Chapter 32 Two chapters combined into one "So busy that I even have to borrow a cat's paw."...
Although Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang were students from prestigious universities, they were innocent and stupid students who had not been exposed to too much social hardship.
Only after becoming "village chiefs" did they realize how many pitfalls there were in infrastructure.
When building streets and city walls, Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang thought that this was the main expense in village and town construction.
If we only consider the money spent, the most is indeed spent on urban construction.
But in a thriving knight territory, once the city planning is completed, the returns are very fast.
Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang then realized something they often saw in the news in their hometown - most of the local government's financial revenue did not come from taxes, but from land sales.
Their streets haven't even had sewers built yet, but major institutions have already marked the areas and basically paid the full amount.
Residential areas and shops are also very popular.
In order to ensure fairness, they used their experience from the hottest real estate market in their hometown, and drew lots for qualification regardless of wealth.
Now everyone who was watching went crazy.
What? As long as I have money and luck, I can buy a house in the best location?
And you buy it directly from the lord, without any middlemen making a profit from the price difference?
The Adventurer's Guild of Green Sand City also opened a branch in the Knight Territory, and often came to Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang to inquire about the progress of the city construction so that they could send people to build the guild hall as soon as possible.
The guild leader laughed and said, "This is the first time I've seen adventurers from the Green Sand City Adventure Guild coming to take on quests so crowded they can't even walk. The receptionist must be exhausted."
Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang count money at night.
Just from the money from land sales, they almost earned back half of the city construction debt.
Selling the land is really profitable. Xia Xifeng wiped his face and suppressed the corners of his mouth.
Compared with urban construction, the money spent on developing supporting agricultural material production lines is just a drop in the bucket if you only look at the investment.
But when they were writing the plan, they found that the investment in agriculture was almost pure expense and there was no hope of making money in the short term.
Even in the short term, let alone a short period of time, this investment is a bottomless pit, so don't even think about making money back.
Just like in my hometown, if you want to make money from agriculture, you have to operate on a large scale and grow cash crops. It is difficult to make money from basic food crops.
The small peasant economy has almost nothing to do with making money.
Moreover, under the premise that the magic network energy is very useful, the farmers' tax revenue is almost a drop in the bucket for the entire Knight Territory.
No wonder the lords tend to neglect the peasants.
If "people" themselves were not resources, they would probably regard farmers as parasites.
A very realistic and cruel point of view is that if local governance only considers "interests", then giving up a group of people is more cost-effective than dragging them along.
When the lord built enough magic network stabilizers, he could even generously provide the poor subjects with almost free food to keep them from starving, and large amounts of non-grain brewed liquor to paralyze their nerves.
It is more in line with "interests" to increase the productivity of ordinary people's fields, allow ordinary people to find jobs to support themselves, and allow ordinary people to receive more education so that more elites can emerge, or to spend a little money to let this group of people lie down until they die.
But this does not conform to the values that Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang have developed since childhood.
With the productivity demonstrated by Magic Network Technology, the two men firmly believed that productivity and production relations should match. Even if their subjects could not run to the living standards of ordinary people with healthy hands and feet in their hometown, at least they would not have to rely on black bread mixed with dirt and wheat bran to fill their stomachs. Every time the season changed, they could buy themselves a cheap new set of clothes, right?
Moreover, when the end of the world comes, even if a magic network stabilizer is built, the magic network will often fluctuate.
Farmers’ own fields can be self-sufficient without relying on the magic network, and more people will survive.
Because of the three views they developed since childhood, Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang could not give up subsidizing agriculture.
Then this bottomless pit will probably never be filled.
"Are we moving too fast?" Xia Xifeng muttered. "The Knight Territory isn't even complete yet, and we're already thinking of using industry and commerce to subsidize agriculture."
Qin Lang said: "It's not even a subsidy. We haven't abolished the agricultural tax."
Xia Xifeng rubbed his nose and said in a muffled voice, "Yes."
Qin Lang asked, "Have you decided what to sell?"
Xia Xifeng nodded: "Even non-professionals can afford a simple mental protection item."
Thanks to the business opportunities brought by the blood moon.
After the three major countries issued a warrant for the Blood Moon Evil God Sect, no enemies were found for the time being.
The Outer Gods had been secretly causing trouble for who knows how many years, and only when they were on the verge of victory were their plans exposed by Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang who had traveled through time. This shows how covert their actions were.
The gods may be able to find clues in the divine realm, but it is very difficult for mortals to immediately find clues of the outer gods.
After all, the world itself is quite chaotic.
If the Blood Moon Cultists cannot be caught, people can only passively defend themselves.
Nowadays, all magical props are handmade. Even if there are workshops, they are made by a group of people on an assembly line, which is very inefficient.
The production of magical props requires mental power. The higher the maker's mental power and the sharper his perception of the magic network, the better the props produced.
