PFC Chapter 2598 Shangri-La (Part )
Chapter 2598 Shangri-La (Part )
Chapter 2598 Shangri-La (Part )
Shangri-La, an ancient and mysterious oriental legend, whether in ancient times or in modern times, this word represents a distant and pure land, and is an oriental version of utopia.
Different from simple wealth, due to the influence of religion, Shangri-La represents more of a pure and flawless holy land in people's hearts. It is a pearl on the snowy plateau, representing freedom, tranquility and a free mind.
Through the mouths of eminent monks, such legends have been passed down from generation to generation, and there are even many novels based on this. Countless adventurers with faith have found their own peace here after experiencing numerous calamities.
In fact, this legend has a basis in reality. What many people don’t know is that the plateau at an altitude of 4,000 meters is not just bare mountains and snow that never melts. On the southern foot of the Himalayas, at the foot of Mount Everest, warm and humid air currents from the Indian Ocean have created an oasis, which is called Mount Everest’s Little Jiangnan.
In addition to the dense vegetation and lush trees, there is also a human community living here for generations. They are called Sherpas.
Sherpa actually means Oriental people. They basically live together on the border between China and Nepal, mainly in Nepal, but there are also more than 1000 of them in China.
Going up along the Sherpa village and deep into the Himalayas, there are several villages located in this subtropical jungle. They are Chinese residents who are not included in the population data because they are the lost tribes of the guardians of Shambhala. In terms of Chinese dynasties, they are people of the Ming Dynasty.
The so-called legendary Shambhala is Kamar-Taj under the leadership of Ancient One, and this group of mysterious villagers who have never contacted the outside world since the Ming Dynasty are Ancient One's fellow villagers. It is the village that Ancient One and Kalu jointly transformed when they debuted.
Due to the influence of magic, hunger and poverty had long been eliminated in the village, of course, hunger and poverty by Ming Dynasty standards.
The people here basically have no worries about food and clothing. Most of them still follow the natural law of life, working from sunrise to sunset and resting from sunset. They have avoided countless wars and still live a contented small farmer's life to this day.
Of course, as time went on, they naturally had some exchanges with the outside world, mainly trading with the Sherpas at the foot of the mountain, mostly in the form of barter.
The residents of Shambhala have been nurtured by magic for generations and have mastered magical skills that ordinary people cannot. They are able to produce a small amount of precious medicinal herbs, leather, and minerals, and have more medical means than ordinary people. Basically, as long as a person is still alive, he can be saved.
In order to avoid inbreeding, they also intermarry with people outside Shambhala, mainly the Sherpas, and occasionally with magicians or foreigners who have pursued this place. They especially like adventurers who have strayed here, because being able to arrive here after going through so many hardships proves that they not only have a determined heart, but also a strong physique and excellent genes.
This situation continued into modern times. Many of the beautiful legends about Shambhala were spread by adventurers who visited here. The residents of Shambhala did not comment on this. They did not feel that outsiders were a disturbance. On the contrary, they hoped that more outsiders would help them improve their genes.
Of course, Kamar-Taj is located in a deeper place, and even the residents of Shambhala cannot easily reach this magical holy land. However, because there are many people who have contact with magic, and many children born in Shambhala have magical talents, it is impossible for the Ancient One to stop them from going home to visit their families, so for many years, the wizards of Kamar-Taj have lived in harmony with the residents of Shambhala.
Mages can generally be self-sufficient, but there are some things they need to buy from the Shambhala village. Although the residents of Shambhala yearn for magic, they also know that magic is a double-edged sword. If they explore too deeply, it will be a curse rather than a blessing for ordinary people.
They lived in peace for hundreds of years, and the model that was maintained was that the monks traded with the residents of Shambhala, and the residents of Shambhala traded with the Sherpas. Everyone could get what they wanted and lived a comfortable life.
But after the founding of New China, this situation gradually began to change, mainly because electricity was connected and roads were built in the Sherpa villages in China, and the green cars of China Post began to come and go, bringing all the supplies needed for life to all the residents here.
The village developed into a small town, and schools and hospitals were gradually built in the town. Seriously ill patients could be taken to big cities for medical treatment, and people's dependence on barefoot doctors and magical medicine became less and less.
With the development of the times, the tourism industry has gradually risen. Teahouses, homestays, theaters and other buildings that do not produce daily necessities have gradually emerged. This also means that this small town has escaped from the status of an isolated plateau island and has begun to enter modernization like most small towns in this country.
This leads to a problem: they are no longer so dependent on the residents of Shambhala, who live in seclusion deep in the Himalayas. The elderly who once saw the elusive guardians of Shambhala have also learned to turn on light switches and turn on taps.
The newly built roads allow modern cars to drive on, and people no longer need to carry things on their shoulders or hands as in the past. The younger generation no longer does heavy work, and most of them are doing live broadcasts as internet celebrities, or rehearsing Sherpa songs and dances for national tours.
