A common tavern that connects all fantasy worlds

"He released the children, and took them back to the town in silence.

"The people in the town seem to only now remember his half-breed identity, throwing stones at him, spitting on him, driving him away, and calling him a monster behind his back."

The sheriff looked at him out of the corner of his eye in complete bewilderment, and asked, "What the hell are you talking about?"

"What I want to say is..." Papa Burke suddenly pulled out an oversized homemade rifle from under the workbench, and pointed the black muzzle at the sheriff's face: "Someone will remember him, he Every one of the rescued children is grateful to him!... If you don’t know him, let me tell you, he is the vampire who rescued me and your fathers from the bloody teeth of the nobles Hunter. If you want him out of town, kill us first."

As he spoke, the old man's expression became serious: "D, ride the horse away. Our business is done."

D glanced at him, got on his horse, walked through the dumbfounded crowd, and walked out of the repair shop.Before leaving the door, he just said in a voice that was so soft that it was almost inaudible:

"Thank you."

Chapter 24 Restoring Faith

Just as D was riding his horse towards the outside of the town, another group of people also breathed a sigh of relief in the abandoned courtyard opposite the repair shop, and put down the storm pulse rifle in their hands.

"Speaking of which, D can get rid of all the blind guys there by himself... Why do we have to be here to watch?"

Behind the boys with guns in front, Kate asked puzzled.

Xue Li smiled and shook his head: "Of course it's because his self-awareness is still human. However, it's hard to say whether the human beings in this world will regard him as the same kind..."

Everyone saw what happened in the repair shop just now, and there was nothing to say for a while.

Hearing the story of the hunter who saved everyone being expelled from the monitor, Kate felt a little depressed, so she could only change the subject and say, "It's a good thing he can think of what will happen in advance... I was scared when he came to the tavern." One jump."

"He's not guarding against people in this town..."

Xue Li raised his head and looked at a person leaning outside the repair shop.

With short blond hair, big blue eyes, and a red combat uniform, she was a heroic-looking woman.

At the same time that D rode away from her, she also happened to turn her head and met Xue Li and his party.

She obviously wasn't sure who it was who appeared here... D has always been a loner, and he has never heard of him partnering with other hunters; moreover, the Marcos Brothers she belonged to also encountered that man a few days ago However, he didn't find any help at the time.

If it's people from this small town...it doesn't look like it.When the sheriff led people to rush in just now, these people didn't follow; they didn't know who D was in advance, and they didn't have the consciousness of ambush. What are they doing squatting here?

Leila frowned, seeing that D had gone far on horseback, she didn't bother to care about these irrelevant people, she just rode on the motorcycle she had left beside the garage, and chased D out of town.

She was the one who reminded the sheriff that a half-breed had entered the town. She wanted to cause some trouble for D. Of course, it would be even better if she could teach this group of lecherous people in the town a lesson... But it seems that there are two purposes Neither reached.

In the abandoned courtyard on the side, Xue Li smiled, took out a communicator known for its astronomical distance without delay, dialed it and said to the other side: "Hey, D. There is a guy with short blond hair, The young girl in the red tights followed you... She was also at the scene just now, and it seems that she also attracted those who were unclear about the situation. What should we do, do we need to follow?"

After a while, D's voice came from there: "I see. If you want to follow up, it will be faster to pass through the tavern, but I suggest you stay for a while."

"What?" Kate asked inexplicably, and then saw one of the group of people who had just walked out of the garage dejectedly talking to the sheriff angrily.

"...Oh." Xue Li sneered, "Amelia, get ready...Everyone, how about we visit this shop?"

"Ah... human beings."

Amelia stretched her waist, put the rifle behind her back, and suddenly took two steps back under the eyes of everyone, and disappeared into the shadows.

She can't suck blood now... But for any vampire, "blood sucking" is just a way of eating.Their strength, speed, and reflexes are their most powerful weapons.

Xue Li led the others to stand up, walked across the street under the surprised eyes of the townspeople, and walked into the repair shop.

"What, is business so good today? To save you from asking, I don't know where that man is going."

The old man said without raising his head.

"We know where D is. If I ask you some other questions, can I get an answer from you?" Xue Li asked while looking around.

The old man finally cast his surprised eyes here: "What do you want to ask?"

The first was Xue Li. He skillfully took out a bottle of wine and handed it to him, and immediately asked a key question: "Aren't you afraid of revenge from those guys?"

"So you saw..."

Papa Burke took the wine bottle with a wry smile, looked at the label on it, scratched his head, put the wine aside first, and continued to answer the question: "I'm old... I don't have a few years left. Besides, the town We old guys are still needed, at least someone has to do the work of repairing cars, repairing weapons, and making bullets. While we can still work, the most they can do is give me a little bit of trouble."

Kate, who was standing aside, heard that he seemed to have something in his words, and couldn't help asking: "What if you don't have the ability to work?"

