Dragon, choose cultural victory to make money

Twin Towers City.

Sutton, the pearl of the south and the most prosperous city in trade, has now lost its former glory.

The city was dead silent.

The once bustling commercial street now has only one in ten shops left and few pedestrians can be seen on the street.

Even Cornflower Street, which used to have huge crowds of people all day long, is now almost closed except for the few stores of the Drogo Group.

The situation at the Zhuoge Group stores was not optimistic either. Only a few people could be seen in the huge store.

The shop assistant also had nothing to do and stood in the store with a blank, dull look in his eyes.

They are all for playing games.

Playing games for eight hours a day at a high intensity is a frequency that most people cannot stand.

No matter how fun a game is, if you play it at this intensity, you might be addicted to it in the first two days, but after a few days it can easily turn into mental torture and a pure burden.

It was also because of the compulsory prayer policy that commercial prosperity was completely destroyed.

Apart from working, playing and praying in a day, there is no time for rest in the remaining hours. If you touch the pillow, you will not fall asleep, but faint instantly. Who has the leisure to spend money?

The closure of a large number of stores has also created countless unemployed people.

The church's way of dealing with these people was very simple: they were all forced to farm.

They called it a "gift". They had no jobs, and the church provided an opportunity to farm. Isn't this a gift?

Of course, these unemployed people who were forced to work on the farm received no salary at all.

In the eyes of the church, you have already been gifted with the work, so why do you still want money?
Therefore, since the appearance of the Goddess of Magic, the only industry that has grown is agriculture, which has produced a lot of surplus food.

This is also what the church hopes to see. As long as people are not starving to death, it is best not to think about anything else and concentrate on providing faith to the goddess.

In Drogo's Game Shop on Cornflower Street, Barn Forge and several dwarves from his clan were playing pinball machines out of boredom.

The dwarves also had a hard time.

Their main sources of income are two parts, forging and mining.

The ore mined today is not easy to sell.

Weird.

Barn had lived for so many years and had never heard of a situation where ore could not be sold.

Forging orders also dropped sharply, and it was only because the Furnace Clan had a good financial situation and was ranked among the top clans among the dwarves that they were able to barely maintain their operations.

As for Barn himself, he was originally going to record the fourth season of the Forging Competition. Now that the war is over, the sword-forging competition, which had been suspended for a long time, will be reignited.

He was quite excited when he received the recording notice.

Barn likes the show very much because it satisfies his two hobbies at the same time: forging and evaluating other people's forging.

For this purpose, he even specially made an exquisite beard shape, which is the most important part in the dwarf's aesthetic evaluation system, along with strength.

However, the styling was completed, but I received a notice that the program recording was suspended indefinitely.

The reason for the suspension was naturally because of the church.

All prime time on Magic TV must give way to programs where the church preaches doctrine.

But this is not the worst. A good program should not be afraid of a bad time slot.

The worst part is, no one watches the Magic Vision shows now.

The entertainment industry is in just as bad shape right now as brick-and-mortar stores.

People who are busy with work have no time to watch Magic Video Machine, Magic Shadow, or even play games.

Especially games.

People have been appreciating games for long enough.

It's gotten to the point where after taking off the virtual mask, I feel nauseous when I see the game.

Barn Furnace seemed to be playing pinball, but in fact his attention was not on the pinball at all. He was just pressing the buttons mechanically with his hands.

This behavior is essentially no different from holding two walnut plates in your hands.

Just find something to do.

After all, people like Barn who rely on playing game consoles to relieve boredom are a minority, so the originally numerous independent game production teams have gone bankrupt one after another.

But they are slightly better than the physical stores.

They were not forced to farm the land for free.

The Drogo Group absorbed these production staff and participated in a game project that was said to be unprecedentedly large.

It is also a project that serves the Goddess.

From this perspective, although those poor game makers are less physically tired, the mental blow should be no different.

After all, making games is paid and the pay is not bad, but you are serving your enemy.

"Damn Drogo! He just volunteered to be a lackey for the church!"

Baines slapped the pinball machine angrily.

The small steel ball bounced up unexpectedly, bouncing between the fancy scoring points, and scored an extremely high score.