With good sanitary conditions, the disease rate naturally decreases, the labor intensity is low, and it is also beneficial to life expectancy. After the popularization of education, everyone knows that if you have a fever, you need to take antipyretics, and if you are seriously ill, you need to take antibiotics. However, most people do not believe in those mysterious herbal medicines because they have never seen them with their own eyes.
As for small items such as tools, animal skins, amulets, etc., they are readily available in shops along the tourist routes and are not rare at all. Neither the sellers nor the buyers expect to buy genuine goods with such a small amount of money, so naturally no one cares whether there are genuine goods or not.
The legends left behind by the residents of Shambhala began to gradually disappear. The young people were more concerned about how to revitalize their hometown and use the tourism industry to make money for themselves and their peers. The elderly enjoyed the benefits of all-round modern life. Apart from telling their grandchildren the legends of Shambhala, they also kept silent about the magical miracles they had witnessed.
However, the number of Shambhala residents is too small, with less than 500 people in the three villages combined. Although the land they own can grow enough food for them, there are no roads leading in, and the trading tradition with the Sherpas has been cut off. Some things that they cannot be self-sufficient in can no longer be obtained, which has a great impact on their lives.
But don't get me wrong, although they live deeper in the mountains, the place where the Sherpas live is already incredibly remote. If roads can be built there, it is not impossible to build roads in Shambhala as well.
The land and country they live in have a strange enthusiasm for road construction. The Sherpas often say that sooner or later the little green car will reach the top of Mount Everest.
The problem is that the protective shield of Kamar-Taj covers Shambhala. This is the main reason why only a few lucky people have accidentally entered it over the past few hundred years, and no one has ever discovered this paradise. With this protective shield, people can't even find this place, let alone build a road here.
However, after the Sorcerer Supreme Strange came to power, he started building a lot of buildings in Kamar-Taj. He first established the Kamar-Taj Academy of Magic, then the Kamar-Taj Magic Research Institute, the Magic Experimental Park, and the Magic High-tech Cooperation Zone.
Although most of the construction materials were transported from the portal, some miscellaneous daily necessities were traded with the residents of Shambhala.
After the Kamar-Taj Academy of Magic was built, it enrolled students from all over the world, and the things they wanted were varied.
Students from the United States need party supplies for parties, students from Nepal need Buddhist utensils for their practice, Chinese students study cooking in their dormitories every day, and the ingredients and seasonings they need are innumerable. Even students from India are looking for spices all over the mountains.
There is nothing that can be done about it. The environment of Kamar-Taj is indeed very good and original, and the quality of all the ingredients is good. However, a group of children who are spoiled in modern families, without any internet access, have a lot of energy and nowhere to vent it every day. The noisy wizards are miserable.
In order to release their energy, Strange had to refer to ordinary schools and give them holidays according to holidays.
But the Himalayas are too far away from their homeland. Even to the nearby Nepalese village, it would be troublesome to go up and down. Strange can't arrange a portal for everyone to go home, so the students still stay near the Himalayas.
Locking them up in school will not achieve the purpose of releasing energy and reducing stress, so naturally they can only go to the village. It can only be said that Kamar-Taj has its own Hogsmeade.
But Shambhala could not provide what the students wanted. They wanted to go out and relax, not to farm, so the town where the Sherpas lived became their first choice.
Although it is indeed a bit far from the school, it is at least at the foot of the Himalayas. Except for students who are too young to cast teleportation spells, most students would rather run farther to visit the Sherpa town.
This place is completely different from Kamar Taj. There are coffee shops, Internet cafes, couples hotels, and you can even join a tour group to travel along the Sichuan-Tibet line. It is the best place for students to spend money and have fun.
A few years after the popularization of air transportation routes, this small town also became one of the endpoints of the Sichuan-Tibet air transportation line. An air rail was opened here a year and a half ago. Although it requires a stop, it only takes two and a half hours to reach Chengdu.
So during long vacations, students prefer to queue up to take the skytrain to travel to big cities. During short vacations, they just collect express deliveries in town, call a few friends to play a few games in an Internet cafe, or spend time in a coffee shop.
Many residents in the town knew these students. They thought they were studying at a university in Nepal, which is what they called themselves. After all, they were young and willing to spend money on food and drink. They were the main force of consumption during the off-season and were very popular among the townspeople.
The students spent money to enjoy entertainment and the townspeople made money. This should have been a win-win situation, but the people of Shambhala played an awkward role in it, like an octogenarian left behind by the times.
These three villages could neither provide students with modern comforts nor maintain self-sufficiency through primitive means of barter as before, and their lives became increasingly difficult.
Until about half a year ago, the chief of one of the villages found his daughter who had married out and called the census workers who went to the Sherpa town back to his village.
The staff was young and didn't know the relationship between these towns and villages. They just thought that there were fewer people living here, and since they hadn't included them in the previous statistics, they just wrote down these hundreds of people.
Now, the mayor of DJ County, the administrative unit to which the town belongs, suddenly found that there were three more villages in his administrative area.
What made his blood pressure soar was that these three villages had no water, no electricity, and not even any roads.