Cthulhu Gonfalon

Chapter 829: Vol V Chapter 189

A Chinese saying states that the core of a country is in its hustle and bustle.

This phrase originated from the ancient Chinese classic "Zuo Zhuan, which discussed the two important pillars of governing a country—sacrifices and war. The extract in which this quote was taken from was in the context of about 572BC, where Lu Chenggong, Liu Kanggong and Cheng Sugong worked together to help Jin Ligong attack Thailand. While presenting offerings, Cheng Sugong was not earnest enough, and Liu Kanggong had admonished him.

In this record, "sacrifice" did not just include religious sacrifice but also that of culture and education. Faith, culture, education, war… In the olden, traditional days, they were indeed the most important things to a country as they are now.

This applied to almost every other world.

Sui Xiong had uttered this phrase casually but did not really remember where it came from. He remembered it from a game where a character's virtual background was decorated by these Chinese characters. That character was called Confucius, and he was a virtuous and warm intellectual. Actually, there was an issue with the creation of this character as religion was slowly separated from religion, where Confucius was the one who had spearheaded such change. Of course, Sui Xiong was unaware of this, and he only remembered this phrase which sounded wise.

In this world, the divide between education and religion was not clear. Not many scholars were independent of religion, and some aristocratic families had many illiterates. To call the entire world an educational desert was not even an exaggeration.

Because of that, Sui Xiong's creation of a technical school and Wall's promotion of stationery became extremely popular. Wall was even able to use his achievements in developing culture and education to become a real god. Within a short period of time, Wall even managed to rise to a mid-level Divine Power. The people of this world had craved education for too long.

The Republic of Northwest promoted education best in this world, and there were virtually no more illiterates left in the country. Even the poor who could not afford to study in the day visited the Church of Void Mask and the Church of Knowledge's combined Literacy Evening School to attend free classes. Within a year or so, they were able to recognize a few hundred simple words and compose simple sentences. This level of literacy was considered under the tier of the low literacy of the common folk. However, if one were to consider the same level of literacy in the Orc Empire or other similar places, these peoples' limited knowledge would already be revered.

Within the Republic of Northwest's army, the educational level was even higher. The truth was that many families chose to send their newly legal children to conscript for three to five years as one could learn much in the army. The army was made up of the following: patrols and the national defense force. Both areas of the army recruited from the public, but the former was a temporary position while the latter was long-term.

Patrols typically consisted of the conscripted youths and their jobs mostly included patrolling the roads of the country, chasing thieves and maintaining order as well as helping out in disasters. Because of the good governance in the Republic of Northwest and the lack of natural disasters, these patrols mostly spent their time training and studying if they were not out on daily patrols.

On the other hand, the national defense force trained much harder than the patrols and often followed the Regiment of Knights on missions to fight dangerous Magic Beasts.

The Republic of Northwest was situated on the northwest side of the Main Plane, and previously, before it had been developed, the land had been the infamous, dangerous area known as Ashes Woods. Negative energy flowed greatly here, and all life was almost extinct, while Magic Beasts thrived. Once the sky turned dark, skeletons would run amok, and several Magic Beasts would rise as well. If one were to explain the situation in game terms, this area would receive five stars and above in terms of danger level.

Even with the establishment and development of the Republic of Northwest, the living areas of the citizens were often disturbed by the remaining skeletons as well as other Magic Beasts, which had not been affected by the Purification Array. Most of these Magic Beasts were fierce and dangerous, requiring troops to get rid of them before they could hurt the common folk.

Originally, the troops in charge of exterminating these Magic Beasts were personally led by "Red Flame Dragon" Jose, and they entered the various towns each day to clear the Magic Beasts they encountered. Afterwards, with the growth of the Republic of Northwest, the troops also got stronger, and now, each town had their own national defense force station. The troops at these stations trained daily under advanced legendary warriors and mages and headed out to exterminate Magic Beasts in their area once they received reports on them.

The entire Republic of Northwest was covered with detecting arrays of various sizes. With such arrays, people could discover the presence of Magic Beasts even when they were rather far away from the towns and villages. In the outer perimeter of every town and village, there were also many detecting structures in place to identify Magic Beasts. That could buy the national defense force some time to mobilize themselves before the Magic Beasts hurt the people.

With these measures and, most importantly, the bravery of the national defense force, the Magic Beasts had never successfully committed any atrocities within the nation even with its long history, and no village was ever destroyed. The truth was that once the national defense force was created, no Magic Beast was able to outsmart their defense and get close to the living areas. One could infer that the national defense force was sufficiently competent and could satisfy the needs of the people.

Even so, Commander-in-Chief Leonard was still dissatisfied. He felt that one could always improve, and a capable army, like excellent warriors, should never be stagnant nor complacent.

Once Leonard found out about the results of the northern army of the Commonwealth of Gold Coins, he immediately rushed over to watch their battle and even spied on their trainings. Afterwards, he reported his new knowledge to the leaders in the Republic of Northwest, and everyone was shocked. After some discussion, it was unanimously agreed that the troops needed increased training to reach a standard higher than that of the northern army of the Commonwealth of Gold Coins. In any case, the Republic of Northwest was already blessed with its resources and thus had no excuse to lag behind. They had the highest and most flexible army budget in the world, best military resources, most loyal, brave and educated soldiers as well as the highest proportion of patron saints. No matter how one looked at it, the national defense force had a better foundation to build upon as compared to the northern army of the Commonwealth of Gold Coins and could exceed them with proper training.

All they required was Sui Xiong's approval.

"I see…" After hearing Leonard's explanation, Sui Xiong began to understand the situation and nodded furiously.

"So… the preparations have already been put in place. No wonder today's meeting was so efficient!"

Leonard smiled. "Yes, everything is ready. You can just sit back, relax and watch things progress! It won't take long!"