Chapter 226 Selection There is a still operating quarry on the hill southeast of the Honest Market area. After Lumian came out of the Breeze Ballroom, he searched for a suitable homeless person and finally came here. At this time, it was getting dark, and the lamplighters lit up the gas street lamps one by one in the streets and alleys. In comparison, the quarry, which had finished a busy day, fell into darkness, and no fire could be seen. In the above-ground part of the quarry there were several plaster furnaces, and around them a number of homeless people were lying in a scattered manner. Lumian concentrated his mind and focused his attention, observing their fortunes one by one. Finally, he found a target that met his needs. He was a male homeless man leaning against a plaster stove. His shirt, trousers and jacket were all torn and stained dark brown by the mud. His cheeks were sunken and he was so thin that he was almost out of shape. His hair and beard were so long and messy that they were almost fused into one. His eyes were half closed and his breathing was weak, giving people the feeling that he might die at any time. According to the fortune Lumian had just observed, the homeless man was indeed approaching the end of his life and would pass away within the next two or three days.
He walked up to the other person, squatted down, took out the bottle of gas he got from the pervert Hedsey, which was named mystic smelling salt by Franka, unscrewed the lid, and put it to the target's nose. ——He and Franka have already divided up Rentas’s “relics”. The drugs and coins worth 212 Felkins belong to him, and the rest belongs to Franka. A sneeze! The homeless man sneezed twice and opened his eyes. He looked weakly at Lumian, who was wearing a blue worker's uniform and a dark peaked cap, and asked doubtfully: "Who are you? What do you want to do?" Lumian replied calmly: "I'm a worker passing by. I felt that you were dying, so I came up to check." The tramp didn't think there was anything wrong with Lumian's explanation, because in the Republic of Intis, after discovering a dead body outside, whether it was reported to the government department or the two major churches, a certain amount of bonus would be given so that the relevant personnel could carry out purification in time or send the body to be burned into ashes. The bonus was not much, only about 1 Filkin, but for the lower class people, the extra income was a surprise no matter how small it was. The tramp's beard trembled, as if he was trying to force a smile: "Your guess is correct. I also feel like I'm dying. Please come and check on me more often in the next two days to prevent someone from snatching away your prize money." Perhaps it was the stimulation of the occult smelling salts, or perhaps it was the topic of death that gave the tramp a brief excitement, his speech was no longer intermittent, and his logic became clear. "Do you have any family?" Lumian, who was squatting in front of the homeless man, put away the mystic smelling salts and asked casually. The homeless man was silent for a few seconds and shook his head slowly: “No more, no more. "If you like my clothes, take them after I die." "Are all your family members dead?" Lumian asked. The beard on the tramp's face swayed as his muscles twisted, and his voice revealed the pain that could not be hidden: "Dead, they are all dead. My parents didn't live past the age of 45. My brother died in the war a few years ago. My sister died of illness. Her child became a child laborer and had a hunchback at the age of ten. He died of exhaustion in a textile factory..."
The tramp didn't seem to be answering Lumian's question, but rather reminiscing about the past before dying. He continued to talk in a rambling manner: "I was originally a quarry worker. They all praised me for my great strength. Later, a gentleman thought I was very hardworking and able to endure hardships, so he taught me how to place detonators and blast rocks. My salary increased, and my life began to improve. I had a wife who was equally hardworking, and we had three lovely children, but only one survived in the end. That was my little angel, my daughter. “That year when everyone was protesting against food prices, my health suddenly broke down and I became seriously ill. "My wife and my daughter spent a lot of money and incurred a huge debt to finally cure me, but I also lost my job. We were oppressed by loan sharks every day. My little angel was forcibly taken away by them. My wife and I looked for her everywhere like crazy. After a few weeks, we saw her body. She couldn't stand the torture of those men and ended her life. "My wife wanted to find the police, but they beat her to death. I don't know where she was thrown. I was also beaten unconscious, but I didn't die and am still alive today..." Lumian listened quietly and asked in a low voice: "What is your wish?" The tramp laughed: "wish? "My biggest wish is that I would have died within a few days when I got that disease." Lumian was silent for a moment and said: "You don't want revenge?" The tramp said with a dazed look in his eyes: "Those loan sharks were killed by other gangs, and now it's other gangs that are loan sharking." He finally remembered Lumian's question and said in a vague voice: "If I die soon, I want to eat another meat pie. I remember that in those years, every weekend, my wife would buy meat, add flax seeds and vinegar, make meat sauce, and put it in the bread. My daughter loved it, and I liked it too..." Lumian nodded, stood up, and walked towards the street below the hill. About three quarters of an hour later, he returned to the plaster stove with a Rouen meat pie that exuded a rich and fragrant aroma. The homeless man seemed to be about to pass out again, and Lumian once again used the occult smelling salts to wake him up. The tramp sneezed a few times, took the Rouen meat pie with a straight gaze, and started to chew it quickly, until his beard was covered with a layer of oil. After eating a small portion, he gasped and asked with a smile: "Young man, what do you want to do?" "I'm going to give you a knife that may cause your death tonight." Lumian said bluntly. The tramp laughed and asked weakly: "Aren't you afraid of the police? "I'm not afraid of death. I should have died long ago, you know? Every winter, I sleep in the gypsum furnace here. After running for a day, it retains a comfortable warmth that lasts until the sun is about to rise. But the remaining gas inside is poisonous and may cause me to die in my sweet dreams. I never waited for it." Lumian smiled: "I guess those cops don't care how a homeless person died, as long as it wasn't obviously murdered." The tramp didn't say anything else. He ate all the remaining Rouen meat pie and burped. After more than ten seconds, he adjusted his sitting position and said: "You can start." Lumian pulled out the "Corrupted Mercury" with its evil and layered patterns and stabbed the back of the homeless man's hand with it.
