Chapter 50
When Wen Xin realized that he was seen, he stopped where he was, holding the little fox and touched his nose to cover up.
But before he could calm down and speak, he saw the red-robed man sitting on the chair change his expression drastically.
The old man stood up, and his aged body burst out with the speed of a twenty-year-old running champion. In the blink of an eye, he even fastened the lid of the teapot.
This is preparing to run away with the tea!
Immediately, Wen Xin didn't care whether it was awkward or not, he rushed over in two steps and pressed down the red-robed man's tea pot first.
When the others saw him, they ran away without caring about anything else, but the red-robed man's first reaction was to take away the tea.
This proves that in the heart of Red Robe Man, tea is more important than himself!
As expected.
Seeing that he couldn't take the teapot away, the man in red robe turned pale and almost got angry.
"Take your hands off me!"
Wen Xinhan became tough and said, "Then you have to promise that you won't run away after I let go of your hand."
The red-robed man said without thinking, "I promise."
No guarantee, just take it and run.
Unfortunately, Wen Xin did not believe his assurance.
"By your pope or your gods."
Red robed man: “…”
The life pulse is in control.
This guy is such a scoundrel.
The red-robed man clicked his tongue, glanced at the little fox who was blinking innocently in Wen Xin's arms, and felt so sad and chill in his heart.
But he has calmed down now: "What do you want to talk to me about?"
Wen Xin was sure that the man in red robe would not run away again, so he withdrew his hand from the teapot that was on his mind.
"I want to learn about Idealism."
In fact, Wen Xin wanted to know more about the divisions of other power organizations, but just now, his thoughts changed a little.
The man in red robe picked up the chair fallen from the ground and brushed off the dust on it.
"You don't look like you want to join Idealism."
The red-robed man sat down again and met Wen Xin's gaze: "You just pry into other people's secrets, do you think I will tell you?"
The accumulation of years has made the old man's eyes reveal a deep power. Under the gaze of these eyes, Wen Xin has a feeling that he is seen through.
Wen Xin showed no fear.
But he had to think about one thing.
That means that I don't have anything in my hands to exchange information with at the moment.
Exchanging information for information might be the most appropriate method, but Wen Xin couldn't do it.
Because he focused on training while in the base and rarely went out, most of the things he knew were related to the training camp and the army.
He would not reveal those things, whether they were confidential or not.
The atmosphere was tense before, and the two sides had different positions. Wen Xin could take out his gun and point it at the red-robed man's head without any burden, listing various conditions.
But not now.
To put it bluntly, his situation is like being dependent on others. He can't say he has to keep a low profile, but at least he can't be too arrogant.
What's more, the attitude of Idealism towards him can be considered friendly.
Seeing Wen Xin's silence, the red-robed man laughed, not surprisingly: "You can't tell."
The little fox was about to look up.
But then I heard the young man clear his throat.
"I thought of one, but I don't know if it counts."
Wen Xin looked at the tea jar in the red-robed man's hand and said, "There probably aren't many people growing tea outside right now, but there is some in the base in City A, and the production is relatively stable."
"If you need it, I can introduce you to the tea merchant when I get back."
The red-robed man's expression did not change, but his eyebrows twitched suddenly.
"Are you serious?"
Wen Xin nodded seriously.
In fact, he didn't know any tea merchants, but he had seen fresh tea in Li Yongming's ancestral home before.
After asking, I found out that there are actually people growing tea in the base.
City A as a whole is not well-off, and many people still go hungry.
Wen Xin himself has never experienced hunger, but he knows that the cultivation of various vegetables, fruits and melons is competing for farmland and greenhouses.
In that case, we should put tea and other things aside and focus on high-yield and filling crops.
Wen Xin has always been puzzled by this.
It was only later that he found out that Wen Jinfeng had allowed the cultivation of those tea leaves.
But they were not sold to their own people, but to wealthy businessmen from other bases.
Since he is a wealthy businessman, he must have a lot of resources in his hands.
They have long been tired of potato pancake instant noodles that ordinary people cannot eat, so of course they will pursue better things that others cannot easily get to improve their quality of life.
Facts have also proved that the decision to sell tea to the outside world has indeed solved the hunger problem of many people in the base.
The warmth and hardship are still fresh in my memory.
It can be said that it was the first time that he filled the seemingly blank image of Wen Jinfeng in his mind.
Instead of just vaguely remembering a serious high school boy who sat at the dining table with his back to him and pushed open the door without looking back.
From then on, apart from a phone call to express condolences every few months, we have never seen him again.
For Wen Xin, the current situation is just right.
The man in red robe likes to drink tea and has a high status in Idealism, so he should have a lot of resources.
It completely meets the target customers for tea sales.
