Chapter 2891: Small Town Infrastructure Construction Happily Underway 11

On the middle section of Silence Bridge, the two sides stood clearly apart, with two groups of people.

On the north side were seven and a half older youths led by Huzi; on the south side there were slightly more, about ten or so, similar in age, also indignant, the leader's forehead was split, blood smeared across half his face.

When Huo Zhanye and Jin Chen arrived, they saw exactly this tense, standoffish scene.

Jin Chen almost thought he had strayed into a market of delinquent youths.

Lu Jun arrived a moment later, also quickly walking from the southern town direction, his brows furrowed.

"What's going on!" Huo Zhanye spoke not loudly, but his usual dignity instantly overpowered the youths' clamor.

The youths on both sides, seeing their own person in charge arrive, felt they had found their backbone, and became even more excited.

The southern town youth with a bloody forehead first cried out with a sobbing voice, "Boss Lu! The people from the northern town are unreasonable!"

"We were just walking on the bridge, and they came up and started hitting people!"

"Nonsense!" The northern town leader Huzi jumped up to retort, holding in his hand the already fallen-apart simple wind-direction indicator model, his eyes red with anger.

"It's you who first acted cheap! You broke our work!"

He raised the broken model high, "Teacher Jin said tomorrow there will be an inspection! We've worked on it for several days! If you don't study, that's fine, but what right do you have to break our things!"

The little boy beside Huzi also shouted, "Exactly!"

"It's just lying! With these few broken wood pieces, you think you can know when heaven will rain or shine? You're fooling ghosts! Your northern town is not only poor, but now you've learned to brag!"

"You're the one bragging! Our Teacher Jin can do it! He taught us!" The northern town youths refused to back down.

"Our Boss Lu can fight wild beasts! One punch can kill two! He's far stronger than your teacher who only fiddles with wood!"

"Our Teacher Jin convinces with reason! You don't understand shit! You've never gone to school, you're illiterate! Totally illiterate!"

The youths got worked up, spouting whatever came out, the more they spoke the more absurd.

The watching adults from both northern and southern towns listened with speechless faces, wanting to laugh but feeling it wasn't the time.

Jin Chen: "..."

Lu Jun: "..."

If not stopped, they could literally fly into the sky.

"Little Hu."

Huzi, whose face was red and neck thick from shouting, abruptly stopped, shrank his neck, hid the broken model behind him, then realizing it couldn't be hidden, lowered his head.

"Teacher Jin..."

Several other northern town youths, like eggplants hit by frost, instantly wilted, each lowering their heads, unevenly calling, "Teacher Jin..."

The southern town youths, who had still been shouting, were stunned by this sudden silence and also unconsciously quieted down.

They looked at the youth walking onto the bridge with curiosity and a hint of amazement.

Clearly wearing old clothes similar to those of the other northern town folks, yet standing there gave an indescribable sense of cleanliness.

Tsk, the northern town's luck is really good—Boss Huo is already eye-catching, and now another such teacher has appeared.

The southern town youths secretly thought in their hearts.

"Admitting fault isn't cowardly." Jin Chen pinched Huzi's back collar, felt a sweaty palm, his fingers paused, quickly wiped them on his clothes, then pulled back and instead tapped his head.

Huzi: "But Teacher Jin! They were the ones who first broke our work! I just wanted them to apologize! They didn't apologize and even shoved Xiaodouzi! I... I..."

"Alright, then why did they break your handicraft?"

Huzi complained, "We were originally practicing on this side of the bridge how to record wind direction; they came across the bridge, saw it, and gathered around to look!"

"I said this is what Teacher Jin taught us to do—it can show the wind, so we know when it will rain! That Ah Mao,"

He pointed at the thin, dark-skinned boy among the southern town youths, "He loudly shouted, accusing us of lying, calling us a lying monster! He reached out to grab it! Unable to seize it, he threw my wind-direction indicator to the ground and even stepped on it twice!"

Huzi grew angrier as he spoke, pointing at the scattered wood pieces on the ground, "Look! They've been trampled to pieces! I couldn't hold back, so I pushed him a little......"

"You're just lying! You northern town folks love to brag!"

"Exactly! Our Teacher Jin can do it! He taught us!"

Seeing the argument about to escalate again, Jin Chen and Lu Jun were once again speechless.

Huo Zhanye rubbed his forehead, feeling a headache.

Lu Jun rubbed his brow, looked at Huo Zhanye, and said, "Huo Zhanye, asking for medical compensation is not too much, right?"

Huo Zhanye frowned tightly, first hearing Jin Chen respond.

"What Boss Lu means is, damaging others' property, provocation first needs no investigation, only compensate the medical expenses of whoever struck first? Rather, let us also calculate: the wood needed for these teaching tools, though not worth much, took three days; using the northern town adult half-day labor exchange, plus the loss from delayed teaching progress......"

"Unable to keep up with the talk—illiterate—Lu Jun: \"... \""

What on earth is this person mumbling about!

