"It's technology."
On Embassy Street in Dawn City, smartly dressed young men and women bustled to and fro along the avenue.
Occasionally, one could spot a glowing garment or two—undoubtedly holographic clothing from Ideal City—where even hair colors could be switched at will.
"Technology truly is wonderful..."
Gazing out the window toward the Ideal City Grand Hotel, Duke Garava gave a long sigh, before offering another abrupt lamentation.
"If only our Empire's technology were stronger, and the Human Alliance had left more of its heritage to my Empire... the subjects of my fief wouldn't have to eat dirt. What a sin."
Yesterday, Dawn City's Survivor Daily had reprinted Red Soil, and he had naturally seen it—though he had only read the reprinted prologue, The Story of L.
While that piece was largely intended to smear, he had to admit that White Elephant City indeed had plenty of lazy loafers who couldn't even afford beans.
Yet where were there no lazy bums?
Besides, the Survivor Daily was clearly an Alliance newspaper, yet it went out of its way to report on slackers thousands of kilometers away while turning a blind eye to the drunks in Boulder City whose families had been torn apart by alcoholism.
Looking at it that way, only the Dawn Garden Post, which dared to speak the truth, truly seemed to speak for the Alliance's millions of suffering survivors.
Yet lip service was a trifling matter after all. Duke Garava didn't really care about the slanders in the Survivor Daily; he had merely been struck with emotion at the mention of red soil.
If only they had the technology to produce nutrient paste.
He had heard that stuff could turn inedible things into food, and it sounded remarkably nutritious.
The more Duke Garava thought about it, the more he felt that General Rowell truly had been no good, having driven the cost of survival for Brahma Province's survivors far too low.
Farming required paying taxes, but eating dirt required none. The entire cycle from production to consumption required no involvement from nobles or their appointed administrators, and even if he wanted to intervene, he couldn't. That was simply unfair to those who actually farmed the land.
"...If Rowell hadn't come up with that red soil in the freezing snow all those years ago, and instead produced real technology—like something to make nutrient paste—our Empire wouldn't be in such an impoverished state today."
When he first heard Duke Garava sighing, Niyang's heart had skipped a beat, but hearing this, he breathed a sigh of relief.
This fellow had indeed read what he wrote, but fortunately not much of it.
A thousand readers held a thousand versions of Boer in their hearts; even Boer himself saw things differently when looking at his own life.
And his duke was as consistently obtuse as ever. This time, he had once again mistaken technology for red soil in the ground. He was probably still thinking that brute force could work wonders—that burying something in the dirt and digging around might yield technology.
Fooling this man was easy enough: just humoring him by burying a few relics from the Era of Prosperity and swinging a shovel according to the routine would probably be enough to keep him happy.
Niyang had already planned in his head how to spend this "charitable fund," but to his great disappointment, Duke Garava's next sentence caught him off guard. The man had actually shown a moment of wit for once, choosing not to leave professional matters to an amateur.
"I have arranged a meeting with Mr. Lister. Go receive him in a moment, and make sure our distinguished guest is not slighted."
Hearing the name Lister, Niyang found it familiar. After pondering for a long while, he suddenly remembered seeing it on an advertisement.
That man was quite the legendary figure. Starting out as a peddler flipping goods, he had ridden the coattails of the Bone Chewer Rebellion all the way to prominence, leaping into the ranks of Boulder City's most influential movers and shakers before pulling out unscathed prior to Boulder City's collapse.
Word had it that his personal fortune was immense enough to rival a nation, making him the richest man in Dawn City.
Niyang, however, felt that calling Lister the richest man was a bit of a stretch; the one attending the hearings was clearly held in higher regard by the Alliance.
Of course, that was hardly important anyway.
"Is Mr. Lister... the entrepreneur who manufactures exoskeletons and batteries?"
"Precisely," Duke Garava said casually, copying someone's mannerism by adding a splash of milk to his black tea. "I closely studied Boulder City's evolution. That merchant named Lister made a fortune from it, as did a steel magnate surnamed Sun. They are basically among the wealthiest people in the Alliance. Buying them off is far easier than bribing those vault dwellers, and much more effective."
