After the Recovery Moon, the weather in southern Anzu began to warm up rapidly.
It's a welcome change of mood for someone who works in a place like a port terminal.
As the temperature rises, the frozen rivers begin to thaw, and the water frozen on the ground in the form of ice and snow melts into trickles with the power of the sun, and the trickles converge into streams and small rivers, and finally, along with the water flowing down from the mountains, The glacier water is injected into the major rivers together. As the water level rises, the number of merchant ships on the river gradually increases. Porters.
Sam is an old resident of Tanzania Town. His family’s history of settling in this mining town can be traced back to a hundred years ago. The ancestor was a "mule" on the pier, and then the profession was passed down from generation to generation, to his grandfather, to his father, and finally to him.
His parents and grandparents have witnessed all the changes in this town in the past hundred years, but in most of the time, the town has hardly changed—the city walls are still those walls, the trestle bridges are still those trestle bridges, the mines and castles in the back mountain The farmland outside can support a limited number of people, and the land that the lord can manage is also limited, so when a town develops to a certain scale, it may not be able to change for hundreds of years-in the whole life of Grandpa Sam, he has witnessed The greatest thing of all (and the thing he most often bragged about to his children and grandchildren) was that he had seen a trestle added to the quay, and the lord had built a mill south of the town.
And Sam, in the past two months, he has seen three trestle bridges, two business houses, four warehouses and a new bridge go up in the southwest corner of Tanzania Town.
He felt that he might witness more things in his life than all his ancestors combined.
The ore output of Houshan has increased several times in the past two months, and the number of merchant ships on the river has also increased several times. There are also many strange machines and magic devices that have been transported into the city. It is said that this All the changes are related to the "Cecile Territory" that just appeared in the lower reaches of the White Water River. It is said that the lord reached an agreement with that Duke Gawain Cecil, and obtained huge benefits in the process, even bringing the entire town to prosperity...
But these things don't make sense to Sam, and he doesn't pay much attention to them, except for his work on the docks—and, thankfully, he has a lot of work.
As an old resident of the town and an old man on the pier, Sam has an unusual status in this increasingly busy place. Although he is also a worker for others and has to be assigned by the pier owner, Sam is a "mule" As their leader, there are more than a dozen people who have to obey his orders, which is the most "decent" thing he thinks.
Early in the morning, after getting out of the dark and damp hut, Sam rushed to the pier to direct the brothers to load and unload the ship.
As the water level of the Whitewater River rises, large ships have begun to berth at the pier these days. Most of these ships come from the northern Carroll Territory or the Holy Spirit Plains. The ships are full of spices, tea and fine cloth. , these things will be transported by caravan to the "civil quarter" of the town and the castle of the lord after being unloaded, and then the empty ship will be refilled, mostly ore - they will then go down the river to Cecil Well, there, the shipowners can still make a lot of money.
"Be quicker with your hands and feet! It's early in the morning, don't act like you haven't eaten!"
Sam was walking on the trestle bridge that was soaked in the early morning fog, supervising the "muses" carrying the goods off the ship. His red nose was stirring restlessly in the fog, and the smell of alcohol was seducing the stomach in his belly. Glutton: In addition to the cloth, the boat in front of me is half full of good wine. One of the wine barrels probably broke when it was dangling on the river, and a lot of good wine seeped out through the opening. Good Karna wine - the owner is standing by the gangplank sighing and grimacing, he is afraid he will have to pay the merchant a lot of money for this loss, while the gang of mules full of clever ideas are scrambling to carry the broken barrel —they're sure to be ready to sneak a few licks when no one's looking.
Sam shook his head. He wouldn't risk being whipped for this temptation, but he wasn't going to stop those tricksters. Anyway, if they were lucky, they could taste the good wine and go back and brag about it. It's just being whipped twice.
Another boat was approaching the pier, and Sam raised his eyes to see that the boat had a high, wide deck and sides painted red, and he was sharp-eyed, and soon he saw the covers under the sides (that was the side of the cabin) position) were opened several times, and several pairs of eyes were looking out through those narrow windows.
That kind of curious and panicked look didn't look like the sailors on the ship, Sam curled his lips, he knew that those were another kind of "cargo".
It could be a slave, or a hitchhiker from the north, or whatever.
After the construction of the New Cecil Territory in the south, this kind of "cargo" has become a frequent visitor on the river. Basically, except for the days when the river is blocked in winter, several boats full of people pass here every day. I don't know how much land and food that new pioneering territory has to support so many people.
Sam didn't like this kind of ship that transported people very much—because there was often no work to do on this kind of ship, and the owners usually took money from the slave trader or the Duke "Gawain Cecil" and were responsible for sending people to the ship. When they arrived at Cecil Territory, they stopped here in Tanzan Town just to replenish some clean water and dry food.
