Chapter 20 A Notification from the Association
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Translator: JayM
Chapter: 20
Chapter Title: A Notification from the Association
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Shen Yi used spatial transit directly from the deck to return to his large villa.
Qiwu was still waiting there silently.
"Heat up the late-night snack Mo Qiu left for me and bring it over." Shen Yi gave the instruction offhandedly. He had no intention of going to sleep so soon.
The good news Dingxiang had brought him still had him somewhat exhilarated.
The plan was actually quite simple.
The original purpose of yesterday's draw had been to see whether he might find some kind of instrument capable of detecting the anomalies occurring in this world. That hadn't come to pass, but instead he had obtained the two fine items — the U-75 and the Sky Fortress.
So Shen Yi had no intention of drawing again right now.
Drawing exactly the item he needed was, after all, only a low-probability event.
He could only make use of a fool's method.
— The Disaster Prediction Scroll.
The item he had used several times before in front of Che Yongchang, capable of predicting disasters that would occur in the future.
One hundred points per scroll.
Naturally, not just any kind of disaster would qualify.
It had to be one of a certain degree of newsworthiness.
In other words, under certain circumstances, this Disaster Prediction Scroll could also be thought of as a radio that could only receive news of future disasters — and it had its own set of standards for what qualified as one.
So, theoretically speaking, as long as enough of them were used, it would be possible for him to find out exactly how the future apocalypse of this world would come about.
This was what Shen Yi called a fool's method.
Or in short — throwing money (points) at the problem.
Foolish as it was, it was more reliable than drawing like mad, and now that he had Dingxiang, he could recoup some of the cost to a certain degree, and even produce other effects he had in mind.
"Let's begin."
Shen Yi went directly to the system shop and started with ten scrolls.
2:32 AM. A tornado originating from West Asia swept through Huelva, resulting in twelve deaths and one hundred and twenty-five injuries.
This one... A warning had probably already been issued locally by now, yet there was nothing to be done about it.
Next.
4:12 AM. The Emden Supreme Apartments in Faro City caught fire due to a lightning strike, resulting in five hundred and twenty-five deaths and two hundred and thirty-six injuries.
"That's the one!" Shen Yi's eyes lit up as he picked up his phone from the coffee table. "Dingxiang, search for the Emden Supreme Apartments."
"Yes." Dingxiang's voice came directly through the phone, and the relevant information was transmitted at once.
Emden was a large multinational real estate company specializing in luxury high-end apartments.
The apartment building in question was located in Faro City, the capital of the Holy State of Faro — a high-rise building a full eighty stories tall. A single look was enough for Shen Yi to understand why the death toll would be so high.
Fires caused by lightning strikes generally started on the exterior walls, and if they weren’t fireproofed, the flames could engulf the entire building in a short span of time.
At that hour, the vast majority of people would be asleep.
Aside from residents on the lower floors, who could evacuate within a short period of time, residents on the upper floors would likely find the fire escape routes already blanketed by thick smoke and flames by the time they became aware of what was happening.
"Gather the residential information of this luxury apartment building. Issue warning text messages within one hour before the fire breaks out. In the final thirty minutes, bombard them with phone calls." Shen Yi instructed.
Though it wasn't quite right for him to feel pleased about the misfortunes of others…
Still, if all went smoothly, this round alone would let him save over five hundred people — which meant over five hundred points.
Equivalent to recovering the cost of five Disaster Prediction Scrolls.
If disasters of this kind kept coming, he might even come out ahead.
Next…
5:27 AM. A landslide struck Chaoque County. A long-distance passenger bus plunged off the mountain, resulting in thirteen deaths and twenty-eight injuries.
6:35 AM. A storm appeared at Grand Port...
And so Shen Yi went on, using ten Disaster Prediction Scrolls in succession.
His predictions spanned locations across the globe, with times extending all the way to six o'clock the following afternoon.
The largest and most severe disaster among them was naturally the fire in the early hours of four o'clock — a conflagration of such extreme severity hadn’t been seen in many years. Beyond that, natural disasters such as earthquakes, storms, floods, and landslides made up the vast majority of the predictions.
Though it could be said that these were the kinds of disasters that tend to make the news.
Nevertheless, the uneasy premonition within Shen Yi's heart grew stronger and stronger.
The fury of nature...
Shen Yi had already lost the excitement he'd felt at the start. He sat alone on the sofa, lost in thought for a while, then he stood up.
"I'll leave things to you for now. I'm going to get some rest."
"Please rest easy, Captain. I wish you pleasant dreams." Dingxiang's voice came through the phone.
Shen Yi had used only ten Disaster Prediction Scrolls for the time being. He needed to see the results of his plan first.
Before long…
All that remained in the villa was the red glow emanating from Qiwu's chest and eyes, casting a dim light over its cold metallic frame.
......
Faro City. Emden Supreme Apartments.
Rossetti Magi was the editor-in-chief of the Faro Holy News.
The local time was one o'clock in the morning.
The weather wasn't pleasant — a heavy rainstorm was underway, accompanied by the rumbling of thunder and lightning.
As was her routine, it wasn't until one o'clock in the morning that she finally brought her busy workday to a close and returned home. Her two children — her twelve-year-old son Leighton and her ten-year-old daughter Eileen — had long since fallen into a deep sleep.
Rossetti stood at the doorways of her son's and daughter's rooms, and using the glow of her phone screen, stole a quiet peek at each of them before lying down on her bed in exhaustion.
The previous month, she had just finalized her divorce from her husband. Both children were in her care, and the combination of raising them while keeping up with her demanding work had left her utterly drained over the past month.
She really needed to find them a nanny — the very best one available, no matter the cost.
Rossetti thought hazily to herself as she drifted off to sleep.
There seemed to be the sound of a text message notification coming from her phone nearby. She didn't check it — whoever sent messages at this hour was almost certainly some wretched spam advertiser.
But barely half an hour later, her phone's ringtone jolted her awake.
What did it feel like when an extremely exhausted person was rudely awakened during their rest?
Rossetti now knew firsthand.
She wanted to kill someone.
She picked up her phone, her bloodshot eyes blazing with fury.
If the person calling was one of her subordinates, that person was getting fired tomorrow!
That was the most genuine thought in Rossetti's mind right now.
However, the number on the phone was a strange one — even somewhat absurd.
— 00000000000
"Good God, does a number like this even exist in the world?" Rossetti's eyes went wide.
She even wondered whether she was simply too exhausted and was seeing things.
But none of that mattered.
What mattered most right now was giving whoever had made this call a thorough verbal thrashing.
"Hello—!? Do you have any idea what time it is?" Rossetti let out a furious shout, and whether it was her imagination or not, she seemed to faintly hear a similar shout echoing from the floor above.
On the other end of the line was a cool, yet thoroughly pleasant female voice.
She was speaking Faroan with diction so precise, it could have belonged to a broadcast presenter.
"This notification comes from the Pan-Humanity Protection Association. Ms. Rossetti, you must take your family and leave the Emden Apartments within thirty minutes."
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T/N - So, some weird sounding country names all of a sudden. I can’t even guess what real world country this Holy State of Faro is referring to… Maybe Rome? Vatican?
Also, now that the MC has Dingxiang, can’t he have her monitor the world for disasters and have her do rescue work on the side? It’s passive income for points, and he doesn’t have to spend 100 points for those prediction scrolls.