Wei School's Three Good Students

Chapter 302 The "Ideological Storm" of Modern Chinese Literature

In June of the 2109th year of the Han calendar, during the summer in northern Longzhou, massive Land Cruisers with enormous wheels sailed across the rocky plains north of the Great Lakes. These steel Land Cruisers were not the tanks we know today, but rather resembled paddlewheel cargo ships from twenty years prior, moving on land. (Paddlewheel ships lacked propellers; their distinguishing feature was the paddlewheels suspended on both sides.)
Now, vehicles with this style of design appeared on land, four massive steel wheels, each five meters in radius and one and a half meters wide, crushing the earth. Like giant mining carts in a 21st-century mine, they kicked up a cloud of dust.

This is clearly special equipment adapted to this location, similar to the special equipment developed by the Soviet Union during the Cold War, which uses two spiral rollers to traverse swamps.

Because there is no more expansive and solid rocky terrain in the world than that of northern Longzhou. Such an iron wheel would sink into the mud in Siberia at the same latitude, but now, walking on this solid ground, it only crushes some stones.

In the northern part of Longzhou, there is a lot of land with a lot of stones on the surface; you might think they are stones, but in fact most of them are stuck deep underground.

This 200-ton land-based weapon platform, equipped with a twin-mounted 125mm naval gun, unleashes a barrage of firepower upon the land. Being a naval gun system, its water-cooling system and loading speed are faster than land-based artillery, allowing it to fire an average of one shell every six seconds, achieving a sustained output efficiency comparable to an artillery regiment.

Under such bombardment by land-based warships, the militia in northern Longzhou gathered 30,000 men and followed closely behind; they marched forward along the huge ruts, singing the "Song of the Warriors".

"We're not just going to shoot those bastards, we're going to rip out their guts to lubricate the iron wheels of our landships. We're going to wipe out these damned green-skinned bastards by the handful."

These soldiers, dressed in uniform, have skin colors that include "black, white, and yellow." This "racism" is a uniquely American phenomenon, not to be missed;
Although internal ethnic communities are severely isolated, they can coexist under the banner of "diversity" when they find a common enemy.

In the mushroom field, a force of over a thousand orcs was wiped out by artillery fire. The remaining orcs, numbering around a hundred, in the rocky tunnels were mowed down in droves by soldiers using machine guns carried by packhorses.

These orcs, clad in stone armor, found their armor utterly useless; 12.5mm machine gun bullets shattered them like a mortar and pestle crushing a crab.

As for the remaining scattered orcs, they fell under the cavalry's lances. And those "mushrooms" that had managed to grow in the valleys and other places were dissected one by one by these Longzhou soldiers. The immature orcs were shackled and transported to the slave market under the Shield Company's trademark in the rear.

…North American tycoon…

Jemint, also known as Xie Ming, was taking stock of the current harvest. Batches of harvested "mushrooms" (orc laborers) were being sent to the laboratory to have a new set of glands implanted, similar to the brain-controlling chips implanted in science fiction novels.

Of course, while chips seem advanced, they're actually quite useless, much like the Zumwalt-class battleship. "Thought" is highly free and difficult to control. What truly allows for complete control is "medicine."

This "gland" secretes hormones when humans need them. The hormones produce fear in the beastmen, causing them to tremble and lose control of their bladder and bowels.

This is similar to how a mouse encountering a cat or a bird encountering an eagle can trigger a stress response and eventually lead to disability.

This is the brainchild of a subsidiary that Jemint has recently acquired. The company is run by French immigrants and is called Drug Kidnapping Company.

Batch after batch of orcs were sent to cages, fitted with metal collars—and then sent underground to work. The Great Lakes region was rich in mining, but had always lacked labor.

In the factory, Jemint said to his servants, "Keep a close watch on them."

A Viking slave servant said, "Don't worry, sir, I will have the black slaves keep a close eye on everyone."

Xie Ming nodded and looked at the orc consumption data for this month. "Hmm, an average of three hundred orc slaves per mine per month. The orcs eat very little; they can even survive by chewing wood and drinking water full of bacteria. The only cost is the implanted glands."

