"Damn it, what's going to happen?"
"Have you heard? Old Liu from the next street got sick. Before long, the whole street was affected. It's all been sealed off now—not a single person has come out."
"The next street? I heard several cities up north have already been completely sealed off. Not one person came out. In the middle of the night before last, there were faint waves of wailing coming from inside. Now there's no sound at all. They say everyone in the entire city is dead."
"What exactly is going on?"
"I heard these illnesses all broke out suddenly, starting from one person before spreading rapidly."
"This isn't normal sickness. It's an attack—a method. Those cultivator lords have been searching for the source."
"Damn it. They said there was going to be a war before. Now the war isn't happening, so why are people getting sick everywhere instead?"
"If you ask me, everyone was living perfectly well before. Nothing much ever happened—it was only after those cultivators appeared that this happened."
"Shut up. Want to die?"
"That's just how it is. We used to live just fine. Things were a little hard, but at least we never lacked food or clothes."
"What about now? They make us eat those whatever-pills every day. Sure, they keep us from going hungry, but who can stand eating that stuff all the time?"
"A friend told me those whatever-pills aren't medicine at all. They're made by grinding up some kind of bug and mixing it with flour. Who knows what those bugs even are? Maybe these inexplicable illnesses are the work of those whatever-pills."
"Enough. Say less."
"Old Zhao, at a time like this, what's wrong with saying a few words? Everyone's talking about it."
"Besides, the cultivator lords are all busy