Shocked that this buffoon had actually investigated Boulder City, Niyang cautiously asked, "Do you intend to have him set up factories in Brahma Province?"
"Exactly. I should have done this long ago. As a diplomat, I must achieve tangible results for the Empire." Duke Garava gave a faint smile, a spark of shrewdness gleaming in his eyes.
Niyang offered a cautious reminder.
"However, we lack nuclear fusion, nor do we have as many experts as Camp 101... How can we attract Lister to relocate?"
"That is actually simple," Duke Garava chuckled. "I made inquiries. In the beginning, the Alliance didn't have those things either, yet Lister's factory still managed to open. As for nuclear fusion, it merely comes down to the price of electricity. I shall simply waive his electricity fees entirely."
If he could move the Lister Factory to White Elephant City and have it churn out a few thousand exoskeletons for him, then perhaps His Majesty wouldn't even need to intervene—his private estate soldiers alone could beat the Alliance black and blue.
A delighted smile spread across Duke Garava's face, and he could hardly wait to visit the Alliance post office to send a telegram sharing this joyous revelation with His Majesty.
Niyang could scarcely keep up with his train of thought, but figuring it wouldn't hurt to let him run wild with his schemes, he bowed his head.
"Understood."
...
At sunny, breezy Golden Gallon Port, the rainy season was slowly drawing to an end, and today's weather was as pleasant as ever.
On the pier ringed by seagulls, a long, massive destroyer berthed at the shore. Several tall and burly Alliance soldiers—or rather, players—clad in exoskeletons disembarked.
Strictly speaking, they didn't have to wear them.
However, wearing such gear turned heads, and [Ling Chong] happened to love showing off.
Walking ahead of his teammates, [Shanhe Rumeng] glanced over at the pack of degenerates and said in a solemn voice, "We'll head to Camp Rowell to check in shortly, where someone will coordinate the mission briefing with us. Remember: not even if it rains, not even if goddamn artillery shells are raining down, do you set foot inside a local's home!"
As he delivered the final warning, Shanhe Rumeng gave Ling Chong a pointed glare.
The latter scratched his head awkwardly, while [Erliang Yueguang] and [Banben Chusheng] called out with vigorous enthusiasm:
"Roger that!"
"Understood!"
The powder keg of the Southern Sea could detonate at any moment.
Logically speaking, having been recalled to Baiyue Province to await orders, they shouldn't have come to Golden Gallon Port at this time. However, a certain blockhead had impulsively quit his job with a crowd of officers, forcing them to answer the request of the Golden Gallon Port authorities and return to train replacements for the militia corps.
Players' tactics weren't suited for NPCs, but combat experience translated anywhere.
Furthermore, through countless fearless brushes with death, the players of the Burning Corps had honed several tactics to absolute perfection.
For instance, the creeping barrage tactic using multiple artillery batteries to cover advancing infantry—players of the Burning Corps could practically charge right along the edge of flying shrapnel, treating 155mm howitzers like bayonets.
Or airborne operations behind enemy lines, hunting giant mutants, and so on.
The group traversed bustling Tulip Street, heading toward Camp Rowell.
Passersby constantly turned their eyes to salute these Alliance soldiers with reverent stares, while the players in their exoskeletons observed the locals along the street.
Golden Gallon Port's first coastal freight railway and first subway line running across the settlement had both officially opened to traffic. Although plenty of old buildings still lined the streets, the haphazardly stacked slum shacks had largely been replaced by higher-density "Alliance-style low-cost housing."
Wide roads were filled with streams of bicycles and hurrying pedestrians.
The streetlights that had once belonged solely to Tulip Street now extended along several main thoroughfares, and before long, they would likely cover the entire city.
Walking through this settlement gave off a distinct "cyber-Mumbai" vibe, especially since its most profitable industries were cotton textiles and dye works, bearing a genuine resemblance to Mumbai in the second half of the eighteenth century back in the real world.
Yet this place was far larger than Mumbai.
In Ling Chong's memory, Mumbai covered roughly four thousand square kilometers, whereas Golden Gallon Port, including its sprawling undeveloped outskirts, encompassed a full ten thousand square kilometers.
