Mystery: Those years when I was a foreign aid for the Aurora Club

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"Your friend has a terminal illness that cannot be cured."

The old fortune teller acted as if he hadn't noticed the ugly expressions and clenched fists of Xiaowu and I. He shook his head, and even continued to say with a little gloating: "Young man, look at it, you all still have a bright future, don't let it be because of a temporary failure." Grief is all over the place.”

At this time, he started to chatter again, which made me very unhappy.

But Xiaowu is a young man after all. Faced with such an old man who is pushing every inch and doesn't even know what to say to his customers, Xiaowu actually remains polite and asks in a calm voice:

"As long as the method is appropriate, the terminal disease is not completely incurable. Is there any way to temporarily extend his life?"

I was shocked. I looked up at this little colleague who stood up about the same height as me. I couldn't believe that he would pin the hope of his terminally ill friend's life on an old fortune teller whose hobby was to take pleasure in misfortunes.

As a successor of socialism and an inheritor of historical materialism, I regard these mysterious things as entertainment.I really want to tell Xiaowu that even if you are a foreigner or a mixed-race person, you must know that these mystics and beliefs cannot save people. Holy water and prayer blessings are psychological comfort for the living and the sick.After all, there are only a few people who rely on faith to defeat terminal illnesses, otherwise they would not be reported in newspapers and magazines. The vast majority of people are still defeated by the disease. If you ask them, you might as well ask the doctor for treatment plans.

And you don’t know the fortune teller’s routine, right? When you meet him, he will first tell you that you are in danger of a bloody disaster, and then put on airs after scaring you. After a few words of evasion, he will reluctantly say that he will help you solve the problem for money. This little combo is so smooth!You are a foreigner, don’t foreign fortune tellers do this?
But I kept thinking these words over and over in my mind, but not a single word came out of my mouth.

For a moment, I felt extremely uncomfortable in my heart, as if I had also experienced some life and death separation, or was about to experience more life and death separation. Indigestible sadness and never-ending regret weighed heavily on my heart.

It's like I know the friend he talks about.

I was infected by Xiaowu's emotions. I turned around and asked the old man seriously:

"Is there a way?"

I looked at the old man expectantly, and Xiaowu also looked at the old man expectantly. The old man smiled calmly as the two of us stared at him.

"You and I can be considered old friends."

For some reason, my first reaction when I heard this was that he would ask me to add money.

The old man also leisurely took out a cigarette and put it in his mouth, then took out a box of matches.

There was a soft "click" sound, and the match burned after a heavy stroke. He lit a cigarette for himself leisurely, took a puff of smoke and slowly exhaled it, then threw the still burning match into the rain outside. Here, I didn’t even ask Xiaowu, who wanted to have one just now, if he wanted to get angry.

coming soon.As soon as I saw his attitude, I knew that he was going to start deceiving people.

A long time ago, when the trust between us had not completely disappeared, he would often start to lie to people based on calculation, saying that I had a good face and would definitely be in the Immortal Class in the future and cultivate the path to immortality.At first glance, it seemed like he was going to do big things in the future, but he was inevitably homeless and told a lot of classic Internet scripts.I joked back and said, "Don't you want me to practice the Sunflower Book of Nine Yin Scriptures? Five yuan a copy can't be more." He also laughed and said that it would cost more, and no amount of money would be enough, because the price is you. life.

My smile disappeared on the spot along with the friendly relationship maintained by the ten dollars.

To be honest, it's really rare for a fortune teller who can tell people's faces to be so dumb and still live to this age.

I winked at Xiaowu, telling him to be careful later and not to believe everything the old man said, but he was only thinking about his friends and didn't pay attention to me at all.I heard the rain outside the shed getting louder and louder. The rainwater flowed freely on the ground, forming rapid rivers in every low and hollow depression.It was dark, and the sound of rain was overwhelming, blocking out all other sounds.

"We are also old acquaintances, and we will still have plenty of time to get along in the future."

The old man blew out another puff of green smoke, looking dazed.

This scene might be more atmospheric if he uses a smoking gun, so that I can hope that he will die of lung cancer soon.

Sometimes I also wonder if my malice towards this old man is too great, as if he has done something to me.But the words and deeds of the other party are always just right to dispel the occasional conscience in my heart, telling me that my malice is not big enough.

"Actually, if you want to save him, it's not impossible. It's just that, as you know, he is terminally ill."

"Anything that can be cured is no longer called a terminal illness."

Just leave it alone...the little combo of cheating money starts now, right?I almost had another attack, but after seeing that Xiao Wu had no reaction, I tried to endure it and see if he had any other ideas.

