Chapter 592 - The arrival of Luo Lan (1/2)
“Oh.” Qin Sheng explained seriously, “Our group has a rule that we must live in a town for a year after we become Riders. Because we normally live in the stronghold, the previous leader of the Riders felt new Riders might not be able to empathize with the sufferings of humanity. So this rule was implemented.”
Ren Xiaosu nodded. “There’s really a need to do that. How great it would be if all the stronghold residents had the same mindset as you all.”
The Riders were virtuous but not pedantic. Ren Xiaosu felt this was a very rare trait in this current era. That was because outstanding people tended to either be inclined towards extreme good or evil. However, Ren Xiaosu did not agree with being on either of the extremes. Sometimes, he would even feel pained whenever he thought of a person who had been too good.
The pain in his heart was like an undercurrent in the deep sea. It was strong and yet not easily detected.
Of course, he especially disliked those who tried to persuade people to be good but had evil intentions themselves.
Qin Sheng’s arrival added some entertainment to Ren Xiaosu’s life. Every day, Qin Sheng did nothing other than helping some refugees in town fetch water. He even helped repair their shacks.
This winter was exceptionally cold. Many of the refugees’ shacks were exposed to the cold wind due to the holes in them, but they could not find any suitable materials to patch them up with.
Ren Xiaosu had experienced hardship like this before. It was a good thing that a richer person like Qin Sheng could experience such a life as well.
However, it was different from what Ren Xiaosu had imagined. At first, he thought Qin Sheng might get flustered or even make the situation messier. But actually, Qin Sheng was very capable at being hands-on with things and had a lot of experience living in the wilderness.
Qin Sheng spent two days hunting for gophers in the wilderness. Then he used the gophers’ hide to mend the shacks while the meat was distributed to the refugees as food.
In fact, he was really skilled at mending the shacks, much more skillful than Ren Xiaosu was.
Ren Xiaosu asked, “Did you do a lot of sewing in the past?”
“No,” Qin Sheng said with a smile, “when I trained under my teacher, we would usually venture out into the wilderness for two to three months straight. At that time, my teacher made me do everything hands-on to train me. He said that it’s an honor to be a Rider and they’d never train a bum to become one.”
Ren Xiaosu wondered if this was just an excuse for Old Li to laze around. He watched Qin Sheng and thought that while he had an abundant amount of experiences in his life, he looked like a good-hearted young man who was very easy to fool.
Qin Sheng also bought a house next to Ren Xiaosu, so both Zhou Yingxue and he were now Ren Xiaosu’s neighbors.
However, Qin Sheng did not jump into Ren Xiaosu’s backyard anymore after he was exposed the last time. More importantly, Qin Sheng knew it would not be easy to sneak in quietly with those strange plants in the backyard.
Every day, Qin Sheng would go to the tavern to look for Ren Xiaosu after helping the refugees. Somehow, Zhou Yingxue, Ren Xiaosu, and Qin Sheng would always start playing Fight the Landlord whenever they got together.
When Xiaolu saw this, she joined the game as well. In the end, it became a four-player game of Fight the Landlord, with two sets of decks and eight trump cards in play.
For the past two days, Ren Xiaosu had been searching high and low in town for a copy of Hope Media’s newspaper.
But the grocery store owner here was not as enterprising as Wang Fugui. He did not read any newspapers and was content with watching over his tiny shop to pass the time.
Ren Xiaosu wondered if he would have to resort to sneaking into the stronghold every day just to get his hands on the paper.
There was no doubt about the importance of newspapers in this era, especially a newspaper firm like Hope Media that particularly respected factual reporting. Ren Xiaosu could learn a lot of news from them.