Chapter 305: Prisoner's Dilemma
"But it's hard to say for sure. Just because I can't think of it doesn't mean others can't achieve it. The United States has already transformed many Spirit Arts into Spirit Energy technology products. Even ordinary people, after donning a set of their manufactured power armor, possess high-level second-tier combat power," Mu Si continued.
Though each nation forged its own path, after the Huaxia Federation introduced a combat power ranking that transcended system limitations, this simple and clear numerical grading system quickly became widespread.
Matters concerning national security like this were not left to others by the major powers; they directly copied the original system. Referencing Huaxia's assessment methods, other nations also successively developed their own evaluation systems.
"I know."
"Though they're called high-level second-tier, in a life-or-death battle, our intermediate mages could easily take on ten of them. They possess formidable power but lack the processing speed to match that armor. I've assassinated too many people like that; by the time my sword pierced them, they hadn't even reacted."
"They are soldiers; discussing one-on-one combat holds little meaning."
Although Bai Mo's avatar hadn't participated in this particular research in the United States, he could discern from some relatively less classified reports that this power armor was designed for ordinary soldiers, transforming each one into a heavy fire-support bastion capable of crushing enemy ground forces on the front lines.
Once they achieved considerable scale, tearing a hole through their formations amidst overwhelming firepower would be no easy feat. Soldiers equipped with single-person Spirit Energy cannons and heavy machine guns were definitely at the upper echelons of second-tier combat power in terms of firepower output.
"I'm leaving." Having achieved his primary objective for this visit, he had no mind to waste any more time, and re-emerged from the psychic blockade.
He smiled and shook his head, saying nothing, simply letting his avatar quietly vanish outside the subspace.
The Spirit Qi era was about to enter its eleventh year. After the advent of Spirit Qi, the world's two poles ultimately diverged into two vastly different directions, each according to its unique national circumstances.
The United States, which had always held a leading position in scientific research, chose to validate its path through science, which best leveraged its strengths. It vigorously developed various Spirit Energy technologies, preparing for the interstellar age of the next decade, without dedicating much thought to exploring individual cultivation paths.
In the eyes of most of them, the concept of cultivation was quite idealistic, a mad plunder of the world's non-renewable resources that would ultimately lead to a decline in the primal force level, a method only barbarians would choose.
As a civilized race, their pursuit should be to analyze everything, know everything, and use genuinely clear knowledge to strengthen themselves, rather than relying on those vague and abstruse "insights."
Over the past decade, the middle and lower strata of the entire United States were immersed in this ideology. Especially after the Color Revolution, their sense of superiority grew even stronger. Media outlets in society portrayed that only "ancient monkeys" would engage in so-called "cultivation," asserting that as the locomotive of human civilization, they should view everything through a scientific lens.
There were even numerous propaganda videos that juxtaposed clips of people heating Spirit Stones to absorb Spirit Qi with scenes of people smoking opium from over a hundred years ago.
It was precisely through this value-outputting propaganda that the American populace developed a tremendous sense of superiority towards other nations that pursued resource-intensive individual cultivation paths.
Due to the widespread contempt among the populace for what they called "ancient monkey cultivation," the consumption of related cultivation resources among the American public was not high. The vast majority of these resources ultimately converged into the hands of the major financial groups, allowing them to have extremely abundant resources to continuously enhance their own power through resource-intensive cultivation.
What the wealthy craved even more was an eternal class, a system where the strong would always remain strong. Thus, they collectively and consciously orchestrated this grand drama, perhaps spanning two generations, making the populace believe to their very core that scientific research was the righteous path, and that those who cultivated and plundered for power were heretics.
Because those who possessed power were difficult to control and could overturn the table at any moment, while researchers with only knowledge, if lacking the financial support of the conglomerates, would find all their plans amounted to nothing more than empty talk.
Therefore, in comics, stories constantly emerged illustrating how power only infinitely magnified responsibility while pain remained unavoidable, leading more people to believe that the existence of powerful mutants wasn't actually something to envy.
As long as this ideology persisted for twenty to thirty years, an eternal class, centered around the major financial groups and simultaneously possessing absolute individual power and immense wealth, would fully form.
By that time, whether it be so-called mad scientists or the various opposition groups born from the awakening of the lower populace, caught in the pincer attack of power and wealth, they would all be utterly annihilated.
Of course, all of this was thanks to the democratic atmosphere that had prevailed in the United States for centuries. Even those whose combat power stood at the pinnacle domestically did not challenge tradition or seize power by force to become dictators. Even the former President Joseph Lee, who once harbored thoughts of becoming a dictator, ultimately abandoned the idea of a forceful restructuring under the persuasion of his friends and chose to step down at the end of his presidential term.
Naturally, this point was also repeatedly emphasized in countless American comics—the result of power being unrelated to politics. In these comics, even existences unrivaled under heaven almost never seized political power through military might.
However, this was fundamentally different from Huaxia, with its millennia of imperial history. In Huaxia, from the lowest to the highest echelons, the vast majority of people harbored dreams of becoming emperor. For them, a great dictator ruling all under heaven was the romance of the strong; the saying "Waking, one commands the world's power; drunk, one reclines on a beauty's lap" had been sung for countless years.
It was precisely because of such values that, in the decade following the advent of Spirit Qi, the upper echelons of Huaxia experienced extraordinarily intense reshuffling. Every individual confident in their sufficient power harbored great ambitions, desiring to acquire authority commensurate with their strength, leading to several political upheavals. Ultimately, it was through the compromise of several giants who dominated the world that the current tripartite system was formed.
Naturally, in the Huaxia Federation, there couldn't be just one voice. There were also many who agreed with the scientific path, believing it to be humanity's future. They attempted to implement their ideas, but unfortunately, they garnered little support.
In direct contrast to the United States, Huaxia's mainstream ideology held that power was the answer to everything. If one could rapidly gain immense power by consuming vast resources, why should they support a scientific path that was slow to yield results and required greater investment?
If I invest resources into scientific research, while others invest resources into themselves, it's highly probable I'd be utterly defeated before any research bore fruit. This is a Prisoner's Dilemma.
Ultimately, the vast majority of people are selfish. Investing fifty units of resources into oneself yields a fifty-point increase in power, while investing fifty units of resources into research yields a ten-point increase in power for everyone. Everyone inherently knew which option to choose..
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