Wasteland Echoer

"Anno X: The dark sky cannot sleep because of the dragon's roar, the dead night becomes bright as day because of the punishment from heaven, the gorgeous peony falls to the ground, the flourishing sunflower withers, the iris and cornflower burn, and the endless prosperous route falls into the deep sea. This is Deepse's call, this is Cthulhu's wail, this is the eternal day of the wasteland's long night, this is the dawn before the stars. The sorrowful look of the Lord of Darkness rises from the resting soil and finally turns to the dawn. This is the fear of the 'white night'." - "Dark Book"

January 9, 558 in the New Era.

Cruz Federation, Far East Central Region, "Grand Railway", "New Extension Line 1".

The sky became dark and silent due to the continuous snowfall, as if one was in a dense forest, enveloped by dim, dark ancient trees.

This "New Expansion" train departs from Novayask and ends in Hoptov, also in the central Far East. It carries all kinds of adventurers from all over the place. It is passing through the ruins of an ancient human city. In the world built by Bai Zhuo, it passes by the remains of two half-built high-rise buildings that are nearly 50 meters high.

At this moment, Dak was kneeling in the boiler room of the train, and with the help of the adventurers beside him, he was inspecting and maintaining these metal pipes that were so old that they were almost scrapped.

"These are all old guys, and they all use primitive coal as fuel. I remember that although the Western Federation still used coal as military fuel in the early days, they switched to gasoline at least a hundred years ago." Dak pounded on the boiler that was still burning fiercely, spewing sparks and a little black smoke, and complained in his heart.

"The East cannot compare to the West. There are not so many industrial sites of the old empire that can be used to research and develop 'new energy'. However, then again, no matter how powerful the technology in the West is, it has fallen into the hands of 'careless people', hasn't it? Although we in the East are a little backward, at least we can accommodate you little officers who have escaped from the West." A middle-aged man in a cotton coat and iconic brass goggles refuted with a slightly contemptuous tone.

His name is Anthony Fengjian, a mixed-race of the Yanhuo Empire and the Crusaders. His ancestors were humans from the East Japan Province who fled westward when the outer stronghold of Prajna Valley in the "Core Area" was abandoned more than a hundred years ago.

During the two days they spent together on the train, Dak learned that the mixed-race man Anthony was much more complicated than he had imagined.

Although his ancestors were humans, it was his grandfather's generation when his grandfather Fengjian made peace for the first time with the Lost Ones who had a strong Western Crusade bloodline and gave birth to him, a half-Lost One who possessed extraordinary power and was relatively proficient in magic power and machinery.

Looking closely, Anthony Kazama was about 40 years old and had experienced many tough battles. The exposed skin on his face, body, and especially his neck was covered with scratches from "careless people" and burns from artillery explosions.

His hair is jet black, full of oriental charm, but his blue eyes, blue semi-mechanical heart, prominent cheekbones, 1.9-meter height, and strong, broad, almost impurity-free muscles highlight his Cruz's "violent" bloodline.

At this moment, Anthony put aside the "Federal Eagle-New" sniper rifle he carried with him, letting the high temperature in the boiler burn its white insulating outer layer. He rummaged through the box next to him that was cluttered with all kinds of complicated but impractical tools, found a wrench and two bolts, and handed them to Dak.

"I see, you in the East are not really backward, otherwise you wouldn't ask a junior officer like me to repair this old thing, right?" Dak joked as he was repairing it:

"In this case, the Adventurer's Guild can only rely entirely on funds from Novaask, and there is only one condition for obtaining funds, and that is to complete the tasks assigned by the city."

"What do you mean?" Dak became interested when he heard this. He put the wrench back into the toolbox, fastened the boiler again, sat down in front of Anthony, took out a "Anshen Inner-rolled Flower Cigarette" produced locally in Novayask from his arms, handed it to Anthony, and asked.

"Complete the task and get a bounty. For example, completing a C-level task will get you 300 new rubles, and completing a B-level task will get you 500 new rubles. The higher the level of the task, the higher the reward, but the upper limit is only 1,500 new rubles. However, 20% of the bonus must be paid to the tax department of the city administrative group as an urban construction fund, and the remaining 50% must be paid to the association as a commission. The remaining money, after deducting the expenses of weapons, food, etc., can be divided equally among everyone." Anthony explained.

"In this way, after completing the C-level task, if 20 people share the reward equally, each person can get 6 new rubles. After deducting 40% of the cost, they can earn 3.6 new rubles at a time. This kind of bonus... doesn't sound like much, but it is actually not small. It is comparable to half a month's salary for factory workers in Binglin City." Dak carefully calculated the account.

