Departing from the Wire Tribe, the Atomic Hummer follows the railway through a hill, occasionally through some ancient tunnels.

The further east you go in this area, the more mountains appear.

After two days of driving, Andy saw on the map that he had left Colorara and entered a territory known as Kansas before the war, and he couldn't figure out what these ancient place names meant, and after asking him, she said that it probably originated from the place names used by the indigenous people of this continent hundreds of years ago, and the meaning could be 'south wind', which can also be judged from this word that the south wind often blows in this area.

On the way, the two spent most of their time drowsy and bored, and only had two accidents.

Once, he encountered a few rickety figures in a dark tunnel, and when he got closer, Andy found that they were some crazy ghouls, these crazy ghouls were all rotten and clean, and the surface of their bodies was shriveled and rough and full of dirt, and they were completely in the shape of live corpses.

The difference from the common mad ghouls is that these guys still have some iron chains hanging on their limbs, some of them aimlessly drag the rusted and broken iron chains around the rails, some are still bound by these iron chains, and can only move in pairs and threes, and some are even hung with heavy iron balls at the end of the chains, looking at the messy traces on the ground, I am afraid that they are quite old.

Andy drove by quickly, dodging a few guys who wanted to rush up, these mad ghouls were quite slow to move because of the chains on their bodies, and it was easy to dodge, but why did they have chains on them?

Xian stared at the mad ghouls and sighed repeatedly.

"Do you see the chains on them? God, no one is going to put chains on the ghouls, which means they were done before they became like this. ”

Andy glanced in the rearview mirror, a little shocked.

"What do you mean... They were the ones who became mad ghouls when the Great War broke out, and have been here until today? But why? Could it be that there were still slaves in the SA before the Great War? Why were people left in the field in chains before the war? ”

The string thought for a moment and made a guess.

"Perhaps, SA is doing the same thing that NcR is doing today."

She looked at the brainless walking corpses that were struggling to chase and roar at the Atomic Humvee in the distance, and there was a complicated look in her eyes.

"These mad ghouls may have been prisoners in the past, they may have committed felonies, or prisoners of war captured in the war and people who were captured and sentenced by the SA government for other reasons, chained to prevent escape, and they were sent here for... Build a railway? ”

When Andy heard this, he felt that it was completely reasonable, because according to the records of Tibbetts Prison, Tibbetts Prison was a large experimental factory before it was acquired by the Environmental Protection Agency-supported Greenway Hydroponics from Poseidon Energy and Shelter Technology, and all the experiments carried out were cruel and inhumane experiments that could not be made public, and the experimental materials used were the prisoners and prisoners of war who were ordered to build and renovate this place. The codE technology and early Vault containment experiments as well as some experiments related to biological and chemical weapons were all quietly carried out there, and Vault Tech even used the remaining prisoners to produce various items for them with high-intensity unpaid labor after the phased experiments were completed.

What's the difference between this and a big slave camp? He thought of the 'Green Room', a terrifying biochemical laboratory built by William Clark, a pre-war scientist and presided over by another pre-war scientist, Dr. Sebastian, in the depths of the reservation, where countless slaves had been horribly treated and eventually died in the incinerator, and their bodies were burned to ashes in the incinerator.

He was driving the car, a little distracted for a moment.

In the past, as an NcR national, he was also promoted by the NcR and was a staunch opponent of slavery, and this abolitionist ideology has a long history and deep roots in the NcR, and it is the spiritual highland that the NcR people are proud of distinguishing themselves from other natives, and with the help of this highland, the NcR people have a natural sense of superiority and contempt for the wastelanders and tribesmen in the eastern region. For in their view, the existence or absence of slavery was the key marker that distinguished the civilized side from the barbaric side.

But since he came into contact with the Buraku people of the Blackfoot Tribe, the salvage workers of Dog City Denver, the 'workers' of Jericho Town, and even the slippery slaves of the reservation, he has gained a deeper understanding of slavery.