If Xia Xifeng pulled out a machine, even if the props he made weren't as good as those made entirely by hand, they would still be better than nothing. But this "nothing" was his market.
No one wants to die at the hands of cultists, not even ordinary people.
Even if this tool cannot save their lives, at least it can leave some evidence to let others know what killed them so that they won't die silently.
Moreover, if you call the police after the incident, you will not be manipulated to harm people around you.
The lord needs this too.
They don't care about the lives of ordinary people, but they care about these ordinary people "spreading the plague."
Generous and kind lords will take the initiative to place orders so that more people can get basic protection; stingy and selfish lords will also open the market and let their people buy on their own, and they can also collect taxes.
Each territory sends out caravans, but its main trade is not when sending caravans.
The long-distance caravan is like the "commercial sales team" in Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang's hometown. What the caravan has to do is to promote goods, open up trade routes, and take on more orders.
The territory accepted the families of the dwarven caravans, who were skilled caravan sales elites.
Xia Xifeng really wanted them to form a caravan again, but he was worried that they would have psychological trauma, so he was reluctant to speak up.
Naturally, Qin Lang was the one who did this "cold-blooded" thing.
The families of the dwarf caravan did have many concerns, but they almost unanimously passed the decision to reorganize the dwarf caravan.
"It's always dangerous out there. We can't just stay home and do nothing." An old man said calmly, "You can't scare dwarves."
Every time a dwarf caravan goes on a business trip, the caravan members take turns traveling and taking holidays. It is impossible for them to stay out all year round without going home.
Many of the dwarves who came to settle in the Knight Territory were once members of the elite.
Qin Lang used them as the backbone and recruited people with business experience to form a caravan led by the Knights.
Many halflings who like to stay at home have signed up to join the caravan.
It seems that the young halflings don’t really like to stay at home. Although they are content with a peaceful pastoral life, they also have an adventurous spirit in their bones.
Leo became the caravan captain.
He is very good at doing business, and even the original caravan captain recognizes Leo's "cunningness".
Leo will lead the caravan personally on its first long journey.
Once he reaches a preliminary cooperation intention with other lords, Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang will "change maps", embark on a new journey, and travel around the world to sign contracts.
By then, the basic work of the Knights' Territory was well underway, and the selection of the official team had been completed. The two of them no longer needed to be physically present at the Knights' Territory; they could simply hold daily meetings remotely via the communicator.
"Before that, you guys pick a name first!" Leo stopped the two of them. "If you don't pick a name, we'll just call it Sun City!"
Pereira, whose boiled egg head had finally grown into a kiwi fruit head, nodded vigorously: "It's a good opportunity to make amends to our gods."
Xia Xifeng actually wanted to use a name like "Huaxia" or "Yanhuang", but it just doesn't fit in with this world.
The two worlds do not speak the same language, so he could only use transliteration to name the city, which sounds strange and is difficult to explain the origin of the city's name.
The appearance of Eastern fantasy names in the Western magical world makes the style of painting wrong, which makes Xia Xifeng, a fan of the plot, feel very uncomfortable.
As for Qin Lang, he let Xia Xifeng decide.
"Taiyang City... isn't that a bit too arrogant?" Xia Xifeng asked. "That name is too grand."
Leo pointed at his nose and said, "The Son of the Sun is here, the Sun Guard family is here, which city is more worthy of the name of the Sun City than ours?"
Pereira asked, "Is it that the gods you respect disagree?"
Only then did Leo remember that Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang were also favored by God, and were not from the Sunflower Family.
He had forgotten that Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang were not his blood relatives.
"Oh, yeah, forget what I said." Leo asked, "Do you want to ask your gods?"
Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang looked at each other.
It is even more excessive to name a city after the Father in Heaven.
"Then let's call it Sun." Xia Xifeng was really bad at naming, so he might as well use the name of the sun. After all, he and Qin Lang had already been included in the family tree of the Sunflower Family. "Let's give it a good meaning and call it Twin Sun City. May the twin suns shine forever."
"Of course the two suns will last forever..." Leo said halfway when he remembered that his own god was called stupid by Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang, and the fact that Blood Moon had usurped so much power from Silver Moon, but Silver Moon was still unaware of it.
Uh, his god didn't almost die, did he?
The sun can still fall, isn't that too stupid?
"Okay, let's call it that," Leo said. "The Double Sun will surely shine forever."
Pereira said sadly, "The gods will probably forgive us."
The two reported to the gods on the double day and asked if they would be given a name.
As long as Sojitz agrees, there is no point in other places objecting.
[This is so embarrassing. There's no need to do this. I forgive them! How about calling it 'City of Hope' instead of using our divine names?]
['City of Hope' is good.]
Leo and Perilla looked at each other.