Wen Xin's two sentences touched the heart of the red-robed man.
He likes drinking tea, but has been struggling to find a stable way to do it.
A high bounty was commissioned to hire mercenaries to search for the tea in the tea shop, but unfortunately, the tea had either been looted in advance or destroyed by zombies.
Even if it's not rotten, it's completely undrinkable if the packaging is damaged and stained with blood.
Only a few cans were recovered.
It's all aged tea.
For some tea leaves, the longer they are stored, the mellower their flavor becomes.
But some teas taste best only when they are young and tender in early spring.
The man in red robe missed the feeling of the latter and would certainly not reject Wen Xin's proposal.
He thought about it, touched his chin, and looked at Wen Xin as if he was a new acquaintance: "I can't believe you also know the tea merchant?"
In terms of property rights, the largest tea merchant in City A is Wen Jinfeng.
So Wen Xin was confident when he said, "I know him."
The red-robed man smiled broadly, his attitude much better than before: "Okay, okay, then come sit here, there are chairs over there."
Wen Xin brought the folding chair over, held the little fox in his arms and sat opposite the man in red robe.
The red-robed man asked, "What do you want to know about Idealism?"
Wen Xin put on an attentive look and said, "I don't know much about Idealism. I'm very curious about why Idealism exists, what's going on in it, and who's involved."
The red-robed man understood Wen Xin's hidden meaning.
The other party wanted to know the origin, personnel distribution and event information of Idealism, and would accept all offers.
Although he was trying to gather information in a roundabout way, the young man's attitude was still sincere and genuine, so he was not unpleasant to look at.
The red-robed man looked at the little fox and talked about some things that did not involve the secrets of Idealism and were not a big deal.
From the words of the red-robed man, Wen Xin learned the origin of Idealism.
In fact, not all idealists believe in idealism. What they say "idealism is supreme, idealism is best" is just a verbal oath.
To be honest, the man in red is a realist.
In his opinion, love and happiness only exist in imagination, and pie in the sky falling from the sky is even more impossible.
The word "Weixin" in Idealism was changed when the sect was founded, but only the Pope knows the real name.
Why it was not adopted is also an unsolved mystery.
When the red-robed man said this, the little fox raised his head silently, looked at Wen Xin steadily, hiding the complicated emotions in his eyes.
Wen Xin asked: "Did the pope of the Noble Church receive any revelation when he founded the church?"
Most people outside may not be able to explain this clearly.
They only knew that Idealism had arisen suddenly, and that the number of members in the sect had expanded at an incredible speed, establishing a survivor base in just a few days.
But apart from that, it seems that he hasn't done anything earth-shattering or awe-inspiring.
The red-robed man took a sip of hot tea and said slowly, "Because people at that time were in so much pain, many almost died."
When talking about the doctrines and dogmas of Idealism, the old man remained very calm, unlike the pockmarked man who was full of obsession and fanaticism.
Seeing that he didn't mind, Wen Xin made a bold guess.
"You mean, at that time, everyone was looking for a spiritual support, and idealism just happened to appear?"
The red-robed man shook his head: "Yes, but also no."
"If you tell a person who is running out of food that tomorrow will be better, he may be able to listen to you because his worry is about tomorrow, not now."
"But if you tell a starving person that things will get better in the future, he will just spit in your face and tell you to get out as far away as possible."
When the end of the world came, the man in red robe saw with his own eyes a child who was not even as tall as his thigh die in the mouth of a zombie.
He knew the child; she was the precious granddaughter of his next-door neighbor.
He is still a baby, speaks with a soft and tender voice, and his eyes are crescent-shaped when he smiles. If you give him a sweet orange slice or a lollipop, he will become very happy and say thank you with joyful gestures.
When he heard the child crying, the man in red robe's eyes turned red and he picked up a stick to hit the child.
But when the zombie heard the noise and turned around, he saw the familiar face and almost dropped the stick in his hand.
Because the zombie biting the child was none other than the grandfather who loved the child the most.
That is such a sad thing.
But such tragedies have been happening frequently on this land without interruption since the end of the world.
No matter what kind of spiritual sustenance one has, it cannot eliminate such pain.
Wen Xin was silent.
He thought of the aphrodisiac that Pockmarked Face had used.
If the brain is too clear, it will remember all the pain clearly, destroying one's spirit and will day by day.
Then perhaps the only way left is to resort to drugs to help yourself get rid of it.
But Wen Xin quickly ruled out this speculation.
Whether it was the red-robed man he saw, or the other black-robed men and ordinary believers, their complexions were relatively healthy and rosy, and they walked with vigor, not looking like they had been taking large amounts of illegal drugs for a long time.
Wen Xin touched the little fox's fur.