A celebratory message “Congratulations to the player for breaking the scoring record” also popped up on the big screen in the store.

But the store was deserted and no one was looking at the screen.

Another dwarf nearby muttered, "But didn't we make a lot of virtual masks for the church? They were almost the same as Mr. Drogo's."

"Can that be the same!"

Baines puffed out his beard and glared.

That job was a disgrace to the clan, not only because it was a church order, but it didn't even make any money.

The church provided the confiscated raw materials and did not pay a single copper coin for the labor.

Is the Magic Goddess so short of money?

"Besides, was it Drogo that I scolded? Wasn't it that he didn't dare to scold someone who should be scolded?"

Baan said confidently that he dared not offend the church.

It's not shameful. No one dares to mess with the church now.

At this time, someone else walked into the store.

The shiny bald head makes the store brighter.

The person who came was the living legend of Twin Towers City, the master of the School of Protection who was often made fun of because of his homonym, Sauron.

"Hey, it's a rare visitor."

Seeing Soran, Barn greeted him.

This was the first customer to the game store in this week, other than the dwarf of the Furnace Clan.

In other words, this house belongs to the Drogo Group, so there is no problem with rent. Otherwise, the game store would never be able to operate.

"You guys are still playing the game." Soran said without any context.

Barne was so amused, "No, why are you here if you can't play the game?"

"I'm here to support every brick-and-mortar store that's still open in the Twin Towers City."

"You what?"

"As the guardian of Twin Towers City, I will naturally try my best to help every physical store that is still struggling to survive. Although I can't help too much, a little financial support is still enough."

"I don't think Drogo Group's game store really needs that much financial support. You should keep that little money for your retirement."

Finally, Barn met someone who was not from the clan outside, and he had a strong desire to chat.

No matter how you calculate it, Soran's wealth cannot be just "that little money". Every legend is a hidden tycoon.

But there are also gaps among the super-rich.

"This is called equality, don't you understand? I gave financial help to other stores, but I only bypassed the stores of the Drogo Group. This is a loss to the reputation of the Twin Towers City that protects fairness and justice."

Before he could finish his words, the sound of orderly footsteps was heard on the street.

At this time, the only ones who could march in the streets were the church's court of justice. The church's devout guards would judge every lost lamb whose faith in the goddess was not pure enough.

In simple terms, these people are here to arrest people who pray for less than eight hours a day.

According to church regulations, those who pray less than eight hours a day will receive a warning and will be brought to court for further offenses.

Hearing the footsteps getting closer, Baine hurriedly asked the young dwarves beside him.

“Do any of you not have enough time to pray?”

"No." The young dwarves answered.

Then Barn calculated his time and found it was enough. So who were the church guards looking for?
Baine turned to look at Soran.

"You're not going to be unlucky, are you?"

Soran did not answer, but pointed to the front desk of the game store.

The guy at the front desk is now pale and shaking uncontrollably.

It was obvious that the guy at the front desk knew he was short on time.

Since you know you will be punished if you don’t have enough time and you don’t have the ability to withstand it, why do you still not have enough time?

On the one hand, it is out of a sense of luck, and on the other hand, it is because we are used to checking the time.

Just like clocking in, getting up five minutes earlier can solve all problems, but some people like to struggle on the line between life and death due to being late.

Just not praying enough is much more serious than being late.

The guards of the Inquisition pushed open the door of the game store. Their white armor looked dangerous and terrifying at this moment.

The guy at the front desk collapsed on the ground in fear.

The captain of the guard team picked him up and began to read out his "crimes".

"Matthew, you were short of 14 minutes of prayer time on the 4th of this month. I was warned once. On the 18th of this month, you were short of 2 minutes of prayer time. A total of 6 minutes are missing. You are now punished with 60 lashes. Execute immediately. The faith of the Goddess does not tolerate any perfunctory treatment!"

The guy at the front desk was already crying.

"I only lost 6 minutes, just 6 minutes. Please, I will make it up today. I beg you, I am absolutely devout in my belief in the goddess."

The guards remained indifferent, but just skillfully grabbed his arms, pressed his shoulders, and made him kneel down.

