Falsifying history is good business

Chapter 388 Sheep and Goats

After being rewritten by Quill, the fictional "Horseshoe Lookout" in the game actually appeared on the map of the United States; this place is about a hundred miles southeast of the Ochita Mountains, located in the north-central part of Louisiana, a place where mountains and river valleys intersect.

There are mountains, but they are not high; there are rivers, but they are not deep. It is located at the intersection of different landforms such as arid grasslands, mountain forests, and alluvial plains.

The natural conditions here are not suitable for large-scale planting, and there are not enough mineral and forestry resources to develop industry, so animal husbandry becomes the best choice.

A large number of small and medium-sized ranches are scattered across this area; before capital began to show its power but had not yet formed a large-scale sweeping wave, the United States did not have a large ranch like the "Dutton Family" that covers an area comparable to that of Rhode Island.

Relying on the existence of many ranches, a trading center for livestock and agricultural and animal husbandry products has been formed here, which is the first decent town in the early stage of the game - Valentine.

I just don't know, after the modification by the quill pen, the name "Valentine" finally replaced which real town in the real dimension.

At the productivity level in the 19th century, a small-scale ranch could only sell 30 to 50 sheep or 17 to 18 cows at a time, which was the normal scale of operation. A larger number of livestock would exceed the carrying capacity of the ranch land.

The small scale of operation means fewer people can be hired; under the security environment in the United States in the late 19th century, every rancher needed to carry a gun and serve as a guard.

However, in front of real bandits such as Arthur Morgan and John Marston, the herdsmen behaved like a mob, not much better than the bandits facing the regular army.

After two gunshots, the herdsmen fled in panic, without even figuring out the direction of the gunman; they were frightened by the bullets hitting their feet; a group of newly-raised sheep all fell into the hands of two long-time bandits.

That's right, just one day after the Scarlett Meadows train robbery, Arthur and John committed another robbery.

How should I put it? Perhaps this is the daily life of the Van der Linde gang; hunting, skinning, making bags, making clothes, and even drinking and gambling all over the world in the game are fake, and are at most just embellishments in their criminal careers.

Lin You stood on the bare top of the mountain and had a panoramic view of the two men committing the crime.

"Sheep and goats?" Lin You recalled the meaningful name of this game mission. "Humph, except for the group of sheep that were robbed, the rest of the people who appeared in the entire mission were all goats."

In the English context, "sheep and goats" is a specific phrase, meaning "good guys and bad guys"; in the game mission named after this phrase, except for the robbed sheep and the original owner of the sheep, all the others are not good guys.

The two robbers need not be mentioned; the merchants in the livestock market who knew that the stolen goods were stolen but took the opportunity to lower the price, the gang members who discussed the crime plan and way out in the tavern, and even the big capitalist Cornwall who came to seek revenge on the Van der Linde gang in person - none of them were good people.

Lin You originally did not plan to stay in Horseshoe Watch for long; because few of the characters that the Van der Linde gang encountered during the Horseshoe Watch period lived to 1911.

Excluding the already exposed Agent Ross and Downs mother and son, the most obvious ones left might be Arthur's ex-girlfriend and her stupid brother; then the sheriff of Valentine Town might also be one. But when Lin You came to investigate, he did not find any traces of divine power on these people.

Out of caution, Lin You still left marks on them for further investigation in the future. But just as he was about to leave after completing the above matters, things changed subtly. A divine aura appeared on John Marston; in the depths of his soul, a fragment of divine consciousness loomed.

Lin You was very surprised; he had observed all the members of the Van der Linde gang less than forty-eight hours ago, and did not find any divine aura at that time. But just as John Marston was about to put his plan to steal the sheep into action, the fragment of consciousness in his soul emerged.

The tree of destiny, which was deeply rooted in Lin You's soul, stretched out its branches and connected with John Marston's destiny, quickly helping the writer to figure out the whole story.

"Is this the reason why Patrick Morgan has not been able to find the fragment of full consciousness? Loki's 'causal line' connects the fragment to the will of the universe, and also greatly strengthens the connection between the carriers of the fragment and the will of the universe. Only when these carriers encounter major changes in their fate will the existence of the fragments be exposed; usually these fragments are hidden deep in the soul and difficult to find."

Robbing and selling sheep was one of the important reasons why John Marston exposed his whereabouts in Valentine; if it were not for this case, Cornwall would probably not have been able to track down the members of the Van der Linde Gang for a while, and it would not have triggered the large-scale gun battle known as the "Valentine Massacre", which forced the Van der Linde Gang to relocate.

This gunfight was a "key but not fundamental" factor in changing the fate of the Van der Linde gang, and John Marston was the main catalyst for this factor; so he was the one who reacted the most to the change in fate.

"Then think about it the other way around. If similar situations continue to occur, will hidden fragments of Loki's consciousness also emerge in other members of the Van der Linde gang?" Lin You's thoughts continued to expand, and the more he thought about it, the more he felt that the possibility of similar situations occurring was very high.

If we count from the time they fled to Plowshare, half of the twenty-odd members of the Van der Linde gang lived until 1911, and a few even lived longer; those people may not be without fragments of Loki's consciousness.

"Perhaps, we should let each of them directly place themselves in the important events that change their fate, or even let them become the key factor in changing their fate?" The writer secretly speculated, "If this guess is correct, the next plan will have to be changed."

Lin You's mind was full of thoughts, but his eyes were always looking towards the direction of Valentine Town. With his facial features enhanced by the microcosm, he could easily see everything that happened in the town from a distance of several miles.

After all, the writer is not the god of truth, so he does not need to be sneaky or hide. He can show his divinity openly as long as mortals do not notice anything unusual when he uses his divine power.

In the distance, Arthur and John drove the sheep into the livestock market in the town. Considering how John later knew nothing about other ranch work at the Pronghorn Antelope Ranch, it is conceivable that his skilled herding skills were developed when he was stealing livestock.

Less than fifteen minutes after the sheep disappeared, a series of intensive gunshots rang out in the town, starting with rapid-fire revolver fire.

The "Valentine Massacre" began.

Cornwall's armed employees, bounty hunters, town police and some "heroic" town residents joined forces to perfectly demonstrate the style of a mob; they besieged the Van der Linde gang members with a stupid fueling tactic, and then were shot dead and wounded in batches, and watched three gang members break out with a wounded man.

There were about twenty bodies lying along the breakout route, which became a footnote to the Van der Linde gang's title of "Western Bandits".

(End of this chapter)