When using black slaves, the consumption rate was capped at eighty people per year. It wasn't that the masters were kind-hearted, but rather that the purchase price couldn't support such consumption. Now, orc slaves perfectly replaced this role, so the black slaves were freed from their shackles and given whips to lash these orcs.

Detonating explosives in the dark mines is an extremely dangerous job. In the past, many of the minions died down there because the white lords had no compassion. Now, the minions are using whips to supervise the orcs, letting them go down with the fuses and not have to come back. The orc casualty rate is almost 100% because the orcs are much cheaper to deal with than the minions.

As the mineral deposits in various parts of the Ice Heart Sea of ​​Longzhou were blown open by bombs guided by "Orc Wet Components", the mine output began to increase.

In the northern part of the Ice Heart Sea, a supertrust began to form and began to acquire armed forces.

…Returning our perspective to the modern Chinese…

The image of "giant buckets digging and excavating minerals" is something that will only appear in the next era. In this era, mining will always involve a group of people, shrouded in darkness, being sent underground to dig and dig.

The Han dynasty was not unaware that the Longzhou region was rich in minerals; it had known for certain that there were many gold mines there as early as two hundred years ago. However, mining gold in this area would "swallow" the population, which would be unprofitable for any vassal state in the Eastern cultural sphere.

Even though the current population of Han is somewhat excessive, the current Han government believes that, just like during the Xuan Chong era, "industrial capacity should ideally be excessive," the population should also ideally remain excessive.

The current Han Dynasty is a timeline that has been adjusted by time travelers who lived two hundred years after Xuan Chong.

Therefore, many modern Chinese cultural and educational viewpoints are a reflection of that time and space-time mapping value.

This line of thinking suggests that once a civilization is powerful enough, there is no need to maintain an extreme "super-industrial" system. This is because if the goal is to allow everyone to enjoy top-notch industrial services, the price would be that half or even more of the population selfishly enjoys modern life while forgetting their crucial obligation to maintain the continuation of civilization.

As for what the individual's mission to civilization is, Qin Tianyi prepared a private message for Xuan Chong.

While at the Yandu City Academy, Xuan Chong noticed the term "all-round war" when he was reading about the current strategy of the Han Dynasty. It mentioned three types of war: first, the war of race; second, the war of the orthodox tradition; and third, the war of military force.

Racial wars are wars revolving around population. Defending requires ensuring that one's ethnic group in the core area of ​​one's own power is not wiped out, while attacking requires ensuring that one's ethnic group can thrive and multiply normally in other countries, rather than being enslaved and exploited.

The war of the orthodox tradition is a war centered on culture. The defense is to prevent foreign monks from spreading the religion, while the offense is to actively educate all nations and let them know honor and shame according to the Chinese concept.

Military warfare revolves around the industrial market. Defense means ensuring that one's vital military equipment is produced domestically and that borders and territories remain intact. Offense, on the other hand, requires seizing all important industrial chains and crippling the automotive, shipping, and construction industries of rival industrial nations.

It is worth mentioning that, except for the last one which requires industry and military, the first two can be expanded without weapons.

The modern Han dynasty, aiming to "dominate the world," currently accounts for less than 30% of the world's industrial economy. However, even if its industrial production declines to only one-tenth of the world's total, it can still suppress other powers by relying on the impact from the other two aspects.

Within the present-day Han Dynasty, "military warfare" is precisely the lowest form of warfare. The best strategy is to attack the enemy's plans; the next best is to disrupt their alliances; the next best is to attack their army.

The current formula for the "King" and "Hegemon" factions in Hanzhong is to win a victory over the imperial court and subdue the enemy without fighting. Both factions believe that, apart from Eastern Shu, all other targets can be appeased.

…a clash of eras…

On his first day of school, Xuan Chong went into the library and asked a fellow student from Kyoto who was reading the State of the Nation Address, "Since we have the means now, why haven't we considered that industrial production should account for more than 50 percent of the market share?"

The classmate looked at Xuan Chong in shock: "Then how tired must the people be? With production at full capacity, they have no time to reproduce. Wouldn't that lead to the extinction of their race?"

Xuan Chong: "But with the expansion of industrial production, everyone's life has improved."

