even fewer lived to this day. After all, the century can wash away any emotion, making it natural for those who’d been laid to rest by the Hales Group to be gradually neglected and forgotten.
The unnad ones who died in the mining accidents were likely those referred to in the "abode of the departed", which is likely an underground cetery privately established by the Hales Group. Finding this burial instance was akin to finding the truth.
However, this was not Xu Huo’s objective. He wanted to know why the mining companies in Zone 019, more than a hundred years ago, seed to have so tacit understanding, constantly triggering accidents, only to suddenly stop during a certain period—such rapid technological advancent couldn’t possibly achieve such miraculous results, especially when it was known that the Hales Group purposefully caused accidents.
Undoubtedly, Mr. Wei knew the inside story, but he wouldn’t divulge more in front of the "lecturer". So Xu Huo knocked him out and moved him outside, instructing Zhao Yiming to take him to a nearby hospital.
"Don’t let him be sent ho, send him to the hospital," Xu Huo specifically instructed.
Zhao Yiming checked Mr. Wei’s body and found no physical issues, aning that once he was sent to the hospital, he would definitely be sent ho once he woke up.
The three exchanged glances, and ng Xiaoman took out a small syringe and injected it into the gap in Mr. Wei’s nail.
On the other side, Xu Huo returned to face the Believer and, in the lecturer’s tone, relented, allowing him to do what he could if he felt that Hales and the Cult didn’t do enough, but forbidding him from telling a second person.
The Believer nodded and checked his private money before leaving.
He went to a dessert shop, bought the newly released dessert ntioned by Mr. Wei, and then headed to the Hales Group headquarters.
Xu Huo followed behind him, and Jiao Hongyuan, who hadn’t left with Zhao Yiming and ng Xiaoman, ca along too.
The Hales Group headquarters couldn’t be entered and exited like ordinary residential areas. Various interference devices and detectors tightly enclosed the entire headquarter area. It would be impossible to sneak in, even by opening a door with a Spatial Teleportation Device, you wouldn’t get in, even if you did, you would imdiately be detected. So, Xu Huo himself couldn’t go inside.
Although spiritual power could cover part of the area, the detectors could sense his presence, and the counterasure program built into the instrunts would activate upon detecting him. For a leading mining group in Zone 019, the Psychic Disturbance Instrunt they used wouldn’t be subpar, making it unnecessary to take such a risk.
Jiao Hongyuan tried placing a few small props on the Believer, but they were all detected at security checks. Zone 019 people often encountered such things, and after the props were removed, the Believer went through several more checks before passing.
"This is a bit tricky, is the abode of the departed here?" Jiao Hongyuan, not fully aware of the process, couldn’t help but ask.
Xu Huo watched as a chain-like power line extended from himself in a parabola into the air, before dropping swiftly onto the young Believer, and as he moved, successfully entered the Hales Group interior.
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