After the expulsion of Ember Day, Lu Yao turned his attention to Yancheng.
Fellows said that the place had changed dramatically, and now it was slave traders in control of the city.
Lu Yao overlooked the city.
A series of alerts immediately popped up in the simulator.
[Salt long created the asceticism society.]
Shokaku created the Citizen’s Council.
[Yancheng invented slavery.]
[Salt Lake City invented the tax system.]
[Salt City got a slight boost in attack and a slight weakening of defence for all because of slavery.]
[Dorian Nunu wrote the first history book, The History of the Changes in Salt City.]
[Dorenunu invented historiography.]
[Everyone learnt to use history.]
……
To this series of changes, Lu Yao observed them one by one.
Firstly, there was the Bitter Cultivation Society.
Salt Long. This masochistic ascetic who liked to be flogged by the gods had left a deep impression on Lu Yao.
Lu Yao didn’t find anyone on his left or right, so his mouse attempted to click on that one reminder of Salt Long, and the viewpoint immediately jumped to a stone house.
It turned out that the reminder bar also had its own location function.
Located in the mountains between Yaocheng and Yancheng, the stone house has a very unassuming appearance.
Lu Yao double-clicked on the stone house, and he entered the overlooking view of the house.
Inside, there were a dozen people sitting on their knees.
They were uniformly dressed: all were naked, with shaved heads and hair, and strings of garlic hung around their necks.
At the head of the group was Saltjou.
He is now 63 years old, but is in good health and has no ghost symbol on his head.
……
[Salt Clan LV14] Shiokyu
Life value: 197/197
Mana: 47/47
Damage: 1
Defence: 7
Speed: 4
[Longevity]
Having a long life span.
[Martyr]
Willingness to die for the purpose of spreading the gospel of God.
[ascetics]
To realise and improve through pain.
[Grand Master of the Order of Suffering]
As the Grand Elder of the Ascetic Order, he has a high reputation.
[Evasion Lv2]
Can evade damage caused by some attacks. The probability of this is higher when compared to one’s weaker beings.
[History].
Founded the ascetic order at the age of 37 and completed his second pilgrimage.
At the age of 45, he was attacked by a monster at sea and lost his left arm, completing his third pilgrimage.
Lost his left eye at the age of 51 and comprehended [Evasion] in the ruins of a miracle.
Completed his fourth pilgrimage at the age of 53.
Completed the fifth pilgrimage at the age of 61.
……
Lu Yao looked a little saddened.
Yanjiu’s life experience was quite twisted.
He was born with [Longevity] and was gifted with extraordinary talent, but later became a believer in the White God after being shipwrecked. After failing to spread his beliefs in the name of heresy, Shiohisa became a traitor who was hated by everyone. In the end, he resisted the pressure and came to the temple to repent.
Lu Yao did not give him a chance.
Yanjiu became an ascetic and a martyr again.
He founded an ascetic order and for many years insisted on making one pilgrimage at a time. During this long and unresponsive process, Shiohisa’s body began to be crippled, but he also learnt about [Evasion].
With a human body, he mastered transcendent power later in life, and Salt Long was the first person among Lu Yao’s followers to do so.
A prompt popped up on the screen.
–Great God, there is a devotee who has performed a feat far beyond his peers, need to convert him into a hero?
Yes. No.
Lu Yao tapped on the shrine and found that there were no new characters inside.
When he returned to the stone house, the top of Yanjiu’s head was radiating a faint light.
That means it’s now possible to transform heroes without being at the shrine. It also seems to be a fine-tuning of the world version update.
Lu Yao tapped [No] once again.
In order to maximise the use of the [ascetic] ability, let Salt Long, the forerunner, continue to practice …… next time for sure!
The symbol of pain once again appeared above Saltcue’s head.
It then converts into a happy emoji.
With the god’s rejection and scorn, Saltcue levelled up to LV15 in one go.
He knelt on the ground and pressed his head against the ground, “My Lord God, your faithful servant senses your boundless will, and I will continue my journey of bitter cultivation until the end of this old body of mine ……”
Exclamation marks lit up above the heads of the other ascetics, and they prostrated and knelt down with them.
The experience of Salt Long had made Lu Yao certain that ordinary villains could grow into transcendent individuals from the path of [Ascetic Cultivator].
