The copy has 0 error tolerance, and the last words on the ground are all wrong for me.

Chapter 379 The Great Stink

Wu Chang calmly took out the wooden sign, and the sword energy left by the sword star on the wooden sign disappeared.

He remembered that Jianxing said that the Steam Council would not take action until a week later. Isn't it a bit too early for the wooden sign to break now?

The signal that Jian Xing suddenly sent was that he and Leng Shan had entered the secret base of the Steam Council. The root power was blocked and the sword energy could not be maintained.

Or did the Steam Council think that Henry wanted to contact the Secret Security Department, and after silencing Henry, they were worried that some information had been exposed, so they took action in advance.

No matter what the situation is, now that you have received the signal, it is always right to be careful.

Wu Chang put away the wooden sign and thought about how to deal with it.

Jianxing only mentioned that the Steam Parliament was going to take big action, but the specific actions are still unknown.

To be on the safe side, he planned to withdraw the members of the Arcane Knights back to their headquarters at No. 6 Baishe Street, so that no matter whether the Steam Parliament wanted to take action against the extraordinary people or attack important institutions in Stellan, they could respond in time.

But he couldn't let the members of the Arcane Knights return to headquarters directly, so he had to find a suitable excuse.

Jianxing must have sent out the signal as soon as he received the news. It's impossible that the Steam Council just said it wanted to take action, but before they could even go out, they found that the Arcane Knights had already gathered in advance to prepare for battle and were waiting for them to arrive.

That would be too obvious. Even if the Steam Council were fools, they would find out that there was a spy in the organization.

In order to ensure the safety of Jianxing and Lengshan, he set his sights on Henry, who had a great imagination, and instantly came up with an idea.

He asked the accompanying arcane knights to send out a magic message to let all members of the arcane knights meet at Henry's house.

First, use the investigation of Henry's death as an excuse to gather the arcane knights together to ensure that they will not be caught alone by the Steam Council.

After investigating the scene, they moved all the belongings in Henry's house back to the headquarters in the name of looking for clues.

There is a special method of communication within the Arcane Knights, and players who join the Arcane Knights also master this method during their induction training.

After Wu Chang issued the order as the deputy leader of the Arcane Knights and it was agreed by the leader, in less than half an hour, all the members of the Arcane Knights gathered around Henry's house and blocked Tals Street.

Wu Changben also came to Henry's house and studied the scene with Ravington.

Ravington carefully examined Henry's fundus, and after briefly examining Henry's body, he said to Wu Changben:

“There is no trace of extraordinary energy in Henry’s body. He is just an ordinary person.”

"It is clear that he was unknowingly affected by the attacker's abilities and fell into hallucinations, which led to him shooting himself."

Raventon took out the hand-held duster, squeezed it twice, pointed at the fluorescent dust evenly spread on the ground and said:

"After silencing the witness, the other party used supernatural powers to clean up the scene."

He picked up his cane and pointed it at an area where the fluorescent dust was particularly dense, forming a regular pattern of many rectangular shapes.

"What they cleaned up seemed to be a book and some other paper materials scattered on the ground."

On his way here, Ravington bought an evening paper. He folded the newspaper into a quarter and placed it on one of the squares, with the width being basically the same.

“The paper materials that were burned appear to be some newspapers.”

He turned to look at Connor and Nestor and asked, "As Mr. Henry's colleagues, do you two have any idea about this?"

The two people who were asked by Reventon fell into deep thought. After a while, Nestor, who was a radical like Henry, spoke first:
"I do have some clues about newspapers. Henry likes to read the Hills newspaper very much. No matter if there is any recent news or not, he will buy it on time."

"Henry is a quick-tempered man who likes to skip useless information and get to the point. But I once saw him reading the Hills newspaper, and he read it very carefully, even more carefully than reviewing manuscripts for other editors."

“Not only current affairs and international developments, but even opinion columns and advertisements are not spared.”

