Chapter 512.2: Scheming Bastard

What Chu Guang really wanted to know was something else. Had the Enlightenment Society actively interfered or even accelerated that process?

From his observations, most survivor settlements held a neutral attitude toward shelter residents.

Ordinary wastelanders neither worshipped nor hated the blue coats. They didn’t care who abandoned whom two centuries ago, or who owed whose ancestors. They barely remembered the Prosperity Era or the Federation Era. They just wanted to live their lives.

In fact, the people from Xiaoyu’s settlement had pitied him, even shared what little food they had, and taught him which scraps could be traded with merchants.

Putting aside shelters that had been targeted by marauders, most shelters under normal circumstances simply needed to maintain basic vigilance, limited contact, and above-neutral cooperation with surrounding survivors to eventually develop into something like Camp 101. Truly extreme cases like them were actually quite rare.

Chu Guang leaned toward believing that the people of the Enlightenment Society must have deliberately done something to hasten the deterioration of relations between the shelters and the nearby survivors.

For example, they might have intentionally leaked the shelter’s location to nearby marauders camps or Mutant Human Camps, or bribed weak-willed wastelanders to betray the blue coats they were cooperating with...

Chu Guang found it hard to believe that an organization devoted to the destruction of the world would show restraint in their methods or spare shelters that refused to cooperate with them or their administrators.

Once those shelters fell, the Enlightenment Society could simply appear as saviors, rescuing the survivors from the abyss and indoctrinating them with the belief that their true enemy was the entire wasteland itself, thus effortlessly gaining a legion of loyal and obedient followers.

In his conversations with Return to Ruin, Chu Guang could clearly feel that while the upper and lower ranks of the Enlightenment Society shared a common goal, their motives were not the same.

The upper ranks sought purely to create a new world ruled entirely by elites.

The lower ranks, however, cared little who ruled the new world. They were simply people driven to despair by the current wasteland.

“Have you ever met that guy called Return to Ruin?”

Zhuang Lan was silent for a long time before she replied. “... No.”

Chu Guang continued, “You haven’t even met him, so why do you believe everything he says?”

After another long silence, Zhuang Lan spoke slowly. “I don’t care if he’s hiding something. That’s not important to me. I only know what those wastelanders did to me...”

𝕗𝐫𝐞𝕖𝕨𝐞𝗯𝚗𝕠𝘃𝐞𝚕.𝐜𝗼𝚖

“And so you did the same thing they did?”

“I... I didn’t, I was only saying...”

“You say you didn’t, but your so-called comrades didn’t miss a single wicked act.” Watching her face flush red as she tried to defend herself, Chu Guang tilted his chin toward the camp outside and said sharply, “Look at those tents. The people living in them are all victims of the atrocities you people committed. Are you going to tell me it has nothing to do with you just because you weren’t the one who tied them up yourself?”

When Zhuang Lan fell silent, Chu Guang went on, “I never expected a cold-blooded person to suddenly grow a conscience, but I am curious about one thing. Do you really believe your home, Shelter 68, was destroyed by wastelanders?”

“Of course! I saw them with my own eyes!”

Staring at the conviction on her face, Chu Guang recalled a discussion thread he had once read on the official site and spoke casually, “You saw them cut off your parents’ heads. You saw them throw you into a cage, and you saw the people of the Enlightenment Society come to save you. Every one of you repeats that same story, including the prisoners we’ve captured on the battlefield. Has it never once occurred to you that all this might be a little too convenient?”

“How did those wastelanders turn into traitors? When and how did the Enlightenment Society find you? How did your administrator die? Where is his work log? Marauders aren’t usually interested in such things... Have you ever checked his logs yourself? Can you answer any of these questions?”

Zhuang Lan froze. “I...”

Chu Guang fixed her with a calm stare and said slowly,

“You don’t know, do you? Whatever they tell you, you believe it. Whatever they order you to do, you do it. And even for a mission as suicidal as this one, that guy called Return to Ruin didn’t even have the courage to meet you in person, did he?”

Seeing her face turn pale and speechless, Chu Guang’s expression suddenly grew to one of intrigue. He spoke suddenly. “Let’s make a bet.”

“A... bet?” Zhuang Lan blinked at him. “What kind of bet?”

“Your freedom,” said Chu Guang. “Get the administrator’s log of Shelter 68. There should be a backup copy inside the shelter, and even if it was destroyed, it can still be recovered. That record can answer your doubts, and satisfy my curiosity. Find it for me.”

Zhuang Lan stared at him in shock. “You’re going to let me go?!”

“I’m merely lending you your freedom for a while,” Chu Guang replied calmly. “If the disaster at Shelter 68 truly had nothing to do with the Enlightenment Society, then you’re free. But if the log’s records match my suspicions, you’ll come back, and you’ll bring it to me.”

