Chapter Ninety-Four: The Beginning of the Eastward Departure

The next morning.

Because Amya had taken a day off the previous night and did not need to train, Qin Le got up early and sat in the dining room, eating fried dough sticks with soy milk while reading through a pile of documents.

The first report stated that almost all the refugees who had arrived yesterday had already awakened. Most were not in mortal danger, though they were severely depleted. Their memories, however, had broken off somewhere in the middle, and no one knew what had happened during that missing stretch.

As for the children delivered in the bodies, most had also pulled through and were recuperating in the infirmary.

For the time being, Xuanlu planned to keep and raise them, and later see whether any of them possessed anything unusual.

As for Qin Le himself, he naturally had no objections.

These children could be called both unfortunate and lucky. As for what their future would become, Qin Le had no opinion, nor the mind to think about it.

Someone else would worry about them. If this had been during the Imperial era, though, they would probably have been thrown into a training camp. After all, with both parents dead, were they not the standard template for elite troops?

The second report said that among yesterday’s refugees there had been several hundred humans who had partially turned into corpse ghouls.

They had no corpse ghoul strength, but their habits had already begun to drift toward the creatures. They could not stomach cooked food and would only eat raw meat, especially human flesh.

Their aggression was extreme; in just a few days, more than a hundred attacks had occurred, and they had basically all been detained.

According to the preliminary investigation, all of them had eaten that thing, the so-called act of eating one’s own child to survive.

One woman who had also partially transformed into a corpse ghoul had gone completely mad, day after day searching for those who had changed and screaming for them to return her child.

Tsk. It seemed those people were, in the end, only a minority. As for these few hundred, just send them straight to the holding facilities.

Qin Le picked up his fountain pen and wrote a line, settling the fate of several hundred people with a few strokes.

Some had become ghouls for the sake of their children, leaving hope for the next generation. More had devoured their children in order to survive.

Human nature, and human depravity.

No judgment.

He picked up the next document. It outlined the next road construction plan: Xuanlu intended to build the first main road directly to Dana City, and from there connect eastward to Lev City, fifty li away.

There was a tributary of the largest river in the Kingdom of Dawn there, the East’s only outlet for both land and water transport.

The road would be built in two phases. The first phase would use all manner of heavy machinery and manpower to carve out the simplest possible dirt road; speed of passage would not be the priority, only that it be broad, wide, and level.

The second phase would be to pave it with cement.

Looking at the proposal from the advisory team, Qin Le’s brow gradually furrowed.

On the premise of not harming fundamental interests, preserve the refugees as much as possible...

The advisory team had selected the kindest option from among the many?

Perhaps that was the greatness of the Republic; at times, it was also a shackle. Not everyone needed an environment like the base. Nor did they yet have the ability to manage everyone. It was enough to achieve basic administration.

[Rejected]

This was the first time Qin Le had rejected a proposal from the advisory team.

What he needed was efficiency. Before those nobles had time to react, he wanted the pace accelerated and a road built through the entire eastern region.

For now, the refugees only needed a bowl of food and a blanket; there was no need to bring them all into the base. If they wanted into the base, then they would have to contribute to its construction and create value through labor, rather than simply relying on Xuanlu’s aid.

Twenty-four-hour shifts, nine-hour workdays, one copper coin a day, three meals, no rest days.

Qin Le’s “a bowl of food” strategy could bring tears to the eyes of those western crocodiles.

There was no helping it; some things had to be done by someone. For the survival of the Republic, the previous generation had sacrificed itself. This generation was sacrificing itself as well, and the next generation would have to sacrifice too. Why, then, should the people of the New World not sacrifice?

History would judge right and wrong, merit and fault, in time.

The fourth document was his promotion notice, elevating him from major to colonel.

After reviewing the remaining files, Qin Le stretched with a long yawn.

Truthfully, it was terribly dull.

Setting the documents aside, Qin Le turned to look at his guard and assistant, Hawkeye and Fishhead.

The girl seemed to have come into her own lately.

Hawkeye still wore that cold, impassive expression. Perhaps because she had become a first-rank ascendant, the scar on her face had faded and her skin was no longer so rough.

“Hawkeye, I’ve finished reading all of this. Take it to the advisory team. Also, unless I specifically tell you otherwise, don’t bring me this kind of thing anymore. Let them handle it themselves. I have more important matters to attend to.”

“Yes!” Hawkeye saluted, taking the documents with both hands before turning and leaving.

After she was gone, Qin Le leaned back in his chair, stretched again, and asked, “How’s the spearhead unit’s training coming along?”

Half a month earlier, Qin Le had handed the spearhead unit over to the two twin assassins, hoping all of the spearheads would become assassins.

In this world, knights were the strongest supernatural profession overall, especially legion knights, whose war formations could allow the weak to suppress the strong. But for Xuanlu, they were actually somewhat underwhelming; assassins were far more useful.

Their nearly uncanny movement methods completely countered modern weapons. In particular, the Shadow Master’s ability to slip into shadows rendered even thermal imaging useless.

If individuals were already top-tier elites in the original world, and then were equipped with assassin abilities, the spearhead unit would become an indestructible blade. In the original world, what country could withstand a group of super-soldiers capable of teleportation? And who could escape this blade’s assassinations?

“Half of the brothers have already begun to grasp the supernatural path. It’s proved that the assassin route suits us better than the archer route,” Fishhead replied, then glanced at the newspaper on the desk.

“Captain, it looks like they still want to fight.”

