Chapter 524: Efficiency
"Were those His exact words?" In the Great Wei Dynasty's Grand Capital, within the Jin Xiu Mountain Villa, Shang Lin Yizheng, the head of the Shang Lin Family, sat in a rocking chair, his eyes narrowed as he listened to the secret report from his subordinate.
"Yes, Master." The black-clad figure, kneeling before him, kept his head deeply bowed, not daring to show the slightest hint of presumption.
As one of the Four Great Clans, and the one most stringent regarding etiquette and hierarchy, dozens of corpses bearing expressions of terror would be added to the Buried Bone Peak behind the Shang Lin Family's estate each year.
...
The assassination had failed. The Hidden Dragon Guard, rescued from Hanluo City by the Four-Faced Daoist Star Torch, had secretly returned to the Grand Capital bearing its oral decree.
Shang Lin Yizheng, who had been closely monitoring developments, received the news immediately through his spies in the imperial palace.
Where there were people, there was rivalry. Between the Four Great Clans, whose strengths were not starkly disparate, mutual infiltration and espionage were an open secret.
Even though the Duan Family had slightly overshadowed the other three over the past two centuries, becoming the so-called Imperial Clan, this fact remained unchanged.
"I didn't expect even the main force of the Hidden Dragon Guard to fail, forcing that fellow to personally intervene and rescue them. The Xuanxuan Family certainly swallowed a bitter pill, losing the genius Xu Xuanling.
The Wilderness Evil and the Heavenly Fiends from Beyond are not easy to deal with."
While it was indeed good news that an old rival had lost a major asset, the current era saw the manifestation of Origin Seeds, with evil rampant. The Four Great Clans were struggling to cope, and there were external visitors of unknown strength lurking, creating a complex array of pressures that left Shang Lin Yizheng's mood quite conflicted.
"However, these Heavenly Fiends from Beyond don't seem to be a monolith internally... this organization of fiends called the God-Slaying Alliance might be exploitable, though they are a reclusive bunch." After dismissing his subordinate, he pulled a strip of cloth from his pocket.
Compared to the Flame Alliance, which sought opportunities through collective descent, the actions of the God-Slaying Alliance, another major organization on the Ark, were far more audacious.
They first subtly displayed their strength to Shang Lin Yizheng, proving a basis for negotiation and fair trade, then began systematically exchanging knowledge and intelligence from Earth for cultivation methods and resources from the Manghuang Realm.
"'Titanium Extreme Golden Body,' 'Fusion Divine Art'... the naming conventions for these foreign cultivation methods are truly strange.
While there's still much room for optimization, they are certainly eye-opening."
The cultivation methods from Earth, in terms of completeness, naturally couldn't compare to the fundamental inheritances of the Manghuang Realm, which had been refined and perfected over thousands of years.
However, some parts, integrating modern scientific concepts, were refreshing even for this old man who had lived for nearly three millennia.
"They call the primordial substance that constitutes the world 'atoms,' and within these primordial substances, there are even smaller entities. By manipulating them, one can unleash world-destroying power—is this the principle behind the 'Fusion Divine Art'?"
Shang Lin Yizheng continuously simulated the scenes described in the cultivation method within his mind. His white eyebrows alternately furrowed and slowly relaxed, as he meticulously pondered every word of the "Fusion Divine Art."
...
"Are we playing with fire?" Outside the Grand Capital, two dark figures whispered to each other.
"In such a backward world, those who can cultivate to the peak of the Six Tiers are truly dragons among men. All they lack is a modern scientific perspective. Is it really a good idea to provide them with these things...?"
"The peak of the Six Tiers, in the eyes of those two up in the heavens, are nothing more than slightly larger bugs. Killing them just takes a few more presses. My only worry is that if we don't stir up enough trouble, we won't be able to complete the Alliance Master's mission."
"Does the Alliance Master hate that person so much that he's willing to fatten up the natives just to cause him trouble?"
"Do you think everyone is a wanderer like you, without any attachments? The Alliance Master is the heir to a multinational corporation. Most of his family's generational wealth, accumulated over centuries, was left on Earth, not to mention the core technologies vital for their family's survival, all forcibly copied. If it were you, wouldn't you hate it?"
"People can leave, but money stays behind. That's classic bandit logic, nothing wrong with it, at least it's straightforward. They said they wanted money, and they only wanted money, not lives.
But as a wanderer, I believe that what goes around comes around.
The Alliance Master's family's properties and companies, in the end, were gained by exploiting and plundering others through capital. Those who plunder will be plundered in turn. It's just a matter of winners and losers."
The black-clad man, who called himself a wanderer, made no secret of mocking the organization's leader. He had always been a person of uninhibited freedom, otherwise, he wouldn't have chosen the path of the Ark.
"Enough talk, drink!" His comrade, worried he was getting too carried away, promptly pulled out some liquor to shut him up.
"Tastes quite a lot like vodka. I didn't expect such strong liquor to be distilled in this godforsaken place."
"If there are powerhouses capable of hand-crafting nukes, making strong liquor is a small matter."
"Cheers! Drink the fiercest wine, and tame the wildest beasts!" After two gulps of the potent liquor, the wanderer was already babbling incoherently. His drinking manners had always been poor.
...
"It's truly strange. The entire society seems sluggish, yet its efficiency doesn't appear low." Lu Yuesheng spent several days exploring Hanluo City, which was undergoing massive transformations, step by step.
She was far too curious about the civilization Bai Mo had described, finding it hard to imagine humanity reaching such a point in less than thirty years.
With a semi-rationing system in place, commerce had almost entirely lost its meaning.
Gone were the countless salesmen and promoters who, in her memory, were indispensable to almost every company. Only a scattered few warehouse managers remained, responsible for organizing and tidying the ration warehouses.
They didn't even need to watch if those coming to collect goods were clean-handed or took too much, because the System itself was the light that illuminated all darkness.
The once immense entertainment and sports industries of modern society had here become personal hobbies for most people outside of their six-hour workdays.
The uniform societal income level and restrictions on personal assets had completely extinguished the fire of desire for money.
The price humanity paid was a rapid decline in the desire to work.
Without the motivation of money, besides pursuing their hobbies, few people were willing to work desperately; completing the System's tasks to merely pass with sixty points was enough.
"With our modern industrial productivity, perhaps only two to three-tenths of the population truly responsible for production and manufacturing, working with advanced machinery, would be sufficient to produce enough resources to sustain the entire society.
The work and busyness of most remaining people are actually just for earning money, and perhaps not essential for the existence and operation of society.
A very important reason why the Land of White can be sustained is precisely by leveraging this fact." She finally wrote this passage in her notebook.
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