Moreover, Mumbai sat on India's west coast, akin to the position of West Sail Port in Brahma Province, whereas Golden Gallon Port lay on the east coast, bordering the mouth of the Everflowing River.
Of course, what felt most jarring—or rather, surreal—was the locals' peculiar verbal ticks.
Whether members of the lower class or high society, everyone spoke with an unmistakable "Alliance flavor."
Much like peppering Mandarin with English phrases, the locals loved lacing their native dialect with the players' distinct grammar and modal particles.
"...Damn it all, why does everyone here love greeting each other's mothers in every sentence?" Ling Chong grumbled, wondering whether the map loading program had glitched.
Erliang Yueguang shot him a subtle glance and coughed lightly.
"...I think you should reflect on how you normally talk."
Banben Chusheng nodded in agreement.
"+1. Expecting folks to pick up only the good habits without the bad is unrealistic. Eat grapes too fast, and you're bound to swallow some skin."
Ling Chong froze.
"Holy crap, how is this my fault?"
Erliang Yueguang shook his head.
"Tsk-tsk. See what I told you?"
Shanhe Rumeng chuckled and patted Ling Chong on the shoulder.
"Relax, it's no big deal... As long as you don't go into a local's house, everything else is minor."
"Fuck me, how long are you guys going to milk this stale meme?!" Ling Chong bared his teeth in frustration, completely helpless.
Then again, the evolution of local customs might genuinely have had something to do with the players.
The players' Human Alliance language was actually very different from the NPCs' version, resembling a form of translationese in its own right.
Aside from veteran top players who had played for a long time or powerhouses who had conversed deeply with NPCs, most players spoke a "piecemeal version."
That is, they picked up a few pronunciations from their VMs, and once they heard and used them enough, they stopped checking the translator. On one hand, the Human Alliance language was indeed exceptionally adaptable; otherwise, it could never have accommodated the diverse cultures of the old era. On the other hand, the game was so realistic that people couldn't help becoming immersed in it.
However, being able to use it and using it well were two different things. Even the few top players were only skilled in everyday conversation, having to rely on context whenever they encountered specialized terminology or cultural references they didn't understand.
As for the majority of ordinary players, they naturally did whatever was convenient.
So long as the key vocabulary was correct, NPCs could understand them even if they applied Chinese syntax.
Golden Gallon Port was essentially a settlement reshaped under the players' leadership. A series of progressive ideals, including equality, had been brought over by the players from the harmonious society of the real world.
Having enjoyed the benefits of modern civilization, both the rising burgher class and the adaptable old nobility of Golden Gallon Port had unconsciously aligned their habits with the Alliance's "iron men."
Under that subtle, ongoing influence, it culminated in today's result:
Namely, the iron men of the Burning Corps had "polluted" the locals' language with their broken Human Alliance vernacular.
It was just like Xiao Yu's habit of squawking "Fuck."
It was clearly just an expletive modal particle, yet the fast-learning creature had adopted it as a communication tool.
"Uh, analyzing it rationally, what you guys said makes sense, but it's not like I say 'damn it' and 'motherfucker' every single time... And why didn't this happen in Dawn City?"
Faced with his brother's bewildered stare, Erliang Yueguang held forth eloquently:
"Because the NPCs there primarily revere the Administrator, while revering you is just incidental—Xiao Yu is the classic example... Besides, Dawn City's player base is much more diverse. Take Miss Tengteng and Yaya, for instance. When have you ever heard them string curses together like you? They're civilized, just like me, alright!"
"Civilized, my ass," Ling Chong rolled his eyes.
Erliang Yueguang grinned mischievously.
"Heh, still better than someone who doesn't even spare kids."
"You motherf—!@#@%!" Ling Chong's face twisted with rage as he began cussing up a storm.
These bastards.
He had merely patted a kid's head by accident and later clarified the misunderstanding, yet the rumors had grown increasingly outrageous, to the point where everyone looked at him in disgust.
Watching Ling Chong fume, Shanhe Rumeng sighed, "There are too many hot-tempered guys in Golden Gallon Port. It'd be great if we could invite Yaya over."
