Infinite Puzzle City

Chapter 253 Archives

While Guo Yongfei continued to run towards the gambling table, Xiao Ran had already returned home with the stone.

Of course, I also brought a lot of local specialties.

According to the old man, that stone is a piece of stone gall on the dome of Mount Tai.

It was during the reign of Emperor Kang that a rock on the dome of Mount Tai was split open by a bolt of lightning, and this rock rolled out from inside.

This thing was supposed to belong to the palace, but when something drastic happened, this Gu Haitang escaped with this thing.

The old man signaled Xiao Ran to wear the stone. With the pressure of the stone, no evil spell could touch him.

After hearing what the old man said, Xiao Ran felt relieved. As for Guo Yongfei's matter, Xiao Ran didn't mention a word to the old man.

However, a few days passed and strangely, the other party seemed to have disappeared. Not only did he not attack Xiao Ran again, even the wandering ghosts around him searched the area thoroughly but could not find any suspicious strangers.

The more this happened, the more uncomfortable Xiao Ran felt.

As the saying goes, you don't have to worry about thieves stealing, you have to worry about thieves remembering.

I'm in the same dormitory with you, and you know there's a thief next to you, but you don't know who the thief is. Wouldn't you feel uncomfortable?

Because you don't know when this guy will take action, and you don't know what he will steal from you next time.

Xiao Ran specially brought some local specialties to find Zhong Yi for this purpose.

However, while eating the Qin City specialties bought by Xiao Ran, Zhong Yi heartlessly told Xiao Ran that the company would not interfere in this matter.

It's the same principle as how Xiao Ran killed Master Zhu. You can kill those gangsters and the company won't care. But if you are killed by others, the company won't care either, because you yourself are no longer the object of the company's protection.

The company is not an individual's property. Although Zhong Yi is very optimistic about Xiao Ran, he will not help in this matter.

At most, when the two of them decide the winner, Zhong Yi will help him take care of the aftermath.

"Of course, there is still a way."

Zhong Yi put a piece of stone bun in his mouth, frowned and chewed a few bites slowly: "The company is very short of people now. Six insurances and two funds, holidays, public medical care, public travel, and even a house for you when you get married. It's the same treatment as a director-level cadre."

Xiao Ran felt instantly moved by Zhong Yi's suggestion.

The five words "treatment as a deputy director" are still very attractive. After all, in China, if you have money, you may be generous, but if you have power, you are the real boss.

However, this heart-beating process only lasted for three seconds before Xiao Ran strangled her to death.

What kind of treatment you receive, what kind of responsibilities you have.

In comparison, I prefer the feeling of being free.

"Forget it. I'm not used to it."

Zhong Yi was not surprised at Xiao Ran's answer. He picked up the persimmon cake and took a bite. Hmm... his brows frowned even deeper.

"By the way, I'm just curious, how many beginners are willing to join the company?"

This question was just Xiao Ran's curiosity.

After all, he couldn't figure out why those newcomers joined the company. Was it just because of these benefits?

In response to this question, Zhong Yi pouted and said, "Not many, but not as few as you think, especially in the Qilu area of East China. As long as they are beginners, they are very keen to join the company. At least one-third of the company's grassroots are from there."

"Okay, I'll go back first. I'll figure this out myself."

After saying goodbye to Zhong Yi, Xiao Ran rode his bicycle and did not go home. Instead, he headed west along Zhongzhou Road towards Jianxi.

Regardless of when this guy who wants to kill me will do it, I have to live my life as usual.

Besides, with the Taishan Stone on him, Xiao Ran was not afraid of the other party's attack. As long as the other party dared to show his head, he had plenty of ways to kill him.

Jianxi is different from the old city. It is a prosperous commercial central area.

The consumer economy cannot be compared with that of the old city.

After passing the City Central Hospital and walking a little further ahead, you will reach Shenglong Plaza.

It is said that there is Shenglong in the north and Baolong in the south.

There are no dance halls in Los Angeles, but the delivery of fried noodles is real.

However, Xiao Ran had no plan to eat fried noodles. Across the street there was a small building about three stories high, which was the archive room that Zhong Yi mentioned.

This place was originally the Los Angeles Museum, but it was too small. After it moved, it was also used to host foreign guests, and finally it became the cultural center it is today.

But not all of them are open. There are very few open hours and they are closed most of the time.

Xiao Ran parked the car, walked to the door and knocked on the glass of the security booth.

After explaining your purpose, you can enter by simply completing a simple registration.

There were special people standing guard on the second floor, so not everyone could enter. However, when Xiao Ran walked to the door, the facial scan next to him had already given Xiao Ran access before he could speak.

"Welcome to the archives. You can preview for two hours today. Please manage your time well!!"

As the recording played in the loudspeaker, the iron door in front of him popped open with a click.

This made Xiao Ran sigh that the company's speed of action in this regard was quite fast.

As I walked into the archive room, the smell of dusty books spread out.

I saw various archival materials neatly arranged on rows of bookcases.

