Chapter 704: Wuguo (2)

Wuguo, like spring wind turning to rain, was changing slowly yet firmly.

First, the terrain around Iron Cauldron Mountain City changed.

Originally, during the Great Martial God State era, Iron Cauldron Mountain City was the sole mountain peak within a million li radius, the surrounding plains flat, with only this square‑shaped odd mountain standing tall like a crouching beast, magnificent and imposing.

Nowadays, around Iron Cauldron Mountain City rise lofty mountains and rugged ridges, with odd peaks protruding everywhere, presenting scenery so beautiful it cannot be taken in.

The Yin‑Yang Daoist, Five Elements Daoist, and Vast Sea Daoist, having gathered fine mountains and waters from Jade Prefecture and elsewhere, under the meticulous design of Ma Liang, the Painting Dao Master, presented a splendid landscape scroll like a beautiful river‑and‑mountain painting before Iron Cauldron Mountain City.

Yuan Qilin used his great supernatural power to press the ley lines underground, arranging them into an excellent feng shui grand formation; the newly arrived ley lines gradually linked with the original ones around Iron Cauldron Mountain City.

Gathering the ley lines of many prefectures within a million‑li radius, the area around Iron Cauldron Mountain City already teemed with heavenly and earthly elemental energy, truly a cultivation holy land; now the density of that energy has increased severalfold.

Yuan Qilin proudly boasted that, with the feng shui grand formation he set up, the ley lines around Iron Cauldron Mountain City would accelerate their growth, making the cultivation environment here ever better, and it would also wield the miraculous effects of prolonging life, increasing blessings and wealth.

In the not‑too‑distant future, even a stubborn stone could, nourished by the rich elemental energy around Iron Cauldron Mountain City, become peerless jade, moreover give rise to spirituality, and even possibly embark on the path of cultivation and transform into human form.

Within Wuguo, the scions of the great clans and aristocratic families had spread to all quarters, replacing the officials of the former Great Martial God State.

Under their leadership, on the once somewhat desolate and empty lands of the Great Martial God State, new cities rose up from the ground, and well‑planned villages and towns were built in turn.

In each crude mine cavern, in each rough earthen hut, great numbers of slaves emerged, bewildered and fearful.

They were assigned to individual villages, individual towns, and to individual neighborhoods within the cities.

They gathered together in a daze, listening to the admonitions of the grassroots officials.

From now on, they are no longer slaves.

They can now eat their fill and keep warm, just like the nobles of the former Great Martial God State.

They can dwell in spacious houses, no longer needing to huddle in mine shafts, crowd in grass huts, or squeeze into earthen cellars; when it rains they have roofs for shelter, when it blows they have walls to block the wind, when it snows they have braziers for warmth.

They can walk down the middle of the streets without fear of being cut down by a random blade for accidentally blocking a noble's path, or being trampled to death by carriages and horses.

Everything they do from now on will receive its due reward: each basket of ore they dig, each basket of herbs they gather, each tree they fell, each grain they harvest—if they sweat, they will receive fair compensation.

They no longer need to worry that their handsome and beautiful children will be seized by those nobles to be wantonly toyed with.

They no longer need to strangle their newborns out of despair for survival.

They no longer need to be driven like dull tools by overseers into numb, arduous labor.

They no longer need to live together like beasts; instead they can form fixed families, have steady spouses, clearly know their bloodline inheritance, understand their ancestors, and understand their descendants.

They can live more clearly, more awake.

They were registered in an orderly manner, their slave brands removed, given surnames, given names, and issued identity waist tablets.

The kindly officials' first lesson for them was to remember their geographic location, remember their newly acquired surnames, and remember their newly acquired names.

They are of Wuguo, some prefecture, some county, some city, some neighborhood…… or perhaps some township, some town, some village, some such.

The first batch of Wuguo citizens whose registration was complete, still dazed and confused, were led by smiling officials out to the countryside beyond the cities and villages—vast tracts of farmland, countless mountain forests and fisheries, countless mountain mines and medicinal fields—all of which had once belonged to those nobles.

These officials led them in measuring the land, fairly allocating farmland and medicinal hills according to their skills, as well as fisheries and pastures, mines and workshops……

What they have been allocated becomes theirs. As long as they work hard and do not ruin their families, these assets will remain theirs forever. According to Wuguo's Civil Code, they can pass them down from father to son, son to grandson, generation after generation.

These new Wuguo citizens were bewildered.

From countless generations of ancestors onward, from time immemorial, their minds held only one thought: 'I belong to Lord So‑and‑So'!

They had never entertained the notion—'Lord So‑and‑So belongs to me'!

'Mine'!

That word is so unfamiliar, even somewhat frightening.

Yet the newly issued clothing, the new dwellings, the grain in the storehouses, the large livestock and poultry before them—all these tangible things were registered one by one by those sweat‑drenched officials.

These things are their lawful property.

All of it belongs to them.

All of it, 'mine'!

My house, my land…… my village, my city…… my wife and children, my elders!

Energetic Kong Chengxi came with countless descendants and disciples, full of enthusiasm.

They all possessed mana and supernatural powers, so building schools for them was no great effort.

Children of suitable age were required to attend school around the clock, all expenses covered by the Wuguo government—Wuguo having inherited the entirety of the Great Martial God State's assets, this outlay was merely a drop in the bucket.

Adult citizens, meanwhile, after their daily labor, had to spend a little time each day attending night school to learn the most basic subjects.

At the very least, they first needed to recognize their new surnames, recognize their own names, and learn to write their own names.

Kong Chengxi was excited to the point of near madness.

These Wuguo citizens were utterly a blank sheet of paper, utterly a knowledge desert. To write freely on this blank page, to sow seeds at will in this desert…… teaching was addictive.

To become a realm's 'Teacher of All Under Heaven' made Kong Chengxi infinitely happy!

Countless enlightenment books were printed and then shipped boat by boat to all directions, delivered to city after city, town after town.

In the schools, in the fields, everywhere rose the halting sounds of reading.

Reading, recognizing characters—then Kong Chengxi's younger generations, his disciples, earnestly taught these new Wuguo citizens what loyalty, filial piety, benevolence and righteousness are, what human ethics are.

Tell them what the 'Lord of Myriad Spirits' is.

Tell them what exactly distinguishes humans from beasts.

To thoroughly reform a nation, there are myriad threads, and it is very busy.

Busy yet spirited, Wuguo is changing slowly, bit by bit, like a corpse that has lain stiff for countless years, a little warmth, a thread of life, slowly reviving.