At that moment, Banben Chusheng, who rarely spoke, suddenly gave a shiver and interjected:
"Better not... What if she comes here, thinks it's a cesspool of sleaze, and tags the trash dev on the forums demanding a vice crackdown?"
Three pairs of eyes snapped toward him simultaneously.
Shanhe Rumeng: "Say what?"
Erliang Yueguang: "Elaborate on this 'cesspool of sleaze.'"
Ling Chong: "Holy shit, I don't get it! Bro, hurry up and spill!"
Under their burning gazes, Banben Chusheng subtly shifted his eyes away and gave a gentle cough.
"Mission first... Paid content gets discussed offline."
Shanhe Rumeng: "..."
Ling Chong: "@#%@!"
...
The surnames of the Rat Clan had thirteen pronunciations, and Brahma Province happened to have thirteen states.
The state where Golden Gallon Port was located was called Rowell State, named naturally after Camp Rowell in Golden Gallon Port, and it was also the only state in Brahma Province "unrelated to animals."
Nashit State, where West Sail Port lay at the westernmost edge, meant Lion. Up from Rowell State on the easternmost edge lay Tiger State; to its left was Leopard State; further south was Snake; and to its right lay the Brahma Sea.
According to the widely circulating theory among local intellectuals, although the states borrowed animal names, what they actually worshipped—or rather sealed—were the deities behind those beasts.
Rowell was no beast, yet he was a totem buried deep within the heart of every survivor in Brahma Province, as well as the only "human god" outside the Thousand Pillars.
For every person was a "pillar"—in other words, a walking human pillar.
Or rather, a sacrifice.
Yet according to Ms. Han Mingyue's reading, there was an alternative explanation.
Two hundred years ago, Brahma Province had been a massive ecological reserve. Rowell State had been the sole scientific observation station and visitor rest stop at the time, while Tiger State was where tigers primarily roamed, Leopard State was where leopards lived, and so forth for different species of snakes, elephants, lions, cattle, wolves, and the like.
For a considerable period, those wild animals had served as food for the survivors back then. After hunting those wild creatures to near extinction, the locals, out of a sentiment of gratitude, sanctified them.
Combined with the influence of surviving Animal World video footage, this gradually evolved into the faith of the Thousand Clans and Thousand Gods.
The two explanations were simply two different perspectives: one peeled away layers from a spiritual standpoint, while the other was a purely rational deduction based on scientific evidence.
The difference between them was roughly that between an oil painting and a sketch—both depicting the same apple, yet entirely distinct.
At present, the northern region of Rowell State was entirely under the control of the Tiger Army, while the west and southwest fell under the Black Panther Army.
Both armies had effectively become warlords. Though they still drew military pay from the imperial court, they had long been estranged from the Empire in spirit.
The bond between them was maintained entirely by money.
The day the Empire stopped wiring funds, these warlords would drop the last shred of pretense.
In truth, thanks to the Empire's previous embargo on Golden Gallon Port and the counter-embargo measures enacted by the Baiyue Company, the two major warlords along the border had achieved "financial independence" long ago through smuggling.
And not just financial independence—productivity within their territories had surged as well.
This was not because the warlords possessed any governing prowess; quite the opposite, most officers knew nothing about administration and had no interest in it whatsoever, falling short of even the Empire's civil officials.
Precisely because of this, the officers adopted a completely laissez-faire economic approach, letting merchants from Golden Gallon Port and local nobles figure things out for themselves.
Whoever paid got the green light from these military lords. They even sided with those merchants against the administrators dispatched by the Empire, using their rifles to enforce buy-and-sell transactions in aristocratic estates.
Such brutish behavior was certainly far from ideal; it severely undermined the Empire's serf economy and tax revenues, and over the long haul, it would hurt the warlords themselves.
Yet these barbarians had stumbled into good timing, catching the dividend of Golden Gallon Port's boom by sheer fluke.
Productivity and development possessed regional spillover effects.
Golden Gallon Port's advanced productive forces moved against the flow of migration to some extent, feeding back into other parts of Rowell State, and even neighboring Tiger State and Leopard State.
After all, opening a dye works in Golden Gallon Port required paying workers a wage of 1,600 gallons.
