Brown with green in it, it can't be some radioactive mineral...
This was Angel's first reaction, but she quickly remembered that the color of a certain Copper Mine was like this. Unlike the yellow Copper Mine called "fool's gold", this mineral was a mineral that could be distinguished from gold at a glance.
She came closer and tried to confirm, but Layton was alerted. He took two steps back, put the "gold mine" back into the bucket, protected it against his chest, and asked in a low voice:
"What's the matter?"
Following his words, the temporary miners who were busy around them glanced at them one after another. There was undisguised vigilance in their eyes, and they were far away from others.
Angel shook his head and stopped trying to argue with these guys who obviously had something wrong.
"No, I'm just curious, is this the first piece of 'gold' you have dug out?"
"Of course not. Such a harvest can bring in several dollars every day. According to my estimate, after finding someone to separate and purify it, the daily harvest will exceed one hundred pounds. If we divide it equally, we can already get thirty pounds of income this week. This is a good job with an annual salary of thousands of pounds!"
Really? I don't think that piece of Copper Mine can even be exchanged for a few soli...
Angel looked at the small bucket containing the ore and didn't know what to say.
No wonder this group of people came here happily and dug enthusiastically. It turned out that they were treating scrap copper as gold, thinking that they could make a fortune overnight. It would be great if they could really dig out gold. The problem is...
She sighed secretly, forced out a smile and said:
"Then I hope you can dig a few more pieces today."
Looking at the mine that they had dug into a deep pit, Angel slowly turned around and left in the direction she came from. It wasn't until she turned a corner that her vigilant sight behind her was blocked by the thick stone wall.
All the way back to the entrance of the mine, I took a few breaths of the salty air blowing from the sea. Angel looked back at the deep cave, as if I could hear the clanging sound of mining picks hitting the rocks from inside.
"Hypnosis, hallucination, or some kind of paranoia?"
Several possibilities ran through her mind.
As a former "Instigator", she may be able to use the power of words to temporarily trick some simple tourists into digging mines, but she can never refer to copper as gold. However, these excited and somewhat fanatical "miners" have completely fallen into such fantasies and cannot extricate themselves. It is obvious that what interferes with them is a deeper power.
Will it be related to Gazer she is looking for?
After thinking about it, Angel decided to go back to the town first and look for more clues through other means.
Anyway, these tourists have been digging for a full week, and there should be no danger for one more day. Well, unless the spoils are unevenly divided, and they fight over a few pieces of Copper Mine worth less than one soli, causing death...
Back in the port town, Angel took off the "hypocrisy" ring and waited for the negative effects to disappear, and made a new "Calamity" Charm. This time, she tried to Charm herself performed a Magic Mirror Divination, and not surprisingly, found nothing. Obviously, the power from the mysterious runes exceeded her so much that even if it was made with her own blood, the divination did not get any effective information.
After recovering Spirituality, after dinner, she put on the ring again, changed into a male appearance, put on a more neutral vest and windbreaker, and came to Spice Street, which was also very noisy at night, pretending to be a businessman who came to inquire about the ore business, and chatted with several unemployed miners.
"That gold mine outside the city? It was developed by an investment company from Bayam. It has been nearly five years. It turned out to be the third pillar of Para Island besides spices and fruits. Almost every household has someone working in the mine, and the dock over there is also very busy. Unfortunately, half a year ago..."
After drinking a few glasses of Fermented Fruit Wine served by Angel, these drinkers immediately became good friends with her, and with a little guidance, they told the truth about half a year ago.
It turned out that half a year ago, when they were gradually digging deeper into the mine, they discovered a deep natural pit. They thought there would be more mineral deposits, but they did not expect that the inside was hollow. It collapsed during mining, and many people were injured. During the period, more than 20 people even fell into coma.
The miners suspected a gas leak and quickly carried the victims out of the mine and reported the incident. However, what they did not expect was that instead of compensation and repairs, they received a notice of emergency closure of the mine.
After that, Government Affairs Hall of Para Island and the miners requested many times to reopen the mine and resume everyone's work, but they were not agreed by the investment company. As a result, the gold mine and the supporting docks have been abandoned until now. Hundreds of miners lost their hard but reasonable-paying jobs. Most of them became plantation workers. A few without craftsmanship and technology could only work hard at the town's docks, and their incomes were much lower than before.
The former miners in front of them obviously belong to the latter group. While drinking, they cursed the investment companies far away. In the words of Emperor Roselle: they occupy the toilet but don't use it.
Listening to the angry curses, Angel thought of another possibility.
This solution, which seems very strange to the outside world, is very similar to the requirements for those involved after the intervention of the official Beyonder. Take Nighthawks's process as an example. If an extraordinary incident occurs in the mine, they will immediately ask the mine to shut down, and then eliminate all threats. Only after multiple assessments that there is no risk will they allow the mine to restart, and that is often half a year or even a year later.