"... Those who can still walk are in charge of the night watch, with a whistle in their mouths, patrolling the streets behind the defense line. In case nobles or other monsters sneak in through the defense line, at least they can blow the whistle with their last breath... If you even walk Those who can’t walk will stay at home and be taken care of by their families, and those without families will leave the town to fend for themselves. But when I get to that age, I won’t be able to mess with them anymore, so of course I don’t have to worry about it.”

Sure enough, just now I felt that the population in the town didn't seem too large... Now that I think about it, there are very few children and old people here.

The technology of the old era is advanced in every aspect, except for medical treatment... The nobles who once ruled the world certainly did not study any medical treatment for human beings. Their own powerful bodies are immune to all diseases.

Most of the biotechnology they have mastered is used to create all kinds of monsters and "barbarians".

In an era when medicine is so underdeveloped, one can imagine the mortality rate of children and the average age of the elderly.

It's not just this town, it's probably the case in the whole world.

Xue Li nodded. It is impossible for people like himself to stay here forever... If it is true that nothing will happen as he said, then you can rest assured.

The other guy who came to ask questions was Jacob, who was curious from the beginning.

"I see you have crosses on top of your houses...does it work?"

Papa Burke replied: "It works, to a certain extent... Those monsters and living corpses will bypass this place, but for the truly powerful nobles, these things probably only make them feel pain."

Jacob frowned.

The cross is different from the holy water. The holy water needs to be blessed, prayed, and performed by the clergy, but the cross is not.

Although some extreme sects believe that giving sanctity to the shape of the cross itself violates the commandment of "no idolatry", but in most scenes, the cross represents the protection of God.

For creatures like vampires, either God is still connected to the human world, so the cross is their natural enemy and cannot be touched anyway; or the world has fallen into the hands of the devil, and wooden frames of any shape will not work .

There is no in-between situation, there is no such thing as "feeling pain".

"Do you believe in God?" he asked again.

"God...so you are a priest? That's great, there are not many people in our area who are even qualified to hold funerals." Burke smiled slightly, and then his expression became serious again: "God why To make this world like this? Do you believe in God?"

The old pastor in front of him suddenly didn't know what to answer.

When Jacob was still a pastor, some believers who had just accepted the teachings would always ask him a question: "God is omniscient and omnipotent, so it must have anticipated the existence of Satan and mankind's betrayal of Him and falling into the embrace of the devil. He Why wasn't that possibility eliminated from the start?"

At that time, Jacob replied: "Human beings are stupid. Just like Adam and Eve who disobeyed the command of God, we are all born with sin, but if we don't have a sense of guilt, how can we distinguish what is right? , what is wrong?

"The oldest passage in the Bible, the Book of Job, says: 'The Lord gave, and the Lord has taken away; blessed be the name of the Lord.' Faith is never easy. It requires us to It took a lot of courage and faith to overcome many tests and prove that I deserve to be saved."

Of course, at that time he hadn't personally experienced the pain of losing a loved one. Maybe it was a bit like Boss Xue said, standing and talking without pain in the back.

Now facing people who are really suffering in this world, he can't say such irresponsible words "this is a test" lightly.

Blood-sucking devils are rampant in the world, human beings are raised as domestic animals, and the whole world is destroyed and reborn several times. How much firm belief can people ask for?

But he still couldn't help thinking about the past in his heart.

Why did he become a pastor in the first place?Is it hope to be redeemed?Do you want to change a ticket to "Paradise" on the day of the end?

"I... believe it." Jacob looked at the world around him, then at the old man in front of him, and gradually found what he wanted to say.

"That's why I became a pastor in the first place. I want to serve people, not ask people to serve me. I want to give people hope, not let them fall in despair. The fate I have experienced is not a test, it is not Enlightenment, suffering is suffering, but being crushed by this suffering is tantamount to giving up on yourself and betraying God.... So, I will continue to strengthen my faith!"

Burke, the owner of the repair shop, had been listening quietly, and interjected at the end to ask, "Even in this world?"

"Especially in a world like this." Jacob replied, "I should devote myself to reality and practice God's love for all beings in the world... We must not delay this matter with 'judgment day' and 'heaven', because You see, isn’t this world the world after Judgment Day? Haven’t the people who have lived to this day been given a mission that only the living can fulfill under the will of God?”

"What mission are you talking about?" Before he knew it, Burke sat up straight in front of him, staring at the pastor who seemed to have suddenly figured something out with a serious expression.

He was illiterate, and his doctrinal knowledge was limited to missionaries' repetitions of biblical stories; of course, none of the biblical stories he had heard.

Somehow, though, he was willing to believe the pastor.

Jacob opened his mouth and replied, "...the kingdom of heaven on earth."

Chapter 25 Sunshine

After running for a long time, the black carriage finally stopped at a resting area.

In the valley surrounded by mountains, for some reason, there is a clear spring, which is as calm as a mirror in the marble pool; the surrounding mottled walls, forests of stone pillars, and flat ground indicate that this place was once a secluded villa, an old The kind of residence that the aristocrats of the era liked best—beautiful scenery, away from the crowd, with retro decoration style, but with relatively convenient transportation, close to the nearby highway.

