Shang Jianyao tilted his head and said to Jiang Baimian:
“I think you should believe in ‘Truth.’”
People with brains wouldn’t believe in such a pseudo-god that popped out of nowhere… Jiang Baimian subconsciously retorted in her heart.
She immediately remembered that Lao He believed in “Truth” and was suspected of being an Awakened in the “Doom’s Men” domain. He might be able to read her memories silently, so she forcibly suppressed the thoughts that had arisen.
Shang Jianyao, who didn’t receive a response, turned his gaze back to Lao He and said in an approving tone:
“Your teachings are indeed good. They can be compared to our emphasis on life and love for children.”
“You’re from the ‘Life Ritual’ sect?” Lao He suddenly understood.
“You only know that now?” The rash Shang Jianyao blurted out, “So you didn’t read our memories!”
He spoke so quickly that Jiang Baimian didn’t have time to stop him.
The atmosphere immediately became extremely awkward.
After a few seconds, Lao He coughed twice and said:
“Reading memories is unethical and very dangerous. You never know what the person you’re facing has experienced. If I look at everyone’s memories, I’ll eventually go crazy or die suddenly because of the content involving high-ranking entities.
“‘Truth’ teaches us that the person who stares into the abyss is also stared at by the abyss, so we must learn to restrain ourselves and not abuse our abilities unless necessary.
“Under normal circumstances, I simply distinguish whether the humans I face have malicious intent.”
Clap clap clap, Shang Jianyao clapped his hands:
“‘Truth’ is indeed the truth.
“Actually, you can use a common saying among Ashlanders to explain it:
“‘He who walks by the river for long will eventually get his shoes wet?’”
This style isn’t quite like the “Anti-Intellectualism Church.” If you really mess with our memories, the probability of something going wrong is very high… Jiang Baimian grumbled in her heart.
When facing Lao He, she instructed the team members to occasionally recall the gaze of “You Gui” and the dream of “Zhuang Sheng.”
In addition, she had prepared Genava as insurance.
Lao He smiled and said:
“I’m used to using the teachings of ‘Truth.’”
“Those of you who believe in ‘Truth’ get along very well with the followers of ‘Fate’,” Jiang Baimian said smoothly.
Lao He glanced at his subordinates not far away and smiled slightly:
“When the End Year City was established, the believers of our ‘Truth’ put in a lot of effort. The Fate Year Authority is very friendly to us.”
‘Truth’ existed when End Year City was established? He appeared quite early… Long Yuehong extracted the most crucial information from the sentence just now.
When they previously communicated with the people of End Year City, they had asked and found out that this settlement was officially established in the mid-Chaotic Era, not much later than Pangu Biology.
Shang Jianyao always focused on different things. He widened his eyes and said:
“You can sense the kindness of the Year Authority?”
As a believer of the “Life Ritual” sect and an employee of Pangu Biology, he had only sensed the gaze of the Big Boss once when he forcefully broke into the lowest level of the underground building.
Lao He almost failed to understand what this guy was talking about. It took him a while to understand and say:
“The kindness of the ‘Fate’ Year Authority is expressed through the elders of the End Year Church.”
“I see… How many elders are there in total?” Shang Jianyao looked like he wanted to get to know them.
Lao He sized him up and answered vaguely:
“Quite a few.”
Jiang Baimian casually changed the topic:
“In End Year City, believing in ‘Fate’ is the mainstream, right?”
“Yes.” Lao He didn’t deny it and even gave an approximate figure, “About 80%.”
He then pointed to his subordinates beside the surrounding vehicles:
“If you don’t believe it, you can ask them one by one.”
“Alright!” Shang Jianyao agreed immediately.
The Old Task Force originally intended to contact the people of End Year City more often to collect relevant intelligence, and now they had a suitable excuse.
By noon, they had returned to Cliff Village after asking around.
The village chief arrived with the pre-ordered lunch.
“The research team that went to the ice plains earlier is returning. They should arrive around evening. Do you want to say hello then?” The village chief was mainly here to inform them of this matter.
Long Yuehong blurted out in astonishment:
“So fast?”
The Old Task Force had estimated that there was still about a week left. How long had it been?
The village chief explained with a smile:
“They sent a telegram saying they encountered some accidents, so they’re returning early. They asked us to prepare supplies.”
“Accidents?” Jiang Baimian didn’t hide the questioning look in her eyes.
“I don’t know what happened. Ask them yourselves in the evening.” The village chief indicated that he didn’t have the right to investigate the employees of Pangu Biology.
Jiang Baimian “Mmm”d and said:
“Alright.”
In order to wait for the returning research team, the Old Task Force stayed in Cliff Village for the afternoon and didn’t go to Shanhua Town to chat with the people of End Year City.
In the evening, five or six vehicles came from the mountain road in the north.
The vehicles were covered in dirt, as if they had been rained on and hadn’t been cleaned in time.
