Chapter 513 - Let the Sun Shine in Every Corner!
Chapter 513: Let the Sun Shine in Every Corner!
Meng Chao sighed and asked, “My condolences, but you must live so that the dead can rest in peace. What about you? After leaving Boss Feng and your friends, you’re alone. What do you intend to do in the future?”
“Dunno.” A’Ji shook his head. He pretended to be strong and nonchalant. “I’ll live through the next few days before thinking about how I’ll live the next few days after that. Live for today, not for tomorrow. That’s how all Leprosy Village villagers continue.
“At least I have a skill. I won’t starve to death no matter where I go.”
“Your ‘skill’ isn’t really a skill, and it’s not a long-term plan.” Meng Chao could not help but laugh. He changed the topic and said, “But judging by your age, it must have been difficult for you to train your hands to this extent. If you were to receive proper professional education, perhaps you could become an outstanding harvester.”
“Received… proper education?” A’Ji looked like he had just heard the greatest joke in the world.
“There’s a compulsory education system in Dragon City. Right now, the government is also promoting the plan to provide three nutritious meals in schools. All the children in Dragon City, be they poor or rich, and no matter how they look, have the right and responsibility to receive education and be trained so that they can serve our civilization,” Meng Chao said with a stern expression.
“Regardless of whether you’re lair citizens or from Leprosy Village, all of you are part of Dragon City and came from Earth. You shouldn’t be an exception.”
A’Ji looked like he had so many things to say that he did not know where to start.
There was a really complicated look on his face, and he looked at Meng Chao like he was staring at an idiot.
The boy cleared his throat a few times and pretended to scratch the scabies on his head to hide his gaze, but he could not hide the dismissal evident on his face.
Meng Chao sighed in his heart.
He was not a nerd who studied behind closed doors in an ivory tower.
He had rich life experience from his previous life, and he had also experienced how it felt like to be at the bottom level of society for years. He knew that the current Dragon City was not a paradise where light shone on every corner of the city.
Even though their martyrs had fought hard and sacrificed their lives for more than half a century, due to the lack of resources, that they were surrounded by powerful enemies, and other reasons, there were still plenty of cold places where hope could not be seen.
Many of the laws and moral truths that seemed to be unquestionable were weak and powerless before the cold, harsh reality.
Logically, since Dragon City had the compulsory education system, everyone should have the right to enjoy cultivation.
But the Survival Committee’s financial system was swaying, and the annual budget could not cover everything. It was normal for them to shift the funds for teachers to war. The education quality of the public schools outside were miles behind private schools, and the government did not even have the money to build new schools in the lair and Leprosy Village.
Where were they supposed to get land to build the school? How were they going to build it? How were they going to build the cultivation facilities? How were they going to provide funds for the teachers? How were they going to solve the problem of funding for the children’s cultivation? All these things cost a lot of money, so who was going to pay for that?
Of course, logically, the Survival Committee should be the one paying for it.
But the Survival Committee did not have money, so it could only remove funding from a lot of important projects to cover for these projects. For example, the Colonization Party and Home Party’s politicians were engaged in a major argument just to deal with the budget to upgrade all the armored airships and modify all the defense systems in the old residential areas. They could not spare any money to build schools!
It has to be known that education in this era was different from Earth. All the children on Earth needed was just a pen, a book, and a stack of draft paper. Meanwhile, the children in Dragon City had to take countless gene medicines and high-calorie nutritional fluids to solidify their foundation and make their bodies stronger, thus awakening to supernatural abilities.
Without enough resources, forcing children to cultivate was not just pulling at a shoot to make it grow faster, but was practically the same as draining the children of all their potential without thinking about the consequences. It would only cripple the children, and it was especially the case for children from Leprosy Village.
As descendants of infectees, their genes had mutated. Once they guided spirit energy into their bodies, it was not rare for things to go out of control and for them to go through secondary mutation.
If the city wanted to turn them into talented people, they had to pour extra manpower, resources, time, and effort into cultivating them. Otherwise, their kind would only end up with going through secondary mutation, and their mortality rate would increase.
Due to this objective reason, up to that date, the number and quality of the schools in the lair were still far beneath the ones outside.
There was also no public school in Leprosy Village. The children did not drop out of school. Instead, they simply did not have the concept of going to school.
It was no wonder then why A’Ji thought that proper education was something far-fetched.
At that moment, Meng Chao decided that he had to solve the problem in the lair and Leprosy Village.
In his previous life, Dragon City lost the northern offense and never solved their problem of resources even after they gained the pyrrhic victory in the Monster War.
They had located most of their resources into the new Colonization War and were dragged into the world war of the two major camps of the Other World.
Meng Chao remembered that even during the best years during the Extraordinary Disaster, Dragon City was not able to solve the problem of cultivation for the children at the bottom level of Dragon City.
Only the descendants of the strong could become new powerhouses. The descendants of the weak could only be weaklings.
Dragons gave birth to dragons, phoenixes gave birth to phoenixes, and the children of rats could only crawl in the holes.
This was a reality they were resigned to.
Perhaps it was one of the reasons why Dragon City lost.
