Cave Refuge

When Mr. Thompson heard that the Officials were planning to use the Enhancement Scrolls to strengthen their base, he understood that he could no longer keep the Enhancement Scrolls in his possession.

Originally, Mr. Thompson had acquired the Enhancement Scrolls through legitimate transactions without any attempt to hide them, which made it common knowledge that he owned quite a few.

From the time he started buying and selling Mysterious Cores, Mr. Thompson had already established a reputation as a businessman. However, everyone knew that, due to his cautious nature, he didn't make much profit from the trading of Mysterious Cores.

In other people's eyes, even though Mr. Thompson also dealt in Enhancement Scrolls, they believed he hadn't made much profit from them either.

Normally, no one would risk such marginal profits to cause trouble in the base, but Mr. Thompson, having lived through the great changes in China, knew that after a collective goal had been established and accepted by everyone.

Most people would ignore individual benefits, especially those of others. So despite Mr. Thompson not earning much, the targets of their scrutiny were not the profits he made, but his principal investment.

After all, it was only during certain specific periods that these people would use the prevailing circumstances to pressure others and completely strip their chosen targets.

Mr. Thompson was very aware that if he made one wrong move at this time, he might lose not just the Enhancement Scrolls he had purchased from others, but also potentially all his possessions and even his real estate could be looted.

So when the Officials openly started collecting Enhancement Scrolls, Mr. Thompson decisively took out all the scrolls he had at home and donated them in front of everyone.

This honorable donation spared Mr. Thompson a lot of trouble.

After receiving a certificate of Contribution Value from the Officials, Mr. Thompson immediately had it framed and hung it on the wall facing the front door in the living room.

The subsequent developments unfolded just as Mr. Thompson had anticipated. Although the donation was initially voluntary, as time passed and particularly after the base began to expand slowly once the Enhancement Scrolls had strengthened it, the situation began to sour.

Initially, some Government Officials in charge of patrolling went from house to house, getting people to donate all the Enhancement Scrolls they had.

Some inhabitants, either out of fear, persuasion, or cleverness, quickly went to the donation center after seeing the Government Officials and donated all their Enhancement Scrolls.

However, despite the persuasion of the Government Officials, some people were stubborn and refused to donate their Enhancement Scrolls.

These people either planned to use the scrolls to enhance their own bodies or simply felt that the Contribution Value offered in return by the Officials was not high enough. Some even hoped to hoard the scrolls, speculating on a price increase.

Faced with this, the initially frequent visits by the Government Officials gradually ceased to persuade them.

As time passed, just when these people relaxed, thinking the matter had blown over, suddenly, some youths barged into their homes, immediately labeling them with allegations of greater wrongdoing.

Without further discussion, they entered the rooms, ransacking destructively for the Enhancement Scrolls. When these youths found the scrolls and triumphantly left, the homes were already in disarray from their search.

After collecting the Enhancement Scrolls from various places, the youths did not keep them but officially delivered them to the Officials' collection point for Enhancement Scrolls.

At the contribution center, the officials didn't care where those young boys got their enhancement scrolls from. For them, whoever brought the enhancement scrolls there, the officials would return the contribution of donating the enhancement scrolls to those individuals.

For those groups of young boys who brought numerous enhancement scrolls, the officials would even considerately distribute the Contribution Value according to the young boys' allocation method to each of them individually.

When these young boys first started this, it was mostly a spur of the moment decision. Therefore, after grabbing the enhancement scrolls, their minds suddenly calmed down, and they still felt a bit uneasy inside.

But after they handed over the stolen enhancement scrolls to the officials at the contribution center, the officials not only refrained from inquiring about the origins of the enhancement scrolls but also considerately registered and fed back contributions according to their wishes.

It was precisely this routine task of the officials that, in their view, tacitly approved of their actions. Since their actions had been tacitly approved, more and more young boys joined in this chaos as time went on.

Just like in the past, relying solely on those unarmed young boys, although they appeared numerous and powerful, they weren't much of a threat to those slightly more capable.

You should know that during that period in China, not only was there no nationwide gun ban, but firearms could even be purchased directly in stores. Therefore, it was not surprising that these young boys initially succeeded a few times by relying on sudden assaults.

However, as time passed and everyone reacted, allowing these young boys to continue to act recklessly unchecked highlighted an obvious issue.

Compared to the old firearms, the martial artists who were not afraid of firearms could even fight hundreds at once. Because of this, how the young boys could forcefully break into the martial artists' homes and steal enhancement scrolls from them was an incredible feat.

Firstly, the martial artists did not want to use up all the enhancement scrolls at home, but the body could not undergo another enhancement immediately after one. It needed to first adapt to the changes brought by the enhancement.

Only after fully adapting to it could they continue to receive enhancements from the enhancement scrolls, and with the use of the enhancement scrolls, the number of body enhancements kept increasing.

Not only did the enhancement effect of each enhancement scroll use weaken, but the adaptation period after strengthening the body also grew longer. Therefore, the martial artists would store some enhancement scrolls at home in advance.

However, despite the adaptation period after enhancement, it didn't mean the martial artists were powerless during this period. The martial artists just couldn't receive further enhancements but it didn't mean they lost their combat capability.

So, when faced with those young boys breaking into their homes, some hot-blooded martial artists didn't want to reason with the intruders, but directly acted to teach them a lesson, letting them understand that everything required considering the strength of both parties before acting.

But just as they were about to deeply imprint a lesson on these youngsters, they suddenly found themselves locked onto by an air of authority from an unknown source.

Even though the owner of this imposing air did not show themselves, the martial artists locked by this aura clearly knew that unless they stood still, if they started to teach those young boys a lesson, the owner of that imposing aura would inevitably take action against them.

Facing this situation, those martial artists locked by the imposing aura could only helplessly watch the young boys enter their homes and plunder enhancement scrolls.

At this moment, the only thing those plundered martial artists could do was mentally record the faces of all those young boys, waiting until after the event to individually seek justice.

As for why they waited for this event to end rather than causing trouble that night, it was because none of the high-level martial artists were fools. In the entire base, there weren't many martial artists who could suppress them merely with their aura.

In most cases, by seeing who ultimately benefited at the end, one could discern who was the malevolent orchestrator behind the scenes.