Chapter 568 — The Meeting
Blade of Dawn · Page 1 of 4
Xuanyao City, inside the lord's manor.
Gao Yang sat behind the broad desk, Hetty standing quietly at his side, and before the two of them a crisp holographic projection hovered above the arcane-net terminal in the study.
A sweetly smiling girl stood at the center of the projection; on the table before her rested an odd device shaped like a low side table, propped up on four legs with a flat surface on top, and on that surface a frying pan of hot oil in which cutlets and slices of bread sizzled cheerfully.
From somewhere off-screen a cheerful voice-over rang out: "...the Arcane Heating Plate, the finest replacement for the traditional stove — no firewood, no open flame, cutting your cooking costs and sparing you all the trouble of cleaning... Kode HomeServe Company, always at your service. Magic, for a more convenient life..."
The short video ended in moments. Hetty waited until the picture switched back to the previous program before breaking the silence with a note of admiration. "That was the latest advertisement from Kode HomeServe. Ancestor, you truly were not mistaken back then — that merchant, Kode... he really does have a gift other people lack... Ancestor? Ancestor, what's wrong?"
Gao Yang was still staring fixedly at the image on the holographic projection, and even after the program ended his gaze had not shifted; an odd expression lingered on his face. This was so unlike him that Hetty grew deeply uneasy, and it was only after she had called his name three times in a row that Gao Yang started as though waking from a dream. "Ah — I was woolgathering."
"Ancestor, are you... truly all right?" Hetty could not help asking with concern, for the look on Gao Yang's face just now had been nothing like his usual self. On that countenance, always so composed and commanding, she thought she had glimpsed a trace of... sorrow.
Yet it was not sorrow either, for mingled into it were unmistakable gladness and joy.
"I'm fine, only a little moved..." Gao Yang saw Hetty's anxious expression and smiled to reassure her. "Seeing things like this spring up among the common folk on their own, I feel that all my pushing has not been in vain after all."
Bringing advanced ideas and magitech into this age was no easy task; Gao Yang had known that from the very start. But what he had always feared was never the "difficulty" of the process. What he feared most was that all his promotion and construction would be "a one-way pile-up," that this society truly lacked any foundation for change, that it was not ready to face a new era — magitech seemed to advance at breakneck speed, the Duchy of Cecil seemed to be rising swiftly, yet he had never once dared let out his breath, for he dreaded that one day, should he, the so-called "guide," fall, the development of this land would grind to a halt, or even... slide backwards.
Even now he could not be entirely certain whether the Duchy of Cecil would keep developing after his sudden collapse, but of one thing at least he was sure: this pool of stagnant water had begun to flow.
Or perhaps it had never been stagnant at all. Even in the darkest, most oppressive of the Middle Ages, deep within that pool... there had always been a small band of people waiting for the age when the waters would move.
Composing himself, Gao Yang suddenly felt that his earlier worries had been rather arrogant, and he could not help shaking his head in self-mockery. "Hetty, don't you think... that I'm a bit full of myself?"
"Full of yourself? How could you think that?" Hetty's eyes went wide with surprise. "Your greatness is acknowledged by history, and your achievements stand solidly upon this land. Compared with those achievements, I would say you are ordinarily far too modest... A run-of-the-mill baron will carve his dull little life into stone, yet you have refused to this day to let anyone make a statue of you."