Each row of bookshelves had dates specially marked on them, such as 1990 to 2000, with each decade as a unit. Xiao Ran skipped the dates in the front, calculated his grandfather's age in his mind, and searched all the way to the back.

"That should be it."

Estimating that this was about the time period for this row, Xiao Ran began to search through the files.

The information recorded in the archives is very detailed, and any file you pick up is as thick as a history book.

Under normal circumstances, it would take two hours to finish reading even one of the files, but Xiao Ran had the bonus of being a scholar.

A scholar's professional ability is insight.

And being thorough in itself not only requires extremely strong observation skills, but also is a great test of one's memory. Having a photographic memory has become a basic skill.

Xiao Ran only needs to quickly flip through a file to basically remember the key words in it.

When you need it, just think of these keywords and you can immediately recall the full text.

It only took him a few minutes to finish a file. In less than half an hour, Xiao Ran found some of the information he was looking for.

The content recorded in this message happened to be the time when Li Jingqi took action.

Xiao Ran scanned the text quickly and found that the records were not complete and did not even mention what happened that day.

Come to think of it, such vicious incidents would not be recorded in files of this level.

However, it does record a lot of the impact of this incident.

Xiao Ran searched through the archives and found out that the old man of the Zhou family died a few days after this incident, and a huge funeral was held.

There is a black-and-white photo in the file, which shows that the funeral was on a large scale. The white guide money along the way was like snowflakes, white flags were held high, and there was a funeral band behind them. Walking along the street, the road was completely blocked.

That was in that era. If it were today, such a large-scale funeral would definitely not be allowed.

Not only does the policy not allow it, the conditions also do not allow it.

Xiao Ran continued to flip through the pages, scanning the entire file at a glance. The contents of the file seemed like miscellaneous notes, with all the recorded information scattered all over the place. This file could not be considered a historical record.

In terms of level, this thing is not as good as the county annals. After all, if a person can be included in the county annals, it can be regarded as leaving his name in history.

What might be recorded on it would not be an ordinary thing.

At this time, Xiao Ran found an article which was a cutout of a newspaper. [A tomb-robbing gang was uncovered and the leader was shot.] Xiao Ran took a look at the photo in the newspaper and found it was Mao Si. He could not help but sigh that this guy could not change his bad habits.

Time passed minute by minute. Xiao Ran finished looking through the files for this period, but failed to find much valuable information, so he turned around and looked through the files for the next few years.

As he was searching, Xiao Ran suddenly stopped.

He looked carefully at the fragment of the file in his hand.

This article records the local population changes, and I actually saw my grandfather's name in it.

In other words, after the Li Jingqi incident, his grandfather moved away from Luo City. Xiao Ran speculated that the old man either ran away to make a living in the world or returned to Xiaojia Village.

Otherwise, where did all those messy things in his box come from?

"Bang bang bang!"

At this time, there was a knock on the door, and an old man leaned forward and said, "Little brother, we have ten minutes left before we get off work."

Xiao Ran was startled and quickly took out his cell phone to check the time. Only then did he realize that he was so busy looking at the files that he didn't notice that he had been here for more than three hours.

This time has far exceeded the stipulated time.

"Sorry, sorry, I was so engrossed in this."

Xiao Ran quickly put the file back.

“Hahahahaha.” The old man grinned and said, “I’ve been here for nearly forty years, and this is the first time I’ve seen someone spend so much time reading files and being so absorbed in them. I came to see you just now, and since you were really focused on reading these files, I didn’t have the nerve to call out to you.”

"Well, I want to look up some information." Xiao Ran said, and suddenly looked at the old man in front of him, and asked in surprise: "Uncle, how old are you this year?"

"97."

The old man in front of him looked quite old, but in extremely good spirits. Xiao Ran was surprised that he had not retired yet at such an old age. This company was too good.

"What have you been looking for for so long?"

I followed the old man out of the archive room. He was leaning on crutches and didn't need anyone's support. His legs and feet were very light and agile, no worse than those of young people.

"I know some of the early days. If you know any interesting stories, please tell me about them."

Seeing a high step ahead, Xiao Ran hurried forward to give a hand.

The old man smiled and shook his head, "You asked the wrong person. I just moved here from another place ten years ago. I am not familiar with the local affairs."

However, as soon as the old man finished speaking, his eyes suddenly fixed on the bracelet on Xiao Ran's wrist. His whole body widened as if he was under a spell.

Before Xiao Ran noticed, he grabbed Xiao Ran's arm and said, "Where did you get this bracelet?"

"bracelet??"

Xiao Ran's heart skipped a beat and he immediately became alert, thinking, "Could this guy be from Wuxiantang?"

But the old man stared at the bracelet from side to side, but he didn't look as anxious as Wuxiantang. Seeing this, Xiao Ran could only say, "It's passed down from my family."

But before he could finish, the old man raised his head, stared at Xiao Ran and smiled coldly: "Bullshit, I saw this thing in the Northeast before, and that guy turned into a monster..."

(End of this chapter)