Someone was bound to get ideas: moving purchased sewing machines and dye vats to places where labor was cheaper and beyond the Alliance's reach to set up small workshops, siphoning off a share of the supply chain's profits.
One could not scoff at those meager margins; a single workshop might not earn much, but a hundred workshops equaled a massive factory.
Furthermore, these "shopkeepers," distinct from factory owners, would also purchase machinery to boost their own productivity.
Rising productivity not only concentrated wealth, but also reshaped relationships between individuals and between factions.
Especially as more and more old nobles tasted the sweetness of increased output—and the bitterness of staring down rifle barrels—they, too, began pursuing greater productivity.
Previously, the Black Panther Army had relied on imperial appropriations for rations. Now, the tax revenue from the Banana Head Bay area alone was enough for the local general to feed his troops, and occasionally even hand out canned beef that Alliance soldiers had grown sick of as bonus perks.
Life was far cozier than when they were dogs for the Empire.
As for the chiliarch who had once held a gun to Axin's head, he now had to respectfully address Axin as "Master." After all, the latter had networked his way to the superior of the man's direct superior, having long outgrown the need to deal with a mere chiliarch.
Yet Axin hadn't held a grudge over the past. He had even politely pulled strings for him, elevating that arrogant officer to myriarch, arranging a marriage with the youngest daughter of a viscount in Leopard State, and purchasing a wedding residence for the couple on Tulip Street in Golden Gallon Port.
With wealth, status, rank, and a gorgeous young wife, that brute—who had been even more reckless than Laxi—naturally wept tears of gratitude, coming inches away from calling him "Father" instead of "Master."
Supported by this myriarch and other high-ranking officers in the Black Panther Army, the Assassin Gang's business grew larger and larger, virtually monopolizing all of Leopard State's cotton.
While Brahma Province's cotton lagged behind Baiyue Province in quality and output, it won on low cost and sheer volume, commanding a substantial market share in Golden Gallon Port.
Even though the ceasefire agreement was signed and smuggling no longer commanded exorbitant margins, they could still leverage established ports and currency exchange banks to conduct legitimate trade, racking up even larger profits than before.
Yet even though Golden Gallon Port's "radiating effect" had a significant impact on other areas of Rowell State, the pace of growth elsewhere could never match Golden Gallon Port itself, the sole import-export harbor on the eastern coast.
Currently, the ten thousand square kilometers under the Baiyue Company's control was merely one-fortieth of the entire state, yet thirty-nine fortieths of the state's wealth congregated in Golden Gallon Port.
If the distribution of interests between the Alliance and Golden Gallon Port was uneven, like the gap between silver coins and gallons, then the disparity between Golden Gallon Port and Rowell State—or even all of Brahma Province—was far more extreme.
The residents of Golden Gallon Port were already riding bicycles that moved like the wind, and children reading aloud in school had begun pondering humanity's place among mountains and rivers, and where people would stand many years from now. Yet in Tiger State and Leopard State, countless people still ate cakes baked from mud, forced to sell their sons and daughters just to stay alive.
Following The Story of L and Diary of a Mad Rat, Red Soil had finally reached its third installment, Soil, appearing on the verge of plunging into its bloody, gruesome core.
The Survivor Daily in Golden Gallon Port nearly sold out. People who had never heard of Red Soil read Soil and rushed back to purchase the earlier issues featuring L and the mad rat.
A few booksellers began contemplating compiling the serialized novellas into a single anthology so readers wouldn't have to clip them issue by issue from the paper.
They couldn't get in touch with Mr. Rat, but they received a letter sent from Port French Fries:
[Feel free to publish it. Just donate my share to the Union.]
This letter electrified many youths in Golden Gallon, as well as the members of the Union.
Mr. Rat was right beside them!
And he was watching over them!
A glimmer of dawn light seemed to crest over the horizon, painting the future in radiant hope.
Boulder City had only one copy of Awakened Boer, but they had millions.
Inspired by the Survivor Daily and Red Soil, the youth channeled their raw, even childish thoughts into poems, paintings, and songs, blending them into corners of Golden Gallon Port's bustling streetscapes.
