Wasteland Echoer.

Chapter 563: Novaask (Part )
"Wright, what are you looking at?" Dak patted Wright's shoulder.

In the instant he turned around, the white-haired boy on the wall disappeared. When he looked back again, Wright only heard a middle-aged man say, "Hoshino, it's time to go back to work." He never saw any human on the dark high wall again.

Light simply repeated the two or three lines of poetry chanted by the white-haired boy from memory. Before Dark could respond, the "Red Wolf" sitting in the front row spoke first:

"It's the language of the Flame Empire. Boy, do you know the language of the Flame Empire?"

Wright smiled awkwardly. If the pronunciation, grammar and character shapes of the "Chinese" in the previous world and the current Yanhuo Empire language are similar, then he can be considered to be "born" knowing a foreign language. However, when he was in the Rinie Empire, Wright read the "New Yuan Dictionary" compiled by the Yanhuo Empire more than a hundred years ago. Except for some commonly used characters like the traditional Chinese characters of "Chinese", other characters are more or less different.

From this perspective, it cannot be said that he "knows" the language of the Flame Empire.

Besides, without knowing whether the people in Novayask are xenophobic, it may not be a good thing to show off that you can speak a foreign language, especially the language of a "mysterious country" in the East.

After pondering for a few seconds, Wright replied with a smile:
"Not really, I just read some books about fire culture when I was in the West."

"Hahaha, don't worry." A rough and heroic voice came out of the throat of "Red Wolf" again, and he said with a smile:

"I said, I have Khitanris blood. My ancestors, my mother's branch, are from their aristocratic family. Besides, the people here have always been unfriendly to the Rigne and Putoya people, but they are quite accepting of the Khitanris. After all, after the Aventre completely disappeared, they are our only neighbors and friends in the east.

"But then again, it's still quite homely to hear the Flame Empire language. The few lines of poetry you just said seem to be in the 'Flame Land' style, but my mother told me when I was a child that there are only three lines, and the word arrangement of 5-7-5 is the style of the Flame Empire's Dongying Province."

"Toyo Province?" Dak asked curiously, "What kind of place is that?"

"It's a 'land of sin' that's what the older generation said. However, the New Dollar Crisis has been going on for so many years, and we don't know what the current situation is." "Red Wolf" knocked his head, put out the cigarette in his hand, turned around, and said:
"Oh, I remember... there was a white-haired boy who really crossed the ice trail and snowfield and traveled through mountains and rivers from Khitanris. Our boss found him because of a few deaths. The boss said that he spoke fluent Khitanris dialect and his Crusaders were very poor."

"Your boss also has Khitanris blood?" Dak asked curiously.

"Don't talk about him. In fact, many of us, the 'natives' of Novayask, came from Khitanris. More than a hundred years ago, because of an 'alien dragon' named 'Mengluo', the Yanhuo Empire lost many military bases outside the core area one after another and was forced to completely shrink its defenses inward, leaving those fertile fields, mines, forests, rivers, etc. to those inhuman creatures. It was at that time that our eldest grandfather lost the protection of the army and was forced to move westward."

The pair of light black pupils of Red Wolf, which were very oriental, showed anger, but there was a subtle sense of loss in his tone. He continued:
"The young officials in Khitan Reese always have a kind of prejudice. They believe that humans who have lived outside the 'Jihe District' for a long time will more or less mutate under the erosion of the 'Heartless Virus'. In their eyes, the ancestors of the boss, even if they are not supernatural beings! Even if they don't have any extraordinary skills! Even if they are no different from normal humans! They are all considered 'foreigners' and cannot return to the 'Jihe District'.

"And those sanctimonious Confucianists wanted to flaunt their bullshit 'benevolence' but didn't want to be poked in the back and accused of 'cruelness', so they had no choice but to withdraw all the troops and transport trucks, leaving our ancestors exposed to the 'wave of careless people' to fend for themselves."

"It seems that they are much more conservative than us Crusaders. They are much more cruel and cunning than those so-called 'gentlemen' who advocate 'species separation' in the Putoya Federation." A trace of contempt flashed in Dak's eyes. He turned his head to look to the east and said:
"I only heard that because of the 'Wave of Careless People', Qidanlis gradually lost contact with us. After coming here, I found that the situation is far more complicated than we imagined. However, if the war situation in the west continues to deteriorate and Binglin City really cannot be defended... or if a flood comes, I am afraid that we have no choice but to go east."

"But, the Yanhuo Empire is not as bad as you think." "Red Wolf" scratched his head and smiled embarrassedly:

"I'm not speaking for my hometown. In fact, I've heard from travelers who have had the chance to come over there in recent years that the Yanhuo Empire is also in trouble. They don't rely on a few large cities as the core to connect small strongholds to guard against the 'Heartless People' and the Lost Ones like we do.

