Volume 8: The Sword Points to the Far East Chapter 267 Far East Strategy
"The only people who have made their own farm machinery and put it into use are the Fox Tribe, the Wing Tribe, the Deer Man Tribe, and the Pika Tribe?"
Xiao Yun flipped through the "Far East Agricultural Machinery Promotion Plan Report" compiled by Primo and recorded by Yangmao, and frowned: "Are the big tribes such as the elephant tribe, ape tribe, lion tribe, etc. not tempted?"
"It's not that I'm not tempted, it's that the need is not urgent enough." Primo said, "The powerful tribes in the Far East all have good territories, and the empire's taxes are not as heavy as those of the human race. The Beast King only collects a maximum of 30% tax, so the cost of living is relatively low. Without external pressure, there is naturally no urgent need to increase productivity."
After a pause, Primo showed a smug smile and said, "However... after I spread the news that the Winged Tribe used agricultural machinery to carry out summer ploughing, before we left, the Elephant Tribe had already sent people to the Winged Tribe's territory to observe."
Mr. Sean stroked his chin and thought for a while, then said, "It seems that these big families are still waiting and watching."
"We will certainly proceed with caution. The mines in the Far East all belong to someone. Even for the more powerful Lion Clan, the investment will not be low if they plan to make their own agricultural machinery." Primo nodded.
Xiao Yun flipped through two more pages, and suddenly his expression changed. He looked up at Primo with a burning gaze: "Tell me about Tea Bear, Primo."
"Tea Bear promised that if the caravans on the grassland can open up a trade route to the Dosi Mountains, they will put the trade with the grassland people before the trade with Lamia." Primo was quite proud of this. This was one of the more successful tasks he accomplished on this trip.
"I'm talking about details! Tell us everything that happened during your time in the Tea Bear territory, no matter how big or small!" Xiao Yun waved his hand hungrily.
Primo: “???”
Although he was puzzled as to why Xiao Yun was so concerned about Tea Bear, Primo still gave a detailed introduction to the trip to the Doshi Mountains...
After hearing about the old tea bear chieftain who maintained his vitality in animal form, Xiao Yun took out a piece of paper and drew a panda chewing bamboo, and threw it in Primo's face: "Is this what the tea bear's animal form looks like?!"
"...Well, almost. But tea bears don't chew bamboo." Primo looked at the cute stick figure and his mouth twitched.
Then Primo & Sean saw Xiao Yun pounding the table, sighing with great regret: "Why is Tea Bear not a grassland person? Why didn't the Beast King exile Tea Bear with him!"
"Hey, hey, control yourself..." Mr. Sean couldn't bear to watch it any longer, "How deep is your hatred for Tea Bear!"
"Don't misunderstand, it's just that I can't get it even if I want it." Xiao Yun immediately retorted, "Hardworking, smart, and cute, who wouldn't like this kind of race?"
"Then it's really a terrible thing to be liked by you." Primo complained.
"Let's get down to business." Xiao Yun's face suddenly turned serious. "We need to carefully consider the extent to which we can develop relations with these tribes in the Far East to the best benefit of our country."
Primo & Sean: "..."
After so many years, I'm still a little uncomfortable with this guy's shameless style of ignoring other people's feelings and quickly changing the subject...
A necromancer, a snow werewolf, and a human were talking to each other about the Far East strategy, using extremely evil words from time to time. If anyone accidentally heard a few of their words, they would definitely think that these three guys in the room were definitely villains who were plotting to subvert the world...
"The Lion Tribe really needs to be disciplined." After a discussion, Xiao Yun commented on the lazy Lion Tribe, who was an obstacle in the Far East strategy. "This powerful race without ambition has limited value. We should adjust our strategy appropriately."
"Do you think the lion tribe can't shoulder the responsibility?" Mr. Sean asked in surprise.
