Chapter 388

After explaining the little incident related to Apep.

Luo De went to Furina's tea party again.

This time there weren't so many troubles and scheming.

Although she had ruled for five hundred years.

But Furina was very "pure".

That word is somewhat unsuitable for a god who personally rules.

But the fact is just that.

In Luo De's view.

Furina shows no sign of having lived five hundred years; her speech and demeanor always hint at a youthful maiden's feeling, and at a glance she always appears completely harmless.

Perhaps it is precisely this mindset that allows her to endure five hundred years without breaking.

Frankly speaking.

Furina's five hundred years are like being in prison compared to Nadixa's imprisonment.

At least Nadixa can still use her authority to roam the void, see what the Sumeru people are doing, browse the knowledge reserves in the void, go to her own dreams to experiment with theories, and create some small animals to keep herself company.

By contrast, Furina.

She has no divine power.

When Focalors went into hiding, she left her not a shred of power, forcing her to bear all kinds of pressure with a mortal body.

She must not let the Fontaine people doubt her divine status, especially absolutely must not let Neuvillette suspect her.

She also had to organize monitoring and research on how to solve the problem of rising water levels in Fontaine.

Moreover, she had to maintain a divine demeanor when facing foreign guests and domestic believers.

Most importantly.

While enduring such pressure, she could not tell anyone about these things, and could only silently suffer the torment.

Being able to persevere for five hundred years under such circumstances probably can only be done with this carefree attitude.

After the tea party ended.

As the host, Furina led Dixiya and the others to tour the Foam-tip Palace.

Neuvillette then went to handle the Apep affair.

He ultimately agreed to send Apep to the Special Patrol Unit to avoid further complaints.

But he still had to repeatedly remind Apep, when killing time, to try not to cause too much trouble, lest the Fontaine Court question the Special Patrol Unit again.

This reasoning is simple.

It's just that dealing with this old stubborn Apep might be difficult to talk about.

So it's expected he won't be back anytime soon.

Thus the remaining Luo De, together with Egeria, strolled through Fontaine City while researching how to locate the Hydro Archon's divine throne.

After all, that is the real major task.

Before coming to Fontaine.

Egeria had already helped Luo De devise a plan: using the power of the Descender to destroy the Hydro Archon's throne, thereby freeing Focalors and Furina.

The plan is simple.

But after arriving in Fontaine City, the problem arose.

Egeria discovered that she and the Hydro Archon's throne had completely lost contact.

Even though she was in Fontaine City, she could not sense the exact location of the Hydro Archon's throne.

That is quite troublesome.

If the throne cannot be found, even if Luo De had the ability to shatter it, he would have nowhere to use it and could only stare blankly in Fontaine City.

"Is there still no way?"

Walking down Fontaine Court's clean and tidy streets, Luo De asked Egeria on his shoulder without glancing sideways.

Fontaine truly lives up to being the most technologically advanced nation.

Leaving aside those shops full of mechanical flavor, just this spotless white jade-like ground already surpasses the infrastructure standards of most nations in Teyvat.

Especially those patrolling automaton soldiers everywhere.

Luo De looked on with great envy.

Sumeru also unearthed similar technology from the Red King's tomb.

But to drive the automatons, one must inject a soul with some residual consciousness into them.

Just this step.

This dooms the technology to be unreplicable.

Nadixa is not the Red King; she lacks that cruelty and naturally would not accept such brutal technology.

And besides the technology in the Red King's tomb.

Luo De knows that on the Tiwatedalu there are countries capable of manufacturing automated war machines, namely Inazuma and Liyue.

Inazuma, that goes without saying.

Their technology is actually the puppet technique of the Raiden Shogun.

This is completely a technology that mortals cannot use, and it's impossible to mass-produce mechanical automatic soldiers like those of Fontaine.

Liyue is the mechanical technique of the adepts.

Liu Yun Jiefeng Zhenjun is adept at this.

But the cost is somewhat too high.

Zhongli had mentioned this before.

Besides, mechanism technique is hard to learn, operation is also quite complicated, and if those fangshi clans of Liyue don't help, the possibility of mass production is zero.

Remove them.

