There seemed to be a gentle and cool wind blowing on my face.
How long has it been since you breathed so easily? How long has it been since you lay down so comfortably? How long has it been since I felt so safe and comfortable - all the pain and fatigue have gone away, and all the old illnesses seem to have been cured.
In my memory, a similar feeling seems to have happened decades ago.
"This child is blessed to be with the land. He inherits the blessings of the Harvest Goddess..."
Suddenly, a voice settled deep in the memory suddenly broke into my mind. , the chaotic and loose thoughts were reorganized. The feeling of being unable to distinguish between illusion and reality suddenly dissipated. The wind blowing on the face became real, and there was a faint smell of green grass and earth. Nostrils——Norris suddenly opened his eyes.
The endless green field stretches out as far as the eye can see. There is indeed a breeze blowing on this land, and the grass blades are wavy in the breeze. In the distance, there stands a strange, seemingly made of color blocks. Among the spliced mountain peaks, majestic formulas and rune arrays can be seen among the clouds in the sky. A giant sun with soft light is slowly crossing the sky, and he is lying in this strange world.
Norris woke up in this strange place and looked at everything in front of him in confusion.
Some vague memories began to linger in his mind. He remembered the figures shaking in front of his eyes, the whispers of Margarita and Bertila beside the bed, and He was walking in the last sigh of his life, and with constant confusion, he got up from the grass and stood up.
He found that his body was more flexible than ever before - this feeling had not been felt for many years.
There was a small slope nearby. You should be able to see more things from a higher place. Norris walked towards it. He easily reached the top of the slope and found that there was On the opposite side of the gently rolling hills, there were actually people.
——A large and beautiful city is lying quietly on the plain, surrounded by gem-like crystal clear rivers and lakes.
A voice suddenly came from the side: "Does it look good? They made it based on the appearance in their memory."
Norris was startled by the voice, and he immediately She turned around and saw a figure beside her. She was a young girl she had never seen before. She was wearing a simple white dress and had long snow-like hair hanging down to the ground. She was standing There, looking at the beautiful strange city in the distance, a simple and happy smile appeared on his face.
Noticing Norris's gaze, the girl turned around and showed a bright smile: "Hello, my name is Naritiel."
Then she pointed at Norris again Behind him: "He's Duarte!"
Norris turned around in confusion, but saw a figure behind him at some point. It was an old man in a simple robe, with a kind face. With a smile, he nodded slightly to himself.
"I..." Norris opened his mouth, but he didn't know where to start. He looked at everything around him doubtfully, and finally shook his head, "Is this the Kingdom of God? The Goddess of the Harvest Goddess Country?"
"This is not the Kingdom of God, but it is also a very good place," the girl who called herself Naritiel said with a smile, "But we are only responsible for bringing you here. The specific situation Someone will explain it to you."
Norris frowned: "Is there someone?"
Naratir nodded with a smile: "He is already here."
p>As soon as he finished speaking, the girl who called herself Naritiel and the old man named Duarte disappeared silently from Norris's sight. The latter subconsciously rubbed his eyes and waited until he put down his hand. , only to see a familiar and burly figure already standing in front of him, looking at him with a gentle smile.
"Your Majesty!" Norris immediately recognized who the other party was, and subconsciously shouted in surprise, "Why are you..."
"Let me see you," Gawain smiled and nodded, "Unfortunately, I couldn't arrive in time in the real world."
"Real world?" Norris blinked and looked around, "You know this is Where? I woke up and found myself lying here..."
"This is the mental space formed by the empire's data network," Gawain said with a smile, "Norris, it seems that you usually I have no time to pay attention to this matter."
Norris frowned: "I seem to have heard someone mention it...but why am I here?"
"In short? In short, you died in the real world a few hours ago," Gawain looked into the old man's eyes and said calmly, "but I made my own decision and made you 'alive' in another form. "
...
It didn't take Gawain a lot of effort to explain all this clearly, and after knowing what happened to him, Norris fell silent for a while.
Looking at the silent Minister of Agriculture, Gawain said after a brief pause: "I heard from Bertila that she had privately suggested that you use the life replacement spell to get the energy from the volunteers. Absorbing the vitality, but you rejected it."
"Yes, Your Majesty, this is something that cannot be started," Norris said calmly, "Some things can never be regarded as a price, even for volunteers. The temptation of this thing is too great. Once the behavior of "exchanging lives for lives" is allowed, or even acquiesced, it will be quickly abused - some people will be forced to become "volunteers", Or be forced to become a 'death-row prisoner'..."
As a person who has struggled up from the bottom of society, Norris has seen too many similar things. A missionary will easily give a civilian Weaving charges, and then "reasonably and lawfully" occupying his properties and houses, even wealthy businessmen will be extorted by the divine and royal power, and must "voluntarily" donate property - money to the church or the king every now and then.If wealth is like this, how much more precious than life?
He believed that Gawain, who had personally created the "Cecil Order", must know these things better than he did.
"Your judgment is correct," Gawain said to Norris, "Bertila made a mistake, and I am glad that you did not fall into it."
" But you still let my soul 'live' and live in this 'mind space'." Norris looked around and couldn't help but said, "I want to know if you only plan to do this to me. Or do you plan to apply this technology?"
Although Norris once read a book and worked as a church attendant, he could not escape the shackles of civilian thinking, but after so many years of working The Minister of Agriculture, after witnessing the establishment process of a country, has long since learned to look at things from a deeper perspective - behind Gawain's move to preserve his soul, he vaguely felt that there should be more considerations.