"I asked him what he was doing with it, and he said he was studying the content structure of the Hills newspaper to improve the Light."

Wu Chang said at the side: "It sounds like there is no problem."

Nestor shook his head and said, "The layout of the Hills newspaper rarely changes. If you just want to study the content structure, there is no need to read every issue so carefully."

Wu Chang suddenly realized, "Indeed."

He turned and gave Ravington a look.

Nestor could tell that Henry read every issue of the newspaper carefully. This level of observation could not be explained by just a few coincidences.

Connor has a unclear relationship with the extraordinary mine thieves gang, Henry was silenced by the Steam Council, and the last of the trio, Nestor, doesn't look very clean either.

However, the investigation into Nestor will have to wait until later.

On the way here, Wu Chang's original body had already communicated with Raventon and told him that the Steam Council was about to take action.

Now that the preparations have been completed, it's time to evacuate everyone.

Ravington continued Nestor's answer and said:

"Mr. Nestor is right. Mr. Henry's murder may be related to the Hills newspaper he was compiling."

"There may be other clues in the room. Let's move the things here back to the Secret Security Department first, and then investigate the Hills newspaper further later."

When the arcane knights were moving their things, Wu Chang invited Connor and Nestor to return to the Secret Security Department together, on the grounds that someone had launched an assassination attempt against the leader of the Charter Movement.

And in the next period of time, we will arrange people around them to protect their safety.

Although everyone present knew that Henry's death was probably unrelated to the Charter Movement and was caused by himself, Connor and Nestor still accepted Wu Chang's protection.

They are not the ones who are in trouble, but they can be implicated.

Wu Chang and others were very fast. In ten minutes, they moved all the things in Henry's house into the carriage and took them away.

When they left Henry's house, everything seemed normal, but everyone felt an inexplicable depression and anxiety, which made them return in a hurry.

Almost as soon as everyone left the East District of Grimland, something strange happened in the East District.

The first abnormality occurred at John's Shipyard, not far from the Bright Light Newspaper Office.

Today is a special day for John Hansen, a worker at the John Shipyard.

Today is the first day after the general strike temporarily ended. Originally, work would not have started so early, but the shipyard had a batch of urgent orders. In order not to delay the delivery time, the boss sent people to contact them one by one last night, promising to pay half of the salary and let them return to work as soon as possible.

Due to the concession of Acting Prime Minister Glad, during the lunch break he heard the editor of the Lamp not far away say that the bigwigs sitting in parliament were drafting a more sound Factory Act.

He had no idea what more sound meant, nor did he know what the Factory Act was. After all, he was illiterate and could not understand what was written in the law.

In his opinion, they would only use these two words when they were arrested or exploited by the factory owners. As for the meaning behind these two words, it was just what the masters said.

But when he heard that he could reduce his 16-hour work day to 14 hours and receive compensation when he got "shipyard disease" or "lead cough", he suddenly felt that the law was on his side.

The shipyard had originally been accepting expedited orders, and the delays caused by the strike made the construction schedule even tighter.

In order to catch up with the order progress, they had to work overtime with lights on.

At around eight o'clock, Hansen and his co-workers were cutting iron plates with a steam cutting machine when they suddenly heard a loud noise.

They first thought that a steam engine had exploded. When they were checking one by one, they learned from outside that it was not a steam engine that exploded, but the sky.

They went outside and saw a big hole in the sky. Through the hole, Hansen saw the starry sky for the first time in a long time.

Hansen couldn't remember how long it had been since he last saw the starry sky, three months, five months, or a year.

Looking back, it seemed that without them noticing, a thick layer of gray clouds had covered their heads, and being able to see the stars at night could become a topic of conversation for them.

Such a large area of ​​the starry sky made them feel both familiar and unfamiliar.

Looking up at the starry sky above his head, Hansen suddenly had an inexplicable idea in his mind.

