Fellow Prisoner, Why Not Try Trusting Spirit City One More Time?

"Young man, what did you do to end up in here?"

In the underground prison of the City Guard Office.

In the cell next to Li Mubai's.

After Xiao Li left, a white-haired old man looked at the newly arrived Li Mubai and asked him that question.

"I offended a gang, and the people from the City Guard Office pinned a baseless charge on me. I was thrown in prison for a crime I didn't commit."

Li Mubai found a relatively dry spot and sat down cross-legged. He looked at the old man and answered truthfully.

Only then did he notice.

The gray-haired man in the next cell looked old and frail.

But his face looked nothing like that of a man in his sixties or seventies. He looked more like a man in his forties whose heart and mind had suffered some terrible blow, turning his hair white.

"Ah... just as I thought."

After listening to Li Mubai's account, the old man let out a long sigh. A trace of helplessness flashed through his dim old eyes.

"Fellow prisoner, your face doesn't look all that old to me. Fifty at most. Why has your hair turned white at your age?"

Hearing the old man's tone, Li Mubai couldn't help asking curiously.

"You're right. I'm only forty-six this year. My birthday was just a few days ago. As for why my hair turned white?"

The old man suddenly gave a scornful laugh and said dejectedly:

"My future is bleak, my home destroyed and my family dead. How could my hair not turn white..."

Hearing the bleakness the old man could hardly conceal, Li Mubai couldn't help asking in puzzlement:

"From the sound of it, were you wrongfully imprisoned too?"

"Hahaha..."

The old man suddenly burst out laughing.

Then he fixed his blazing gaze on Li Mubai. His eyes swept over the entire dungeon, and he said with a serious expression:

"Of the people locked up here, which one of us wasn't wrongfully imprisoned?"

"They say money is a person's courage. Almost everyone locked up here now is poor, with scarcely an exception. They're here because they couldn't afford to pay."

"Those who could afford it were bailed out long ago."

"Worse still, some people rape women and treat human lives like grass, yet they can pay to be smuggled out."

The old man grew more agitated as he spoke.

"In the cell at the very front, there's a blind man covered in festering sores. All he did was accidentally bump into a young master from a wealthy family, and they locked him up here. It's been two years already. From the look of him, he doesn't have another two years left."

"And in the second cell from the entrance, there's that old cripple the rats have gnawed into a sorry state. He just didn't have the money to pay his stall fee for the time being, and the gang dragged him in here. What did he do wrong? If he had no money, the worst he could do was stop setting up his stall. Why arrest him? The rats gnawed at him a couple of days ago, and those heartless bastards did nothing. By the look of him, he's only got a day or two left."

"And over there..."

Suddenly.

The old man trailed off and looked back at Li Mubai. His eyes were brimming with tears as he asked in a trembling voice:

"Young man, tell me, with laws like these, would poor people like us dare break them?"

Looking at the pitiful, helpless old man, Li Mubai couldn't help feeling deeply shaken.

This world.

It was utterly different from his previous life.

The strong reigned supreme, standing atop the mountain peaks and gazing at the stars without ever casting a glance down at the mortal world below.

The nobility monopolized power, passing it down from generation to generation, their descendants' wealth and status lasting forever.

Powerful tycoons and wealthy merchants toyed with ordinary people. They were like hateful mosquitoes, greedily sucking human blood.

Li Mubai had been mentally prepared for these privileged elites from the beginning.

That was also why he worked so hard to cultivate.

Wasn't it so he could become a giant elephant, rather than an ant someone could crush underfoot without even meaning to?

After hearing the old man today.

Li Mubai finally understood that this world was far more complicated than he had realized.

At the same time, a profound sense of powerlessness welled up in his heart.

In a world so complicated and changeable, it was far too difficult to change even a little!

Then.

The old man began to tell his own story.

He had been a moderately successful merchant. Though he was no great businessman, he could make money with his craft.

Since he was just an ordinary commoner.

The old man had known his place and been very careful to limit the quantity of goods he sold.

He feared that the profits would attract unsavory people and throw his household into chaos, leaving neither chicken nor dog in peace.

But the good times did not last.

Even though the old man kept his output down, certain people still sniffed out an opportunity for profit.

So someone came to his door and proposed buying his family's ancestral craft.

That ancestral craft was how he earned his living, and it could be passed down from generation to generation.

Naturally, the old man would not agree to the request.

But.

Within a few days, someone came calling again.

They said they would pay a higher price.

Even so, the price they offered was hardly convincing.

This time.

The old man naturally refused in no uncertain terms.

And yet.

Just like that.

Catastrophe descended on his family.

There had been no threats or intimidation to warn him beforehand.

One night.

They broke directly into his home in the middle of the night, seized control of his family, and threatened him into handing over the ancestral craft.

The old man had not believed they would actually do anything.

But he had never imagined.

That they would lay into his family with ruthless brutality, beating them viciously right in front of him.

With no other choice.

For his family's well-being, he told them everything about the craft.

After they verified that it was genuine.

The old man had thought they would let his family go.

Never had he imagined.

That to ensure they alone possessed the secret recipe, they would frame him.

In the end, he was arrested and brought to the City Guard Office.

There was no investigation. The people from the City Guard Office detained him and subjected him to brutal torture to force a confession.

In the end, he was locked up in the prison.

When he finished.

The old man earnestly advised Li Mubai:

"Young man, if you have money, don't be stingy. Get it out as soon as you can, and when the person bringing food comes next, give it to them. Perhaps you can get out of here sooner."

The old man looked around the prison and shook his head:

"This is no place for a human being. Even a healthy person, after being here long enough, will either go mad or come down with consumption and die soon after. Worst of all, the rats will gnaw on you after you die, so your corpse won't even be left whole."

Finally.

The old man let out a long sigh, his face full of disappointment:

"As for me, I can truly say I've lost faith in Spirit City. It looks orderly, but in truth there's no rule of law. Everyone says you can bring a sack here and pick up money, but once you actually come, you find it's completely different. If I ever get out alive, I'll never come back."

"Fellow prisoner, is Spirit City truly so disappointing?"

Li Mubai asked seriously.

The old man laughed. "Disappointing? It's utterly hopeless! This place isn't even half as good as the Heaven Dou Empire."

"Fellow prisoner, why not trust Spirit City one more time? Perhaps after tomorrow, it will have a new face."

Li Mubai was full of confidence.

The old man responded to Li Mubai's words with nothing but a cold laugh. He did not take them to heart at all.

How could one man's words convince him?

His experiences over the years had already taught the old man one lesson.

A dog... could never stop eating shit.