Chapter 4 Su Zhou Beats the Guanxi of Zhen with His Fists 4400

"I have wine, do you have a story?"

Although this saying isn't popular in this other world, Su Zhou's meaning was clear: he was offering money for information.

This was indeed a good method to inquire about local news and customs. A few bold, or perhaps drunk, adventurers had already stepped forward: "Then, sir, I won't be polite!"

Su Zhou's appearance was indeed rare in this place, but in the end, he was just a black-haired person. The Etruscans and Goths in the south looked similar, and everyone assumed he was a lone transcendent from the south.

After all, even a three-year-old child knew that the world was about to end. Many transcendents didn't want to just stay home and wait for death, so they traveled around, not to save the world, but at least to see a little more of the new world before they died.

As for suspicious... hey, it's almost the end of the world, and the lord died some time ago, so what if it's suspicious? Instead of worrying about that, it's better to tell more stories and drink more wine!

Nesser City was indeed the largest sanctuary city in the surrounding area. Most of the adventurers making a living here had a few unique skills, and there were many stories and news to boast about. Su Zhou happened to be eating the local specialty, charcoal-grilled fish, while listening to these locals tell him about various aspects of this world.

Although the end of the world was near, the resources within the Order Array were not lacking due to magical assistance. This was why the major sanctuary cities were able to maintain stability—after all, most people wouldn't be too desperate if they could eat their fill. If all else failed, they could just bury their heads in the sand and pretend they didn't know about it.

Of course, Su Zhou wasn't someone who could be fooled by obviously false information. With his years of experience arguing online, and his transcendent senses of various subtle human signals, he could easily detect inconsistencies and lies in people's descriptions. After he threw the few people who were trying to scam him out of wine out of the tavern, most of the people who were willing to exchange stories for wine were honest and told the truth.

Soon, an afternoon passed, and evening arrived. The dim sun had completely set.

There were still many people who wanted to tell stories, and Su Zhou had plenty of money left.

But now, Su Zhou had obtained enough information and could roughly summarize the overall situation around Nesser City, as well as the general situation of this world.

First of all, there was the division of power levels in this world—Apprentice, Official, Elite, and near-God powerhouses above them. Converting them, they were equivalent to the Kai Ling, Awakening, Transcendent, and Commander stages.

As for why the Commander stage was considered near-God, it wasn't strange. After all, the stage after Commander was Overlord, and demon god powerhouses like the Heavenly Pond Dragon King who could subvert an entire world were only at the Overlord stage. As the stage second only to Overlord, the Commander stage was at least at the level of Human Immortal or Demon King, so it was indeed considered near-God.

Su Zhou's strength, in this world, was considered top-tier. The previous lord of Nesser City, Duke Nesser, was only at the high-stage Transcendent level, and he had died unexpectedly during his breakthrough to the Commander stage.

"Moreover, the spiritual energy recovery of this world actually started decades ago?"

This was also valuable information. Su Zhou had already noticed that the spiritual energy recovery in both the Divine Wood World and this other world had started earlier than on Earth.

If the spiritual energy recovery was truly a rising tide among the worlds, then the universe where Earth was located should be the outermost layer, the highest point.

As for why there were still adventurers in this world even though it was almost the end of the world, Su Zhou had also learned a bit about the reason.

The underground of this world was not completely solid, but rather a series of huge mazes, and within the mazes, there were actually relics from the ancient past, possibly from a previous civilization.

In these maze relics, there were many magical transcendent items that could still function even after thousands of years. For example, the water purification magic array currently in use in Nesser City had a water purification core that was excavated from a relic.

However, the underground also harbored many magical creatures and monsters. Powerful treasures were guarded by powerful monsters, and the adventurers were a group whose goal was the underground mazes and transcendent items.

It was said that in the deepest part of the underground relics, there were secrets about why the world was being destroyed and the secrets of the previous civilization—but regardless of whether this was true or false, the underground relics were also layered. The underground area currently being developed by Nesser City was only around the sixth layer, and even there, transcendent-level magical beasts occasionally appeared.