But maybe there are some shipowners who are just shippers, and their cabins will have other cargo piled up, and the slaves and refugees will sleep with the cargo-there are still things to do in this case.
Just thinking about this, Sam saw the dock master in the distance waving to him, and then raised his hand to point to the ship with red sides that had just approached the trestle bridge. Seeing this instruction, he quickly stopped his wild thinking and speeded up. Footsteps walked towards the ship.
The boat was steady, the gangway was lowered, and a captain in a brown cotton coat came out and nodded to Sam: "Call some nimble mules, and all the wine barrels in the cabin will be unloaded."
Sam called out enough people, then jumped onto the boat by himself, followed the boss of the boat to the hatch, and after opening the cover, he looked inside.
He saw that the cabin was full of wine barrels, and there was almost no place for people to stay, and the owners he had seen before who looked at them in panic—these people were all huddled in the gaps between the barrels, one by one. Described as haggard and pale.
Sam frowned. These people have no place to sit down here, let alone lie down. I don't know where they came from, and how long they have been in this terrible environment—but there is one thing Obviously, these people are definitely not as valuable as the wine to the boss of the ship.
But the strange thing is that these people are not ragged slaves, nor do they look like refugees, and several of them even wear decent woolen clothes—where did these people come from
While the boys were at work, Sam went to talk to the bosun who was standing nearby—he didn't dare speak to the owner, who was a real respectable fellow—and asked if there were any ghosts or ghosts in the hold. Ghost, but the origin of the "boat passenger" who wears good clothes. As a person who makes a living on the pier, inquiring about some things on the ship is the capital for him to brag to others in the tavern after he returns.
"They? From the Holy Spirit Plains," the bosun spat aside, "fleeing."
"The Plain of the Holy Spirit? That's far away!" Sam showed a look of surprise, "What are they doing all this way?"
"They are all members of the Blood God Cult, and there are a few members of the Shadow Sect," the boatswain said casually, "It is said that some people in their local church have an affair with the heretics, and even those who often go to the church are suspected of being heretics, the Holy Spirit The killing of heretics on the plain is fierce, and the Tribunal of the Church of the Holy Light has burned thousands of people to death—these people couldn’t survive in the local area, so they turned into property and fled.”
While speaking, the boatswain shook his head: "Three people died on the road. They were thrown into the river for fear of getting sick."
When Sam heard that he had something to do with the cultists, his hairs all over his body tightened, and his eyes became awkward when he looked at the passengers in the cabin—he looked at those people, as if there were really a few cultists hidden among them of.
"Look how timid you are—these people won't disembark, and they'll have to be sent all the way to Cecil," the bosun couldn't help shaking his head seeing Sam's appearance, "but Cecil leads the way. If you don’t want these people, it’s just a matter of saying, after all, they are related to heresy... If you don’t want them, these people will have to be thrown into the wilderness, but that’s better than burning to death.”
Sam wiped his red nose, suddenly feeling a little awkward.
He believed in the blood god.
The wind, which had already started to warm up, seemed to be cold again at this time.
At the same time, in the only Holy Light Church in Cecil, Pastor Wright finished his morning prayer.
He is a devout believer, a pastor who is keen on preaching—although many people will be deceived by his powerful appearance, but Wright himself knows that he has never been a person who likes to use force—especially force over the heads of fellow citizens.
The Lord of Holy Light protects the world and teaches the weak mortals the art of holy light that can heal and exorcise evil spirits, in order to protect this world, so the essence of the way of holy light should also be protection, not destruction—that's why Wright He tempered his body, because he hoped that even when it was time to eradicate the evil, he could use power other than holy light to strike the enemy, so as not to tarnish the spirit that should be used to comfort and protect people. strength.
This is his obsession, and he knows it's a bit stupid, but he doesn't intend to change it.
But a letter sent to the church a few days ago made him a little tangled.
Wright cleaned up the prayer hall of the church, then sat in the front row of seats, took out the church letter from the Holy Spirit Plain from his arms, and read the contents on it again.
"... Evil breeds, pagans are active... ignorant people who believe in different gods are polluting the pure belief in the world... The Lord hopes that this land will be restored to purity, and the solution is to clear away the confused and wrong beliefs in the hearts of mortals...
"... Therefore, anyone who does not follow the guidance of the Holy Light and who does not agree with the Lord's teachings... is a heretic..."
The white letter paper was crumpled into a ball, but it was unfolded, flattened, folded and put away.
Wright looked up at the bright skylight of the church and the statue of the Holy Light shining brightly in the sunlight of the skylight.
"Lord, do you really think so..."