Cthulhu Gonfalon

“Are you talking about creating some new magic to improve people’s living standard?” In the hall of the Sanctuary, Ariel, the Goddess of Ocean, who was the best talented in magic, pondered for a moment and nodded with a smile. “It’s a good idea. Improving the living standards of the believers will help maintain their beliefs and strengthen their power. When they become powerful, they can promote the expansion of the beliefs, and that will finally lead to a virtuous cycle.”

Sui Xiong was surprised at that. He had never expected something like that, but he was relieved after thinking. Only with goals could people have motivation, and only with benefits could people have enthusiasm. If his idea could benefit the people as well as his friends, wouldn’t that be the best result?

“Yes,” Sui Xiong laughed and said. “So I think we can work together to sum up what troubles people have in their lives that can be solved simply by magic, and then create some magic correspondingly.”

“I don’t think that’s a good idea.” Yorgaardman, the God of Justice who always wore shabby clothes, shook his head and showed his disagreement. “Spell-casting is a very difficult thing, and it takes a lot of time and resources to train the spellcasters. Thus, if it is just to solve some nonurgent problems, it will be a waste to spend so many resources.”

“But it’s better than to not solve the problems,” Manissy, the Goddess of Wealth, said. “It’s better to have a solution than to not.”

“You’re too naive.” Yorgaardman sighed. “You see, the resources of training the spellcasters are mainly controlled by three forces now. The first and largest one is religion. However, the gods are antagonistic towards each other. Besides preaching religion, the spell-casting ability of the clergymen is mainly consumed in a meaningless confrontation between gods. Thus, there are few resources that they can spare.”

Seeing that everyone nodded slightly, he went on saying, “The second one is aristocracy. The spellcaster consumes a lot of money, so usually, only those nobles and business families can afford that. When businessmen acquire the ability of spell-casting, they will mostly seek aristocratic identities. Similarly, many spellcasters who were scholars and adventurers before also prefer to become aristocrats. For example, there are a large number of spellcasters settled in the Mifata Federation, but as long as they reach mid-level, almost all of them will be nobility.”

“But the nobles do not care about the lives of the civilians. Although there are some outstanding and honest men like the late Baron Keane, most of them are still hostile to civilians. There was some magic that could help improve people’s living standard in the past, and the nobles mastered a lot of these spells. But did they use these spells to benefit the civilians? They have never thought about it at all!”

All the gods sighed with gloom.

“The last one is the adventurers. They are very strong, but they are like sand and don’t have even the most basic organization. They may be a powerful force in destruction, but if it’s for construction, they can’t help. Not to mention other aspects, how can the adventurers who have always pursued freedom settle down for a long time and work for ordinary people? Do you have any idea?”

The gods thought about it for a moment. They looked at each other and shook their heads.

Yorgaardman talked a lot in one breath and finally took up his glass and poured a lot of wine into his mouth. “Generally speaking, after we create the new spells, it will not help improve people’s living standards but will become a tool for the nobles to enjoy themselves.”

He had spoken quite reasonably, and everyone couldn’t help but fall deep into thought.

To talk about the understanding of human society, none of the gods could know as much as Yorgaardman. He was not only born at the bottom of human society, but he also always walked around in the appearance of a mortal. He saw too much of the joys and sorrows of the mortals as well as the good and evil in the human world. All the gods on the spot together couldn’t know more about the world than he did.

If he believed that the magic to improve people’s living standards would only serve as a tool for the nobles to enjoy themselves, then that would probably happen.

However, Sui Xiong still wanted to try.

He felt that magic, like technology on earth, would never have any vitality if it served only a few people. If he wanted to usher in a great development of magic and to further promote the progress of the whole society, he should let the power of magic serve the public and popularize it.

But Yorgaardman was right. Talent and resources were required if one wanted to learn magic. It was like two high thresholds, ruthlessly shutting out the vast majority of ordinary people from magic and made it impossible for them to enjoy the benefits of it. Correspondingly, why should people who had crossed these two thresholds condescend to serve ordinary people?

How was this kind of problem solved on earth? Sui Xiong thought about it carefully and tried to find a solution.