The decay of a tree often starts from within. From an external perspective, the Beast King is the Far East King who commands the Orcs, but in fact, the Beast King actually rules only the Black Bear Clan. The Moon Bears and White Bears are more like cooperative relationships. The three of them have a consensus on this point, and the strategic direction of the Far East layout is based on this principle.
"That's not the case... It has been clearly shown in the promotion of agricultural machinery. In the Far East, the weaker races have the courage to go all out in the pursuit of change." Xiao Yun's eyes flashed.
Since there were no outsiders present, Xiao Yun did not need to worry about his words and said frankly, "Before these seeds of 'seeking change' grow, they need to be properly 'protected'. The Beast King, who knows everything about Kronin's movements far away in the southern continent, will sooner or later know that the grassland people in the Cursed Land have reached out to his empire. By then, the Beast King will naturally handle it differently depending on whether the grassland people like us who 'come with ill intentions' have the most contact with a strong tribe like the Lion Tribe or a weak tribe like the Wing Tribe."
Primo looked strange: "You mean, use the Lion Clan as a sign? Isn't this too obvious? The Lion Clan's elders are not all useless."
"So we have to hurry up and use the lion tribe as a springboard to contact the elephant tribe, the ape tribe, and even the white bear and moon bear tribes." Xiao Yun chuckled, "The lion tribe is not the only powerful tribe that has close contact with us grassland people with ulterior motives. So how can we say that we have used the lion tribe?"
"When the group that the Beast King needs to strike to establish his authority is too large, where should he swing his clenched fist? Can such an act of attack still achieve his political goals?"
The premise of killing a chicken to frighten the monkeys is that there are too many monkeys and too few chickens, and the chickens are weak but the monkeys are strong. The premise of killing a general to establish authority is that the killing of this general will have little impact on the strength of the group. When Emperor Wu of Han conquered the Xiongnu, could he kill Wei Qing to establish authority? You must be kidding!
Sean & Primo: "..."
It's evil, but it's alright...
Xiao Yun had said so much, so the two old men Sean and Primo did not give in for nothing. They quickly decided that the Lion Tribe would be the first partner, and other powerful tribes in the Far East would be candidates for the first partner. The Tea Bear Wing Tribe and even the Fox Tribe, which was their traditional "diplomatic ties" with the Snow Wolf People, had to give them a strategic distance.
"In this case, should we increase support for the economic development of the Golden Plains?" Primo, who had abandoned his moral principles, said without hesitation.
"Let's start with small-scale projects like the promotion of Miaoxian Juice and dairy product cooperation." Xiao Yun thought for a moment and shook his head. "Not every race has the opportunity to develop a specialty industry. Agriculture is the foundation of all races. Weak races like the Winged Tribe and the Fox Tribe can achieve great results in agricultural development, which is much more attractive to other strong races than the Lion Tribe relying on side businesses to make a fortune."
Mr. Sean nodded and said, "If the gap between what we give to the Lion Tribe and other powerful tribes is too big, then obviously we will have problems first, and we won't achieve the effect we need."
Primo suddenly realized that this was also to avoid the problem of inequality rather than scarcity... Knowing certain principles and being able to apply them anytime and anywhere are indeed not the same thing, and even he occasionally neglects them.
There is nothing wrong in setting up an incentive mechanism among your own people and using differential treatment to motivate your subordinates to work hard and make progress; but if you start to give unfair treatment while you are trying to win over others, it means you really don't want others to get on board!
Treating the elderly with preferential treatment does not mean that the newcomers who are drinking the soup should watch the elderly eat meat and then eat half and throw away the other half. There can be a gap, but it cannot be too big!
"If the Lion Tribe is an ambitious race, there is no need to go through so much trouble. Help them create conditions, and they will be able to stir up trouble in the Far East." Xiao Yun spread his hands and said, "Since we can't rely on the Lion Tribe, we must be flexible and adaptable, and not be stubborn."
"Indeed, in my opinion, the moon bears are more interested in the position of the king of the Far East than the lions." Primo said with a little disdain, "Even if the tigers who died in the underworld were sent to the Far East, they would be more decent than the lions."