Lu Yao also discovered an entirely new point: history.
He clicked next to another ascetic.
In this villain’s panel, there was indeed a [History] section as well.
……
Five fingers of his left hand were chopped off for stealing at the age of 15.
Lost his hearing while capturing slaves at age 16.
Joined the Order of Passionists at age 18.
……
Lu Yao checked the surrounding bitter cultivators one by one.
……
Became a pirate at the age of 24 and escaped while fighting slave traders.
Joined the Order of Passionists at age 27.
……
Poisoned at the age of 31, he was saved by Shiojyu.
Joined the Ascetic Order at the age of 32.
……
Captured by slave traders at age 22 and made a slave.
Killed slave owner and escaped at age 29.
Joined the Order of Passionists at age 33.
……
Lu Yao saw it.
Everyone learnt to use History, giving them more [History] in their personal panels.
Personal history currently starts at a simpler point when [Historiography] was invented, with only significant personal events being described and recorded.
This is similar to the invention of text by tribal villains, which gave the entire game interface all sorts of detailed resource data.
The advancement of civilisation not only benefited the pixel villain’s own development, but also brought operational convenience and intuition to Lu Yao behind the scenes.
……
Lu Yao clicks on [Citizen’s Council] in the reminder.
The viewpoint jumps to Yancheng.
The council chamber is behind the library, and the building is circular, like a two-size smaller ale theatre.
The Civic Council was bustling at this time of year.
One by one, the representatives of the council sat on the circular stepped seats and looked towards the speaker in the circular centre of the hall.
A dialogue box popped up above the head of one of the villains.
“…… Salt City is now under great external pressure. To consolidate the city, a taller and more complete wall is needed, the wall is what protects the entire city, and the harbour is also an important part.”
“Once a connected city wall is built, no matter if it’s monsters or pirates, they won’t be able to break through in a short period of time. This will protect everyone’s property and safety.”
“Salt City needs more and higher walls! A large amount of tax money must be spent on building walls!”
The council did nothing about it.
The villain steps down and leaves.
Another man walked up to the centre of the hall, this one draped in a black coat, a scholar.
“Ladies and gentlemen of the council, the Copper Sea leads the pirates in a continuing threat to the entire city.”
“If I may be blunt, if Salt City wants to change the situation, slavery must be outlawed!”
He said, “We all know that the slave market is close to being out of control these days. Not only the formerly hostile savages, islanders, and uncivilised natives, but also a portion of the foreign citizens who have long since migrated to Salt City have been captured as slaves ……”
“The situation has reached the point where it can’t be done regardless!”
“The pirates are growing in number, not because they are getting stronger the more they fight, but because more and more slaves, people who are worried about becoming slaves, are joining them.”
His words were answered by the council.
“The slave market is a trade issue, and we will follow up with further regulation of the trade.”
“Pirates are pirates, criminals and robbers, don’t confuse piracy with business!”
“Without slaves, the city would not have the population and prosperity it has today, one must not forget the roots.”
The scholar could only leave.
A few more made various suggestions, but also received little effective feedback.
Lu Yao was not surprised.
Salt City was now in the hands of the slave traders and the Salt Clan, and the main source of their wealth was the slave trade, so it was unlikely that they would cut their own interests.
All he had to do was to give orders to the Apostles and slavery would disappear from the city. However, Lu Yao was in no hurry to do anything, he still hoped that the little people themselves would work hard internally to end this barbaric system.
Lu Yao noticed the harbour to the northwest of Salt City.
There were two groups of people mingling.
One side was pirates and the other was slave traders. Both sides are fighting fiercely, and people are constantly falling.
To be precise, it was the pirates and the merchants’ slaves who were fighting.
But the slaves clearly had little will to fight, even though they were much more numerous. But after a dozen or so were cut down by the pirates, they scattered and fled.
The merchants had long since seen the situation and fled.
The pirates who occupied the harbour began to light fires everywhere.
The harbour, which many labourers had worked so hard to build in the past, was by this time wrapped in flames and destroyed in a red light.
Lu Yao remembers that there was originally a lighthouse here, once the pride and symbol of Yancheng.
It wasn’t very tall, but when lit, it could guide the way for distant ships.
All that remains now is a field of ruins.
