Pirate Kingship

Byron naturally had no way of guessing Britney’s thoughts, otherwise he would definitely have recommended that she go to the Old Continent for further study.

With the way her mind and the Fairy Town School’s thinking radiated outward, if she went to the Old Continent and studied the advanced knowledge of the [Ladder of Glory] for just two days, she could casually qualify as a [Novelist], maybe even open up a branch path of "Fairy Tale Writer" and produce a few figures like "Andersen".

Just listening to her describe the Eastern Continent, he couldn’t help lowering his head to look at the restless earth beneath his feet.

The Corridor of Truth and the Hundred Beasts Paradise had many similar traits.

On the vast and primitive Continent, the weight of the Natural World far exceeded that of the Humanized World, and the level of development was extremely low.

The sprawling mountains and forests, many times taller and broader than those on the Old Continent, rustled and swayed, and every blade of grass, every tree, flower, and stone gained Life under the Blood Moon.

Grotesques prowled among the clawing shadows, Evil Spirits keened; in Secret Realms that were supposed to be forbidden zones devoid of people, crowds would suddenly erupt, bustling and noisy.

"All Things Have Spirit" might be nothing more than a mortal’s awestruck fantasy about Nature elsewhere, but in these two places it was an obvious piece of realist sketching.

It was just that the Southern Continent, being a veritable "Hundred Beasts Paradise", was still dominated by all sorts of beast-leaning Bizarre entities or Demon Monsters.

Byron had once witnessed with his own eyes: a [Bizarre Thousand-legged Centipede] whose body was as large as a sheet-metal locomotive, bearing a Human face, with thousands of tentacle-like limbs all replaced by Human feet;

and a [Demon Monster·Sky Pit Worm] roaming deep underground, whose single bite could create a gigantic sky pit on the surface, enough to swallow a small Human tribe in an instant, then lie there like a corpse for dozens of years after one meal, until a new tribe settled, bred, and grew right by its mouth, only to be gulped down in one bite again;

and corpses polluted by the Blood Moon, climbing out of their tombs once more, wandering everywhere in pursuit of the slightest scent of fresh flesh and blood...

But once you reached the Corridor of Truth, this situation changed significantly.

Activated knowledge and Secret Realms born around World Rifts replaced ordinary Bizarre phenomena, more Hidden and far more dangerous.

A roadside Human tavern that on the surface seemed to be roaring with voices and full of lively bustle might in fact be a "Human Skin Inn";

a quiet and peaceful little forest town under the night could be "Silent Hill"; in some utterly ordinary city, a "Yushu Street" might inexplicably appear;

an inconspicuous house in the forest might very well be the "Forest Cabin"...

One after another Human settlement across the Continent was cut into fragmented dots by dense clusters of Secret Realms of all sizes.

Don’t even think about vast territories, huge populations, and economically flourishing Great Empires—there weren’t even many Kingdoms and Principalities, the most numerous political units on the Silver Continent.

The main mode was still fortress cities, each pairing with surrounding satellite cities serving as resource points to form isolated land blocks.

"Your Majesty the Frenzied Hunt King, in fact, the more culturally developed a region is in the Corridor of Truth, the more Activated knowledge there is, and the more severe the disasters.

The Northern Continent, separated by the world’s largest desert, the ’Sunset Desert’, is populated primarily by immigrants from all over the world.

Ideas and cultures mingle, creating the most complex cultural environment, and also providing a breeding ground for all kinds of Activated knowledge.

In many places, Humans are turned into ’reserve rations’ in Human farms without having the slightest clue.

In recent decades, as the Source Tide has grown ever more active and the Material World has fallen into the Intertidal Zone, this situation has only become more and more dire..."

While flying alongside them, Britney introduced the current situation of the Continent to Byron and to Heather, who had been away from home for twenty years, helping them redraw an overall picture:

"In the present Corridor of Truth, Activated knowledge, Wizard Schools, and the newly risen Old God Sects form a three-way deadlock.

In the northern part of the Continent, there are about fifty top-tier organizations and forces with multiple Fifth Order guardians; purely Human forces account for only a quarter of them.

Attack and defense swap places, and the suffering is beyond words.

The strongest Human force among them is the Lonely Star Kingdom of the Wizard Kingdom, which, together with the second-ranked Flower Kingdom, is known for this: the Lonely Star Kingdom doesn’t support slackers, and the Flower Kingdom doesn’t support idlers.

Humans who wish to gain their protection must possess at least one specialized skill; these are the core regions of economic civilization, and as long as those weird things don’t unite, they can at least continue to hold on.

By contrast, the Desert Empire in the ’Sunset Desert’ is naturally resistant to the Sea of Origin Matter, retaining the scale of an Empire, ruled by the [Radiant Queen].

And the southern region beyond the desert is primarily the homeland of the Black Iron Race, which is relatively much safer.

Many northern forces that can no longer hold out have begun migrating south, either starting anew or establishing branch bases..."

Just as Byron had once remarked about the Black Iron Race, they had never lit up the Talents of learning and Wisdom, they didn’t even have their own script, let alone any civilizational inheritance.

Their only Empire, the Sanghai Empire, collapsed with a crash in less than a century.

Among this Species, not a single Wizard School worth naming had ever been born.

By a quirk of fate, this depression of civilization instead became a blessed land for the continuation of the Species, and the living environment here was far friendlier than in the north.

"What a pity..."

Listening to Britney’s account, Byron already had a general understanding of the situation in the Corridor of Truth, and a trace of regret surfaced on his face:

"With population and goods unable to circulate freely on a large scale, a self-sufficient manor economy is bound to flourish.

I finally understand why the technology tree for Whale Oil tech here has been pushed along the extraordinary branch instead of the more universally applicable Steam Engine branch.