Every shelter’s administrator log was a vital document. After a shelter’s shutdown, recovering it was the duty of all administrators.

Even a single punctuation mark in it held value.

Such logs were precious sociological data.

Chu Guang had also recovered the logs and documents related to Project Torch stored in Shelter 0.

“You’re not afraid I’ll just run away?” Zhuang Lan asked, taking a deep breath, disbelief in her eyes.

Chu Guang smiled faintly. “Your expression tells me you’re thinking about it. But if you have even half a brain, you’ll realize how stupid that would be.”

“The ones who killed your parents didn’t just deceive you, they deceived all the comrades you hold dear.”

“Find that log. It’s your only chance at redemption.”

“The Post-War Reconstruction Committee and their fallen empires won’t deal with you. We will.”

...

Watching the figure disappear through the barracks door, Lu Bei hesitated before speaking quietly. “Sir, is it really alright to let her go?”

He didn’t doubt the Chu Guang’s judgment, only whether that cunning woman would keep such a one-sided promise.

Unlike the worried Lu Bei, Chu Guang seemed unconcerned and replied casually, “If she finds something, it might help us dismantle the Enlightenment Society from within. At the very least, she might lead us to their headquarters.”

And if she found nothing?

Impossible.

Chu Guang didn’t believe for a second that such a petty schemer could resist the temptation of an easy shortcut.

If he was wrong, then so be it, it didn’t matter. A single small pawn would change nothing.

After a pause, Chu Guang added, “Of course, if she doesn’t investigate at all and just returns unscathed, think about this, if you were one of the Enlightenment Society’s leaders, what would you think?”

Lü Bei pondered for a moment, scratching his head. “If I were one of their leaders... But, sir, I don’t really have that kind of mindset.”

Seeing how clueless the young man was, Chu Guang shook his head and rebuked him in a sharp voice, “Assuming those above you have three heads and six arms, or some godly figure... That’s a slave’s mindset. They’re just people. How many times have I told you that?”

The young man was bright after all. Under Chu Guang’s glare, realization dawned instantly.

“They will be suspicious! They would suspect why she came back alive!”

Chu Guang nodded in approval. “Smart.”

Especially Return to Ruin, he struck Chu Guang as the embodiment of arrogance and vanity.

The man might be skillful, but he wasn’t too impressive. His theories outweighed his practice, and his subconscious inferiority and insecurity drove him to prove his strength, going so far as to flaunt it right in front of his enemies.

By contrast, the Army’s Marshal, the Academy’s Dr. Conclusions, and even Boulder Town’s Lord preferred to keep themselves hidden.

Those old monsters... No one knew how long they had lived and they had never revealed how many cards they held. No one knew what they actually thought.

“But... Will she really be alright alone?” Lu Bei asked uncertainly.

“That’s her problem,” Chu Guang said indifferently. “I never intended to place all my hopes on a spur-of-the-moment idea.”

The people who murdered the Pioneer crew had already perished in the nuclear explosion. She had nothing to do with that, and never had access to their data. The Army wasn’t his ally, and he had no obligation to avenge the Wislander. Killing her would have been pointless.

And if he locked her up with the other prisoners for re-education through labor, the Army would only keep pestering him to extradite her, again and again. It was pure trouble.

If Cohen wanted revenge for his subordinate, he could hunt her down himself. They were closer to the Great Desert anyway. He could let them keep an eye on the Enlightenment Society’s movements for the New Alliance.

At that point, Chu Guang paused for a moment before he continued, “Oh right, go inform General Adelia. Tell him that the Enlightenment Society agent who murdered Wally has escaped, and let them handle it themselves.”

Lu Bei pressed his right fist to his chest and looked at the administrator with admiration.

“Yes, sir!”

“Go.”

Smiling as he watched the young man disappear through the door, Chu Guang turned his gaze to the memory extractor on the table.

Rumor had it the thing was a god-tier equipment. Not only could it drain a person’s memories, it could even help them recall things they themselves had forgotten.

When they had first come out of the shelter, Battlefield Cheerleader had secretly tried it on, but it hadn’t worked on players, so he made a forum post about it and stopped experimenting.

It was never going to work anyway.

A clone’s brain was like a blank sheet of paper, merely a signal relay with some caching capacity, incapable of storing long-term memories. As for the players’ real memories, they were stored in their brains, brains that existed in another world.

Suddenly, a thought surfaced in Chu Guang’s mind.

What would he see if he wore it himself?

The thing he feared most, buried deep within his memories?

As he pondered, his hand reached out and touched the glasses-like device. But after only a few seconds, he shook his head and dismissed the idea.

A strange feeling warned him that nothing good would come of it...