This is a beautiful, dreamlike city.
The sky is clear blue, and the bright sun hangs quietly in the corner of the sky. She brings just the right amount of warmth to passers-by without letting their eyes dazzle when they inadvertently look up.
The streets are bright and clean, but not overly formal and depressing—there are precisely calculated imperfections and imperfections everywhere, making them appear more real than real.
On both sides of the street, there are rows of exquisite single-family buildings. The styles of each building are different from each other - whether it is the traditional heritage derived from major cultural sources around the world, or the industrial beauty brought by the extreme practicality of ultra-futurism, if we must say what they have in common , that is their artistic value is inestimable.
As for the people here, Jiang Zhou saw a girl with eyes as bright as stars, reading the original wooden version of "The Divine Comedy" in the bright sunshine under the willows swaying in the breeze; he saw a girl wearing gray clothes and purple robes. The solemn old man was talking about German classical philosophy with a cheerful young man wearing a cotton T-shirt under an umbrella outside the coffee shop; he also saw children chasing red dragonflies barefoot on the grass, and not far away The mother who smiled and asked him to be careful not to fall...
The faces of every pedestrian he met showed genuine happiness from the bottom of their hearts.
Jiang Zhou felt that every picture he saw was worthy of a colorful oil painting, worth writing a sonnet, and worth composing a brisk march.
And every pedestrian he met along the way would smile sincerely and kindly, nod his head, and say hello to him when they saw him.
"It feels incredible, right?"
The captain of the guard who led Jiang Zhou asked.
Then, without waiting for Jiang Zhou's answer, he continued:
"In order to prevent a common misunderstanding, I have to make it clear first - happiness must contain the definition of happiness. Along the way, everyone you meet has a different understanding from that of you and me. There is not much difference between them. Therefore, their happiness does not come from ignorance and stupidity deliberately maintained by lies, nor does it rely on any psychedelic means for manipulation.
"That is to say, everyone you see maintains free will and feels happy with a clear mind..."
"clang!"
A burst of gongs and drums resounding across the sky covered up the guard captain's words behind him, and at the same time, it startled countless sparrows on the trees and flew into the sky.
Jiang Zhou looked in the direction of the sound. It was a mighty parade. Men, women and children dressed in gorgeous and strange clothes, playing, blowing and plucking various musical instruments, sang along the winding road paved with stone slabs.
The sparrows that were startled earlier were now hovering over the parade, chirping in harmony for them.
Some people in the team waved colorful flags, and others set off fireworks into the sky during the day. Although the gorgeous fireworks were not visible in the sun, the colorful ribbons falling after the fireworks exploded were like a goddess scattering flowers. , sprinkled on the heads of the parade.
In the team, there were several children jumping around, trying to reach out and catch the gorgeous ribbons floating down.
Because it was led by a float, the parade moved very quickly. When the team passed by them, many people in the team enthusiastically invited them to join them. During this period, there was even a beautiful girl who looked to be sixteen or seventeen years old. She put a wreath of flowers around Jiang Zhou's neck with a shy expression, and then tried to pull him directly into the team.
"Sorry... this gentleman is a newbie, I have to take him to the Dionysus Bureau to register."
The captain of the guard refused this warm invitation.
And his words caused the originally noisy parade to become silent for several seconds. Immediately, everyone burst into cheers like a mountain roaring and a tsunami.
Most people blushed with excitement, many men and women hugged each other, and some even shed tears. After that, everyone in the team gave Jiang Zhou the most sincere blessing he had ever heard in his life. Then, the team sang about the beauty of life and left even more noisily than before.
"The parade is so beautiful... After the parade is over, there will be dinners and parties. Apart from the carnival day, this is probably the most lively event."
Looking at the parade that was going away, the guard captain couldn't help but sigh.
Jiang Zhou, who had previously avoided the girl who rushed towards her for a kiss, asked with lingering fear:
"So...are all your people here so warm and open?"
The guard captain looked away from the parade and said:
"There are also people who like quietness, but most of those people live in Beicheng District. Let's continue... Where did we just talk?"
"People here are happy from the bottom of their hearts, and their happiness is not based on lies or illusions... So, how was this utopia built?"
Jiang Zhou asked.
Utopia, this is the most intuitive impression this city brings to Jiang Zhou.
The guard captain nodded.
"I won’t say much about what happened before I came to Narcissus Plain. After all, every wanderer lost in the abyss and dark web has his own past. And the previous city of sages was not like what you see today. ...Rather, it is simply the opposite of all good things, a place full of ugliness and sin."
Even Sodom and Gomorrah were lights of civilization compared to this place.
As the guard captain spoke, he stopped and looked into the distance - it was a landmark building in the center of the town. Its appearance looked somewhat like the ancient Roman Colosseum, but it was much larger in scale.
He looked at the landmark building, as if recalling something, and then slowly said:
"At the beginning, each of us was afraid that our deep-diving device outside would malfunction, or be artificially shut down, and our brains would be hot-swapped... After all, no matter what our status is in the abyss dark web, our own The body in basic reality is always extremely fragile.
"Therefore, almost everyone lives in the anxiety of precarious life. Therefore, naturally, the idea of carpe diem has become the mainstream - enjoying as much as possible before oneself dies has become the choice of most people.
"And this also became the beginning of countless disasters."
(End of chapter)
