Chapter 421 — The Beast Unleashed

"The second reason is that this world is not safe. The Typhonians have already gone ahead of us, the wasteland threatens us to the south, and now we must face Ansell's civil war. Against these challenges, making ourselves strong is the only way to survive," Gaoyang said, setting out for the first time the earliest and most important reason for forging his new order. He had not expected Amber to be the first to hear it, but seeing the rare seriousness on the girl's face, he went on. "We must grow strong in the fastest, most efficient way possible—strong enough at least to defend ourselves in this world. Every path humanity has ever walked fails to achieve that, so I have no choice but to open a new one. When change or death is the choice, what reason is there to cling to the old order? And in fact... this new path seems to be the right one."

"Even if you're right..." Amber pursed her lips. "But you still haven't answered my earlier question—even without the old landowning nobles, can you guarantee that the Administrative Hall you build will never know a day of corruption and decay? If they too form a new... group, then what..."

"That is why, from the very beginning, I have been working to put extraordinary powers like magic into the hands of ordinary people," Gaoyang cut in as soon as Amber finished. "Why do you think I keep stressing that every link in the whole magitech industry—from research and development to manufacturing to use—must ultimately be made independent of the extraordinary?"

Amber's eyes went wide, and she was suddenly lost for words.

Gaoyang smiled faintly and offered no further explanation on the subject.

From the very beginning, he had known that the "new order" he was building was destined to harbor hidden dangers, and that his transformation of this world was destined to be incomplete.

Not only because tradition and inertia would obstruct change, but because the people's level of awareness and the actual laws of productive development limited change. He could not forcibly forge a perfect social order when the foundations of society fell utterly short of the standard—even if he did, it would be only a fleeting utopia, and such a utopia, which must in the end compromise with the productive forces, could not withstand the Magic Tide.

He could only push this society forward as far as possible on the foundation of existing productive forces—to the utmost limit, as far as it would go—and in the process he had to permit those hidden dangers and flaws to exist. In fact, one of the greatest flaws in this new order came from himself: to ensure the new order did not spin out of control, to ensure social development operated at peak efficiency, and to ensure that Cecil would stand indestructible when facing the Magic Tide in the future, he had to guarantee the maximum concentration of power. He had to concentrate the greatest power in his own hands—or rather, in the hands of the Administrative Hall he controlled. And that was a hidden danger.

This hidden danger would not erupt in his lifetime, nor perhaps within one or two generations after his death (assuming his strange state of life truly had a lifespan limit), but sooner or later it would erupt.

So from the very beginning, Gaoyang had arranged for his "new order" a parallel "path of correction"—the "magitech power" that could be wholly controlled by mortals.

He remembered a saying from his past life: society develops in a spiral. Whether that saying was absolutely correct he did not know, but it had at least some truth to it. Yet in this world where extraordinary power existed, society could not even manage a spiral—once extraordinary power took shape, it would almost permanently petrify the social structure. The lower classes would not have even a ten-thousandth of the capacity to resist, so that even if the upper classes became deformed and corrupt to the extreme, society would still sink onward in darkness. And "magitech" was the fierce beast Gaoyang had bred and tamed to break that deadlock.

Perhaps he could not establish the most advanced social order in one step, because that would be a castle in the air—but he could give ordinary people of later generations the ability to overturn the table.

From the very beginning, the "Cecil New Order" had never been his greatest achievement. "Extraordinary power returned to mortals" was.

The former allowed him to build the Cecil Empire; the latter allowed ordinary people to overthrow the Cecil Empire.

Yet the things involved were too complex and too shocking—it seemed even the most carefree Amber would be frightened—so he could not go on explaining.

So he simply patted the somewhat dazed half-elf girl on the shoulder: "Let's go. We'll talk to Pi Yun first."

……

Frostrest, the Silver Fortress.

The study where Francis II had once bent over his desk was now cleared out.

Virodai??Moen stepped into this place that fire had once devoured. Everything burned had been carried away, yet across the bare stone walls and floor, great swaths of smoke and scorch marks remained.

Holy light drifted through the air, scattering the dust and lingering ash. Clad in the white robe of a goddess's priestess, Virodai came to where the desk had once stood and lowered her head, as though she could still see the old king lift his gaze from behind it and smile at her.

"What a pity..." the holy maiden princess said in a voice only she could hear. "You did well enough..."

Footsteps sounded behind her. Virodai turned and saw Wales??Moen—the elder brother nearly twenty years her senior—standing in the doorway, casting her a puzzled look: "You're not at the church today?"

"Today is the day I return to the castle," Virodai lowered her head slightly. "Father always met me here on such days."

A flicker of sorrow surfaced in Wales??Moen's expression. He glanced at his sister standing at the center of the study and shook his head slightly: "Everything has been burned or carried out."

"I know," Virodai said softly, walking slowly toward the study door. As she passed Wales, she asked, "You've already gone to war with Edmund, haven't you?"

"It is the royal house that has gone to war with the Eastern rebels."

"You represent the royal house now, my brother."

"...Yes, I have gone to war with Edmund," Wales??Moen said, looking at his formidably clever sister. He had never been able to fathom what went on in her mind—not when she was small, and even less so now. "Does this concern the Radiant Star Church?"

"The church only carries out the Lord's will and does not meddle in royal authority," Virodai shook her head. "I only wished to warn you, as family, that troubling news has been coming from the south of late."

"...Bedrock Keep has sent some intelligence, but Duke Baiyu believes the Eastern rebels pose the greater threat."

"...Perhaps that is so," Virodai said, meeting Wales's eyes. Suddenly she shook her head gently. "I am only warning you. That founding ancestor of yours is not as safe as you imagine. He has loosed a savage beast—you would do well not to wait until it has grown."

Virodai walked away, and the comforting warm radiance in the air slowly faded. In the study, once more empty, Wales??Moen still gazed in the direction she had gone.

Only after a long while did he shake his head: "What good would my words do?"

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