In addition, adventurers were also a combat group in the city responsible for resisting attacking magical beasts and undead. The local lord would grant them legal status as extra-establishment mercenaries. Any sanctuary city that wanted to continue to exist had to have such a group of adventurers exploring the mazes and exterminating underground magical creatures, protecting the city while also searching for potentially useful transcendent items in the underground.

"There must be a secret underground." Even Su Zhou, a person from another world, could clearly feel that the underground of this world had a big problem and definitely hid some secret. He decided to find an opportunity to go underground and see if he could encounter some powerful monsters or find some magical items.

Putting everything else aside, this world actually had storage rings, this kind of space equipment! At least the Nesser family's treasure contained such a ring, which was said to be able to hold enough food for thousands of people to eat for several years.

Su Zhou didn't even need a complete spatial device. He just needed the corresponding transcendent materials so that he could cultivate the divine power of a personal space.

Su Zhou had also roughly analyzed the situation in Nesser City from the many different versions of the story.

About half a year ago, the old Duke Nesser died, and the other members of the Nesser family also died quickly. Then, teams of transcendents from unknown places moved into the Duke's mansion and took over all power.

These people weren't exactly tyrannical, but they were definitely cruel and ruthless.

As long as someone didn't follow their rules, they would be hanged. In the past few months alone, dozens of people had been hanged or even beheaded for violating the curfew or refusing to be searched. A dozen ordinary families who had previously served the Duke's family had been arrested one by one, and now there was no news of them. It seemed that they hadn't met a good end.

Most ordinary people didn't dare to stay on the streets for long, because if they were suspected by those guards, the best outcome would be to be extorted a large sum of money.

"But if we leave Nesser City, we have nowhere else to go."

An adventurer who had finished telling his story complained to Su Zhou: "Within a radius of thousands of miles, Nesser City is the only place that is relatively stable and not easily besieged by undead and magical beast hordes. So even if those newcomers are killing, searching, and extorting everywhere, we can't do anything other than obey and go out less often."

"That's right—except for the various large sanctuary cities, smaller towns and villages have been dug into the ground and live in mazes with fewer monsters. Although it's dangerous, it's not impossible to live."

Another adventurer, older and with a scar on his face, downed a glass of wine and said loudly: "When I was young, I once participated in a team organized by the Duke to try to explore the edge of the world. As a result, we found that most of the world is now shrouded in gray mist, and in the mist there are only rocks and undead... At that time, the entire surface may be filled with mist, and even the sanctuary cities can only be transferred to the underground."

Although he was talking about a despairing doomsday future, it seemed that the adventurers present were used to this feeling, and even had the mind to joke: "This doomsday has been said to be coming for thousands of years, but it hasn't come yet. It's like a pigeon." (The original words were not pigeon, but the most descriptive metaphor after soul transmission.)

"That's true, hahahaha!"

Su Zhou looked at these adventurers who could still laugh even in such a dark world, and couldn't help but nod slightly, admiring their great hearts.

However, he was very clear about his goal in coming to this world.

One: Find enemies worthy enough to fight, and through battle, find the inspiration he needs for his true form.

Two: Find any spatial transcendent materials that may exist to prepare for cultivating a personal space.

Three: Explore in another world, and if possible, find the avatar of the Lonely Lord in this world, and no matter what method he uses, try to stop the other party as much as possible to see if he can prevent this world from being destroyed.

It was basically certain that the abnormal situation in this world now was likely caused by the revival of the Lonely Lord. After all, the current decline of this world was related to decay and undead, and the silence of the four elements might also be a characteristic of some underworld?

And Su Zhou felt that the Lonely Lord's avatar was not particularly difficult to find. After all, even the Divine Wood relied on the Panrong Undying Tree to change the world, and the Lonely Lord should be the same. The source of the many disasters and undead monsters in this world must have a powerful being or thing behind it.

The strong people in this world needed to protect the people and maintain the sanctuary, and could not spare the time to find it, but he, Su Zhou, did not need to.

"Finding the Lonely Lord's avatar may solve the problem from the root, and for this, I need to understand the history of this world, as well as many secret information that these ordinary adventurers cannot know."

After dismissing the other adventurers, Su Zhou sat alone at the table, eating grilled fish while thinking to himself: "Along the way, I can naturally find many strong people and encounter some monster battles, killing two birds with one stone."

