Zhuoqian County is located in the southeastern part of Qingdao Province, bordering western Shu and Tibet.

It took nearly four hours to reach this small plateau city. Luo Youcheng did not intend to hide his tracks, and the flying wings generously parked outside the small settlement.

The settlement is located next to the road, and on the other side of the road is a river, Za'aqu. The small settlement has a dilapidated appearance, with a cobblestone wall about three meters high, and the entrance and exit are heavy, primitive and rough wooden gates made of whole logs.

A man poked his head out of the wall, his skin was dark, his shawl hair was scattered like grass, and a rifle was mounted on the wall.

"Who are you? What to do? ”

As the man's voice fell, there was a clattering sound on the wall, and two old armed guards struggled to "crawl" out of the wall, the crunch of the barrel as it turned, making it seem suspicious that they would fall apart at any moment. Such equipment can also defend against wild beasts.

Luo Youcheng was about to answer, when an old and hoarse voice came from the wall: "Tenzin, please come in." ”

The man retracted his head from the wall, and in a moment the wooden door slowly opened inward with a screeching grinding sound.

The door was halfway open and didn't move. Tenzin beckoned and motioned for everyone to enter. Walking in front of Tenzin, Luo Youcheng found that he was actually quite young, with a faint circle of fluff on his lips, and he should be younger than himself. Tenzin's eyes widened as he stared at the electromagnetic rifle he was carrying on his chest for five and seven seconds.

Luo Youcheng coughed lightly, Tenzin came back to his senses, smiled embarrassedly, leaned his back against the wooden door, and made way for the passage.

"Distinguished guests, please come in." The old voice said.

Waiting behind the gate was an old man with a slumped back, a thin man with a palm-sized face covered with furrows. He holds a prayer wheel in one hand and a Buddhist bead in the other. The old man pinched the beads in his left hand, and the prayer wheel in the other hand rotated silently.

Luo Youcheng clasped his hands together and bowed slightly to the old man.

"I'm not really a Buddhist, I'm just asking for peace of mind." The old man said thoughtlessly, turned and walked towards the settlement.

The old man did not walk quickly, his legs were slightly stiff, and he was as mechanical as a puppet, but his gait was quite steady.

Luo Youcheng was about to keep up, and pulled his sleeve in three seconds, and the vigilance in his eyes was very strong. Luo Youcheng shook his head lightly, indicating that it was okay. His instinct told him that this trip should be rewarded. He stepped forward and grabbed the old man's left arm. The old man shrank his elbow slightly, indicating that he did not need to be supported.

Luo Youcheng let go of his hand and walked beside the old man: "The old man knows that we will come?" ”

The old man's eyes were staring at the ground, and his footsteps did not stop, "Last night, I had a feeling in my heart and knew that there was a distinguished guest coming to the door today. ”

Luo Youcheng joked: "Why do you think we are honored guests? Two of my companions have guns. ”

"In the last days, who doesn't bring a weapon when they go out."

"Why does the old man think we're here?"

"Knife man." The old man replied, "I know you call him a swordsman. ”

Luo Youcheng was taken aback, and came here to recruit swordsmen, but he only made a temporary move in the morning, "The old man is a prophet?" ”

The old man did not answer, but walked with his head down.

As a small tourist city with western characteristics, there are no high-rise buildings in the eastern cities, and there are generally three- or four-story small buildings here, with independent households. The streets were empty, and Luo Youcheng did not see a single resident of the settlement except for the old man and Tenzin. Firewood is piled up in front of many small buildings, and there are many piles of ash on both sides of the street, or black marks left by the removal of ashes. After walking for about a minute, the old man stopped in front of a small building, and the door was open.

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"Come in and sit down." The old man walked through the door.

The lighting in the room is not too good, and it is a little dim. There is a lot of furniture in the house, and the furnishings are messy.

"I'm old, I can't do it anymore, and I don't have the energy to clean it up." The old man laughed at himself, he inserted the prayer wheel into the base of the lotus platform and sat on the single sofa, "Sit down." ”

The sofa was the only neat part of the room, also close to the window, which had better lighting. Luo Youcheng sat down on the sofa opposite the old man, signaling for five seconds and seven seconds to sit as well, and the brothers and Shi Yanshan squeezed on the three-person sofa.

The old man put the Buddha beads around his neck, and tapped the fingers of his right hand lightly on his temple, "Xening, the distinguished guest is here, don't you come out to say hello?" ”

A fleshy insect came out of the old man's earhole, swayed his body, greeted the four of them, and shrank back.

Shi Yanshan shouted: "Old man, you have worms in your ears. ”

"If you don't speak, no one will treat you like a dumb person." Luo Youcheng scolded, and said sorry to the old man, "My brother is open-mouthed, please bear with me, old man." ”

The old man smiled and waved his hand, "I don't mind, normal people will have a bug in their ears." Didn't you ask me if I would prophesy? ”

The old man pointed to his ear: "I won't, it will." ”

Thinking of the name of the insect is Xening, Luo Youcheng realized: "Xening, is it the meaning of tomorrow?" ”

"Yes, it knows what's going to happen tomorrow, so I'll name it Xenin."

Shi Yanshan's mouth opened widely: "You mean, we were prophesied by a bug?" ”

Luo Youcheng glared at him.