The classmate looked at Xuan Chong with a sneer: "Do you think that the current system of assigning labor to lower levels is an even distribution, or that some people bear a heavier burden and others a lighter one?"

Xuan Chong: "Of course, some people are burdened with heavy responsibilities, and when the higher-ups issue a directive, the lower levels will add even more and impose additional burdens." — At this point, Xuan Chong suddenly realized something.

The development of industry requires labor, and the act of mobilizing labor by the state is called labor service in modern Chinese! Although in the industrial age, there is a "salary" for working, the "salary" is actually a credit paper currency that cannot be used to purchase means of production, just like the ancient court's promise to provide laborers with daily meals. However, the bureaucratic system in modern Chinese is much more transparent than in the industrial age, and the wages received by laborers will not starve (they will only die from overwork).

The "labor service" was levied at each level. The central government issued a quota, which was then passed down to the middle-level "powerful families," who would increase the quota at each level while squeezing the "rations required for labor service" to a minimum. Therefore, the Han Dynasty wouldn't issue orders to forcibly impose labor service on unnecessary large-scale projects. Oh, the current large-scale project is the competition for a new generation of large warships. This project requires sufficient steel, a large number of shipbuilders, 2,300 companies, and the activation of related civilian market competition. As a result, the Jiangnan region was "conscripted into labor service," with tens of millions of people caught up in various industries for wages.
Although not like the "labor service" of ancient times where people were away from home for a year without returning, they still worked an average of more than ten hours a day. Ordinary couples spent little time together, leading to a negative population growth.

Xuan Chong was an ignorant fellow from Dongtu who envied the prosperity of Jiangnan, with its towering factory chimneys and the constant flow of ships on the river.

However, unbeknownst to the officials in the Han court, the Jiangnan region was already in a state of "extremely high labor service." The labor force of the common people had been squeezed to its limit. —If it weren't for the navy directly affecting the smooth operation of the court's overseas trade routes, and the military force of Dongshu bearing the burden of suppressing the enemy, the people of Jiangnan would have a much easier time.

…Xuan Chong re-evaluates and rewrites our understanding…

The war in the Western Regions wasn't a "military war"; it was a "war of the descendants" while maintaining sufficient military technology. Wave after wave of Han blood was being exported to the Abbasid Caliphate. Before the appearance of the Orcs, the equipment of several divisions was standard pre-World War I weaponry: water cannons, heavy machine guns, and 30mm mountain guns. The main vehicles were still mules and horses.

Is it because we lack 150mm heavy artillery and armored trains? — Modern Han has the technology, and with determination, a large-scale factory could emerge in the Northwest within twenty years. Furthermore, the scale of armored vehicles could be increased tenfold.

However, the steel torrent couldn't solve this problem (Xuan Chong understood this concept, given the story of the Russians and the American Empire in the graveyard of empires). On the contrary, to maintain the steel torrent, people in Liang and Yong went to factories to work on screws. This would lead to a disadvantageous population growth rate.

This would fundamentally fail to achieve the goal of strengthening the Han bloodline for the modern Han population. (Xuan Chong: Insufficient manpower hinders integration and stability.)
Therefore, in the Western Regions, a few divisions are just enough to maintain a force sufficient to crush the modern armed forces accumulated by the local military strongmen. To actually maintain a force exceeding this...
Narrator: Those three divisions alone were enough to force the local nobles to pay tribute annually, and Han envoys held high positions in various tribes. They favored having women raised alongside Han families.
The Western Regions now have modern cities. After all, the kings needed to maintain modern armies to resist strategic invasions from Europe. Some gun parts, cannonballs, and the like couldn't be transported directly from the Han region, right? So they also needed to build factories. However, the local tribes couldn't enter the factories because of their different languages ​​and customs. So Han people gathered in these cities, accounting for more than 30% of the population. In some urban communities, the proportion of Han people has reached 70% (although they wear small hats and have many dietary restrictions, they identify themselves as Han people when facing Persians and Arabs).

Xuan Chong reflected on his own time and space: Just as in the Western order, there were secularists and conservatives, with the secularists being one ethnic group and the conservatives another, a similar development has now emerged in the current Han order.