Since Yale led his tribe to escape from the Tiger Clan's Great Tent last year, the Tiger King and the remaining Tiger Clan warriors have been lingering in the underground world for more than half a year.
Not long after the Fire Tribe suffered a flood, Mumu, who was running a shop in the dungeon, sent back news... The Tiger King had fallen in a head-on conflict with the Dwarf King.
The death of such a king of a clan did not attract much attention. In last month's "Travels of the Continent", only a dark elf ranger mentioned it casually... The tiger clan, which shed a lot of blood for the dark elves, finally won only a sentence in the travel notes.
This is the fate of most declining tribes. Not every fallen leaf rotting in the soil is lucky enough to make people feel sad.
"Maybe this is the style of the lion tribe." Mr. Sean didn't care at all about the tiger king who quietly disappeared from this world. When he mentioned the style of the lion tribe, he thought of his past and smiled nostalgically, "When I traveled to the neighboring Bradrick Continent, the lion tribe there also opened my eyes a lot."
Primo didn't quite agree with Mr. Sean turning himself into a ghost, and he mocked him whenever he got the chance: "Now you can only recall the scenery of Bradrick Continent, Sean. If you were to walk on that land in person, those lunatics in the Holy Land Inquisition would immediately go crazy."
"Yes, the Holy Land's aversion to dark creatures is even more exaggerated than a clash between dark elves and minotaurs." Sean agreed at first, then changed the subject, "Primo, what do you think of the black warrior?"
Primo: “???”
"Based on my brief experience in the demon world, undead creatures like the Dark Knight are quite suitable for you." Mr. Sean said with a smile.
"What a joke!" Primo almost jumped up.
"But if I remember correctly, your life span is almost over." Mr. Sean raised his eyebrows, "Are you ready? To turn into dust in two or three years?"
Primo's face froze.
"Primo, Sean and I don't want to see you become a corpse." Xiao Yun also said, "Maybe you should think about it carefully... Different forms of life are not as taboo as you think."
After Mr. Sean's soul voluntarily fell into the demon world, he was brought back to the material world by Hodgson and transformed into a necromancer with the help of his own body. This process took more than half a month to complete in Isaac's knight territory.
In order to complete this undead reincarnation ritual, one's soul must be extremely powerful, powerful enough to be accepted by the demon world after falling, rather than immediately dissipating after leaving the protection of the body... Such a weakling is worthless even if he is transformed into an undead.
Next, while the soul is returning to the material world with the help of the black magician, the body must be protected. If it rots or stinks, it will be terrible... Xiao Yun temporarily built a large freezer for this purpose.
The principle of reincarnation is that after the body's life span can no longer be sustained, the body is transformed into an undead (zombie) container to hold the soul.
This black magic was transformed and modified by magicians from liches. The difference is that the lich can put most of his soul into the life box and a small part of his soul into the body. As long as the life box is not destroyed, the soul can be immortal, achieving a purpose similar to eternal life.
However, only high-level black magicians can split their own souls...so only black magicians can transform into liches. This is why Mr. Sean scolded Xiao Yun when he suggested Mr. Sean to transform into a lich.
Primo was so angry that he could not help laughing. If someone else had advised him to degenerate into an undead creature, he would probably have pulled out his dagger and stabbed them. But when it came to these two... he really had no temper. He knew in his heart that Sean and Ayun were doing it for his own good.
"We'll talk about it when the time comes." The old man said proudly, "Maybe by then I'll have no regrets in my life and won't be attached to this world at all."
Hodgson knew that Sean and the others had something to discuss, so he took the initiative to leave the mobile home.
When Xiao Yun and the other two were secretly plotting something bad, he was walking in the tribe with his hands behind his back and a serious face.
The busiest post-disaster reconstruction has passed, and what follows is the autumn harvest, which is much more leisurely than in previous years... Mr. Sean was even able to get the cooperation of the Hilly New District to get a batch of walk-behind harvesters that even human female workers can use for testing, which shows how low the labor intensity of this year's autumn harvest is.