When they got closer, Bai Chen keenly noticed that some parts of the car’s surface still had a small amount of thick ice accumulated.
The temperature in the Cliff Village area wasn’t too high in the current season, and the thick ice melted very slowly.
Soon, the convoy passed the verification, swiped their cards, entered Cliff Village, and stopped on one side of the small square in front of the office.
“Let’s go. Let’s go down and say hello to our colleagues,” Jiang Baimian said with a smile to Long Yuehong and the others as she withdrew her gaze.
Shang Jianyao immediately nodded:
“Fellow villagers meet fellow villagers; tears well up in their eyes.”
He’s saying it as if he really wants to see fellow villagers… Long Yuehong muttered inwardly.
Considering his own position, he didn’t say it out loud.
Genava stayed in the room. The four members of the Old Task Force went downstairs to the office hall.
Nearly twenty thickly-dressed humans were in groups of three or five, each occupying an area, chatting idly while waiting for the village chief to arrange accommodation.
Among them, about five or six people were clearly in a lower position, in the peripheral and corner positions, without much to say, and very silent.
“Village chief, hurry up. Everyone’s waiting to take a hot bath. Didn’t I send you a telegram this morning, asking you to prepare in advance?” A man who looked to be in his forties, with a bit of gray hair, urged.
He had clearly undergone some genetic modification, but the effect wasn’t very good. His originally decent looks became somewhat mean as the flesh on his cheeks became increasingly unable to hold on.
The village chief smiled flatteringly:
“Researcher Xu, aren’t I distributing keys to you and taking you up there right now?
“Ah, Captain Jiang, this is Researcher Xu I mentioned earlier.
“Researcher Xu, this is Captain Jiang who just came from the company. They’re also going to the ice plains on a mission.”
Jiang Baimian greeted him with a smile:
“Researcher Xu, I’m Jiang Baimian.”
Researcher Xu was stunned for a moment, and a smile gradually appeared on his face:
“Old Jiang’s daughter?”
In Pangu Biology’s scientific research personnel circle, Jiang Wenfeng’s reputation was much greater than Jiang Baimian’s.
When they mentioned Jiang Baimian, it was mostly “Old Jiang’s daughter who looks good, is tall, and has excellent grades.” Later, the modifier “has a bit of a problem with her ears” was added. Now, it’s “is only 25 or 26 years old and is about to be promoted to management.”
Jiang Baimian took advantage of the situation and nodded with a smile:
“Yes, Uncle Xu. Before I came out, my dad was still saying that I might run into his acquaintances when I go to the ice plains this time.”
“What a coincidence.” Researcher Xu was a little flattered.
After all, he wasn’t yet in management, but Jiang Baimian had placed him on the same level as her father.
He then instructed his research team members and volunteers:
“You guys follow the village chief up first.”
After almost everyone in the hall had left, Jiang Baimian asked curiously:
“Uncle Xu, I heard that you encountered accidents this time?”
Researcher Xu sighed and said:
“Yes, we encountered extreme weather, which is relatively common in the ice plains. You have to pay attention too.
“A very big blizzard suddenly blew up at the time. The volunteers outside the car couldn’t be saved even if they wanted to.
“Considering the loss of supplies and the number of volunteers, we could only return early.”
Jiang Baimian sighed as if she felt the same way:
“The ice plains are really dangerous.
“Uncle Xu, what experiments are you doing this time? Hehe, if it involves confidentiality regulations, pretend I didn’t ask.”
Researcher Xu didn’t think it was a big deal:
“It’s still the experiment on the effects of the cold environment on human physique and spirit.”
“What’s the point of studying this?” Shang Jianyao forcibly interjected.
Researcher Xu smiled and said:
“How is it meaningless? In the future, we might be able to do cold-resistant gene modification.
“The company has never stopped exploring human evolution.”
“But this has nothing to do with cold-resistant genes,” Jiang Baimian said, puzzled.
It’s not like they’re screening humans with high cold resistance to find cold-resistant genes.
“You have to ask the board of directors. I’m just responsible for the specific research,” Researcher Xu said, spreading his hands.
He then moved his neck:
“I’ll go back to my room to rest first. Let’s chat at dinner.”
Just as Jiang Baimian was about to say “Okay,” Shang Jianyao suddenly interjected:
“As a researcher, don’t you have your own guesses about this experiment?”
Seeing Researcher Xu looking at him with the gaze of “Who are you? Why should I answer you?”, Shang Jianyao added with a smile:
“I’m also an employee of Pangu Biology, Captain Jiang’s subordinate, and I’m very interested in scientific research.”
Researcher Xu’s eyes flickered for a moment and said:
“For so long, my personal feeling is that what the company wants is not only new humans with physical changes, but also hopes that the new humans’ spirit is strong enough, which has a certain correlation with the acquired environment and experience.”