Chapter 3325: Their Hero

Starting from the more than twenty exchange practices the recorder had personally experienced, this report analyzed the development of Seven Towers Mages in various aspects such as combat techniques, the development of new spells, and Magic Theory.

It also gave a high evaluation that while they were not yet sufficient to pose a threat to Elven Magic, they were highly likely to surpass Elven Magic in the later stages, and even proposed in the report that ways must be found to contain the magic development of the Seven Towers and Netheril.

The recorder personally put forward many suggestions, and Xia Duo could even see the shadows of these suggestions in the actions of various Elven nations in recent years.

For example, by guiding the development direction of Netheril Magic through exchanges, making it develop toward exquisite and delicate individual duels, rather than toward War Spells that win by quantity.

Another example is dumping a large amount of cheap Civilian Magic Artifacts onto Netheril to cut off the development of Netheril Magic toward Civilian Magic Artifacts; after all, if Civilian Magic Artifacts prosper, they will inevitably provide feedback to the development of War Magic Artifacts.

Yet another example is imposing restrictions from the perspective of strategic resources, such as blockading Mithril Refining Technology, controlling the Mithril Mines within Netheril, and guiding them toward incorrect technical paths, and so on.

The most brilliant part was that this report explicitly mentioned that they could unite with other Elven nations to restrict the scale of magic activities throughout the Northland, with the excuse that Elven Magic requires more archaeology than experimentation.

Conversely, a new magic system like Netheril Magic requires a large amount of experimental support; as long as the scale of magic activities is restricted, the magic development of Netheril will inevitably be greatly limited.

At the same time, supplemented by the extreme disparagement and exclusion of Netheril Magic, the ultimate goal was to guide humanity back to the "correct path" of Elven Magic.

……

Xia Duo carefully flipped through this report and discovered that the time it was written was actually over a hundred years ago, because one section of the report mentioned, "Netheril is recently preparing for a decisive battle with Orc tribes, and its interest in exchange magic has greatly diminished," which is why the author of the report did not continue to follow up, but chose to "summarize past exchange experiences for the King's reference."

In other words, over a hundred years ago, there were Elves who foresaw the development potential of Netheril Magic and even suggested that Yierlan take the initiative to contain it.

The approach mentioned therein of containing Netheril's magic development by restricting the scale of magic activities in the Northland is exactly what the later "Magic Restriction Treaty" was!

It is just that the later Magic Restriction Treaty was first proposed by Keman, not Yierlan, but this is perhaps what is called "great minds think alike."

However, the author of this report did not anticipate the later establishment of the Northland Alliance, and Keman did not anticipate that due to the establishment of the Northland Alliance, the magic development of various Elven nations would also usher in a major opportunity.

While the Magic Restriction Treaty could indeed restrict Netheril, it also restricted themselves, and thus, the Magic Restriction Treaty that no one wanted to abide by became a mere scrap of paper.

Of course, when Keman proposed this suggestion, the ostensible reason was still very correct and sufficient—protecting the Magic Net environment.

Due to the abuse of magic in the last few thousand years (wars and other unbridled magic activities), the Magic Net environment was long since not as good as before, specifically manifested in the lower efficiency of Magic Net energy acquisition per unit of space.

Or it can also be understood as the energy density of the Magic Net having decreased.

This is a fact acknowledged by all nations, so the later Magic Restriction Treaty began to be discussed in the direction of Magic Net protection, until the recent Ailan attack incident, which caused seven huge Magic Web Decay Zones that were also very likely to spread.

Only then did the various nations completely make up their minds to invest resources and manpower to protect the Magic Net.

Xia Duo also supports Magic Net protection; most Arcanists in Netheril do not reject repairing the Magic Net, but the premise is that it is easy to repair, as doing so can earn Divine Grace.

But only a very small number of Arcanists are willing to repair those Magic Network Knots or dead zones that are difficult to repair; the former requires combing through the Magic Net structure in a larger area, and the "dead" description of the latter is enough to explain the problem.

It belongs to the category of long-term unpaid labor where spending twelve parts of effort does not necessarily yield one part of results.

Some Arcanists might occasionally try it on a whim, but to have them do this kind of thankless, unpaid labor for a long time, I am afraid ninety-nine percent of Arcanists would not be willing.

Including Xia Duo, even if he knows that doing this is beneficial to the public, the role of selfishness will be infinitely magnified in a situation where he must personally bear various costs while benefiting the public interest.

Unless one is a saint or someone with some kind of Faith support, it is possible to engage in such unpaid service of "sacrificing myself to benefit thousands of families" for a long time.

Therefore, it is good for the Alliance to take responsibility for this matter; after all, the Alliance is truly able to provide money and resources, rather than letting people work for nothing.

As long as such a reward and punishment mechanism is established and maintained well, the magic environment of the Northland and even the entire Main Plane will gradually improve in the future.

And such behavior can probably only be mentioned now that the Northland Alliance has been established and various nations do not need to worry about war for the time being.

If it were placed before, even if the relations between nations were friendly, they would worry about whether they would be backstabbed by an ally one day; in such a situation, who would sacrifice their own interests to fulfill the public interest?

Now, among the nations in the Northland Alliance, although some seem to have bad relations, or are even hostile, within the framework of the Alliance, cooperation still outweighs conflict.

Only in this situation can the nations of the Northland act as a whole and jointly bear a portion of the costs for the sake of the overall interest.

Of course, the Alliance is not perfect; not to mention the threats from the outside, as long as the nations of the Alliance are united, they can always overcome them, but the internal crisis is very fatal.

For example, the conflict between the "Golden Elf Supremacy" ideology and the "Five Races Equality and Prosperity" concept that Xia Duo has always kept in mind, as well as the contradiction between the Upper Families wanting to achieve eternal rule and the lower classes wanting to progress, and so on.

These may only be a few sparks now, but if not handled well, they might cause the entire Alliance to split apart.

……

Putting down "Morien Tower Exchange Observations," Xia Duo picked up the next book; this should be his first contact with the undisguised true thoughts of the Elven upper class.

Although such true thoughts could be glimpsed from the process of getting along with Elves in daily life, it is almost impossible for any Elf to say to his face how they would contain Netheril.

Almost all Elves carry disguises when facing humans; those of low status have to pretend to be submissive, because those of high status, even if they are human, can decide the fate of those low-status Elves.

Those of high status also have to pretend to be aloof to suppress the status and interests of humans, or feign stupidity to make humans misjudge.

Of course, this world has never lacked Elves of true character, but they are mostly in the middle and lower classes; the higher up one goes, the less difference there is between Elves and humans, which is also an inevitable manifestation of social Wisdom-possessing creatures at a certain stage.

Xia Duo was unhappy in his heart, but there was indeed no way to change it for the time being; all he could do was continue to develop.