"Where are you going?" Fang Ming asked his father, his eyes filled with accusation.
Fang Daolong smiled slightly, "To continue saving the world. This world still needs people like me to save it. If I don't, who else will?"
Fang Ming stared at Fang Daolong for a long time, speechless. He might have understood his father's thoughts, but understanding didn't mean he agreed.
"Are you guys really not going back to take a look?" Fang Ming asked.
Fang Daolong sighed, "No. If I can defeat Changsheng one day, it won't be too late to go back then."
"I'm leaving now. There are other things waiting for me," Fang Daolong waved his hand, preparing to leave.
"What else do you have? All the miners are here. Are you going back to pretend to be a miner again?"
Fang Daolong was silent for a moment before continuing, "On October 2nd, the reincarnation will merge all the miners into one malevolent spirit. I must seize the opportunity to defeat it. It's the only chance."
"I need to make some preparations."
With that, Fang Daolong jumped down without looking back, using the heads of the miners below as stepping stones to leap away.
Fang Ming watched his retreating figure without saying anything further. Only when his father disappeared from sight did he turn back to look at Nannan.
"What's wrong, Fang Ming?" Nannan blinked her eyes and tilted her head curiously.
"Nothing," Fang Ming forced a smile and patted Nannan's head.
He seemed to have guessed something, yet at the same time, he felt he hadn't guessed anything at all.
He raised his hand to look at the runes on his hand. These were left to him by Changsheng. He didn't know why Changsheng had left him these two runes, nor what Changsheng meant by calling them keys to return.
But he had a feeling that Changsheng had some unavoidable difficulties.
His interactions with Changsheng had been brief. So far, they had only met face-to-face once in Bai Mu Village. After that short meeting, he felt that Changsheng was not the "demon" his father described.
Fang Ming was certain that Changsheng was not a person who enjoyed slaughter and war.
If Changsheng merely wanted to eliminate excess malevolent spirits, wouldn't it be easier for him to do it himself? Initiating a war between the Changsheng Realm and the real world was definitely not the optimal solution.
"After we leave, I'll find Changsheng and ask him clearly."
Fang Ming made up his mind and glanced at the situation below.
Under the restraint of the runes, the miners could no longer launch effective attacks against him. They were trapped in a cycle of death and pursuit, their resentment being drained and their lives extinguished by the runes before they could even get close to Fang Ming.
This also gave Fang Ming a chance to catch his breath.
"Nannan, let's continue searching in the residential area."
Fang Ming led Nannan off the roof and resumed their previous plan.
Based on the documents found in the first house, the mining accident years ago was not a simple one. He needed to find more clues to reconstruct the entire situation.
The two of them began to search through the houses one by one, following the order of their arrangement.
The second house had a slightly different layout than the first. The first house was clearly a man's room at a glance, while this room belonged to a woman.
The house was quite messy, with a pile of women's clothes and various trinkets scattered around. The entire space felt cluttered.
Fang Ming searched a few important areas, deeming the living room unnecessary. He went directly through the living room to the homeowner's bedroom.
The bedroom was much tidier than the outer areas, but it looked like it hadn't been lived in for a long time. Fang Ming guessed that the owner might not actually live here, and this room was just a temporary changing room for her.
There were two photos on the wall, of a woman with a sexy appearance, her long, wavy hair dyed a light yellow. The backgrounds were of a beach, and she was wearing sunglasses, making it impossible to see her true features.
Fang Ming didn't pay much attention to the photos and searched the bedroom. There was only some spare change and some cosmetics.
"Is there nothing useful in this room?" Fang Ming surveyed the room. He had searched everything that could be searched, and there was indeed nothing useful.
"Fang Ming, there's another space above us," Nannan suddenly said.
"Above us?" Fang Ming looked up at the ceiling, where only an ornate chandelier hung.
"Inside the ceiling?"
"Yes, my dispersed hair strands have detected a space." Nannan nodded.
Fang Ming transformed his arm into a claw and leaped up, plunging his arm into the ceiling and tearing open a large hole with a forceful rip.
"Rumble..." Countless banknotes fell from the large hole.
Fang Ming was surprised. Good heavens, who was the owner of this room? How could they be so extravagant as to hide so much money here?
However, this money was useless to him, practically like waste paper.
Fang Ming continued to pull open the ceiling, and more and more banknotes fell down, along with several documents.
"Another equity transfer agreement?" Fang Ming picked up the document and frowned upon seeing the names on it.
Why were these high-level executives so eager to sell their shares?