In the sunlight, the two barbarians guarding the carriage were busy with their own affairs.

The woman in green leather with hair like a lion's mane was squatting on the roof of the car with a solemn expression—the man in the black robe in the trio has not returned yet, and it is likely that something happened.

Something is wrong... At first, I thought that only D was considered troublesome, but now it seems that the group of hunters who were blocked by her from the car are not easy to mess with.

"I shouldn't have left Beikai there alone before..." she whispered to herself.

Bei Kai, that is, the guy in the black robe all day long, after she stopped the hunters' chariot, he proposed to work with her to deal with those people...

But at the time she wasn't interested.

The three of them are the top combatants among the barbarians, and they have defeated countless hunters. Do they need two people to deal with such a group of people?

So she came back directly by herself, and left the so-called "Marcos Brothers" to Bei Kai alone.

But now it seems that that guy is dead...

Going further north for a while will reach the destination, and there will be no rest time after starting from here.If he had dealt with the enemy, he should have returned to the team long ago.

While she was frowning, the hairy man on the other side was unhooking the two-horned horses from the cart, letting them rest, drink and eat.

He concentrated on tending the horses and didn't care about other people's problems.

The only goal of this man is to escort the passengers in the car to their destination. As for his companions and even himself, they are just tools to achieve this goal... He has this self-awareness.

Suddenly he heard the creaking of the door of the carriage behind him, and he immediately looked back, only to see that the door was opened in the daytime, and a figure was about to come out of it.

"Master Meyer! It's still daytime!"

The conscientious guard immediately reminded, but in the next second, he saw a pair of white and small feet stepping down the step of the carriage door.

"It's okay..." Mayer Link, who was lying in the coffin, said, "Let her go... This may be the last time she bathes in the sun."

Charlotte Albon stepped barefoot in the shallow water of the pool, and walked towards a quieter place on the other side where he would not be watched.

The water in the pool looks calm and calm, but when you step on it, you will know that it is still flowing slowly. The water inlet on the side is constantly injecting fresh and clean spring water, and then from the drain at the bottom of the pool. flow out.

Even though it has been vacant and unmaintained for many years, the pool is still operating normally. Even the plants growing on the poolside and on the pillars are lush and verdant, which makes people feel peaceful after seeing it.

It's just that Miss Charlotte is absolutely not in the mood to appreciate the beautiful scenery at this time.

She has already made a decision, and she believes that she will never regret it... But the feeling of loneliness that she should have will not be dispelled a little because of this.

When ordinary girls get married, they know that they will start a new family and start their own life, and will not become alienated from their parents because of this, but they will still be inexplicably sad.Maybe it's because "starting a new life" means saying goodbye to the past.

Charlotte is not enjoying herself at the Elbon's.She treats people kindly and doesn't judge people based on their status or class. This is her nature, not the result of etiquette education... But people in the family always seem to use this to accomplish something, and often let She goes to various occasions, talks to various people, asks her some boring questions afterward, or simply tells her to "get it."

Her sincerity did not seem to be rewarded with sincerity, and she felt that she had gradually become a bird in a cage and a fish in a tank.

Until Meyer appeared in front of her.

In the past time, there are too few things worth nostalgic for.But where did this inexplicable loss come from?

Charlotte, who couldn't find the answer, suddenly looked up and saw a black figure appearing on the stone floor beside the pool and above the steps.

Wearing a wide-brimmed hat, wearing a black cloak, carrying a long knife, long hair shawl, pale face.

She has seen this man before and knows who he is... D, the most difficult hunter in the mouth of Master Meyer, came to hunt down two people and tear them apart!

"You are still human... but you are worried about the safety of that nobleman. Can you tell me why?"

D asked.

[99. No. 99]

The girl lowered her eyes and gave an answer he already knew: "I love him."

"You... don't understand the price of this love. The moment you choose this path, human beings will only hate and fear you, regardless of whether you have been transformed or not."

"I'd rather be like this... The daughter of the Elbon family is dead, and the person who exists here is 'I', that's all."

Charlotte's answer silenced D.

The price is more than that... He is a mixed race, and he knows better than anyone how human beings view this so-called "love".

Even though the mother did not resist and had no intention of harming others, she was arrested and burned to death with a stake in her chest.

The hatred as thick as blood for thousands of years has long been irresolvable. Those caught between the two races, no matter whether they have ever borne sins or whether they lean towards either side, will only be crushed.

"I see. Humans who fell in love with nobles..."

Another voice suddenly sounded from the side, and Leila, wearing a red combat uniform and short blond hair, appeared on the other side of the stone pillar.

Just as Charlotte turned her head away, she slapped her across the face.

"Don't be so naive, the people in the village on the way have all turned into living corpses, you don't want to say that it has nothing to do with him, do you?"