by <unknown>
"So, if you are a real Cultivator and you are considering the happiness and future of humanity, you will have fewer reasons to add to my trouble at such a critical moment, in which case we will both suffer heavy losses, and the villains and brainless puppets will take the advantage! You should stand on my side unwaveringly! When we join our hands, we will be able to rage in the entire universe!"
Chapter 2620: True Love Is Boundless! |
Wuying Qi's thoughts were truly turning into a whole sky of brilliant stars, and the stars were corrupted into the color of black instantly by his ambitions before they flooded into Li Yao's soul nonstop.
As if hit by lightning and drowned in an abyss, Li Yao struggled to put up the final resistance. "But… But your plan will kill a lot of people. In the Empyreal Terminus Sector alone, thirty to fifty billion people will die. What about them?"
"They are the slits during the operation, the throes when a new life is born, the fuel to boost the civilization of mankind forward, and a price that we have to pay."
Wuying Qi's eyes became profound and antique, as if he could see the changes in billions of years. He said in a completely inhumane tone, "We are all going to die in the long run. Not just us, even the ultimate experts in the thirteen carbon-based clans that made up the Pangu civilizations' alliance. No, not just Pangu, all the formidable civilizations that once existed in this universe during the tens of billions of years before Pangu have all been swallowed by time. There is absolutely nothing left now.
"In the past billions of years, hundreds of the most prosperous primordial civilizations perished, and the civilization of mankind will repeat their course soon. In such a magnificent background, does the life or death of a few individuals really matter?
"I can tell that you also believe we cannot wait and be killed but have to march out in search for a way of survival. Then, have you considered how dangerous the universe out there is? Has it occurred to you that, even though we may reach a final destination, allowing the civilization of mankind to reach a certain…'glorious eternity', the journey will still be such an arduous march that perhaps 99% of the people will die on the way and only 1% of them will be the ancestors of new human beings?
"It can't be helped. Even though we know for sure that those people will be sacrificed, we have to go forward relentlessly, because that is the significance of life.
"Billions of years ago, when the first fish crawled onto the continent clumsily, I believe that it was not unique but had many companions. However, 99% of the other fish died of drought in the lethal air.
"By the same logic, when the ancient apes reached the plains from the forests timidly, they must've paid tremendous sacrifices under the claws and tusks of the ferocious beasts on the plains too.
"If the fish and the apes were intelligent, and if you were the commander of the fish and the apes, would you tell your partners that it is too dangerous up ahead and that you should return to your warm and safe nest because you are reluctant to pay the 'minor sacrifices'? Yes, your partners may be kept safe for now, but the future of the civilization will be completely obliterated by your petty kindness!
"Trust me, if possible, I want to reduce the casualties as much as possible, but this is a war. It is not just a war between the reformists and the nobles, or one between the Imperium and the Covenant Alliance, much less one between the Immortal Cultivators and the Cultivators, but a war between new human beings and old human beings. It is a war that will change the world! Such a conflict between the old and the new can't be gentle, harmless, and gradual as you imagined. It is destined to raise the most intense contradictions. Too many obsolete interest groups will be crumbled. Many people will die.
"The virtue of a general is not to keep his every soldier safe but to try to make every soldier die a worthwhile death so that their lives can be traded for the greatest results and the eventual victory. In many cases, even if the general knows that the troop leading the charge or covering the retreat will be wiped out, he will still have to ruthlessly send his most beloved and most elite troop into inevitable doom. Is the general an unpardonable murderer? No, it is the responsibility of a commander!"
Li Yao couldn't hold it anymore and roared, "Soldiers are all braced for death, but what you are going to kill are not soldiers but civilians!"
"Wrong! The classification between 'soldiers' and 'civilians' only applies for the civil wars of mankind. In the wars in the grand universe that we will soon face, in the infinite battles of infinite civilizations, everybody will be a warrior who has to devote their everything to the whole civilization!"
Wuying Qi's voice also became aggressive. "Think about it. If one day we truly march out of the grand universe, only to be faced with the full scourge of a certain alien civilization, would it tell the difference between 'soldiers' and 'civilians' within mankind? Or, if we are faced with a civilization where each planet is a magnificent weapon, and it is crushing at our world, about to tear our planets apart with the tidal force, will it tell the difference between 'soldiers' and 'civilians'? If a mysterious force above the three-dimension world arrives and is about to raise or lower the dimension of our world, transforming us into a certain weird, indescribable state, will it care about the difference between 'soldiers' and 'civilians'?
"Don't be silly. Since the moment we discovered the grand universe, the old morals are already gone. The whole civilization has naturally entered a new age where everybody is a soldier. In order to survive in the dark universe, everybody can and must be sacrificed! One wouldn't deserve to be the commander of mankind without such a cold and clear understanding!"
"I-I can't do it!"
Covering his head, Li Yao replied in agony, "I can't treat so many living individuals as 'fuel'. I can't accept the death of billions of people casually. I can't view the problem from the perspective of billions of years. I can't do it in any case!"