If it was just one, it might be due to some accident. But a second one appearing after that made things complicated. There was definitely something fishy going on here!
Next, Fang Ming picked up several other documents. One was another weather forecast, and another was a document with a blank cover.
Fang Ming opened the document with the blank cover. Inside, there was only a handwritten letter of commitment.
"I promise to never mention this matter after the mine collapses and to bury all of it in my heart. If even a word is leaked, others will have the right to divide my personal assets..."
Fang Ming's heart sank as he read the letter of commitment.
A huge conspiracy began to form in Fang Ming's mind. These executives actually knew the mine would collapse?!
Why?
Even with heavy rain, it was impossible to be so certain that the mine would collapse. The mine's safety measures were very advanced, having undergone multiple tests before being put into use.
This was why some miners dared to live in the mine with their families, because the mine's safety coefficient was very high, and to some extent, it was no different from living on the surface.
So why were these executives so sure?
Fang Ming had some guesses, but he needed to find more clues.
"Click, click." Fang Ming photographed the documents and then took Nannan to search other rooms.
The third room yielded no harvest. The fourth room also contained share transfer agreements and letters of commitment.
It wasn't until the fifth room that Fang Ming made a new discovery.
The decoration of this room was more luxurious than the previous four. Antiques worth hundreds of thousands and paintings worth millions were casually placed in the living room, and the entire room exuded a sense of technology.
The security system in this room was so advanced that Fang Ming, with his extraordinary abilities, would have had trouble getting in if he wasn't special.
The owner of this room definitely had a certain influence in the mining area, and might even be one of the major shareholders behind the mine.
Fang Ming stood in the bedroom, next to a high-end safe that had been cut into pieces. He held several documents in his hand.
Share transfer agreements, weather forecast reports, letters of commitment, and newly discovered documents – labor compensation agreements and resource exploration data.
"According to Article 123 of the Labor Law, before a company applies for suspension of operations (not bankruptcy), it must pay labor breach damages and subsequent employment guarantees to its employees."
"According to the mine's annual revenue, after the mine's suspension, the following remuneration must be paid to employees of all levels: ordinary employees will be paid 31,500 in breach damages and 1,200 per month in employment guarantees..."
"Heh."
After reading the two documents, Fang Ming couldn't help but sneer at these vampire-like executives.
Now, Fang Ming could guess about seventy to eighty percent of the situation. According to these resource exploration data, the mine's internal resources were less than ten percent, and they were in difficult-to-mine depths. The investment and return were no longer proportional.
In this situation, these executives were preparing to suspend operations and were therefore selling shares in large quantities, finding some buyers to take on these rapidly falling shares for cash.
After cashing out their shares, these executives faced another, bigger problem – the breach of contract and employment guarantee payments after suspension.
Even for an ordinary employee, the compensation was over thirty thousand yuan. And the entire mine had over twenty thousand employees, not to mention various middle and high-level managers.
Overall, after the mine suspended operations, it would cost at least over a billion yuan in compensation!
Over a billion yuan was not a lot compared to the mine's total output value, but it was a considerable sum for individuals.
How could these executives bear to pay over a billion yuan to these unrelated employees?
Therefore, taking advantage of the heavy rain on October 2nd, they deliberately caused the entire mine to collapse, achieving their plan without anyone noticing, burying all twenty thousand-plus employees in the mine!
In this way, besides paying some accident insurance to the families (in reality, many miners lost their entire families), they could also mourn pitifully to gain public sympathy, and the matter would be dropped.
In fact, after the mine disaster, the executives did exactly that!
They mourned loudly in public, stating in media interviews that their entire enterprise was destroyed, how this and how that, gaining sympathy from many people.
After all, an asset worth tens of billions was lost in a single heavy rain.
But no one expected that the real situation was like this!
"Despicable!" Fang Ming took a deep breath, crumpled the documents in his hand into a ball, and threw them fiercely on the ground.
No wonder such a powerful malevolent spirit had formed in the mine. In this situation, he wouldn't be surprised if another Changsheng appeared.
"What's wrong, Fang Ming?" Nannan, seeing Fang Ming angry, leaned over obediently and touched his palm.
"Nothing, I just discovered some of the darkness of humanity." Fang Ming didn't tell Nannan about these circumstances. He didn't want Nannan to be exposed to the dark side of humanity.
At this moment, considering these mining executives who treated human lives as worthless, Fang Ming actually felt that Changsheng valued human lives more!
At least, he would not slaughter innocent people for personal gain!