It is undoubtedly wrong to separate slavery, a mechanism that arises naturally from the development process of human society, and to look at and evaluate it separately, and it is also wrong to believe that it should have been completely replaced and disappeared along with the development of human society.

Forcing some individuals in society to perform involuntary unpaid labor for others for some reason can happen in any group at any time, in any place.

As long as the development of human society fluctuates due to war or other reasons, it is necessary to find low-cost labor to improve the overall productivity of society based on cost considerations, such as the pre-war SA government that made these prisoners and prisoners of war wear iron chains to build railways, or the NcR government to levy felons, death row prisoners, and any ' The right people come to the Eastern District and are incarcerated in Black Canyon Jail, where they either sign an agreement to go to the dangerous Dog City in exchange for a completely disproportionate reduction of their sentences, or maintain and build a railroad for the NcR under the violent supervision of the military and police, as Andy saw on the train to Dog City.

For the NcR, they may think that this is a last resort, after the domestic war with the Brotherhood of Steel has led to economic constraints and even began to owe a large number of wages to those railway engineering teams, and further directly or indirectly led to a number of tragedies such as the 370 robbery, Eagle Rock Incident, etc., it is obviously more appropriate to let the prisoners in the prison do what they have to do, after all, first, prisoners do not need to be paid for their work, and second, If there is a problem, shooting them directly will not arouse domestic public opinion sympathy like the Eagle Rock incident and the 370 robbery.

But, is this not a kind of slavery?

Andy's heart faltered.

When the ghouls on the reservation used ghoul racism to circumvent the accusation of slavery on the grounds that they did not organize slave hunters and only bought slaves from other slave traders through legitimate trade channels, Andy felt that this was completely unacceptable and should support Colonel Greene in launching a military coup to overhaul the reservation and overhaul the reservation; When the Buramen of the Blackfoot tribe refuted Andy's accusation of enslaving others on the grounds that they would allow slaves to join the tribe after a certain number of years of work and become a free man, Andy felt that this could not fully convince him, because the implementation of the slavery system caused the Blackfoot tribe to miss a large number of trade opportunities with civilized areas and even attract wanted and hostility, so that the living standards of the Blackfoot tribe members remained low for a long time, so he persuaded the slave-born chieftain Kurisu to carry out abolition reform; When the sheriff of Jericho Township forcibly sent prisoners to the water purification plant for felony crimes they had committed as a kind of slave called 'worker', Andy felt that it was just an unsustainable and inhumane temporary emergency mechanism, and he had facilitated Sheriff O'Connor's pre-war promise to abolish the water purification plant before the looters were about to be killed. When he saw the salvage workers in Dog City struggling in a desperate situation, while the NcR side held a blank piece of paper in his hand and held the final interpretation, he vaguely felt that something was wrong with this matter, and communicated with the Dodge Mayor many times to express the amazing tenacity of the salvage fighters he witnessed when he was in contact with Potter and others in Dog City, hoping that the Dodge Mayor could use the railroad to send more supplies after restoring contact with Dog City, and thinking that they would be able to dispose of these people as reasonably as possible for the sake of their original crime and extenuating circumstances。

Along the way, he has always practiced himself, never forgot his original intention, and always chose to stand on the other side of the slavery system.

Today, after seeing the corpses with chains wandering through the tunnels on the way to the railroad and reminiscent of the Black Canyon prisoners who had been asked by the NcR to repair the railroad because of the strings' explanations, he really felt that he could no longer make a simple and direct assessment of the complex world as he had before.

The stages of development of human society are indeed differentiated because of the differences in productivity caused by the environment, and some regions may have reached stage 3 or even stage 6, while others are still struggling in stage 2 and have no hope of catching up with the former in a short period of time.

Another thing is that when those societies that claim to be far ahead and advanced in civilization are complacent, they will unconsciously lose their vigilance against some things, which are the twists and turns, turbulences, and retrogressions that may occur in the process of social development.

Over the years, the self-proclaimed civilized and powerful New California Republic has extended its tentacles of expansion from New California to Colorara, no matter how many words are used to whitewash the mistakes they have made in the process, such as the 'unity' and 'negotiation' that Mayor Dodge has said, some things cannot be completely covered up, and the fact is that the NcR is constantly moving towards the opposite in the actions of practicing its founding values.

