Chapter 1171
Then why don’t I just become a Lord?
When Sherlock heard the Eye Demon’s words earlier, he subconsciously assumed that the number of slaves in the city was three times the number of free people. Perhaps there were also the Lord’s own slaves, but not many more.
But this ratio of free people to slaves was too strange!
In other cities, this ratio generally did not exceed one to four.
And in Heaven City, this ratio was an astonishing one to three hundred!
Rather than calling them “free people,” they were more like “nobles”!
“So that’s how it is…”
Eivass commented sharply, “He’s probably invented feudalism.”
If the treatment of free people was good enough, then all that was needed was to reduce the number of free people.
“But there are so many slaves,” Lily, hidden in Eivass’s shadow, couldn’t help but ask, “If they secretly eat a little food, you can’t control that, can you?”
“We can control it, Miss.”
Although the voice’s origin was unclear, the Eye Demon obediently provided an answer. Clearly, Lily was not the first to ask such a question. “That food has exceptionally bright colors, and these colors cannot be digested or erased. If those lowly people dare to eat these free biscuits, free meat, and free drinks, their feces will have color.
“All the toilets used by the slaves are fixed, and defecating outside of the toilet is a capital offense. Every day, Adler sends people to inspect the toilets. If colored feces are detected, all slaves who use that toilet will be executed together, unless the head of the thief is presented before the inspector arrives.
“The slaves must find and kill the offender with their bare hands, and the inspector will use the colored feces as a medium for a curse. If no one dies as a result, the matter will be concluded—if the curse is effective, then the slaves who used that toilet will still be executed together, so impersonating someone is also impossible.”
This felt more like it.
Eivass breathed a sigh of relief and nodded.
Hearing such cruel punishments, Eivass immediately felt that the style was back—this was the style of the Ancient Kingdom of Anxi.
No wonder the Eye Demon had just said “Adler gave us color,” this was what it meant.
Thank heavens. Eivass had just thought he had mistakenly wronged a good person.
“But with so many slaves…”
Lixia frowned, “Where do they usually live? The slums?”
“Underground, my lord. That’s how the city stays clean.”
“The unregistered slaves have other things to do. Only for them, serving a free person and living under the sun is a better life, and they will loyally serve their master.”
The two Eye Demons answered in succession.
“What specific work?”
Lixia pressed.
To this, the Eye Demons could not provide an answer.
It was not out of secrecy, but because they genuinely did not know or care about these matters.
“Underground…”
Sherlock, however, slowly savored the word and looked around thoughtfully, “Eivass, I remember you said… Anxi’s desert is blood-sucking, right?”
“Are you referring to the alchemy stone slabs?”
Although Sherlock’s words were disjointed, Eivass instantly guessed his meaning. “Did the Lord of Heaven City buy stone slabs from Rock Cell City?”
“That makes sense, my friend.”
In front of outsiders, Sherlock did not call Eivass “Fox.”
He said calmly, “Rock Cell City, as a border town with no special products and insufficient production capacity, was able to purchase so many alchemy stone slabs and build underground channels of this scale. Why do you think that is? Where did the money of the Lord of Rock Cell City come from?
“They didn’t even capture slaves who escaped from the city, and they actively built underground passages that might facilitate their escape, only maintaining oversight. Why do you think that is?”
“The former… naturally, it’s to resell the stone slabs to Adler at a high price. As for the latter, it’s a fallback for that Lord… If he sensed the killing intent from his incomparably powerful partner, he would likely swap identities with a slave and escape through the underground passages.”
Eivass glanced at the troll wizard who was constantly chanting painfully, “Praise the generous Adler, praise the benevolent Adler,” then turned to walk into the room, saying softly as he did, “If a person neither has a job nor parents to support them, yet inexplicably has endless money… it’s highly likely that their funds are illegitimate.”
Hearing this, Sherlock smiled with relief.
He knew that Eivass had finally understood.
Since the merchants traveled to Anxi, they naturally intended to do business there.
Therefore, their trade routes and convoys could not stop at Rock Cell City, the entrance. Because Rock Cell City, a small town with only a few hundred people, could not possibly have enough purchasing power to buy out all the products here.
But if the merchants could go deep into the Ancient Kingdom of Anxi, how could they not bring back any information from the interior?
There was only one answer.
That is, most of the merchants stopped at Rock Cell City.
Rock Cell City certainly didn’t have enough money to buy all their goods, but Heaven City did.
Heaven City gave Rock Cell City money to purchase goods and then hand them over. Because the caravans had already bought everything, they only needed to exaggerate the subsequent dangers to drive away these merchants.
And any city-states that intended to attack Rock Cell City would be defeated by the powerful Heaven City. Therefore, Rock Cell City, as a key choke point city, the necessary route for Star Antinomy to reach Anxi, had such weak defenses… because they were themselves subordinate city-states under the long-arm jurisdiction of Heaven City!
Heaven City was cutting off supplies to other city-states from the land route in this manner.
As a result, only the Goblin Merchant Guild, which could bypass to the south of the desert, could sell goods to other city-states. The greed of the goblins allowed them to drain all the resources of other city-states. Heaven City obtained a continuous supply of cheap goods, thus gaining an advantage in trade and war with other city-states.
Now, Heaven City has suddenly turned its back and attacked Rock Cell City, directly destroying this city… there are only two possibilities.
Either Rock Cell City was too greedy, taking too much commission from the trade and meddling too much, and Heaven City could no longer tolerate it. Therefore, they intended to destroy it and replace it with their own people to manage this trade.
Or, Heaven City was too greedy… and no longer needed partners who were not completely obedient.
Regardless of the reason, it all indicated one thing:
They felt that the time had come and they intended to unify Anxi.