"...Is there no hope?"

"It can be saved, but it is destined to leave the root of the disease, which will stick with me for the rest of my life. Maybe it would be better to die."

"..."

Xiaowu was obviously silent, and I saw his lips pursed tightly, as if he had lost his mind for a moment.The fortune teller didn't even say a few words to comfort the client. I looked left and right, opened my mouth, and finally said cautiously:

"What kind of sequelae?"

"Well, you might get schizophrenia, hemiplegia or something." The old man lost his calculations, but didn't care about the results at all, and said casually, "It's just these symptoms anyway, not to mention that in order to cure his disease, you Sacrifice is also indispensable.”

I didn’t know what to say at this point, so I asked Xiao Wu: “Does the patient have a strong will to survive?”

Xiao Wu was also silent, and after a while he said:

"Based on what I know about him, he probably wouldn't want to die in such an embarrassing way. This shouldn't be wishful thinking on my part either."

After the old man finished speaking, he lit Xiaowu with the cigarette in his hand:
"Then you should know what to do."

Xiaowu's expression was serious: "But I don't have the ability to intervene at the moment."

The old man smiled, dusted off the tobacco with his fingers, and began to gloat again:
"If you don't have that, just think of a way. Can you pick up strength by just sitting here and waiting? Oh, you really can, but today is no better than in the past. After passing this village, there will be no such store. If you stand there and don't move, the opportunity will be lost. If someone takes it away, your friend will not be saved."

Xiaowu glanced at me: "What else can I do?"

"You think about it, there are many sources of power, it just depends on whether you have the courage." The old man spread his hands and pointed the cigarette butt upward, "I am just a fortune teller, I don't have the power to help you realize your wish. If you can't do it, then this is your life and his. If you work hard and die, you will gain the power you never had before, and there's nothing to complain about, right?"

"How did you speak?"

I really don’t think these words are worth ten yuan, but Xiao Wu doesn’t seem to think so. These strange words seem to have really inspired him. He didn’t notice my expression at all and asked again:

"Then may I ask if there is any way to extend his life?"

"If we don't do something, I'm afraid he won't be able to wait until I regain the strength to save him."

Didn’t we just talk about terminal illness?Why did it change to rescue now... I was confused for a moment, but subconsciously I felt that he was right.

"There is no way."

"what?"

"There's no way." The old man spoke in a longer tone. Combined with the raised corners of his mouth and his malicious smile, he looked even more in need of a beating. "I want to save people but also want them to live a long time. How can there be such a good thing in the world?" ?Whether you save him or not, he can only live for so long. If he dies too late, he will lose both his life and money. You should worry about whether you can afford the medical expenses." After saying these words, all three of us No words were spoken, and for a while it was so quiet that only the sound of rain falling was left.

Is the rain a little too heavy?
……

"Why should I die with those civilians?"

A young man with an aristocratic appearance who was exquisitely dressed and wearing gold jewelry complained in a low voice: "Even if my mausoleum has not been repaired, I should not die at home like a commoner, not to mention that my burial objects are not ready yet. "

"Why didn't the high priest allow me to go to my grandfather's tomb to wait for death? He didn't choose us as the lucky ones to go to the gods during the project. As nobles and descendants of the great death god's bloodline, we should be more precious than civilians. Death comes sooner or later, at least not at the same moment, otherwise what is the difference between us and civilians?"

"My parents can go to the mausoleum. They are mid-level Extraordinaries. I can only stay at home and treat my home as a mausoleum..."

But complaining was a complaint, and he still had to accept the inner meaning of "all beings are equal at death". He obediently said goodbye to his parents who went to his mausoleum, and returned to his room alone.

With the help of servants and undead creatures, he took off all the gold and silver jewelry on his body and put them aside. He placed the bones and tokens belonging to important people around him, lay down quietly on his bed, and closed his eyes. Eyes, prepare to stay awake like this.

After letting the noble young master sleep peacefully, the living servants returned to their rooms one after another.

The manor house quickly became quiet, with only the cats and dogs raised in the manor still running through the garden, looking for people.

There are no more pedestrians on the streets, and even the homeless have basically found a place to sleep.Even though death itself is not terrible in their culture, the living still have an instinctive fear of death and want to use sleep to escape the moment of death.

There are also people who are running away, running desperately, running outside the city and into the distance.

They don't want to die for various reasons, but they can't find a way to live.

The members of the Church of Death are preparing to take up their last posts. Most of them are awake and even standing at high places, eager to witness the moment when the gods descend and the River Styx flows out of the spiritual world.