We can’t call it Double Day, but we can call it “Hope”? I really don’t know where the “embarrassment” of Hope Day manifests itself.
Also, isn't Hope's tone too lively?
At this time, Pereira had the idea of disrespecting the gods.
He thought that maybe he should switch identities with Leo.
Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang received the "oracle" that the Day of Hope would forgive them.
Xia Xifeng almost uttered another prophecy that insulted the gods.
This little sun is quite interesting, so lively and cute.
"Then let's call it City of Hope." Xia Xifeng said, "I feel like this name is more arrogant."
But the gods have given the name, and Xia Xifeng can't think of any other name, so he just has to be arrogant.
Not convinced? Go to the Church of the Sun and ask the Day of Hope.
When Soul learned that the Day of Hope was "named", he smiled helplessly.
The name "Prophet" is indeed the most suitable for the name "Hope".
When he built the city, Day of Hope also wanted Green Sand City to be named this, but he wanted to keep a low profile as much as possible and did not agree.
This time the hoped-for day finally came true.
I hope he won’t be too noisy and drag the gods to a celebratory banquet when the war between gods is about to begin.
The Day of Hope is not the ancestral god of the halflings, but his personality is similar to that of the halflings. They both like to find excuses to hold parties, so he connected his own divine domain with the divine domain of the halfling ancestral god, and they often get together to have fun.
Sue prayed, "Heavenly Father, is 'City of Hope' also your name?"
There came an approving response from the Heavenly Father.
Soul smiled.
Heavenly Father rarely responds to trivial matters. It seems that Heavenly Father is truly doting on this little prophet.
Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang’s pioneering knights were finally listed.
It is said on the Day of Hope that this city is called the City of Hope. If you don’t agree, just keep it to yourself.
After receiving this oracle, Pereira once again began to wonder if Shuangri had accidentally chosen the wrong one when selecting the God's Favored One.
Hope Day and Leo's personality are more compatible, right?!
The oracle received by the Church of the Sun was vague, and they did not hear this rogue remark, but they received the approval of the Day of Hope.
Well, the importance of Hope City is going to increase again.
When Hope City expands, the Church of the Sun might even move its headquarters here.
The Silver Moon Church is also thinking about this matter.
The silver moon is the side of the sun. Wherever the sun is, the moon is there.
The two churches invested a lot of money and began to enclose land in advance.
They are preparing to build a "city of education" in the city in the future.
Well, the land prices in Hope City have skyrocketed again.
Before the caravan even set off, the agricultural workshop had already earned back the initial investment.
Xia Xifeng wiped his face again and lowered the corners of his mouth.
Selling land is really profitable.
He has to hold back. Real estate is prone to bubbles, and healthy finances cannot rely solely on land sales.
But real estate really makes money.
Xia Xifeng said to Qin Lang, "I'm almost being corrupted."
Qin Lang said, "It's just the order for basic mental protection items from Green Sand City. You're still ten thousand short of completing it."
Xia Xifeng: "...Shut up."
He is clearly the city lord, a feudal lord and capitalist who should be hung on a street lamp, so how did he become an exploited person?
What’s even more hateful is that Qin Lang, who has no life skills, became his supervisor.
"Ahhhhhh! We need to recruit workers!" Xia Xifeng frantically said, "Hurry up and start literacy classes and vocational schools. We need more workers!"
Qin Lang agreed: "Okay."
The money he just earned was invested again, and Xia Xifeng needed to take more orders to fill the fiscal deficit.
Xia Xifeng: “…”
He tilted his head and looked at Qin Lang: "Is your job to add more work for me?"
Qin Lang said: "While you are working, shall I go and clean up the magic pollution points?"
Xia Xifeng pouted.
In fact, he knew that when he was busy, Qin Lang was also busy.
He buried himself in the workshop, leaving Qin Lang to handle all matters in the city, big and small. Qin Lang also had to find time to kill monsters and level up. He only had to sit and wait to gain experience.
Compared to the complexity and tiring level of the work, I am far inferior to Qin Lang.
But he just wanted to complain.
This is a damn job. I really don't want to do it for a single day.
Xia Xifeng reflected. Has he become willful?
While Xia Xifeng was considering whether to apologize to Qin Lang for enduring his unreasonable behavior, Qin Lang did something big.
He busted a "den of thieves" and tied up all the "thieves".
There were a total of two hundred people.
Two hundred cat people.
Xia Xifeng: "...Ah, the lizardmen featured in "Fantasy of Wonderland"."
Qin Lang's mouth corners rose slightly.
Sorry, he doesn't usually laugh, but some of the jokes in "Wonderland Fantasy" are really funny.
"Yes, the lizardmen featured in Fantasy World," Qin Lang said. "Actually, I didn't catch them. They were trying to scam me."