"Yes, 99% of people can't. They cannot break themselves away as individuals and view the problem from the perspective of the whole civilization. Therefore, Cultivator Li Yao, no matter how strong you are, you can't be a qualified leader. If the civilization of mankind is led by a cowardly man full of petty kindness like you, it will perish within several hundred years!"
Wuying Qi smiled casually. "However, it doesn't matter. I can achieve what you can't. That's why I am the most perfect commander of the civilization of mankind, and all you need to do is to help me.
"Your rationality obviously tells you that what I say and do are right, but you can't accept it emotionally. You can't be a leader, and you are stopping me from becoming one. What's the reasoning in that? The civilization of mankind always requires an absolutely rational and absolutely cruel commander. Who else can it be if not me? Would it be better if the commander is as 'kind, vulnerable, and sympathetic' as you, who will cry or shout useless slogans whenever anything happens?"
Li Yao bulged his eyes, not knowing what to say for a moment.
"Your kindness that is limited by personal feelings is only petty kindness, if not hypocrisy. You only see that tens of billions of people may die before your eyes, but you have never considered the lives of the hundreds of billions of other people in the Imperium!"
Wuying Qi's voice grew tough again although it was mild for a while. "Do you not understand? The tens of billions of people in the Empyreal Terminus Sector are destined to die. If I do not activate the 'Next Sun Plan', the four families' ace fleets will occupy the capital planet tomorrow, and there will be as many victims who will die of massacre, famine, and plague!
"To make things worse, the four families are too useless and unorganized to resist the main force of the Covenant Alliance. The Imperium will definitely collapse under the Covenant Alliance's ambush!
"By then, not only will the number of victims be multiple times higher than 'tens of billions', but the survivors will inevitably be brainwashed by the Covenant Alliance in the worst way!
"See? Your 'kindness' can't change anything and will only ma
ke things worse. If hundreds of billions of people are truly killed in the massacre of the four families and the invasion of the Covenant Alliance, that will be your crime. They will be killed by your hypocrisy and your ridiculous sense of justice as well as your moral values!"
Dumbfounded, Li Yao was lost for words.
He only wanted to buy more time in the beginning and "pretended" that he was brainwashed by Wuying Qi.
However, his beliefs were truly corrupted bit by bit, and countless cold and dark things were injected into his mind.
"With everything coming to this point, countless people will die and countless people will be brainwashed one way or another. There's nothing that you or I can do to stop it."
Wuying Qi sighed and said, "I can only prevent the death of hundreds of billions of people by the death of tens of billions of people. I can only prevent the pale and evil brainwashing of the Covenant Alliance through righteous brainwashing. I can only try to make the sacrifices of countless individuals to be more worthwhile so that their deaths would not be for nothing. Even though I will be cursed for all eternity after doing that, I will not hesitate to do it as long as it is in the best interest of the future of mankind. I may kill a million innocent women and children today, but a billion innocent women and children will be saved tomorrow by what I did today. That's the greater kindness and justice. That's what might be called 'boundless love'!
"Cultivator Li Yao, I have been so patient with you because I do appreciate your talents. Are you still being pigheaded? If you insist on your beliefs, you'd better come up with a solid reason that disapproves of what I said and a way to resolve the four families and even the Alliance of the Holy Covenant with no bloodshed!"
Li Yao was stunned for a long time, and his voice became weaker and weaker. "But… But the whole Empyreal Terminus Sector will be destroyed by you! How can the Imperium deal with the Covenant Alliance after its heart is destroyed?"
"Haha. Hahaha. It seems that you have accepted my opinion despite the details that still need discussing, but these trivial problems are easy to settle!"
Wuying Qi laughed aloud and waved his hands. "You've made the same mistake on the matter, which is that you are viewing the new world with obsolete eyes. The so-called 'capital' is only necessary for a political entity on a planet. A real interstellar civilization does not need to, nor should it, set up a capital. It is not the heart of the Imperium but a cancer and the greatest redundancy of the country!
"Or rather, even if the interstellar civilization does need a political center, it should not be fixed to a certain planet but should be mobile. That is the only way to project the influence of the political center to the local places in time."
Chapter 2621: Wuying Qi's Greatest Secret! |
"An interstellar civilization does not need a capital?"
The theory shattered Li Yao's mindset again and opened a whole new gate for him.
"That's right. In the age of the ancient Cultivators, the methods of communication and transportation were relatively underdeveloped, and the territory of the regime was not huge. That's why the rulers concentrated most of the leaders and the experts in one place, known as the 'court' in the 'capital', which is the epicenter of politics, economy, and military. At that time, it was a rather reasonable approach."
Wuying Qi elaborated, "But when it comes to this day, a united country of mankind can easily govern hundreds of Sectors, with a territory that spans across millions of lightyears. If you continue to rely on the experience of politics in the past, hoping to rule over the whole universe with one planet, wouldn't it be too absurd?