Upon the underlying canvas of "the gods do not exist," people inscribed another tenet:
They needed to unite!
Just like the residents of Boulder City!
Even if people held tens of thousands of differing ideas, one conviction remained identical:
To uproot those thousand pillars!
And smash the old shackles to pieces!
And while a storm brewed in Golden Gallon Port, a certain hot-tempered, angry youth finally laid eyes upon the army he had yearned for.
They could hardly be called an army; they looked more like refugees or roving bandits, falling short of even what he had possessed when taking Camp Rowell back then.
At least back then, he and his daring men still possessed some hot blood and reckless courage.
Yet here was a mob of half-naked men clutching farm implements, hiding in a desolate valley of Tiger State where Tiger Clan power was deeply entrenched. They cleared barren ground where nobles couldn't oversee them, eking out an existence on the relief supplies their Moon Clan brethren smuggled through immense hardships, occasionally eating dirt, or causing trouble for nearby petty nobles.
After all, the Moon Clan had a sizable population, with no lack of handsome men and beautiful women. The nobles had invariably bought Moon Clan members as slaves or concubines, so raiding them under the banner of rescuing their kin was entirely justified.
Moreover, they only took people and grain without killing anyone, keeping trouble manageable, so petty nobles couldn't do much about them. High nobles viewed them as fleas and couldn't be bothered, using the disturbance to annex the petty nobles' lands and drive down property values.
As for the Tiger Army, their main forces were stationed along the Rowell State border, caring even less about them.
In these times, anyone with muscle focused on managing their own turf; who would bother wasting time helping the imperial court suppress bandits? If anything, they could use the Moon Clan as a pretext to squeeze more funds from the court.
Thus, the Moon Clan thought they had disguised themselves well, believing that posing as refugees fleeing the ravages of war could slip past the Tiger Army's notice, never imagining that even Axin all the way in Golden Gallon Port—a gang leader—could locate them with ease.
Everything was as pathetic as what he had read in the battle reports.
The Tiger Clan chiliarch who had escorted him here had even joked that if they met on the battlefield next time and didn't feel like fighting, they could just toss their gear on the ground and run—that way, everyone could make money together.
What a humiliating disgrace!
"Motherfucker..."
Looking at the youths lounging lazily along the ridges of the fields, Laxi cursed through gritted teeth. He drew his sidearm and pulled the trigger toward the sky.
*Bang!!*
The thunderous blast startled the Moon Clan laborers in the fields. Looking up, they saw a ferocious man flanked by a pack of demons at the edge of the field, looking ready to devour them alive.
Standing in the dirt, a middle-aged man stared dumbly at him, suddenly recognizing the face. His stunned expression twisted as though he had seen a ghost.
"La... Laxi?!"
Laxi didn't even spare him a glance. Reaching out, he seized a youth by the scruff of the neck, hoisting the scrawny boy out of the field like a chick and throwing him to the ground.
"Ow... Ow, it hurts..." The boy cried in pain, tears squeezing from his eyes. But seeing him cry, the demon kicked him square in the rear.
"If you can't take pain, go home to your mommy and daddy! Quit messing around with this bunch! Go call your parents over for me!"
The boy shrank back, terror gleaming in his eyes.
"I don't have parents... I was sold nearby, and the folks here rescued me."
"No parents... Hah, then wipe your damn tears dry, or I'll send you down to meet them right now!"
Releasing the boy, Laxi glared daggers at a farmer trying to step forward, then turned his gaze toward the resistance soldiers approaching with rifles.
The commotion at the village entrance had finally drawn some attention.
This bunch, incapable of even posting sentries, at least wasn't deaf—they could hear his gunshot.
Those men glared at him warily with hostility, rifles in hand, yet none dared level their barrels at him.
Several of them recognized this man—the ruthless commander who had captured Camp Rowell and hung its commanding officer from the watchtower.
Regardless of how much aid the Alliance had supplied or how many cannons and rifles they had provided, he was the one who had taken the camp.
Laxi didn't even look at their firesticks, merely narrowing his eyes at them.