A little blood spilled out, staining the tip of the knife red. At the same time, Lumian saw the illusory river of mercury again. His purpose of looking for the dying homeless man is to exchange for a more practical fate! This is not to say that the fate of "encountering the Montsouris ghost" is not terrible. On the contrary, it can have the effect of certain death or even death of the entire family for many humans, and it is very persistent. But the problem is that it takes a long time for it to take effect - exchanging fate can often be completed within a few minutes, but when the Montsouris ghost will look for a target is purely random. Maybe after ten or twenty minutes, it will launch an attack, or maybe you have to wait three or four months. In other words, the fate of "encountering the ghost of Montsouris" is not suitable for raids or encounters. Moreover, with the experience and lessons learned from Maggot's death, Lumian's target this time, "Black Scorpion" Roger, will certainly be wary of similar things. Once he is stabbed by the "Corrupted Mercury" and does not die immediately, he will most likely ask for help from the "Lady of the Moon". Lumian is not sure whether the lady who truly possesses divinity has a way to defend against the Montsouris ghost. If so, then his action will be a complete failure. Based on this consideration, he planned to exchange the fate of "encountering the ghost of Montsouris" in advance and choose a fate that could be more effective in raids and assassinations, in order to make "Black Scorpion" Roger die on the spot without being able to ask for help. As his thoughts raced, Lumian "saw" one scene after another: That was the homeless man sleeping in the plaster furnace, that was the homeless man who was beaten unconscious, that was the homeless man who had fainted recently, that was the homeless man who had a complete mental breakdown kneeling in front of his daughter's body, that was the homeless man who shared homemade meat pies with his wife and daughter, that was the homeless man who carefully measured and checked and finally placed the explosives... Lumian did not try to change the homeless man's fate of dying within two or three days. That was too heavy a fate that could not be changed by "Corrupted Mercury". Even the "Luck Change Technique" could not change such a fate. The only solution Lumian could think of was to use the "substitution technique" and find a death row prisoner to replace the homeless man, and live with his identity for a period of time until he was recognized by the people around him. Then he would complete the ceremony and replace the homeless man's death with the death of the death row prisoner. However, this would take two or three weeks or even longer to prepare, which was simply too late. Lumian, who was considered to have quite a bit of experience, made a brief distinction and chose the fate of the homeless man who had recently fainted due to physical collapse. It broke away from the long river of mercury, condensed into a drop of liquid, and seeped into the blade of "Fallen Mercury". In contrast, the fate of "encountering the ghost of Montsouris" was transferred to the tramp at the very beginning. Lumian took back the evil silver-black dagger, which was clean without a speck of blood. The wound on the homeless man's hand was so shallow that it seemed like it would scab over in no time. "Is that it?" the homeless man asked doubtfully. He was ready to be killed on the spot. “Yes.” Lumian stood up and left the hill. Late at night, the homeless man who had shrunk into the plaster furnace suddenly twitched a few times and suffocated to death. ………… Opposite 126 Market Avenue. Lumian returned here, leaning against a shadow without a gas street lamp, and looked towards the target building. Beside him, Franka, wearing a black robe and a hood, walked out of the darkness. "How is it?" Lumian asked, not at all surprised. (End of this chapter)