Of course, the leisure time during the autumn harvest does not mean that everyone can sit back and do nothing. In order to prevent drought and flood, Xiao Yun decided to dig the swamp in the southern part of the tribe into an artificial lake with a diameter of no less than 6,000 meters. As a result, everyone in the tribe suffered - even Yang Mao and Rosemary, who had just returned, were kicked to the construction site to dig mud and transport sand.
Wool's premonition came true!
Anyway, Hodgson took a walk in the tribe in broad daylight, and after walking around for a while, he only saw Niu Jiao, who was busy trimming the branches of the blessing tree...
Hodgson stopped as he passed the wall surrounding the Blessed Tree.
The two blessing trees that had been carefully cared for by Niu Jiao for several years grew quite vigorously. After the beginning of spring this year, two tiny green fruits appeared between the branches and leaves of the blessing trees that had been silent for many years.
Hodgson stood outside the fence, staring at the two fruits on the tree that took more than half a year to grow to the size of a child's fist. His eyes were particularly deep.
He had seen a note written in the language of the high elves in the Ivory Tower. The ancestors of these pointy-eared guys claimed that the Blessed Tree came from a kind of wood spirit from the demon world, and that the high elf druids had to cultivate it for many years before this wood spirit from the demon world could grow in the material plane... Hodgson didn't believe this irresponsible boasting anyway. Bringing a wood spirit from the demon world that would inevitably cause a tremor to the earth when it appeared to the material plane? These pointy-eared guys were really boasting without fear of being exposed.
It can be said that it is a native crop grafted with branches and leaves of the demonic wood spirits.
After seeing the Blessing Tree with his own eyes, Hodgson was more convinced of this conclusion - the leaves of the Blessing Tree had some characteristics of plants from the demon world, but the branches, trunk, and even the roots that Hodgson secretly checked with his mental power were no different from native birch trees.
Well... this kind of detail was only discovered by Hodgson, a fourth-level black magician, and he confirmed it without hesitation, because he can indeed go to the demon world...
"The Tree of Wishes, this was originally named by the high elves. The forest elves probably thought it was inappropriate, so they changed it to the Tree of Luck or the Blessing Tree." Hodgson narrowed his eyes slightly, and a thought that showed little respect for the elves flashed through his mind. "If it can have the subtle characteristics of the wood spirit, then it can indeed show a little bit of 'divinity', but most of it is just some pure energy essence, which can only cure diseases, increase strength, and slightly prolong life."
As a high-level magician, Hodgson naturally did not think highly of this kind of thing which only had an effect similar to blessing magic... Although the forest elves did not brag about the effectiveness of the fruit of the blessing tree, this thing could indeed save the lives of seriously injured people at critical moments, and it could indeed be sold at a high price of ten times the price of gold, but in the final analysis, it was just that.
Hodgson showed a little interest only when his eyes fell on the cow horns that were trimming branches.
Although wood spirits come from the demon world, they are recognized as the most divine creatures. Once a wood spirit grows up, from the most powerful Greedy Hell Flower to the weakest Demon Devourer Teng, they all have a vague talent for borrowing power from the "power of rules".
I don’t know what kind of wood spirit has been grafted onto the blessed tree, but it should also have similar instincts.
"The fruit of the Blessed Tree grown by the young forest elves contains the energy essence of blessing power, so what can the Snow Werewolf grow?"
Just as Hodgson was thinking this, he heard the cow's horns inside the wall suddenly jump to the ground with a "bang" and let out a scream.
Hodgson's expression froze, and a breeze gathered under his feet, making his body float up. He looked at Niu Jiao, who was squatting under the tree, with concern.
Niu Jiao was holding a green-skinned, hard blessing fruit in one hand, and he was extremely nervous and panicked: "How come it fell off after just a slight touch?! Is it rotten?? Are there bugs?"
Hodgson: “…”