"I told you lot you might as well go farm, and you actually went and tilled the soil! Look at how pathetic you are! Are you expecting the girls in Port French Fries to feed you for the rest of your lives, or the Baiyue Company to take care of you forever?"
A middle-aged man summoned his courage and stepped forward, glaring at him.
"What do you mean by that?!"
Laxi squinted at him.
"Are you in charge here?"
"I am—"
Before the man could finish, a slap cracked across his skull, sending him sprawling face-first into the field.
"In charge, my ass!"
Those were the exact words the Alliance drill instructor had shouted at him during training, and now he tossed them right back at this man.
It was this fellow's incompetence that had gotten Fang Chang transferred away!
At least, that was how Laxi saw it.
The slap cracked loud and clear, instantly igniting the fury of the resistance fighters. One by one, the youths raised their rifle barrels, pointing them squarely at Laxi and the hundred-plus officers behind him.
"No! Don't shoot!"
Sprawled in the mud, the fallen man ignored his own pain, shouting in horror toward his comrades in the resistance.
As if that fire weren't burning hot enough, Laxi took a step right up to the youths, grabbed one of the gun barrels, and slammed it against his own chest.
"Come on! Shoot me! Gun down the brother who came to save you! Do it!"
The youth turned pale, his hands trembling on the gun as though it might misfire at any second.
Clearly, he had rarely set foot on a battlefield and had barely practiced shooting, nor had he ever had the chance.
After all, the safety was still on; he had merely chambered a round...
Spotting the cowardice in the boy's eyes, Laxi snatched the rifle from his grip and shoved it hard against his chest, sending him stumbling back two steps until his comrades caught him.
"Did nobody ever fucking teach you? When you want to kill someone, disengage the safety, keep the sling welded to your shoulder, and if anyone tries to snatch your rifle, smash the butt right into their face! Losing your weapon on the battlefield means losing your life! Count yourself lucky, kid, that the one who took it was me."
Gaze after gaze locked onto him—some filled with rage, some with bewilderment, others with shame and humiliation.
Yet hope also ignited in several pairs of eyes.
Including the man sitting in the field who had claimed to be in charge.
He knew better than anyone that they were not survivors of Port French Fries, nor were they survivors of Golden Gallon Port. What they needed was not someone to lead them in plowing fields, but someone who could lead them to victory in battle!
Laxi surveyed the crowd, looking not just at the resistance soldiers blocking him at the village entrance, but at the farmers standing tall in the adjacent fields, watching him.
"If you want to farm, stay here and farm your fill. But if you're sick of being pathetic, get off your asses and follow me!"
A resistance officer swallowed hard, staring at him.
"Where are we going...?"
"Where are we going?"
Laxi chuckled, turning his back to the dusk to look northeast, squinting toward the darkening sky.
He had planned it all along the way.
Fighting the Tiger Army was out of the question. Those bastards had guns and grain, and their combat capabilities were no longer inferior to the Gray Wolf Army; they had nearly carved up and absorbed the Gray Wolf Army stationed along the border.
Just as the Alliance folks said, fighting that bunch would only mean being farmed like wild creeps.
They had to open a new theater, and the best choice was the northeast corner of Brahma Province.
It bordered the Zhubar Mountains, and just over the range lay Silver Moon Bay. The Tasang River, flowing down from the mountains, irrigated an alluvial plain known as the Tasang Plain, home to marginal ethnic groups of Brahma Province and even believers from Silver Moon Bay.
On the Empire's administrative map, that territory was called Mammoth State. It shared a freshwater source with Silver Moon Bay and boasted soil no less fertile than Rowell State.
Most crucially, the mountains were high and the emperor was far away, while the region bordered the Alliance's supply network.
Though its level of development was lower, underdeveloped areas had their own advantages.
Without a highway network connecting it to Tiandu, and far from the banks of the Everflowing River, forces loyal to the royal family and the supplies they required could hardly be deployed there.
Furthermore, poor regions never lacked recruits!
Only there could he raise a massive army. Starting an uprising in Tiger State, where the Tiger Clan held the majority, was sheer suicide!
"Shrinking back in this godforsaken gully will only starve you to death sooner or later. If you want to live, follow me and fight our way to the sea!"
Chapter 769