On earth, not to mention those backward areas, in the relatively advanced and developed areas, almost everyone had to learn scientific knowledge. But in fact, for the vast majority of people, what they learned was still far from the scientific front. For example, Sui Xiong was a college student, and he had studied for 16 years from primary school to university. But the scientific knowledge he had learned just belonged to the mainstream level of society. If he wanted to do scientific research with what he had learned… Look at how many times he had tried to produce a blast furnace and how many times it exploded and failed; one would know that there was still a long way for him to go.

So, on the earth, how did people solve the problem when they couldn’t keep up the pace with science?

The vast majority of people on earth did not have the ability to transform science into productivity, but they could still enjoy the convenience of science without obstacles. What was the key?

Sui Xiong frowned and thought about it hard.

On earth, when technology first appeared, it was also used as a tool for enjoyment by a few millionaires and nobles, wasn’t it? I remember that there is an idiom in China to describe this… I don’t know about what people do in Europe, but we are all humans that have two eyes and one mouth, two arms, and two legs. There shouldn’t be much of a difference. Then, when did science and technology begin to be used by the public in large quantities?

At this moment, Sui Xiong regretted that he had not studied history well.

If he had been a master of history, he could have solved this kind of problem easily. Then no matter if it were science and technology or governmental affairs, it would have been a piece of cake for him!

Alas! Why was he an artist student? What was the use of art at this moment? Even on earth, the Renaissance was supported by businessmen!

Wait! The Renaissance?! Businessmen?!

Sui Xiong suddenly had an idea in his mind, and this sudden inspiration made him thank himself for not skipping class to play games when he was studying art history.

I remember! The key to the popularization of science and technology is also businessmen or the capital! When we were in class, we were taught that the Renaissance and the Industrial Revolution were the results of the development of a capitalist society to a certain extent and the destruction of the old feudal system! God! I have to thank Professor Cheng, who looks a bit like a famous movie star. He always liked to talk about something else when he talked about art history. At that time, I only thought his words were interesting. When I recall what he said now, it was actually the crystallization of the painstaking efforts of scholars of all dynasties! Unfortunately, the professor didn’t talk about how to make a blast furnace.

He couldn’t help but laugh quietly, and he had a plan in mind.

“I really need your help this time, Manissy,” Sui Xiong said. “You have the most businessmen in your followers, and we all know that businessmen always pursue profits. As long as we can let them find some new profit points, coupled with the promotion of your church, I think it is hopeful to make the magic work well.”

Manissy looked at him in confusion. “I know that businessmen always pursue profits, but why do you think businessmen can shoulder such a heavy responsibility? They have always made a living depending on the aristocrats. Even if they become rich and powerful, they will only choose to become new aristocrats.”

She sighed while saying that. “In the Commonwealth of Gold Coins, wealth symbolizes the social status. But the millionaires still spend a lot of money and time to seek the chance to become aristocrats. Having wealth alone is not enough for them.”

“That’s because becoming an aristocrat can always bring them privileges. No matter how rich a businessman is, wealth can’t bring him enough power,” Sui Xiong laughed and said. “This problem can be solved gradually. What we need to do now is to create magic that can not only improve people’s lives but also bring enough profits to businessmen.”

He turned to look at everyone. “The threshold of this kind of magic should not be too high, otherwise it will be meaningless. The cost should not be too high, or it will be difficult to make a profit from the civilians. As for the rest, we have to take the control.”

“Yes, there is no limit for the businessmen to pursue profit, so their activity needs to be restricted by law.” The God of Law nodded first. “We should also strengthen the supervision to avoid the nullity of the law.”

“I think it’s better to control this magic in the direction of good magic,” Yorgaardman said. “Good clergymen are the most reliable force, and if we can control the magic in this direction, it can directly eliminate many dangerous elements and avoid many potential troubles.”

“Last but not least,” Sui Xiong smiled and said confidently, “we should strictly control the use of this magic. We are not going to blindly promote it on a large scale but popularize it bit by bit. Let’s start from the Republic of Northwest. There is no aristocratic power there, so we can avoid the interference to the greatest extent.”

At this moment, he remembered many of the earth’s sages as well as some famous arguments. “In the future, if we have any new ideas, we may also choose a small area to try these ideas first. This area will be called the ‘Special Administrative Region.’”

The gods looked at each other and nodded.

Thus, everything was settled.