"Roughly estimating, the compensation this youth of your town should bear is about equal to fifty eggs, or equivalent value of your town's specialty soy products; Boss Lu feels it would be good to offset each other and not pursue further, or should we calculate it precisely?"

Lu Jun: "..."

Alright, now I understand.

This broken piece of wood demands so much material from them!

——Huo Zhanye originally felt a bit guilty in his heart because his town's kids had fought, but hearing Jin Chen's words, he turned his head, glanced, and laughed.

Teacher Jin, though usually not talkative, when he retorts he has a whole set of tricks.

And it's kind of cute.

Lu Jun was choked enough to feel smug, rubbing his nose, gave an embarrassed laugh, "Cough... Teacher Jin has great eloquence."

"Forget it, forget it, kids fighting, no light or heavy, each gets fifty blows, even, even."

Jin Chen, however, gave no reply, suddenly turned his gaze toward Yan Tenggu standing slightly behind, "Professor Yan."

He asked seriously, "Have you ever seen someone who argues over reason like this?"

Yan Tenggu was observing the water flow beneath the bridge, pondering how the upstream water quality seemed slightly abnormal when he came over just now; unexpectedly being called out, he startled a moment.

He followed Jin Chen's gaze, looking at the somewhat embarrassed Lu Jun opposite.

Lu Jun: "???"

Yan Tenggu didn't understand why Jin Chen suddenly asked him this, but he looked at Lu Jun, recalled the earlier argument, and answered seriously and factually, "No."

Lu Jun: "..."

I don't know why, but I feel like my knee was mysteriously struck by an arrow.

After all that trouble, the youths of South Town still complained verbally, but they also started to have doubts in their hearts.

They understood that the strange wooden pieces and paper boards from North Town were probably not toys, but something that could be used to observe the sky.

If North Town really managed to come up with a method to predict the weather… that would also be greatly beneficial to South Town.

For a moment, many people looked at the broken wind indicator, their gaze shifting from contempt to curiosity, even a hint of envy, and then, thinking of the recent vague rumors they'd heard, saying that the lifeless slope of North Town seemed to have improved somewhat after Professor Yan arrived…

Is North Town's luck perhaps too good?

The atmosphere subtly eased, and suddenly a terrified shout came from the riverside below the bridge: "Corpse! There's a corpse in the river!"

Everyone on the bridge shuddered, rushed to the railings, and looked downstream.

In the murky river water floated an indistinct mass, rising and falling slowly with the current; judging by its shape, it looked like a person.

"It drifted down from upstream!"

Upstream is the wilderness.

That is a dense, gloomy old forest denser than ordinary wildlands, with complex terrain, severe pollution left from the old era, and mutated monsters appearing more frequently.

The two towns have an understanding; unless necessary, they generally do not venture deep inside.

"Those who can swim! Two people go down and check!" Huo Zhaoye ordered.

The able-bodied young men took off their outer clothes and jumped into the river, swimming hard toward the floating object.

Soon the corpse was dragged ashore; it was a man in his thirties, still recognizable.

Someone from South Town immediately exclaimed, "It's Chen Si! Chen Si, who's been missing for several days!"

"Missing?" Huo Zhaoye looked at Lu Jun, his face solemn, "Does South Town also have missing persons?"

Lu Jun crouched to examine the corpse carefully, "Also? Does North Town also have 【missing persons】?"

"Yes!" Before Huo Zhaoye could answer, the monkey beside him blurted out, "Three people are missing!"

"They've been gone these past days; we've searched the vicinity thoroughly and found no one!"

Huo Zhaoye said, "Two went out to gather supplies and didn't return; one got up at night to relieve himself and never reappeared—no body, no trace."

"It seems not coincidental."

Both towns simultaneously experienced disappearances, and the corpses drifted down from the Upper Forest direction…

The two exchanged a glance, and Huo Zhaoye said in a low voice, "We must go in and have a look."

"My people will go too," Lu Jun said, "but let me say this first: once we enter the forest, each relies on his own ability, each accounts for himself."

"All right," Huo Zhaoye nodded.

The two quickly selected their people: Huo Zhaoye chose the monkey, Xiao Wu, and two other capable hands.

Lu Jun also selected four of his own people.

After examining the corpse, Jin Chen stood up, wiped his hands, looked at Huo Zhaoye, and said, "I'll go too."

Huo Zhaoye didn't even think, "No, the wilderness is too dangerous! We don't know what's inside, you can't go."

"Why?" Jin Chen's light brown eyes looked at him, "Are you worried about me?"

"I…"

Huo Zhaoye was choked by his blunt question, his ears flushed, his wild yet handsome visage tightened somewhat, "Yes! I said that once you came to Peace North Town, I wouldn't let you get hurt. The wilderness likely contains mutated monsters, and the environment is also complex."

Jin Chen glanced at him with a smile for a few seconds, then stepped forward and lightly embraced him.

That could hardly be called a real hug.

But Huo Zhaoye was still startled, momentarily unable to react.

Jin Chen stepped back and said, "All right, Lord Huo, please stay safe."