It turns out that when the dark clouds above are lifted, the scenery behind is so brilliant.

This feeling of surprise was like when he discovered that after the general strike, the law could actually be on their side.

No wonder those guys at Mingdeng Newspaper, who earn less than them and work harder than them, are so energetic all day long.

Are they also trying to blow something up?

Before Hansen could figure it out, the supervisor whipped them and urged them to return to their posts. "Go back to work! The boss didn't pay you half the salary just to let you enjoy the scenery!"

Hansen and others reluctantly returned to their workstations, but the work did not last long before it was interrupted again.

The cause was that Hansen smelled a pungent odor similar to rotten eggs while working.

At first, no one took the smell seriously. As shipyard workers, they were already accustomed to the smell of the Hills River.

In recent years, with the rapid development of Grimland's industry, the number of factories and workers in the city has increased rapidly, and a large amount of industrial wastewater and domestic sewage is discharged into the Hills River every day.

Especially in East Grimland, the Hills River has become a stinking river of death.

When working by the river, you can often see rotting animal carcasses floating on the water. If someone accidentally falls into the water, they will inevitably get seriously ill when they are pulled out of the water.

Hansen and others even suspected that there were no living creatures in the waters downstream of the Hills River.

It's not uncommon to smell a bad odor when working next to a dead river like this.

But it didn't take long for the workers to realize something was wrong.

As the stench continued to grow stronger and more intense, more than three workers had fainted from the smell.

Having just heard about the Wanslon Textile Factory incident, Hansen and his colleagues could not continue working under such conditions. They left the workshop to look for the source of the odor despite the supervisor's attempts to stop them.

They followed the smell all the way to the river.

At this moment, the big hole in the sky had not closed yet. With the help of moonlight, everyone saw a layer of strange color attached to the surface of Hills River.

The color is like soap bubbles when washing clothes, but the texture is not transparent. Instead, it looks dirty and greasy.

The stench that Hansen and others smelled came from the colorful Hills River.

"Come out and see, the river has turned colorful!"

The abnormal behavior of the Hills River soon attracted the attention of other factories in the surrounding area. People came to the river, covering their noses, to observe this strange phenomenon.

"thump."

"thump."

Before they could figure out what was happening, they could hear the sound of people falling to the ground from the crowd.

The weaker workers were the first to faint from the stench. Their bodies convulsed and they fell into a coma, as if they were possessed by an evil spirit.

Hansen was strong and with a towel over his nose, he did not find the stench unbearable.

However, due to the influence of the stench, his lungs began to feel stuffy and he had difficulty breathing.

As a steel plate cutter, Hansen has been dealing with iron filings, welding fumes and wood dust for a long time. He has not yet developed a serious "shipyard disease", but recently he has felt chest tightness at night and needs to cough a few times to feel better.

Apparently, the stench in the river triggered his lung disease.

He turned around and went back to the workshop, and as usual, he coughed hard to get rid of the air in his lungs.

cough!
cough!
After coughing, he felt a sense of relief in his chest, but he felt that he had coughed out not only the stuffy air, but also a lot of other things.

He took off the towel covering his mouth, and saw a layer of bright red blood on the gray-black towel.

Is this what I coughed up?

The next moment, Hansen's legs went limp and he lost consciousness with a "thump" among the crowd.

As more and more of their companions fainted, the workers began to panic. They fled the Hills River while spreading the rumor about the deadly Colorful River.

The workers were so caught up in panic that they did not notice that as their panic spread, the colors on the river surface continued to expand, flowing upstream at a speed visible to the naked eye, turning the entire Hills River into color.

When the entire Hills River was dyed in strange colors, colorful steam that ordinary people could not see rose from the surface of the river, mixed with the mist of Grimland, and spread to the entire city.

Almost as soon as Wu Chang and the others returned to No. 6 White Street and had not yet unloaded Henry's belongings from the carriage, Wu Chang wrinkled his nose and asked, "What's the matter with you?"