"Sort of." The old man didn't care, and said with a smile, "I don't know where it came from, but one day, it suddenly appeared in my ears." ”

"What does it eat? Need to feed it? No matter how Luo Youcheng stared, as long as Shi Yanshan was curious, no one could stop him.

"I haven't fed it." The old man said.

Shi Yanshan suddenly realized: "I know, it eats earwax." Can you lend me a favorite? My ears were clogged. ”

Luo Youcheng said angrily: "Three seconds, accompany Yanshan to go outside." He has a lot to say to the old man, and he is always ridiculed by this rammer, how can he stand it.

Shi Yanshan hurriedly begged for mercy: "Brother, I was wrong, I'll shut up." After speaking, he pursed his lips tightly.

The old man smiled: "The little brother is a wonderful person. ”

"He's just a bastard, the old man doesn't need to pay attention." Luo Youcheng said apologetically, and then asked, "Brother Daoke can be in the settlement?" ”

"He's taken people to hunt in the mountains, and it's customary to come back the day after tomorrow, but I've sent Nima out to look for him, and if it goes well, maybe he'll be back tomorrow."

"The old man was very interested in our visit."

"Xenin has not given me a very clear hint, I don't know what you can bring us, but if you can change the status quo a little, I always have to show some kindness. We are a settlement, and we are busy every day for a bite to eat, and I can't leave them at home to welcome you, and I hope you will understand. The old man used honorifics in his words.

"No wonder it's deserted."

The old man explained: "Some people hunt, some people gather. The gathering team returns on the same day, and the hunting will go out for three or four days. ”

"How many people are in the settlement?"

"Plus the useless old man, a total of thirty-six people."

"As far as I know, there were 50,000 permanent residents before the disaster, how can there be so few survivors?"

"There were those who survived

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More than 700 people were poisoned one after another, and the remaining dozens of people were not afraid of poison. ”

There is no means to resist, distinguish or transform poison, and in the last days when poison is everywhere, there is only a dead end. The supplies in Zhuoqian County were not abundant, and the food stocks were exhausted within two years. Driven by hunger, even if he knows that the food in his hand is poisonous, he will not hesitate to swallow it.

"So, I can't leave you for dinner." The old man said apologetically.

"We can figure it out on our own." Luo Youcheng is not afraid of poison, and Shi Yanshan also has a certain amount of poison resistance, but five seconds and seven seconds are not good.

According to the old man, what is even more tragic is that the survivors do not have many life skills. For example, they don't have a power engineer, and even if they know that there is a hydropower station dozens of kilometers away, they don't have the ability to connect the electricity. The reason for choosing this accommodation area is that there is a fuel generator here, which is not very powerful and the fuel inventory is not much, but it is still possible to ensure the operation of the two armed guards. Second, it is close to the river and convenient to get water.

People in the settlements rarely turn on the lights and go to bed when it gets dark. If you can't sleep, you build a fire outside the house and chat for a while with your neighbors who are also not sleepy.

"Didn't want to get out of here?"

"Of course I thought about it, but at that time, the old and the young, we dozens of people were supported by a few young people, where can we go? Now she has grown up, but we don't know where there are still living people, and where they can take us in. We don't know anything about the outside world. A few days ago, the swordsman went to Dian Province, and when he came back, he said that there was no one there, and there were monsters everywhere. ”

Luo Youcheng nodded to show his understanding, it is not easy for a group of people who have no life skills to struggle to survive in the last days, how can they take risks easily.

"Listen to the accent of the old man, not a local?"

Since the beginning of urbanization at the end of the twentieth century, population movements have become more frequent, and over the centuries the differences in localization have become very small. Only those who have lived in the same place for generations will allow some dialects to be brought into the present through centuries. Therefore, people like Mi Doudou, Shi Yanshan and Shang Shiyin, who can speak the Shu dialect fluently, can be called living fossils of language.

The old man spoke standard official dialect, but Luo Youcheng keenly captured the dialect vocabulary mixed in it - fine lingzi.

"I'm from Hunan Province." The old man said, "I remember that year I passed my one hundred and twentieth birthday, and I felt that my body was still strong, and I wanted to walk and see it again." One of my great-grandsons lives here, I came over and never left. ”

Luo Youcheng was not surprised by the old man's age. In the old era, the average life expectancy of humans reached 96 years. In the idyllic XXVITH century, there was even a long-lived old man who lived to be 199 years old, spanning three centuries.

The old man continued: "My name is Dao Qixiang. ”

"Are you a Dai?"

"The knife man is also surnamed Dao, and he is my fifth generation grandson." Dao Qixiang paused slightly, and then said, "I am a Han Chinese, and the knife surname of the Dai people is not the same. Many branches have changed their surnames to avoid disasters, but our branch has always used this surname. ”

The old man is the ancestor of the swordsman, whether he can convince the swordsman, Dao Qixiang's attitude has become very crucial.

"What would be your attitude if I took you out of here and lived a life of relative affluence?" For a long-lived old man, Luo Youcheng also used honorifics to express his respect.

"I will respect my grandson's opinion." Dao Qixiang kicked the ball to his great-grandson without hesitation. Many people are like this when they are old, and they don't care about anything and let themselves go.

"What do you think his attitude would be?"

Dao Qixiang was silent for a long time before he said, "You can ask Xening." ”

(End of chapter)

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