Mondstadt's creation alchemy can also be counted as one.

After all, it's a top-tier technique inherited from Golden Rhine Dott; not to mention war machines, even humans can be made.

But the problem is also the inability to mass-produce.

The learning difficulty of creation alchemy is even higher than Liyue's mechanism technique; few people can learn it, and relying solely on Abeiduo cannot achieve the needed mass production.

Thus he pondered.

Luo De still craved Maple Crimson's autonomous war machine, to the point that he could even sit on a roadside chair and watch the machine go back and forth all day.

However, the immediate priority is not going to talk with Naweilait about transferring technology, but rather where the Divine Seat is, or how to summon the Hydro Archon's Divine Seat.

"There is a method, but I don't know if it will go smoothly."

"Egeliya this time did not give a negative answer again, but directly said: 'With vast faith power, one can draw out the response of the Divine Seat.'"

"Faith power?"

"This Luo De is familiar with; using faith power to draw out the Divine Seat sounds indeed feasible."

But the problem is.

"Fukaluosi drew all of Maple Crimson's faith power into some machine."

"Even if you provide her with a large amount of faith power."

"I'm afraid it won't draw out the Divine Seat's response, but will instead directly enter that judgment machine."

Luo De raised his doubts.

"Egeliya quickly replied: 'No matter how the Papal Curia draws faith power, as long as faith power is sufficient, it will definitely cause the Hydro Archon's Divine Seat to manifest.'"

"Are you sure?"

Luo De asked again.

"Hmm."

"Egeliya nodded and said: 'When I escaped confinement, it was exactly when the Hydro Archon's position was vacant; since there was no god to inherit the Hydro Archon's Divine Seat, the heavenly principle let me gather faith power, achieve a new Hydro Archon, and it was then that I saw the connection between faith power and the Hydro Archon's Divine Seat.'"

"There's also this matter."

Luo De was slightly surprised, never expecting Egeliya to have such a past.

But this is also good.

Through Egeliya's own experience, they can indeed confirm a method. Then the next problem.

Namely, how to gather this faith power.

"Maple Crimson's faith power mainly comes from judgment, not true faith in the Hydro Archon."

"Although just strolling briefly in Maple Crimson Court, this is already enough for Luo De to have sufficient understanding of the Maple Crimson people."

"These guys talk nonstop about justice and fairness."

"Actually, the justice followed by the Maple Crimson people is merely what they consider justice, not true justice in fact."

"This concrete manifestation."

"Namely, the existence of duel agents."

"Their main duty is to settle disputes and problems through duels, while this more personal duel method, in Maple Crimson's legal system, is regarded as a form of judicial judgment."

"In Maple Crimson, duel agents can directly replace traditional judicial proceedings with duels, the victor being regarded as the side of justice."

"This is quite absurd."

"At least in Luo De's view."

"Such a system isn't it basically saying that the strong are just?"

"Then what is this called justice?"

Someday, find a time for Luo De to give Nawailait a beating; then would he be able to do as he pleases in Fontaine? Anyway, no matter what he does, as long as he wins, he is just.

Although we cannot determine the truth.

But the Hydro Archon understands.

The Hydro Archon will surely let justice prevail.

So passing the trial of the gods' spokesperson is justice!

Luo De pondered the Fontaine people's understanding of the duel proxy rule, and thoughtfully said, "You wouldn't be trying to use a justice that conforms to Fontaine's values to forge a great power of faith, would you?"

Indeed, that is what I think.

Egeliya openly admitted her idea: "To quickly harvest faith in Fontaine, a just trial is undoubtedly the best method; as for how to create a century-defining grand trial, it's actually not difficult."

Oh?

Go on.

Luo De became interested, and his eyes shifted back from the wandering automatons.

Judging the gods, this method is the most direct; Fukalos seems to be holding this idea.

The first thing Egeliya mentioned was judging the gods.

Of course.

The gods she spoke of were not just Furina, but also people like Luo De and Nawailait who hold divine titles or have equal status to gods.

Relatively speaking.

The most effective are these two from Fontaine.

Whether judging Furina or judging Nawailait.

As long as their 'evil' is acknowledged by the Fontaine people, the resulting judgment will cause the Fontaine people to actively contribute a large amount of faith.