But it was different this time.
In this life, Dragon City won the northern offense, and with the resources they gained by developing the northern frontlines, they started attacking from all fronts and were launching a tactical counterattack.
It was only by winning the current war that Dragon City would get an overwhelming tactical advantage.
Then, they should be able to free up their hands to solve the problem of the lairs and Leprosy Village so that the warm light of hope could shine on every corner of Dragon City equally.
Meng Chao swore that he would do everything it took to make this real.
For now, though, he could solve A’Ji’s problem, since he was just one person.
With that thought in mind, Meng Chao asked, “A’Ji, how old are you?”
“Eleven or twelve,” A’Ji said. “I don’t really know when my parents gave birth to me.”
“Eleven or twelve, huh? It’s not too late yet,” Meng Chao said. “Listen. I know a few friends outside. Perhaps they can get you a place and let you receive proper education so you can develop your potential and become an outstanding harvester.
“As long as you perform outstandingly, they will give you a proper job that will garner you respect. You will no longer have to live in fear. It won’t be a problem to ensure that you will always have a full tummy either.
“You won’t have to worry about being discriminated against by the people from the world outside because of your appearance either. Trust me, before long, Dragon Citizens’ views will change.”
Dragon Citizens’ discrimination toward the descendants of the infectees came from their fear toward the zombie virus, the lack of resources, and the limited space they had for survival. Hence, they were instinctively against people who were different from them.
But before long, Dragon City would get out of the “newbie village”, and their survival space would instantly expand a hundred times its original size. They would also see all sorts of strange people from other races. They will even talk to half-orcs and vampires. The descendants of the infectees would become their own kind, so it won’t be a problem to accept them.
A hint of longing appeared on A’Ji’s face, but he soon squashed that tiny bit of hope.
It seemed like the children in Leprosy Village had long since learned to not have any hope for anything. That way, they would not taste any disappointment and despair.
Meng Chao could tell what the boy was thinking just by looking at his expression. After some thought, he brought out a high-purity crystal from the tactical bag and tossed it to him.
A’Ji caught it instinctively and found that this time, Meng Chao did not use the skill to control items remotely to pull the crystal back. He was stunned.
The hope that he had just squashed started flickering in his eyes again.
“I’m a man of my word. Consider that crystal as your deposit,” Meng Chao said. “But you must help me solve the problem in Leprosy Village and the lair; otherwise, all of Dragon City will end up in chaos. Then, my promise and your hope will naturally turn into dust.
“So, helping me is the same as helping yourself leave the fate of slowly rotting away under Leprosy Village behind you and start a brand new life, understand?”
A’Ji pondered his words for a while before he tightened his hold on the high-purity crystal and nodded earnestly.
“Alright. Now, tell me. Do you have any communicators with you? Handphones, computers, walkie-talkies, anything will do,” Meng Chao said.
“Yeah.”
Meng Chao’s words seemed to have touched A’Ji’s heart. The boy opened his cloak, removed a few communicators from his thick belt, and handed them over.
There were two rugged phones wrapped in rubber, a tactical communication watch, a tablet, and a point-to-point walkie-talkie specifically built for mines.
Meng Chao turned on these communicators, but aside from the rustling sound of static, he could hear nothing else.
The top corner of the phone showed the sign of the phone not able to get any signal. Meng Chao could not even send a single message.
It was the same for the tablet.
“Darn it, looks like the Vortex has completely blocked the internet in this area!” Meng Chao cussed under his breath.
He had wanted to test his luck.
It was possible that all communications had just been cut off temporarily because of the explosion from the super crystal bomb, since it led to spirit energy waves surging into the air and creating a large-scale spirit energy magnetic field interference.
But A’Ji had a point-to-point walkie-talkie used in mines. When they were built, their creators considered the problem of the interference caused by spirit energy magnetic fields in the crystal mines, so these walkie-talkies were really good at resisting interference.
A crystal bomb would not be able to completely cut off communications through this walkie-talkie.
The only thing that could affect it was military-grade, high-power signal interference equipment. It had to have been used to block all communications from Leprosy Village and perhaps all of Golden Tooth Lair to the world outside.
Because of this, Meng Chao’s plan to search for the command center and report their current situation went up in smoke.
But that made sense, since the Vortex had a detailed plan. It would naturally not make such a low-grade mistake.
Aside from cutting off communications, it probably had already set up its best assassins at the highest spots in Leprosy Village.
If the Heaven Realm superhumans who were heavily injured wanted to use maglev to flee from Leprosy Village via the sky, the assassins would easily strike them down like children using slingshots to hit sparrows.
As for Meng Chao, he had not recovered his ability to use maglev just yet.
But even if he did, he did not intend to run like a dog with its tail between its legs.
Meng Chao pondered his situation for a while before he said, “Forget it. Throw away all the communicators you picked up so that no one can figure out our location.
“A’Ji, tell me. Where can you find a large amount of cultivation resources in Leprosy Village?”
Meng Chao’s current most important task was to treat his wounds.
He had to heal at least 80% of his wounds before he could continue playing with the Vortex in their game.
And the stake was Dragon City’s survival!