"You can tell it if you look at the capital planet today. In order to govern the whole universe, too many government agencies have been set up in this place. As a result, the population is booming, the agencies are bloated, and the environment is polluted. The departments and the major forces hamstring each other. This place has completely lost the functions as the brain and the heart.
"When the nobles and the strongmen at the remote border of the Imperium grow insubordinate, it is beyond the capital's reach, and it is impossible to mobilize troops in time to restrain and suppress them. As a result, the four Kurfürsten and other local warlords have arisen, making the Imperium fall apart.
"How does such a capital help with anything?
"As a matter of fact, since the first time that mankind embarked on the journey into space, they should've given up the obsolete way of administration. They shouldn't have established a fixed capital at all. It's a pity that from the demons to the Imperium a thousand years ago, none ever saw through it, which resulted in tragedies again and again.
"Let's talk about the collapse of the Star Ocean Imperium, the greatest catastrophe ten thousand years ago. At that time, the brilliant Supreme Emperor stayed on the capital planet but asked the Blood God to command the strongest expedition army and crush the remnant demons in space. As a result, the political force and the military force of the Star Ocean Imperium were completely separated. It was absolutely impossible for the capital planet to command the expedition army millions of lightyears away effectively. There were too many variables in the expedition that took decades to consider. Even if the Blood God was the Supreme Emperor's clone, so what? A rebellion is the inevitable outcome!
"If the Supreme Emperor had seen through it in time and moved all the government agencies of the Star Ocean Imperium into the expedition army, regarding the expedition fleet as a 'mobile capital', so that he could command the troops in person, how could the Blood God have had the chance to rebel, and how could the Star Ocean Imperium have collapsed?"
Attracted, Li Yao felt that what Wuying Qi said was so reasonable that he could not come up with any argument.
"In fact, many knowledgeable people since ancient times have vaguely realized the problem, and they made certain efforts intentionally or unintentionally."
Wuying Qi went on and said, "From the Demon Beast Empire to the Imperium of True Human Beings, a lot of people who were in power established supermassive space fortresses. Sometimes, they even hollowed a whole planet and modified it into a military fortress, naming it as 'Death Star', 'Destruction Star', 'Doom Star', 'Dark Star', or the likes.
"As a matter of fact, from the military point of view, the battle efficiency of such superspace fortresses, which put all the eggs into the same basket, was terribly low. Not only was their mobility close to zero, but they could also be attacked easily once the enemy broke in. It was a better option to devote the abundant resources that were spent on them to the construction of fleets or the armed forces on the surface of the planet!
"However, even if the 'Death Star' of the previous regime had poor performance on the battlefield and got destroyed instantly, the new regime would continue to establish new 'Death Stars'. Why was that? Were the military experts and technicians all idiots who could not see the fatal shortcoming of such supermassive space fortresses?
"No, the key is not military but politics. The purpose in building those super space fortresses with a huge fortune was not for their performance on the battlefield, but to absorb the resources of the local places incessantly during the construction so that the power of the local magnates would be diminished. When the local magnates could not resist the order of the court, the long-term peace and prosperity of the regime would be ensured.
"Of course, the local magnates understood the intention of the court very well. Therefore, they slandered such supermassive space fortresses through all kinds of channels, even by depicting the destructions of those super Death Stars in the literary works. They mocked such splendid-looking but actually useless weapons. But the truth was that they just did not want to be drained by the court with the excuse of the construction work.
"In the past, the counterattack of the local forces all worked out. Not a single regime had persisted on the strategy of weakening the local forces. Besides, the capital planet was too prosperous and convenient. Not a single emperor could bear to leave this enjoyabl
e world and start from zero.
"A thousand years ago, I did not see through it and couldn't bear to depart from it, but today, I have clearly realized how ridiculous it is to have a fixed capital. I've made up my mind to move the capital to a fleet that is large in scale and has a high combat ability, transforming the Imperium into some sort of 'grand starship civilization'.
"However, the issue is too huge. There are too many stubborn interest groups on the capital planet. Not only do the four Kurfürst families hold tremendous interests in this place, but the reformists including the Wuying family are also deeply rooted too. If I propose the motion to relocate the capital, it will definitely raise the objection of countless people. It can't be helped. The capital has been the capital of the civilization of mankind for almost fifty thousand years. Those shortsighted and obstinate guys are too used to it to realize the problem.
"Therefore, I've decided to resolve the problem from the source by destroying the Empyreal Terminus Sector. In such a way, those noisy flies will have to shut their mouths. There's nothing they can do even if they do not want to move the capital!
"While a great price will be paid in the short run, it will be of great help for the sustainable development of the civilization of mankind in the long term. A short pain is definitely better than a lasting pain!
"By sacrificing the Empyreal Terminus Sector, I will receive a super fleet that has an extremely high combat ability where everybody is fair and clean. Then, I will move the entire court to this new fleet, which can be named the 'capital fleet'.