The difference is that, under the current Han order, there has been no fierce clash between the secular faction in the cities and the local tribal conservatives. After all, with the current Han order still in effect, the concept of "harmony between heaven and man" is an unshakeable truth.

If one day the current international order collapses again and its influence shrinks, a conflict will break out between the conservatives and secularists here. The conservatives' knives are sharp, but the secularists' machine guns are no less swift.

After all, the conservative faction of the tribes was still in a nomadic state, while the secular faction, having been mixed with Han Chinese, still valued local agricultural production to some extent. If a war broke out, the secular faction would control the food supply.

This is different from the situation in the main timeline, when the United States dominated the global order, where the secularists were utterly incompetent.

Women from the secular faction in the Arab world who championed "Han Dao Chang" still couldn't have as many children as the conservative faction, but the secular faction, who controlled the means of production, "bought" all the women from the conservative faction.

Because the secular faction in this area used betrothal gifts to buy concubines, there was a saying in the region: "It is better to be a concubine of a Han Chinese than a wife of a Hu (non-Han)."

Besides "military wars" and "wars concerning descendants," there was also a "war of moral orthodoxy."

The war of the Daoist lineage mainly took place in the lower reaches of the Canglan River in the southern region and in India.

The Han Chinese forces systematically eradicated the original Theravada Buddhism in the southern vassal states and replaced it with Confucianism. However, they encountered resistance in the Indian subcontinent.

In order to win the "battle for the orthodox lineage," the modern Chinese have been continuously belittling the deities of India for over a century. For example, among the original Five Elders of the Five Directions, the Western Venerable is no longer the Buddha, but has been replaced by Yakshita.

As for numerical monsters like Brahma and Shiva, who are creators and destroyers of the world, the official explanation, in order to prevent debates with the Indians on numerical values, was to directly find the concept of "one mustard seed, one world," and to categorize all those irrefutable supernatural forces into a "small world." As for the universe of the present Han Dynasty, it is boundless and limitless.

Oh, those who are willing to summarize the indigenous gods of India are still moderates. Extreme Han Confucianists have always held a disdainful view of the strange fantasies of the sorcerers in India who are addicted to drugs. They believe that they cultivate a righteous spirit amidst the vicissitudes of human life and have no need to fear the strange and chaotic gods of this place.

…He returned to Yandu with the grace of the wind and the composure of a bell…

He arrived in Yandu once again, but this time, his studies were not in the form of attending a school. After receiving the emperor's request, the Ministry of Rites originally intended to simply place Xuan Chong back into his original class.

Xuan Chong looked at the streetlights that had been replaced on the main street of Yandu and realized that Yandu, where he had come from, was different from the capital city where Liu Haoxing had been in the past, which was located under the emperor's nose in just a few years.

The original school in Yandu was so popular with the wealthy and famous because its alumni were all rich and powerful. The Ministry of Revenue planned to reintegrate Xuan Chong into his original circle, thinking that this was quite good, and would help Liu Haoxing, who had "disgracefully dropped out of school," return to his rightful place.

However, the Emperor slowly said on the phone, "He said he doesn't need classmates or study companions." — Subsequently, after discussing with the Ministry of Revenue, the Emperor requested a batch of teachers, matching the number allocated to his eldest son, and assigned them to Xuan Chong. The Ministry of Revenue had no choice but to make the arrangements.

The supervision of a great Confucian scholar is equivalent to one-on-one tutoring by top college entrance exam tutors in the 21st century. Although Xuan Chong was slow to realize it, he did! The person explaining "All-Round Warfare" to him in the library was none other than Liu Shangying, the third son of the current Han emperor, and the designated successor.

After Xuan Chong successfully entered the internal class, Liu Shangying greeted him with great pleasure. Xuan Chong was somewhat flattered, after all, his predecessor had been bullied and driven out by the people of Yandu, and he knew that his identity as a "barbarian" was not something to be proud of.

…in the Emperor's study…

Liu Shangying stood beside Liu Lu, looking at the map in front of her.

The Emperor: "The new student has seen it, hasn't he?"