He asked out of the blue: "Does the Pope have special powers that can help people relieve their spiritual suffering?"
Having said that, the red-robed man was not surprised that Wen Xin could guess it: "That's right."
Except when he appeared at the door of the hotel room, the old man showed enough momentum towards Wen Xin.
Most of the rest of the time, he was like the old man strolling around the garden, holding a thermos in his hand and taking a sip from time to time.
Only at this moment, a hint of religious piety appeared in the eyes of the red-robed man.
Not as crazy as the pockmarked man, but full of gratitude and obedience from the bottom of his heart.
He said seriously: "When you arrive at the base, you will know how incredible the existence of His Holiness the Pope is, and how fortunate we are."
The little fox moved its ears, and Wen Xin held them in his hand and rubbed them gently twice.
As if remembering something, the man in red robe looked at the young man meaningfully.
"So don't say I didn't remind you. Once you arrive at the base in City B, you'd better concentrate and don't think of any crooked ideas."
The red-robed man had an unspoken subtext, and I believe Wen Xin would be able to understand it.
——I know your main target is Zhang Quanyong, but don’t think about taking him away. He is now a member of our base, so just stay put and behave yourself.
Hearing Wen Xin being warned and threatened, the little fox glanced at the man in red unexpectedly.
“Hmm.”
The red-robed man twitched his lips and said, "This is just a friendly reminder, nothing more."
Wen Xin hesitated for a moment, then calmly said, "Don't worry, how could I have any evil intentions?"
The red-robed man looked at him suspiciously: "That's good."
The current members of Idealism can be roughly divided into four categories.
Ordinary people, priests, twelve bishops, three cardinals and the most powerful Pope.
Clothes are the easiest way to distinguish your identity.
Ordinary believers usually wear plain linen robes without any patterns and without any emblems on their chests.
The priest wore a black robe with simpler patterns and a three-petal flower emblem on his chest.
As the name suggests, there are twelve bishops in total. By analogy, they are equivalent to the management level in the A City base, supervising and managing the affairs of different sections. The patterns on their black robes are also more refined, and the emblem is a four-petal flower.
Further up is the cardinal, wearing a red robe and a five-petal flower emblem.
Wen Xin draws the analogy: "Then is the emblem on the Pope's clothes a six-petal flower?"
"How could that be?" the red-robed man said as a matter of course, "Your Holiness can wear whatever he wants. If he needs anything, why not just tell us directly?"
Wen Xin: “…”
Yes, that's very papal.
After talking about the origin of Idealism and the division of identities of its members, all that remains is the major and minor events that took place in the base.
It is inevitable to mention the current operating mode of the base.
Today's currency has become a piece of waste paper. Only gold can still maintain its value. After all, it is a non-renewable resource and can also be used in the production of some ultra-high-precision electronic components.
Under this premise, barter is the most common form of transaction in the base.
If you can't think of what you need at the moment, you can redeem it for contribution value or points and record it in your account, and you can redeem it at any time.
Most of the disputes in the base are about the distribution of contribution points.
Wen Xin waited for the red-robed man to continue.
But no one spoke.
He followed the red-robed man's attitude and came to an incredible conclusion.
"People only disagree about the distribution of contribution points, and won't argue about other things?"
There are at least tens of thousands of people in a base, and with tens of thousands of people living together, resource allocation becomes a big problem.
There will always be people who don't have enough to eat or enough to wear, and there will always be people who eat too much.
Before Wen Xin joined the training camp, Li Yongming sent someone to take him to familiarize himself with the base.
The private trading market is where the loudest noise comes from.
Some people tampered with the scales, some took advantage of the information gap to raise prices secretly, some formed groups to engage in private monopolies, and some hired actors to drive up prices and mix fake products into their own goods.
Once they are discovered, they will start fighting without mercy, until their heads are broken and blood is shed and they scream in pain.
The person in charge of the private market could not help but call in the security team to take away the talents from both sides and end the matter.
This is just the tip of the iceberg.
Facing Wen Xin's disbelief, the man in red robe repeated the sentence mysteriously.
"When you get to our place, you'll understand."
It took about seven days for Wen Xin to reach the base of City B following the Idealism Cult.
Perhaps because he got along well with Wen Xin, the man in red robe was willing to answer other questions asked by the young man on the way.
He told Wen Xin that the current power organizations are roughly divided by direction.
The first base is located in the north. It took less than a month to incorporate the two surrounding cities and establish the largest survivor base in the world.
Countless survivors were rescued and taken in by the First Base, and they burst into tears of gratitude.
However, there are also some bad rumors circulating in the First Base.
Rumor has it that the zombie virus and mutants were created by them.
After all, the predecessor of the First Base was H City, where the virus originated, and the research on zombies and mutants was so in-depth that it didn't seem like it had only been conducted for a few months.