When railroad workers who were unable to go back to New California to meet their families because they were not paid to do so took up their shovels and pickaxes and rushed into the National Bank of NcR or picked up the inferior explosives used to blow up the railroad and threw them at the deputy mayor of Hoover Dam, the cost of the country's actions was shown from the weaker side simply, bluntly, quickly, and at the same time savagely, furiously, and madly toward the stronger side.

In addition to this sudden encounter and the accompanying thoughts, another accident was that they saw the 'dead wind' in the hangman's mouth, and despite the hills, Andy Chord still saw the huge pillar of wind in the south that seemed to connect the heavens and the earth from a distance in the car.

Huge rocks and countless debris can be seen rising into the air by it, and the gathered radiation is accompanied by strong winds to emit strong radiation towards the surroundings, and the wind pillar forms a huge dust cloud in the sky, which is constantly bursting out of strong lightning, and the low but shocking sound comes from far and near, and the manifestation of the destructive power of nature stands in the south like a god's mansion, slowly moving towards the north.

This is indeed a 'dead wind', no matter where you come from, no matter where you are going, if you dare to stay on its path or even close to it without long eyes, you will die without a place to be buried.

The only thing that gave them a little peace of mind was that there was a towering mountain not far away that could act as a barrier.

String checked the information stored on his portable computer and said the name of the mountain.

"That's Mount Sunflauer... It is also called Sunflower Mountain, with an altitude of 1,231 meters. ”

Andy stared at the mountain and subconsciously asked.

"What's a sunflower?"

The strings explained that it was roughly a pre-war plant, which could produce yellow flowers, produce fruits that could be squeezed for oil or edible, and also had a beautiful appearance, and would look good if it was a field growing in patches, because they would change the direction of the flowers according to the position of the sun, and always maintain a posture of facing the sun, that is, 'towards the sun'.

Once again, she sighed at the diversity and wonder of the pre-war species, and praised the erudition of the strings, and blushed her boasting, waving her hand to argue that this was all the knowledge that Diana had taught her when she was in the nursery.

Half a day after entering the Kansas area, Andy Chord encountered another sudden situation when he was about to arrive at the location of Leavenworth Prison on the map.

A red and gold flag fluttered in front of a small village built on a railway, and the surrounding grass huts and earthen houses had been scorched and destroyed, and black smoke rose into the sky.

On the banner is a noble and proud golden bull.

Andy slowly pressed the brakes, then got out of the car and pulled out a telescope to look over.

At the entrance of this small village, many tribesmen are kneeling with their hands tied, and around them are soldiers wearing red shirts, black and brown armor, helmets and black goggles, and skirt-like waists.

The bizarre skirt-like dress may seem bizarre and in keeping with the Buraku aesthetic, but when you think about it, the weather has been sunny and dry since escaping the Radiation Hurricane Belt into the eastern region, and it can feel hot even at night with long sleeves and trousers, and during the day during field operations, it is a cool outfit that not only dissipates heat and breathes, but also makes it easy to move.

Andy looked closely, and these tribesmen kneeling on the ground suddenly appeared with similar patterns to those iron wire tribes he had encountered before, two parallel black lines, and the hairstyles on their heads were also highly similar.

They fell to their knees with sullen faces, not daring to move, and a man dressed as a chief was dragged to the front, and then a Maisheti was lifted up by the legionnaires, the Kansas sun reflecting the black blades with a shiny glow.

Andy was nervously watching the scene when he suddenly noticed a legionnaire wearing a black goggle with a long black and white feather fixed on top of his lens and raising a lever rifle to take aim at him.

His face froze, thinking that under such dazzling sunlight, the reflection of the telescope was also very obvious from a distance.

Pumping in the combat potion, Andy dropped the telescope and pushed the strings around her to the ground, she fell to the sand with a blank face, and then a bullet fired with precision, making a small hole in the shell of the atomic Humvee.