"This is a more long-term plan," Gawain said frankly, "I call it the 'Immortal' plan."
"In short, after obtaining eternal sleep After obtaining the key technologies of the narrator and establishing the narrator neural network, I plan to establish a special 'soul database' to retain outstanding talents or talents who have made outstanding contributions in the form of network minds, so that they can have the opportunity to continue to contribute to the empire. Serving, these people are called 'immortals'.
"You are the first, Norris.
"This can also be regarded as some preparations I have made for future changes in the world - the world we live in is not peaceful. For a country that is not strong enough, we need to make more preparations. "
"Immortal..." Norris subconsciously repeated Gawain's words, but couldn't help showing a hint of worry, "But I'm worried that this will affect our social order - from a certain In this sense, gaining immortality on the Internet is also a kind of 'life bargaining chip', and according to you, the 'immortal' itself has a special status and influence during his lifetime. Can such a thing... also be abused? "
"Any good thing has the risk of being abused. The only difference is whether they have the opportunity to be controlled. Compared with Bertila's life replacement spell that is easy to control privately, at least it depends on the state. The system's Immortal Plan is easier to control." Gawain was not surprised by Norris's questioning. He spoke frankly about his thoughts, "The Government Affairs Department will simultaneously establish a set of management processes to ensure that the 'Immortal' It will not conflict with the social order of the real world - of course, this may take a long time, and in the long future, these systems will also undergo destruction and repair again and again, and these must be taken into consideration.
"As the first immortal, Norris, I am sorry that we did not seek your consent before this - subsequent immortals will abide by the voluntary principle and will clearly formulate it' The responsibilities, rights and obligations after soul rebirth are also an important part of getting the Immortal Plan under formal control.ring.
"In addition, to prevent immortals from affecting the social order of the real world, Norris, I will take back your position as Minister of Agriculture, and a successor will replace you in the real world in accordance with legal procedures, and you Then you can participate in the affairs of the Government Affairs Department in the form of a consultant - we will run this for a period of time to observe whether the process is reasonable, and if problems arise, we can slowly adjust it.
" Finally, the immortals living in the narrator's neural network will also be constrained by the social order. You should have seen that there are cities in this world, and there will naturally be residents in the future - they are 'users' who access the network as 'short-term residents', and immortals who are 'long-term residents' of this world. The Government Affairs Department will This special world has established a management organization similar to the real world. When the time comes, you will find that living here is not much different from living in the real world. ”
Norris listened carefully to every word of Gawain. He tried his best to imagine what kind of future it would be, but found that even with his expanded vision over the years, it was difficult for him to follow Following Gawain's thinking, he could only roughly imagine some subversive and unprecedented "prospects" - the world is divided into two, the real world and the mental space in the Internet run simultaneously, and countless people live in these two worlds at the same time. Here, all knowledge and ideas will be exchanged and shared with unprecedented efficiency. The immortals will live in the network for a long time, which may even give birth to a new "ethnic group", which is one of the biggest challenges that Cecil will face in the future. One, perhaps to achieve a balance between this new ethnic group and the social order...
Some challenges are worth looking forward to.
While Norris is working hard to conceive of the future, Gao Gao. Wen's mind was also filled with thoughts.
The Immortal Plan... This is a bold and ambitious plan.
Outstanding talents will be protected, and valuable knowledge will be enhanced. Thoroughly exploited, it can also play a huge rewarding and motivating role. At first glance, it is almost all advantages
But risks also lurk deep in these exciting advantages.
p>Just as Norris immediately worried - this subversive, soul-immortalizing technology is likely to conflict with the existing social order, and be in danger of being abused and out of control one day in the future.
To this end, Gawain must lead the Government Affairs Department to formulate a lot of rules and regulations to restrain the immortals, strictly control the channels, prevent them from blocking the flow of classes in the real world, and prevent them from destroying the relationship that has been finally established. A fair social order to prevent it from becoming an outlet for out-of-control power...
But even if there are many risks, Gawain decided to start this plan and make it an important "reserve force" of the Cecil Empire One.
This world is not peaceful, and humans... are not very powerful species in this uneven world.
Elves with a long history and rich individual strength. Extremely tyrannical giantDragons, mysterious, powerful and immortal sea monsters... there are too many races with better innate conditions than humans, and they themselves have extremely advanced civilizations.
Another characteristic they have in common is that they have a long lifespan and are exceptionally resilient.
Any individual who survives to adulthood can accumulate several generations of human knowledge and technology.
Although the relationship between the Cecil Empire and these forces is good at this stage, this does not allow Gawain to sit back and relax, because he still remembers how the dragonborn not long ago saw through Cecil at a glance. those investment plans and trade plans of the Er empire. Although in the end the Dragonborn agreed to join the Cecil settlement area, seemingly falling into the currency siege of the Cecil people, there are various signs that the Grand Duke Baloger did not fall into a "trap" at all. ——Since the Dragonborn can see through the investment plans of the Cecil people from experience, they must be familiar with the little tricks of humans in currency. They accept the settlement area lightly, which only shows that... they don't care about it. .
The giant dragon of Tallond may be standing behind them, and deep in their mountains there may be an "ancient super weapon" buried deep in the mountains that no human being in the entire continent can defeat.
Gawain really hopes to maintain long-term peace with those races, but there is one thing he knows very well: if you want peace, you also need the capital of peace.
The Cecil Empire needs some "special heritage" belonging to mankind.