But at this moment, his overly sensitive hearing heard the sound of chaotic furniture destruction and mixed cries of men and women coming from the other end of the street.

"What's going on?"

Su Zhou put down the grilled fish skewer in his hand, raised his eyebrows, and looked out the door.

On the side, an adventurer seemed to see that Su Zhou was interested, and said flatteringly: "Isn't that the transcendents who occupied the Duke's mansion? Recently, I heard that Duke Nesser has a descendant with inheritance rights who has arrived in the vicinity, waiting for an opportunity to sneak back into the Duke's mansion and regain the authority of the Order Array... After getting this news, they suddenly went on a rampage like mad dogs."

"Although regaining authority is not that simple, it is not difficult to destroy it. As long as this heir has some courage and dares to directly destroy the protection array of the Nesser sanctuary, it will be enough to make those outsiders get nothing!"

At this time, another relatively thin adventurer sneered: "So recently, those jackals have been arresting people everywhere. Anyone who is slightly suspicious will be arrested and killed if they can't get the information they want—rather kill the innocent than let one go."

Obviously, these local adventurers did not like those outsiders and even had deep hostility towards them.

According to Su Zhou's personality, he should now ask some questions that would sting these adventurers, such as 'If that's the case, then why don't you resist?' or 'If the descendant of Duke Nesser really succeeds and destroys the authority of the elemental array, and the entire city is buried with them, what do you plan to do?' Such questions.

But now, Su Zhou didn't have the mind to think about such trivial matters—the answers were nothing more than 'can't beat them' and 'don't know'.

He quickly walked out of the tavern and looked at the street where the sound originated.

Su Zhou could see several soldiers wearing armor and holding long spears interrogating a family of civilians on the street with whips and clubs. If anything was wrong, a club would swing, and a whip would lash, causing blood to spurt and flesh to roll.

There were five people in this family, a male and female adult, who should be the parents, an elderly woman, and a boy and a girl. At this time, the adult man had been beaten unconscious, the old woman had also passed out, and the leader of the armored soldiers was holding a child, while the woman was holding another child in her arms, and was so frightened that she didn't know what to do.

"You have the Nesser family's magic power on you! In the past few days, you must have communicated with him!"

The armored soldier captain had one hand on the little boy's neck, and his fingers were constantly tightening, gradually causing the little boy to roll his eyes.

He shouted sternly, threatening the remaining woman: "Don't answer 'I don't know!', you must have seen him! If you don't tell me now, we will send you to the magician Deranger later. I'll tell you the truth, soul torture is much more painful than my whips and clubs!"

"And now, if you don't speak, I'll let this little guy see the end of the world sooner!"

At this time, a team of armored soldiers were searching the house of this family roughly, and from time to time there were sounds of furniture breaking and things being smashed. The surrounding doors were tightly closed, and the neighbors didn't even dare to watch, but could only pray that this wouldn't happen to them.

A few adventurers who came out with Su Zhou were also there. Obviously, when they saw this scene, they just frowned, but they didn't even dare to point fingers—those who dared to oppose this group of unknown guards had long been sunk into the lake. Although it was almost the end of the world, it was better to say that precisely because it was almost the end of the world and everyone was about to die, there was no need to stand up and conflict with this group of people.

And among the adventurers following Su Zhou, there was a guy who was relatively short and completely hidden in a robe. When he saw this scene, his body suddenly shook. After a brief hesitation, this guy made up his mind and put his hand into his arms.

Of course, he didn't have a chance to act.

Because Su Zhou had already taken a step and crossed one hundred and forty-five meters in less than a second, and punched the armored soldier captain in the head.

Blood, bone fragments, brain matter, and even helmet fragments burst and flew in a resounding metallic collision. Half of the street corner was like a dye house, red, black, and purple all blooming.

Then, Su Zhou turned around and looked at the soldiers who were staring blankly, obviously not realizing what had happened.

"The aura of evil on you is almost red and purple, purple and black, only a little bit worse than the demon generals of the Divine Wood World."

The young man sighed: "I can't find a reason to spare your lives."

Then, he raised his fist again.