Liu Shangying: "It's an open channel." (This describes Xuan Chong's character and qualities.)
Note: This is an allusion. Under the bright moonlight, a clear canal can be clearly illuminated, but if fuel oil or other substances are spilled and dripping ash pollutes the canal, the light will not penetrate. This is used to describe the relationship between a ruler and his ministers. In other words, it is best not to use dark, unpleasant things like oil or fire to stir up trouble between ministers, lest the originally clear relationship become unclear.

Of course, not everyone is so clear-headed. Some people with deep-seated ulterior motives cannot be seen clearly by simply letting the moon shine brightly; they need to be stirred up before they can be seen clearly.

A map of Longzhou was unfolded before the emperor, along with a map of the north. The Han Dynasty had already deciphered the code of Pengzhou and knew that Pengzhou was still summoning "interstellar orcs"!
The Han court's strategic experts advised the emperor: "Given the current distribution of humanity, even if the Orcs were to land in any of the mid-latitude countries and ethnic regions, they wouldn't be able to develop. The advanced technology of the Dragon Warriors and other factions' superhumans would prematurely stifle the Orcs' early development. However, the north is a weak point. The next wave of Orcs will land in the north."

In other words, in the eyes of the emperor and his advisors, the north needed a "Great Wall," and Xuanchong, whose fiefdom was in the north, was the perfect candidate. This was also to balance the excessively powerful maternal relatives within the capital, Yan.

In the future, Xuan Chong is someone Liu Shangying will most likely need to use. Of course, how will he "use" him?
In Longzhou, a negative example was provided: the emperor could know everything happening in the world without leaving his home. The trust in the north of Longzhou is now rising rapidly, not only economically, but also with its militia growing to over 100,000 men.

From the very beginning of this interstellar catastrophe, the Dragon Continent Federation had already lost control of its northern territory.
The emperor needs to declare that the emperor is "controllable." This "controllability" is not like the slave owners of barbarians taking in slaves. According to the current theory of the emperor and his subjects in the Han Dynasty, both sides need to establish a lot of communication channels on the basis of "reason".

Therefore, the emperor instructed Liu Shangying: "You must not let him have the name of a 'barbarian.' If you regard him as a 'barbarian,' then in the future you will not be able to use 'Neo-Confucianism' to issue orders, nor will you be able to use 'rites' to restrain him."

As a mature civilization, the modern Han dynasty fully understands the principle that "punishment does not apply to high-ranking officials, and etiquette does not apply to commoners."

The scholar-officials who controlled both power and influence had numerous means to make "punishment" appear procedurally sound. Even women and unscrupulous individuals who infiltrated the scholar-official class would, when making judgments from their superior position, avoid violating the law themselves, portraying their manipulation of procedures as "understanding" or "having their own difficulties."

For example, the bullying of Liu Haoxing back then went unpunished; Xuan Chong still doesn't want to settle scores. Because even if it were taken to higher authorities, the final outcome, following procedure, would only be a high-profile but light-handed punishment. Back then, Lin Yang, a local from Yandu, was not a commoner, and there was a group of female scholars in the Imperial Academy. Explaining the procedures of "punishment" to them was useless.

Now, the tables have turned, and Xuan Chong has become a "Shi" (a type of official), making his position and role exceptionally important. Using harsh punishments against Xuan Chong is no longer effective; Xuan Chong has also begun to employ countless procedural methods to refuse cooperation.

Just like the Zhu Ming Dynasty in the main historical timeline, the Zhu family morally condoned the princes' accumulation of wealth in the local areas. Although they could use the righteousness of the emperor and father to call for the killing of the scholar-officials, they could not legally levy taxes on the scholar-officials as a group.

In contrast, the modern Han dynasty morally condoned the "harvesting of the vassal kings by the industrial group of the scholar-official class," and thus was able to use the moral system of "rites" to kick out the scholar-officials who did not pursue their proper duties from fame and fortune.

The Emperor now instructs that Liu Xuanchong should be treated with courtesy from now on.

The emperor pointed to the situation in Longzhou: "The people there are like monkeys wearing hats."

Liu Shangying nodded. Longzhou was gradually established with the support of the current Han dynasty, but after completing its reforms and learning about the "military merit-based land grant" system, it felt it had grown too powerful and wanted to go solo. Its cultural foundation was too weak, and now, less than a century later, it was already rushing headlong into a pit.

(End of this chapter)