The guy at the front desk was still begging for mercy.

"60 lashes will kill someone. You can't do that. The goddess is forgiving."

Speaking of the goddess, the captain of the guards finally spoke.

"The great goddess is of course lenient, so when you are whipped to the point of losing consciousness, the execution will be suspended until you recover, and then the remaining number of whips will be continued."

After that, the shirt of the guy at the front desk was ripped open, and the captain took out a whip with a diameter of nearly two centimeters and hit him mercilessly. In an instant, his skin was torn and his wails echoed in the empty game store.

Baines stared at the executioner, his eyes filled with anger, and reached out for the hammer.

But he was held down by Sauron beside him.

Barn looked at Soran and asked in confusion: "What are you doing? Aren't you the guardian of the Twin Towers? A whip that thick will cripple you even if you don't kill him."

“You can’t do that.”

"Can't do that?"

Barn still didn't understand what this sentence meant, or whether there were other ways to do it.

I saw a burning glass bottle flying in a parabola from the street and hitting the captain's armor accurately.

The flames spread immediately.

The team immediately released the front stage and formed up to deal with the threat that was currently uncertain where it came from.

And just as they let go of the receptionist, a figure suddenly appeared next to the receptionist, picked him up, and teleported away before the Inquisition team could react.

While people were being rescued, numerous Molotov cocktails flew over and raging flames enveloped the team.

However, the fire did not really harm them, and the team immediately locked onto the direction of one of the attackers.

"shooting!"

As the captain gave the order, several rays were immediately emitted.

These people from the Inquisition had obviously undergone very rigorous training, and their shooting movements were extremely professional.

Baines' heart also began to tighten.

It's such a shame that the person who dared to throw a Molotov cocktail at the court was beaten to death like this.

Just when he was thinking about how to help, he suddenly felt a fluctuation of magical power nearby.

He turned his head and saw that one of Soran's hands was secretly moving runes.

It looks like a protective spell.

At this point, the Inquisition team discovered that the first round of shooting was ineffective and gave chase.

Soran then cast a spell to put out the fire caused by the Molotov cocktail, but the poor entrance of the game store was burned black.

Barn looked at Sauron's operations and had many questions to ask.

Soran spoke first.

"Don't look at me. It wasn't me who did it. It was Tower Man who did it."

Baines's beard twitched and he tried hard not to laugh.

"No, why only use Molotov cocktails? Why not use something more powerful?"

"Are you stupid?" Soran replied, "What if the powerful one kills the Inquisition?"

Baines was not able to react for a moment. "Isn't it just to kill them?"

"Saving people now is just a small matter. The church is only responsible for the Inquisition stationed here. The goddess of magic doesn't bother to take care of these things. If someone is killed, it will be a big deal. Will the goddess come to deal with it?"

What Soran said was very realistic.

The church's own power is no longer invincible on the continent, but their backers are too strong.

Baines curled his lips, unable to utter any rebuttal.

After thinking for a long time, he said, "Then let's just keep playing 'house' with the church."

Soran also fell silent.

He was of course aware that such actions would not have any substantial impact on the church.

But there was only so much he could do.

"There's always a chance."

"what chance?"

"Wait for Drogo. He is not a dragon who will bow his head so low to pledge allegiance to the goddess."

"He, isn't he bowing his head and pledging allegiance to the goddess right now? He's working on that, what, project?"

This was the first time Barn couldn't pronounce the name of the game Drogo was developing.

In his opinion, it was no longer a game, but a prison built for the goddess.

"The Lord of the Rings," Sauron replied.

"Oh, Lord of the Rings."

"Maybe that's an opportunity."

"Why is The Lord of the Rings an opportunity?"

"Because The Lord of the Rings is a story about countless small characters uniting to defeat the gods."

"what?"

Barn scratched his head, feeling that he had watched The Lord of the Rings in vain.

"Are there any gods in there? Didn't they defeat a big eyeball in the end?"

Sauron rolled his eyes at Barn with disdain, "That big eyeball is the Eye of Sauron. In The Lord of the Rings, Sauron is a Maia, and the Maia are considered gods. You should read more books if you have nothing to do..." (End of this chapter)