Some companies, fearful of getting into trouble again, simply abandoned the mine and closed it permanently.
"After the accident in the mine, did Church of Storms from Midway Island or the garrison come?"
Angel interrupted the miners' complaints and asked. She knew that there was no Church of Storms church on this small island, so she asked about the Midway Island that was closest to here.
"Army? Of course not. They won't come to this quiet little place once a year. It seems that a few priests came from the church to help treat the poisoned miners and left after they woke up."
It seems that this is the action of "Mandated Punishers". They left directly because they did not find the problem, or did they leave after cleaning up the abnormality at that time? But now...
After some questioning, Angel had more doubts in his mind.
Saying goodbye to these drunken miners, she continued to wander around the town for a while. In the dead of night, she sneaked into the Government Affairs Hall in the town and used her skilled lockpicking skills to pry open the door of the archives room.
This small town near the port has only more than a thousand permanent residents, so there are not many files. Angel quickly found the dust-covered mine information among the various plantation materials. There is no detailed internal record of the collapse accident that occurred six months ago, or specifically at the end of June 1349. It only roughly marked the accident location and the number of victims on the internal map.
Obviously it was processed by "Mandated Punishers" and the relevant content was deleted... In this case, we can only attack the most abnormal person...
She restored the file, left the dark Government Affairs Hall, took out Magic Mirror, and quickly confirmed the residence of the leader of today's batch of temporary miners, Layton, through divination.
As a foreign tourist, he also lived in a hotel in the town. Angel disappeared directly and walked past the sleepy front desk waiter, went upstairs to the door of Layton's room, opened the door through the silk thread cut into the door, and walked in swaggeringly.
The "miner leader" who was overworked during the day had fallen into a deep sleep. Angel found a chair to sit on, threw a "dream" Charm, and entered his sweet dream...
... and entered the dreamland where he was having sex in full swing.
Unexpectedly, Layton was also working hard to mine the brown and green Copper Mine in his dream. His mining friends were the young male and female tourists who Angel had met during the day. Everyone worked together in the dream, regardless of fatigue, and the efficiency was several percent higher than during the day.
Of course, this all stems from the imagination of one person, Layton. Obviously, he was not so satisfied with his working conditions during the day, so he dreamed of more efficient night operations.
Angel did not disturb Layton in the dream, but wandered around in this wonderful dream. Dreams usually reflect the dreamer's subconscious desires or fears, and some important clues may be found in them.
Soon, she discovered that the mine was just a closed scene, and the surrounding roads were blocked by endless darkness. As an intruder in the dream, she could not control the dream to make corresponding changes, so she had to return the same way.
But when Angel returned to Layton, he was surprised to find that there was a short man in the crowd wearing a black trench coat and a half-high silk top hat with a vague face. He did not belong to anyone during the day, and Angel didn't even notice his existence before leaving the cave just now.
Another dream intruder?
Angel raised her eyebrows. She used Dream Charm Dream Invasion and could leave at any time through her thoughts. Therefore, she did not immediately act excessively, but wanted to see what the other party was going to do.
"Hello, young Nighthawks," the man in the trench coat took off his hat and put it on his chest, bowing politely, "I'm glad you were able to grasp various clues and come to the dreamland of Mr. Layton."
Me, Nighthawks? In a sense, it is true, but how did he know... because he mistook "dream" Charm as Nightmare's ability?
Angel held his breath and remained calm, as if he had acquiesced to his identity.
"I'm sorry. I was supposed to communicate with you alone in your dream. Unfortunately, your vigilance stopped me, so I had no choice but to wait for you in these people's dreams."
The man pointed at Layton and others who knew nothing but were still swinging their mining picks hard.
I was wary... but I slept very well last night. It should be the effect of "Hidden Holy Emblem"...Angel could hardly hold back his expression, so he had to nod to cover it up and asked:
"So, who are you anyway?"
"Me? Just a poor person waiting for Redemption. Didn't you come to Para Island because..."
The man in the windbreaker said doubtfully, his hazy face gradually showing his facial features, but at the moment when Angel was about to see him clearly, the gas light placed by Layton and others was instantly extinguished, and the entire mine suddenly fell into darkness that even Angel and Dark Vision could not see through.
Without hesitation, she cut off the connection with the dream, opened her eyes, and stood up from the wooden chair.
On the single bed in front of her, Layton's limbs suddenly twitched, her eyelids rose, and only the whites of her eyes were left underneath, as if she was having an epileptic seizure.
"Evernight."
Reciting the opening spell, Angel threw out a "Slumber Charm" Charm in his hand. The silver piece exploded with dark red light in the air, and invisible waves rippled. Layton, who was on the edge of madness, immediately stopped struggling and lay back on his warm bed.