"However, the more people share the money, the less everyone gets. Sometimes, there can be as many as 1,000 participants in an S-level mission, so participating in the adventure will result in a loss. But sometimes there are only one or two people participating in an E-level mission. Although the reward is less, there are fewer people sharing the money, so it is actually quite profitable." Anthony explained the reality to Dak.

"Then, I speculate that as the number of people participating in S-level tasks increases and the utility decreases, people will tend to participate in lower-level tasks or tasks with fewer participants. This will lead to an increase in the number of participants in low-end tasks, a decrease in marginal benefits, and a rush to high-end tasks." Dak analyzed this interesting phenomenon based on what he learned in the strategic group:

"The number of participants in the mission is strictly confidential. Anyone who leaks the number will be executed by the city guard. So, in the process of swinging between high-level and low-level missions, people will inevitably fall into a prisoner's dilemma and develop a fear of the unknown. According to the middleman principle, in the end, the most valuable or the one with the most participants is the middle-level mission."

"Yes, if I remember correctly, C-level missions have the most participants and medium returns. But do you know, Dak, the number of people participating in this 'Search for Nebrius' mission is more than 3,000." Anthony glanced at Dak, his mouth corners slightly raised, and said.

"3,000 people? Why... why are there so many? Also, there are only a hundred or so people on this 'Xintuo Special Line'. Did the others go there in batches?" Dak suddenly had a bad feeling in his heart.

"Of course!" Anthony smiled.

"As for the others, they did go there in batches, but they had already been summoned by the underworld and were heading to a place with abundant grass and water, so it was our turn. In fact, after entering the Far East Central District, there would be unpredictable dangers at every stage.

"Because the last core of the 'Evolution Platform' project, which should be called the 'Chitanlia Core', was discovered in the ruins of the old Imperial Science Laboratory in Nebsk a few days ago, the monsters, demons, 'Heartless People', Lost Ones and 'Alien Monsters' that were originally dormant in the Far East Three Districts have begun to stir. Among them are the vampires who once integrated into the human world."

Anthony paused, adjusted his side-lying position, and further explained:

"It is said that Nebsk's chief executive, Nebrius, used his power to seize this core. In order to activate it, he went to the Outer Nebya Mountains, which are rich in 'decayed lithium mines', and disappeared while searching for mineral energy.

"But I heard that he was carrying the 'Core of Khitanria' with him before he disappeared. Even if the 'Core' is not occupied and used by the Lost Ones, the smell it emits will make the non-human creatures energetic and ready to move."

"I was wondering why the reward for this mission was so high. The kid from the Adventurer's Guild also told me that I could get supplies here for free. It turns out that all the previous people died, so we can collect the supplies they left behind. With fewer people splitting the bounty, our rewards will be higher." Dak pouted, acting in a slightly funny state of despair.

However, at this moment, the "Xintuohao" train, which had been running smoothly, suddenly shook violently. Amid a harsh sound of friction between wheels and tracks, the train slid forward for a short distance and then stalled and stopped.

"Let me see what's going on." Anthony took out the military binoculars from his waist and observed the ice field and forest belt in the distance through the front window.

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He discovered that black smoke was billowing out from near the front of the train, and several humanoid creatures holding simple bone forks were rushing towards the train.

As soon as they approached the train, their stomachs swelled up rapidly and burst like balloons, blasting out brilliant and dazzling flames.

boom!

The train shook violently again, and Anthony lost his balance and nearly dropped the telescope in his hand.

After putting away the telescope, Anthony picked up the "Federal Eagle-New" sniper rifle, took off the heat-resistant material, and explained to Dak:

"These are mutated 'heartless people', a variant of the 'explosive heartless people', called 'explosive fish people'. The area west of the Naibuya Mountains, north of Hoptov, used to be a lake called Lake Kastard, which was the fief of the Naibsk nobles.

"After the New Yuan Crisis, the nobles here fled and the city of Nebsk became under the jurisdiction of the city. Since this place was once a place where magic power users conducted experiments, the 'explosive fishmen' were born after the lake dried up. However, Nebsk should have a building like a 'military observation tower' nearby, and at worst there is also the 'Fourth Aerospace Army'.

"Could it be that the situation has become so bad that a large number of military buildings have been abandoned? Or is it that..."

"I can feel a strange fluctuation of dark magic power. It is in the ice, but not in the ice." Dak put his right hand on his chest, feeling the beating of the semi-mechanical heart, and whispered:

"There are Lost Ones commanding this group of 'heartless people'."

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