“Heh. The more anxious the enemy becomes, the more it proves that our path is the right one.”

“But Xuanlu still has no confidence in winning the Second World War. The republic you seek cannot withstand the assault of the nations,” Fishhead said.

“To prevent that from happening is our mission.”

Time flowed swiftly, and the sun and moon completed ten more cycles.

When the sun rose for the eleventh time and the moon set for the tenth, a long dragon had finally emerged from the desert.

“We are proud of labor! It lets us eat our fill and dress warmly!”

Workers in uniform surged forth, singing at the top of their lungs, smiles on their faces, shovels and hammers in hand.

“We find happiness in labor, for it frees us from cold and hunger.
Labor is the origin of human civilization.
Labor is the source of human wisdom...”

Beneath the blazing sun, the workers poured out their sweat, their eyes blazing with boundless passion.

Engineers in blue caps, one hand holding blueprints and the other a mallet, commanded the scene with sweeping vigor.

Great iron beasts roared as they swept aside everything in their path, digging through boulders, flattening thickets, and leveling forests.

Boom!

With a tremendous blast, a massive stone block more than ten meters across shattered apart.

[The firebreak has been completed. All personnel are to leave the forest.]

[Beginning deployment of napalm bombs.]

Iron eagles soared through the sky and dropped fire from heaven. In an instant, the entire forest was engulfed in a sea of flames.

Waves of fire dyed half the sky red.

Where there were mountains, mountains were cut through; where there were rivers, rivers were filled; where there were forests, forests were burned.

Construction without regard for cost, labor without pause or cease: a miracle was taking shape.

Dana City.

Inside the castle, in a lavishly decorated noble dining room, Count Dana listened quietly as his wife, son, and daughter recounted their recent romantic escapades.

Grand noble banquets, invitations from ladies of rank, coy glances from young noblewomen...

Every word dripped with luxury and indulgence.

True high society was all about excess. The castles of the great nobles were spacious, bright, and splendid; noble gentlemen were elegant and gentlemanly; noble ladies were full of allure.

They delighted in being accepted by high society, delighted in the opulence of noble balls, delighted in the amorous charm that followed those balls into the night.

It was true that they had, in fact, been accepted by the nobles. From this moment on, the Dana family had truly become a noble house.

If this had been in the past, Count Dana would have been so delighted he would have drunk himself into a stupor. But times had changed. Once, these people had looked down on him; now, he no longer cared for their acceptance.

What he had once longed for now seemed worthless.

Enge said brightly, “The many ladies of Count Lev’s household were truly beautiful yesterday, beautiful enough to make one feel inadequate. Especially the third wife, Mishaia. She was like a fairy from legend.”

His youngest daughter blushed and said, “Count Lev’s eldest son, Lord Kerns, dances so exquisitely. If I could, I would attend Lord Kerns’s balls every day.”

“Dear mother, when is Lord Kerns’s next ball?”

His wife smiled and said, “My darling, very soon.”

Then she turned to Count Dana beside her and said pleadingly, “My dear Dana, Count Lev’s wife has invited us to a banquet three days from now.”

A flash of cold light passed through Count Dana’s eyes, though his expression did not change. With a touch of guilt, he said, “My dear, I am truly sorry, but I have more important things to attend to. I cannot leave the territory.”

“I’ll send the knights’ order to escort you. Leave this afternoon. We must not delay the ball, and we must not appear rude to the other nobles. I’m terribly sorry to make you go to the ball alone again.”

“Oh! How unfortunate.” Count Dana’s wife covered her mouth with both hands, her face full of regret, as though she were truly sorry that Count Dana could not accompany her to the ball.

In the end, his wife left the castle with their son and daughter in a carriage, escorted out of Dana City by the knights’ order.

Standing atop the city wall, Count Dana watched in silence as the carriage disappeared into the distance, unable to speak for a long while.

The butler stepped forward and softly consoled him. “My lord, the madam, young master, and young lady have simply been dazzled for the moment.”

“Heh.” Count Dana gave a cold laugh. “I have already given them many chances, yet they have never been able to seize any of them. Their only value now is to stand in for me and create the illusion that the Dana family is making every effort to blend into high society.”

What he was about to do next could not be known by those nobles, and the best way to keep a secret was to make less contact. So long as there was no contact, it would be difficult to reveal any flaws.

And when it could no longer be hidden, that would be their death sentence.

Just wait, you filthy swine drenched in grease. I will grind your so-called nobility completely underfoot.

The butler took a half step back, staring at Count Dana in disbelief. “My lord, you mean to...”

No matter what, the madam had accompanied the lord for so many years, and the young master and young lady were his own blood. Even if they had erred now, their crime was not so grave as to deserve death, was it?

Count Dana did not answer. He merely gazed quietly into the distance, his calm so unsettling that the butler felt a chill creep over him.

At that moment, at the far edge of the horizon, a line of figures was approaching Dana City: workers in blue clothes, each carrying shovels and hammers.

Behind them came towering iron monsters, and the dragon that would soon set out eastward.

Count Dana looked momentarily stunned, and then his face split into a broad smile, one of undisguised delight.

One month! In only one month, they had actually opened a road all the way to Dana City!

How had they carved a highway through rubble, marshland, and forest? And in just a single month—could it be that a supernatural powerhouse of the fifth rank had used overwhelming force to tear a road open by brute strength?

Or was it truly just the power of mortals, the power spoken of by that lord—the power that could change the world overnight?