Unfortunately, the First Foundation was so powerful that no one could verify this.
The north-west is basically the area where the warm and strong winds in City A occur.
Because of its location farther away from the First Base and its geographical advantage, City A was able to avoid the latter's efforts to gain power and expand its territory, and was not forcibly conquered.
The South China Sea is dominated by a giant whale mutant.
This whale dislikes humans very much and often creates small tsunamis, causing great suffering to the residents in the surrounding areas.
Although people generally won't die, no one can stand having their home flooded from time to time.
The residents had no choice but to move away, and basically no fishermen or mercenaries dared to approach that area.
As for the East and the West, it was all chaos.
There were large groups of snakes in the east, as well as other extremely dangerous mutants. These mutants were full of hatred for humans and would attack them if they met them.
The mercenaries who had been there and survived described it in such a fearful and terrifying way.
——Every step I took was like walking on a wire on the edge of a cliff. I had never felt death so close.
A little further east is a well-known forbidden area.
Because there are terrifying unnatural disasters happening there, such as waterlogging that goes against the climate and thunderstorms that are several kilometers long.
No one dared to go deeper, and no one could see what had happened there to cause such an abnormality.
"If you have something you want, or something you want to know, you can go west. The dark market there is well-known and has the largest trading house. But I advise you to stay away from a place called Rose City."
The red-robed man said sarcastically.
"His master has just taken office and is very arrogant. He is very keen to bury those who disobey him in the ground."
.
In the blink of an eye, the B City base was within reach.
Wen Xin remembered that Tang Qi's parents were in City B.
When the zombies appeared, Tang Qi was worried about his parents and also came to City B.
Wen Xin felt a little relieved.
Since Idealism has established a survivor base in City B, the people here should have a great chance of surviving.
I don’t know how he is doing now, and whether the ragdoll cat Huanhuan is still healthy.
The car stopped and members of the Idealism Church got off one after another.
The guards saw their shadows on the city wall and ran to the gate early, lined up in a row, and waited respectfully.
Wen Xin followed the red-robed man, and as he walked past, a deafening shout was heard.
"Welcome to the Church--"
Before he could finish his words, he was interrupted by the red-robed man who suddenly came to his senses: "What are you yelling about! The emperor has been dead for hundreds of years. Stop learning those feudal ideas and go back to do your own things."
The church members who were paying their respects were immediately stumped: "..."
They looked at each other and responded blankly.
The man in red robe and the little fox looked at Wen Xin at the same time.
Seeing that his face looked normal and seemed like he hadn't discovered anything, I couldn't help but breathe a sigh of relief.
As soon as he entered the city, Wen Xin clearly had an unusual feeling.
This feeling was ethereal, but it made him relax his body subconsciously.
Worried about his brother Wen Jinfeng, team member Lin Nan, and long-lost friend Tang Qi;
Concerns about whether they could successfully meet with Zhang Quanyong;
grief for the fallen servicemen;
There is also the indescribable fatigue that has been felt for the past few days.
It's like someone took an eraser and wiped it clean.
Wen Xin couldn't help but look at the people walking on the street.
These people were obviously under the same spell as him, and each of them had a bright and carefree smile on their face.
It seems that the world is beautiful, life is worth looking forward to, and there are no more troubles that can bring me down.
Even those who are pale and thin will not be as numb and dull as the survivors fleeing outside.
Wen Xin became more and more fascinated as he watched.
He had seen so many desperate faces and heard so many hysterical voices that he almost forgot that people's eyes could be filled with hope like this.
A luxury of hope.
Wen Xin couldn't help but be moved.
The red-robed man saw his ease and said with a smile, "Now you understand, this is the greatness of His Holiness the Pope."
Although Idealism is fundamentally different from traditional religions, they still followed etiquette and built a church.
The heavy porcelain-white door was pushed open, and Wen Xin stepped onto the shiny floor holding the little fox.
After walking a few steps, he was attracted by the paintings hanging on the wall.
"That's... your Pope?"
The little fox's pupils shrank, and he quickly looked in the direction of Wen Xin's gaze!
【Author's words】
Thank you to the little angels who voted for me or irrigated me with nutrient solution during 2023-04-28 23:58:41~2023-04-29 23:58:50~
Thanks to the little angel who cast the mine: 2 pieces of taro paste Sijichun;
Thanks to the little angels who irrigated the nutrient solution: Lavender's Voice 11 bottles; Sunbathing Bear, Yehuang 5 bottles; 50472109, Charlie Su 3 bottles; Wei Lan, Look at What I Do, Fei, Hahahaha, Shuying 1 bottle;
Thank you very much for your support. I will continue to work hard!
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