"Did you smell a stink?"

The natives of the copy plane, such as Raventon, were slow to react. They sniffed sharply and shook their heads in confusion.

Players like the Negotiation Master have higher attributes and sharper perceptions. Most of them have already noticed something is wrong and are frowning.

The top ranked player among the crowd, Divine Tongue, said, “There is indeed a stench, and this stench is very unusual.”

Wu Chang's inspiration told him that this strange smell was definitely caused by the Steam Parliament.

He shouted with his true self: "Close the doors and windows, open the defense barrier, and don't let this smell in!"

"All arcane knights, assemble and prepare for emergencies!"

Wu Chang arranged a large-scale occult ritual at No. 6 Baishe Street. As the occult ritual was activated, a pale white barrier that could only be seen by extraordinary people appeared around the Secret Security Department.

Raventon and other indigenous knights were full of questions, and were somewhat confused by the big reaction of Wu Chang and others.

Raventon wanted to ask what happened, but as soon as he opened his mouth, he was surprised to find that the pale white barrier was rapidly turning into color under the influence of some force.

Then he also smelled the stench that Wu Chang had mentioned.

Large-scale occult rituals were powerless against the stench. There was only one possibility, and that was that the stench carried the power of the root.

The indigenous arcane knights such as Raventon are not as strong as the players individually. Although they smell the stench late, they react earlier than the players.

Soon, some arcane knights began to dry heave, while others felt dizzy, had a stuffy feeling in their chest, turned pale, and had weak limbs.

Under the stench, the players were not much better. After only two or three minutes, Booker and White Horse, the weakest players, began to pour potions to cure their normal state into their mouths.

Faced with the stench of the root power, ordinary potions were simply powerless to resist. Only by taking the potions did the two of them look better.

But after a few seconds, when the potion's effects were fully absorbed, they became weak again.

After Bai Ma and Booker, it was soon the turn of the Negotiation Master, Veronica and others.

The players became weak one by one, and only Ma Jia, Killing Wave, and God's Tongue were left on the field. Wu Chang's original body and true self were not affected by the stench for the time being.

Not only the Secret Security Department was attacked by the stench, the entire Grimland was shrouded in an indescribable stench.

Whether ordinary people or extraordinary people, they will fall into weakness and other inexplicable negative states when exposed to the stench.

If you are a strong person, you will just feel dizzy and nauseous, and your body will become weak for a short period of time, but you will not suffer from any serious illness.

If you already have an underlying disease, the stench will aggravate it and make it worse.

For example, Hansen from John's shipyard had his lung disease aggravated by the stench and fell into a coma on the spot.

Grimland is currently experiencing a severe malaria epidemic. Patients with severe malaria are already on the verge of death. After the great stench tonight, tens of thousands of people have died suddenly.

The entire Grimland, including the Secret Security Department and even the Stellan Palace where Queen Olivia was, was invaded by the Great Stink and fell into chaos.

What's even worse is that as people discovered that all the problems came from this great stench, they became afraid of the great stench, and the stench became more and more intense and its effect became more powerful.

It was so powerful that even players of Ma Jia and Killing Intent Wave began to find it difficult to resist and became weak.

This is the first law of mysticism that Wu Chang had seen when he was in the Moonlight Sanatorium:

Human cognition is one of the origins of the existence of mysticism. The more people believe in its existence, the stronger its power becomes.

People's panic about the great stench has exacerbated its spread and transmission.

Shrouded in the stench, Grimland seemed to be in the end of the world.

But if you stand high in the sky and overlook the entire city, you will find that there is only one place that is completely unaffected by the stench and where life is peaceful and quiet.

That is the Grey Church Slum.

The towering tree of miracles blocked out all the mist mixed with a foul stench. The residents in the kingdom of God did not even smell the stench and were immersed in their dreams.

(End of this chapter)