That’s why they intended to sell this great ritual, which could easily destroy cities, to outsiders in exchange for a large amount of funds and complete control over this gateway.
The reason those three Ritualists were waiting here was not to guard this troll wizard…
Their essence was that of “real estate agents.”
Although the three Ritualists were waiting here in advance, they had not prepared any trap-like ritual spells—otherwise, even Eivass would have been in a bit of a pickle. After all, Ritualists were a profession that relied on long preparation times to defeat the strong with the weak.
This showed that their purpose was not to “kill all outsiders and prevent the ritual from being stopped.”
This troll wizard was already nearing his end. Even if Eivass and the others didn’t come… in at most two or three more days, as the troll wizard naturally died, this petrifying wave that constantly solidified everything would have ended.
At that time, the number of visitors would increase. And these three Ritualists would engage in business negotiations with those interested—after all, the Lord of Rock Cell City had handled negotiations with foreigners before, and this was Rock Cell City’s secret to self-preservation. For them to forcefully take over, they would need to establish contact with people again.
What “Adler’s great achievement” was, was also simple…
For a divided Anxi, “unifying Anxi” was the only great achievement that the Anxi people could recognize.
Each city-state had different laws, and each city-state had its own Lord. Each free person who adapted to their own city-state’s way of life hoped to assimilate other city-states according to their own way of life.
When one city-state defeated another, if the opposing free people could not pay to redeem themselves, they would be demoted to slavery. Their way of life and rules would be replaced, and the original free people of the city could migrate to the new city-state.
Although the Lords would still be retained for water production, they would be demoted by three ranks to “governors” and would lose their privileges and the right to make rules. If a Lord accidentally died, the city would be directly abandoned, and everyone would migrate to a city protected by a Lord.
If their own Lord could unify Anxi, then they would live in the capital as “nobles,” a level even higher than free people.
For the free people of Heaven City, they naturally hoped that Adler could unify Anxi, thus saving everyone.
Let everyone live a happy life with unlimited food, water, no disputes, and no conflicts!
Of course, slaves were not considered people.
Even the slaves themselves did not consider themselves human.
They would rather go to other Lords or other cities than leave the desert as humans.
“Young Master…”
Far from the crowd, Lily’s voice sounded softly, “Why are the Anxi people… so strange?”
She wanted to help these people, but she didn’t know where to start. She felt that everything was so natural and self-perpetuating. Any outside interference would only make the Anxi people uncomfortable.
Eivass did not answer her, but continued to walk deeper.
The crow on Eivass’s shoulder said coldly, “Because they have no choice, Lily. Without a Lord, everyone will die. The root of the problem is that this desert should not have had living people in the first place—this is not a place for humans to live. From their ancestors, all of them were wrong.
“It’s like a group of people who mastered the ability to make others breathe and live underwater, so they took a group of people to the seabed to survive among the ruins of Atlantean civilization. They naturally possessed the power to control everyone, and anyone who disobeyed them would be deprived of the right to breathe. Because their ancestors had sold this power… the power to control their descendants, generation after generation, to their rulers.”
“And it’s not possible for them to return to land either. Although they entered the seabed from other countries back then, if they were to come ashore now, they would occupy the land of other countries.”
Eivass said softly, “The people of other countries would not allow these strangers to enter their territory inexplicably—if they were forced to agree, it would just be a change of oppressors.”
The problems facing Anxi were extremely difficult to solve.
Fundamentally, it was difficult to treat the root cause—should he directly say that their choice to live here was wrong?
They thought this was just an ordinary desert, and with the power of the Lord, they could permanently transform the desert into an oasis… but that was not the case.
Sin Thorns were rampant underground here… It was very abnormal for the Material Realm to have so many Sin Thorns. It was likely that the underground here was the umbilical cord connecting the Material Realm and the Dream Realm, much like the Fey Realm.
So if it was wrong, what should be done? Should they kill them all?
“Then what should we do?”
Lily felt confused.
It was a feeling of powerlessness that was difficult to describe.
“It’s very simple,” Eivass replied, “Although the existence of ‘Lords’ cannot be erased, the problem is not here. It lies in the fact that the Lords chose to monopolize the ability to become a Lord hereditarily.”
“Hahahaha…”
Hearing this, Viness let out a joyful laugh.
She had already understood what Eivass was going to do.
She seemed to have returned to the days when she had first met Eivass, and was amazed every day by Eivass’s bold and bizarre ideas.
Eivass continued to walk towards the Lord’s room, saying slowly, “I indeed cannot become a Lord, because I lack the Adaptability of the Twilight Path… No, to be precise, I should have it. But for some reason, the power of the ‘King of the Wild Hunt’ that I obtained from the Ascension Ritual has never been usable.
“But if it’s just about communicating with an Abyss Heavenly Envoy… even I, as a Cardinal, can do this.
“And if it’s just about producing infinite water—Sherlock can also do this.”
“In that case…”
Eivass walked into the Lord’s bedroom.
The Lord of Rock Cell City was a tall, extremely fat man.
His appearance was not ugly, and he could even be considered handsome—this was due to the excellent genes inherited from generations. He was fair-skinned, with not much excess fat elsewhere, and was relatively strong, except for his abnormally large belly, which looked like a pregnant woman’s.
He was holding his wife, who had a young appearance, and chattering excitedly. His face was etched with a mocking smile, and his five wives were also surrounding him, either lying or kneeling, serving him on the huge bed, their faces also showing similar smiles, whether genuine or flattering.
Eivass gazed at the Lord and said softly, “Since the Anxi people are only willing to obey the rules of the Lord, only acknowledge that the Lord can rule them, control their fate, and change their way of life…
“—Then why don’t we just become the Lords?”