But this is also the worst method.

Because the trial of Fu Ning Na was Fu Ka Luo Si's plan, not what E Ge Li Ya wanted to see.

How to say it.

Diligently, and having lived in fear for five hundred years, the result was, however, the people's lack of trust and questioning; E Ge Li Ya could easily tell how great the impact on Fu Ning Na would be.

As for Na Wei Lai Te.

That makes it even more impossible.

After the pitch-black disaster, Maple Crimson spent how much effort to bring him over and let him form an unbreakable bond with Maple Crimson.

If they were to put him on trial, his heart would grow cold.

Anyway, E Ge Li Ya had not even a bit of thought about this matter, and had never considered it in this regard.

So why not not put them on trial?

Only one candidate remains.

"To clarify beforehand, I don't accept this proposal, haha."

No need for E Ge Li Ya to continue speaking; Luo De directly refused, letting her eliminate this dangerous idea.

"Hmm, I know."

Although she said that, E Ge Li Ya appeared somewhat disappointed.

"This plan won't work."

"E Ge Li Ya's next plan is also ready."

"Go cause a disturbance in Mei Luo Bi De Bao, then let the Judgment Court publicly try you."

"The principle of this plan is to let Luo De change his face, become a villain hated by thousands, despised by people and dogs, the kind that can even make children stop crying."

"When the time comes for the Judgment Court's public trial."

"Luo De directly clashed with the Duel Agent, ultimately losing by a narrow margin to Na Wei Lai Te, thus practicing the Maple Crimson people's understanding of justice."

"To be honest."

"Your idea actually sounds quite reasonable."

"That's why I want to hit you."

"Speaking of this, Luo De directly reached out and grabbed E Ge Li Ya, hammered her head twice, and continued to complain: 'How could you come up with such a lame idea? Don't I care about face? After all, I am also the Red King of Sumeru; if people found out, how could I still survive in Sumeru?'"

"The hurting E Ge Li Ya covered her head, pouted her lips, and complained: 'You don't have experience being a villain in Sumeru, do you? Besides, besides you, no one can beat Ke Luo Lin De.'"

"The Ke Luo Lin De that E Ge Li Ya spoke of is the strongest Duel Agent in the Judgment Court of Maple Crimson, possessing strength comparable to that of the Lowest-ranking Executive of the Foolish Masses."

"For the Maple Crimson people,"

"Such strength can guarantee that Ke Luo Lin De sweeps away all criminals who come to challenge her to a duel, practicing Maple Crimson's justice with her formidable personal martial power."

"That makes sense."

"But."

"Change it."

"Luo De, dissatisfied, poked E Ge Li Ya's forehead with his finger: 'You should still have a third backup plan, right.'"

"There is, there is."

"Speaking of this third plan."

"E Ge Li Ya's voice became hesitant."

"Hard to speak up?"

"Luo De sensed the abnormality, stroking his chin, said: 'Let's talk about it first; I'll help you consult on its credibility.'"

"Uh."

"After hesitating a while longer, E Ge Li Ya finally spoke: 'Let's create a big case that shocks all of Maple Crimson, and then as criminals, be publicly tried.'"

"Seeing Luo De's expression somewhat off."

"She hurriedly added: 'Or we could go find a hugely influential case to overturn, preferably one that affects the whole nation and leaves a deep impression.'"

"This one is still okay."

"Luo De's expression eased slightly."

"Actually, E Ge Li Ya's second proposal is theoretically the most effective."

"After all, speaking of the so-called sense of justice of the Maple Crimson people, when bandits defeat the Duel Agent and it seems justice is no longer just, if someone suddenly defeats that evil, upholding Maple Crimson's justice, the resulting faith power will absolutely be unprecedentedly strong."

"However."

"With too many villains around, Luo De wants to change his taste."

"Then let's go with the third plan for now; later we'll ask Na Wei Lai Te what big case with great influence and hidden details exists in Maple Crimson."

"Really can't."

"Then we'll just execute the second plan, and I'll act as a villain again."

"After pondering for a long time, Luo De finally made a decision."

"(End of chapter)"