Light Fortress
Chapter 291 - 267 Farewell Joy (5)

Chapter 291: Chapter 267 Farewell Joy (5)

All of this, was it all lies fabricated by "Deep Sea"?

Seated in the wheelchair, Zhao Xilai, who awaited a lengthy discourse, never expected Lu Nanzhi to give him such a response.

If, say,

there never was that runaway train.

Then the person tied to the abandoned tracks, the one sacrificed... was an innocent sufferer.

Their sacrifice was utterly meaningless.

The trade-offs at either end of the balance were also completely meaningless.

"This phrase... it sounds familiar..."

The elderly man muttered.

Perhaps it was because of old age, or perhaps because time was almost up, but countless fragmented images from his long life swarmed in, and he could not remember who had spoken these words.

The wheelchair reached the top of the barren hill.

There stood a wooden stele.

Zhao Xilai, who had been thinking hard for a long time, finally caught that glimmer of enlightenment.

He spoke with a complex expression, "I remember now... these were Old Lu’s words to me."

"So you’re a member of the Ancient Literature Society too..."

Lu Nanzhi squatted down, sweeping off the dust that had accumulated on the wooden stele. She didn’t confirm it verbally, nor outright deny it.

The dust of the past was swept away with those few passes of her hand.

The words "Ancient Literature Society" were the truth Zhao Xilai had been unable to bear telling Lu Nanzhi for all these years... The reason why the Zhao Family took over the Flower Banner Club in its entirety after Lu Cheng’s death was precisely because of the "Ancient Literature Society".

Twenty years ago, the Federation Government had ordered the extermination of all members of the "Ancient Literature Society".

Not a single one was to be spared!

This purge continued for many years.

Flesh was torn, yet blood and bones remained.

And before the bloody incident in Lion Alley... the Great Capital Council had initiated a confidential investigation against Lu Cheng, a secret probe that was personally overseen by Zhao Xilai. The investigation team highly suspected that Lu Cheng was a remnant member of the "Ancient Literature Society" and had gathered substantial evidence to that effect.

The Federation Government suspected

that some of the survivors of the "Ancient Literature Society" still maintained communication.

And their means of communication... was through encrypted meetings established within the Deep Sea Network. As the organization was founded by Allen Turing, they still retained a crude method of commandeering authority over the deep water area.

The Federation Government dubbed it... the "Encrypted Door".

Since the Deep Sea Network was fully accessible to the populations of the Five Continents, billions of people connected daily, and countless computing power was distributed... The encrypted meeting room of the "Ancient Literature Society" was attached to one of those many root strings, using an identical algorithm to that of the deep water area, making it as difficult as finding a needle in a haystack to uncover this theoretically independent space.

Unless one could find the so-called "Encrypted Door".

The investigation team suspected that Lu Cheng carried the "Encrypted Door" on him... and the ensuing bloodbath in Lion Alley later proved this man’s "innocence".

That was the real reason for Zhao Xilai’s guilt.

But now,

watching the back of Lu Cheng’s daughter... he realized that the events of those years were not so simple.

Lu Nanzhi straightened the wooden stele, knelt in front of the grave, and bowed respectfully.

After finishing, she stood up, her back to the old man, pinched some sandalwood, took out a folded paper lantern from her bosom, and then slowly unfolded it. Using the residual flame from the sandalwood, she lit the lantern’s wick.

The twilight’s glow faded beyond the horizon.

The light from the lantern enveloped the entire barren hill.

Lu Nanzhi finally spoke, "Actually, Old Lu told me everything back then... about the investigation team... and about your involvement..."

As the eldest daughter of the Lu family.

She bore that secret responsibility earlier than Nan Jin... This burden may have seemed unfortunate, but now, having carried it, it seemed like a stroke of luck.

If she had been younger, unable to shoulder this burden, then the "Red Gate" would have been exposed following the massacre at Lion Alley, and not just Old Lu would have died.

She slowly turned around, facing Zhao Xilai, and said calmly, "Yes... I am a member of the Ancient Literature Society, the very "Door" you seek is on me. I opposed the bill because I do not trust the Federation Government, nor do I trust Deep Sea."

The old man looked somewhat bewildered.

After Lu Cheng’s death.

The investigators didn’t stop there... They even proposed to continue investigating Lu Cheng’s family, determined to unearth the truth about the Ancient Literature Society.

Zhao Xilai flew into a rage then.

Because Old Lu’s first wife had passed away, leaving behind only two daughters, one who had just come of age and the other still a child.

"Investigating the family" meant applying the same tactics used against Old Lu to the children!

He lodged strong objections and protests.

Not long after the Lion Alley massacre... the Federation Government began to fully support Zhao Xilai. He successfully took over the Flower Banner, and this absurd proposal was naturally rejected outright, with the original investigation team being disbanded.

The investigation into the "encrypted door" vanished into thin air, and Zhao Xilai used his parliamentary privilege to pick up the set conclusions in Lu Cheng’s file and gently put them down.

A person who has died... has no secrets.

And that "encrypted door", which only existed in theory, was also deemed nonexistent by Zhao Xilai.

The power of the council is limited... With the Ancient Literature Society completely faded into oblivion, the Federation Government did not establish another task force to chase the elusive "Door."

All these actions were taken because of Zhao Xilai’s guilt.

Because of this investigation, he got what he wanted and became the master of the Flower Banner and a key player in Da Du; everyone saw him as the biggest beneficiary of the Lion Alley case.

And now.

Suddenly, a weight seemed to lift from the old man’s heart.

He looked at Lu Nanzhi, the girl who entered the Flower Banner ten years ago, still tender then, who had endured much hardship over the years and had now become an independent "Madam."

In fact, after Lu Cheng’s death... he had come to view Lu Nanzhi as his own "daughter".

It was not because of guilt.

But because his heart also held tenderness, trust, and reluctance... Beneath that layer of stone, he always remembered his pact with Lu Cheng made many years before, that raising the banner should not be a task for him alone.

He also had a daughter.

If one day she could take up the banner for him... perhaps he would not have broken the promise of those years.

Now that Zhao Xilai knew the whole truth, he did not feel regret but rather... relief.

If he had hesitated even the slightest back then.

What would have happened after Lu Nanzhi became the target of the investigation team goes without saying.

"All of this... doesn’t matter anymore..."

The old man muttered softly, "Let’s not talk about such weighty topics today... I came here to visit an old friend."

At life’s end.

He no longer needed to struggle with those painful, complex issues of right and wrong, those matters of consciousness, culture, belief...

He just wanted to feel a bit lighter, even lighter.

So Zhao Xilai pushed his wheelchair firmly, moving toward that wooden monument, pausing at a distance, and gazing intently.

"The nameless, Lu Cheng."

An ironic epitaph indeed... Buried outside on desolate hills, a life unattended, was actually the backbone and soul that shook the tallest towers and led countless people.

After a decade, Lu Cheng’s name was forgotten.

But compared to him.

I... am the true nameless one.