"Instead, they connected the entire 'several nuclear' area into one piece, relying on strong military mobilization capabilities and material production capabilities to ensure that the internal area is completely unaffected by the virus. It can be said that the entire 'several nuclear areas' is a 'paradise' comparable to half the size of Cruz. Perhaps, they are not discriminating against humans living in external bases, but they really do not have more materials and energy to manage.

"I heard that they are quite friendly to the 'superpowers' from the West and South Seas. Apart from being under a certain degree of surveillance and being unable to enter some important areas, they can live comfortably there. Sometimes... I think, if I had some extraordinary superpowers, even the ability to manipulate magic power, such as rolling a fireball, spreading ice water, or commanding rocks, I would drive this shabby old friend to the east."

"So, in fact, the people of the Flame Empire... well, they are quite realistic, like a kind of... cruel reality." Wright complained. Soon, the various mechanical vehicles in front and behind began to make mechanical rumbling sounds, and moved forward at a medium speed.

Although feeling somewhat surprised, "Red Wolf" still restarted the vehicle and followed at the urging of the shrill horn of the car behind.

Along the wall, Wright was able to peek at a corner of the entire city of Novayask. He found that these walls surrounding the city were basically pitch black and had about two layers.

The first layer is on the outside, more than 10 meters high. It is said to be the first line of defense against the "wave of careless people". The core is the four "checkpoints for outsiders entering". Looking from the outside in, the inner wall is at least 50 meters high. According to the description of "Red Wolf", the inner high wall was mainly built to guard against "alien monsters". Construction began in 405 of the New Yuan and was gradually completed in 435.

Because, in the history compiled separately for the city, there are many records of invasions by "alien dragons", "alien giants", "alien beasts" and "alien giant plants". These giant creatures named with numbers seem to possess some rare supernatural powers.

When resources are scarce and the environment is harsh, they will sleep under the gravel and soil. Once the temperature improves slightly, they will use their unique sense of smell and perception to rush straight to densely populated areas and capture humans to obtain nutrients.

The strange thing is that these "alien monsters" will only attack strongholds with a population of more than 30. As for small towns with a population of several thousand, tens of thousands, or even hundreds of thousands, they will not even look inside even if they pass by.

About an hour later, Wright and his two companions finally arrived at the door of "Checkpoint No. 2". Wright got out of the car and looked up. This checkpoint was not simple.

The giant iron fence gate at the entrance and exit is the same height as the metal-cast city wall. Outside, there are two 15-meter-high tower-like military sentry towers, on the top of which stand two lightning rod-like military devices wrapped with electric wires.

They were connected together through wires in the air, acting as "signal diffusers" so that the city could communicate with western outposts via telegraph at any time.

In addition, there are many giant exposed mechanical arms and artillery barrels, as well as several hidden "sniper points" where you can faintly see the reflection of machine guns, which together serve as the first line of mechanical force to guard the city.

If it weren't for the few bald spots on the black walls that were corroded by the "burning fluid" and the broken guns discarded at the foot of the wall, Wright would naturally have the most basic confidence in the city's defense system.

After getting off the bus and waiting for three to five minutes, with a heavy "bang" sound, Wright and his two companions followed the instructions on the temporary metal plate and followed two local [warriors] wearing gray mecha-style uniforms to the door of the "guard booth."

"Hey, it's 'Red Wolf', where did you bring this kid from?" A local [warrior] who was about two meters tall and fully armed greeted "Red Wolf" first.

"Where else could they come from? From the train station. They also escaped from the west. They will only stay in the city for a while before heading to the east." "Red Wolf" smiled, touched the back of his head and replied.

"'Red Wolf', you know that in the past month, there have been only people coming from the west. Each of them said that they were only staying for a few days as a transition, and after entering the city, they refused to leave. They were unwilling to join the 'Guards' to defend the city, and they were also unwilling to enter the factory to produce supplies, which gave Commander Shaneva a headache. So..." The tall local [warrior] turned his head to look at Wright and Dak, raised a finger, and said solemnly:
"Commander Shaneva ordered that starting from the day before yesterday, no matter how long you have been in the city, as long as you do not have an employment contract with the army or the factory, you must pay 100 new rubles as urban construction fees if you want to enter these two gates. However, before that, you must do a 'blood test' to prevent those Lost Ones who are prone to irritability from sneaking in."

As he spoke, the tall local [warrior] pulled out two boxes from the pile on the table, handed them to Wright and the other man, and ordered in a serious tone: "Take out the needle inside, prick your finger, and drop the blood on the test paper."

"Oh, okay," Wright said, pricking his finger as requested.

Dark red blood dripped onto the test paper, and the next second, the tall local [warrior] and the "Red Wolf" frowned at the same time.

"It turned blue? So quickly?"

(End of this chapter)