The venerable high priest returned to the bottom of his inverted mausoleum and spread "Requiem" and "Sweet Dreams" so that all those who wanted to use sleep to escape death could quietly fall into a dark sleep without dreams, instead of Having trouble sleeping due to stress and tossing and turning.This old man who has survived for thousands of years has witnessed the most prosperous moment of the Balam Empire, and also witnessed the country that had been trampled to pieces regain its legal status.In the end, more than 200 years of struggle turned into a dream as the gods disappeared, and there was only one road waiting ahead.

"It's over."

At this moment, with a relaxed smile of relief on his old face, he was quietly waiting for the moment of silence to arrive.

it's dark.

……

it's dark.

Anderson looked up and stared at the sky dumbfounded, unable to look away for a long time.

Black was like black ink dripping in clear water, quickly smearing from in front of Anderson to the horizon, dyeing the entire sky into deep black.He witnessed the whole world skipping dusk and evening at the same moment to usher in darkness, and he also witnessed the starlight that followed.There is no moon in the sky. It may be that the moon has not come out yet, or it may be that the moon is also covered by the dark sky. Countless stars are shining in the night sky, most of them are silvery white, and a small part are of other colors, like a Just eyes that are looking at the earth.

And the outline of another world could still be vaguely seen in the dark sky, and the ship made of countless human bones was deeply reflected in Anderson's mind.

He vaguely saw a figure standing on the boat that was darker than the night, but he couldn't see the other person clearly anyway. He only saw endless undead creatures surrounding the boat and the figure like mosquitoes in summer. Around him - even though he knew he couldn't use "mosquito" to describe these creatures that were each stronger than him, the density could only make him think of this word.

It wasn't until he took a deep breath that he realized that he hadn't been breathing.

Anderson breathed heavily, trembling all over, and fell to the ground with his legs losing strength.He no longer dared to look up at the sky. After regaining his senses, he suddenly felt boundless fear.Even for a sea explorer who was struggling to survive on the edge of life and death, this scene, which was like the arrival of a mythical world, destroyed all his courage and will in an instant, and destroyed his idea of ​​​​escape.

He was suddenly able to accept death.

No, or it wasn't that he could accept it, but that he finally realized that in such a situation, it was impossible for him to run away.Anderson grabbed his hair hard, making his blond hair as messy as a bird's nest. He laughed so hard that he couldn't breathe.

"Hahaha!"

"Haha! I actually, I actually-"

"I actually think I can escape..."

Anderson's chest heaved violently, and he completely lost the courage to look up, but it was not his style to just look at the dirt under his feet and wait for death.He desperately tried to use the "Roselto Dream Technique" again, and was not surprised to find that there was still no signal. ——It’s not that the contact was not successful, it should be that he didn’t even send his message, because he clearly felt that his spirituality was strongly suppressed when arranging the ceremony. Anderson could understand that he was too far away from the place where the myth came. It's close. When you reach this position, don't even think about living.

"I can't escape, I can't escape at all!"

He grabbed a handful of his own hair, and his expression was as ferocious and ferocious as ever before. However, such pain could not divert his attention, nor calm his fear of the approaching death and the imminent end of his life.

As a famous adventurer and sea hunter, Anderson can accept that he will encounter dangerous death during his exploration, but it is difficult to accept waiting for death without resistance. Even if the former is more painful and torturous, it is also difficult to accept the latter psychologically.

His emotions became restless, and his helpless fear finally turned into restlessness and anger with nowhere to vent.

In the cold that invaded his bone marrow, Anderson's hands trembled violently and his teeth chattered. He put his hands into fists and put them against his forehead. He didn't bother to think about which god corresponded to which prayer gesture, because prayer could not resolve his fear.

"The Great God of Mysteries..."

"You are the embodiment of number and essence..."

"A fool who does not belong to this era..."

He recited the names of all the gods he knew, but none of them received physical or spiritual salvation. Anderson himself found it funny that a person without faith still placed his hope on faith at the last moment of his life, and even He longed for his time-limited prayer to be saved - whether it was an evil god or any existence, as long as it allowed him to live, he was willing to accept it.

At this moment, he was actually a little glad that Edwina didn't come.

Because if you come here, you will just die with him.

TBC
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The door of heaven is opened.

The night poured down on the earth like water, and the huge ship revealed its clothes in the darkness. The god carved on the bow had the characteristics of a feathered serpent. It was wrapped around the corner of the giant ship, like a sculpture, and like a coil. The complete skeleton of the entire ship.

The distant chanting slowly echoed across the land in the night, like an unknown requiem, sung quietly at this moment.

The sky was dark, and the stars could not illuminate the earth.

At some point, the sound of flowing water actually appeared on the empty river.