The "Fantasy of Wonderland" jokes that even Qin Lang couldn't help laughing at were "Western fantasy translation jokes" that only people who have played Western fantasy games and often read Western fantasy novels can understand.
In the early years, most Western fantasy games and novels were "introduced from the public" and the translations were very free. There were transliterations, some were semantic translations, some focused on local fidelity and elegance, some were to piggyback on the popularity of other works, and some were completely random translations that made no sense.
For example, the traditional "orcs" in Western fantasy are not the furry beasts that the public thinks, but a word created by the author, meaning evil creatures. Therefore, they are not furry, not cute, and have pig noses.
The meme used in "Wonderland" is the most famous Western fantasy meme - the dog-headed man meme.
Kobolds in the Dungeons & Dragons universe are not only unrelated to dogs, but the original word "Kobold" has nothing to do with dogs either. They look like lizards and claim to have dragon blood and be descendants of dragons.
The dog-headed man in another phenomenal Western fantasy game, "World of Warcraft", has a distinct rat head.
Here we only mention the kobolds in Dungeons & Dragons.
There are many explanations for why Lizardmen were translated into Dog-Headed People. Because it is a very old joke, the truth behind it is no longer reliable.
When new players first come into contact with "Dungeons & Dragons", they have no idea why kobolds are lizardmen, and even after reading the "research", they are still confused.
They didn't care what was in the little heads of the ancient translators. They simply asked, if lizardmen are dog-headed people, then what is this subhuman race that looks like a puppy? Is it called lizardmen?
Don’t even mention that there are no dog people in the Western fantasy world right now. Since it’s already a Western fantasy world, isn’t it normal for dog people to appear?
So many players created their own memes, drawing cute dog people and then labeling them "This is a lizard man".
This is a joke that only veteran Western fantasy fans in China would find heartwarming.
This meme was recreated in "Fantasy of Wonderland".
The Chinese term for "dog-headed man" in "Fantasy of Wonderland" is still lizard man, but "lizard man" is dog-headed man.
The dog-headed people claim to be descendants of dragons, but the dragon people do not admit it; the lizard people are close relatives of the werewolves, and the werewolves acknowledge this close relative.
So what does this have to do with Cat People?
This is a special Easter egg race in the official event.
Why are there dog people but no cat people? Cat lovers strongly protest.
So the Lizardmen had another subspecies, the Catmen.
Cat-people and dog-people are the same in that they are not humans with cat heads or dog heads growing on their heads, but cats and dogs that walk upright.
Compared to the dog-headed man, who is more like the orc in traditional Japanese fantasy, or the werewolf in the Western theme next door, the cat-man is really a cute cat standing up.
Some old players of "Monster Hunter" were very upset.
Isn’t this our cat Elu?
How did Felyne come to work in "Fantasy World"?
What made players even more amused was that "Wonderland Fantasy" and "Monster Hunter" actually linked up. A lizard subspecies and a famous NPC from Green Sand City accidentally fell into the world of "Monster Hunter" and provided new costumes and cats for the veteran hunters.
The featured cat-lizardmen in "Fantasy of Wonderland" only appear in game activities. Xia Xifeng and Qin Lang both thought that they would not appear in reality.
Unexpectedly, Qin Lang actually "caught" a bunch of cat-lizardmen.
Regarding the activities of the Cat Lizardmen, they are indeed open in the "Novice Village" of Green Sand City.
I didn't expect there are really rare cat-lizardmen in Green Sand City! !
"Respected Lord, you defeated us and captured us. We will be your slaves!" The cat raised its head, its watery eyes wide open. "Whether it's carrying bags, pushing the millstone, or pulling a cart, we will do any hard work! As long as we can have a small thatched hut to live in and a piece of dry bread to fill our stomachs, that's all! We cat-lizardmen are the most resistant to hunger!"
Qin Lang is not a cat lover, and he also accepted the cat-lizard man's scam.
In the game activities, the Cat Lizardman is indeed an all-round worker, similar to Felyne.
Let me complain again, the cat lizardman is actually the Elu cat!
Because the Cat Lizardman is so capable, players unanimously request that the Cat Lizardman be allowed to stay permanently.
According to official news, in the second part of the game, the cat-lizard man will join the player's "follower" team.
They didn't enjoy the cat-lizard man as a follower in the game, but after traveling through time, they actually saw the cat-lizard man trying to scam them.
Of course I accept it!
Cat-lizard people are indeed very intelligent and very hardworking and simple.
Xia Xifeng only demonstrated it three times, and most of the cat-lizardmen were able to do it.
A few days later, all the cat-lizard people who were trying to scam people selected the best members of their tribe, who became the first batch of employees of Xia Xifeng's agricultural tool workshop and obtained the qualification of being a resident of Hope City.
The cat-lizard man cried so hard that the fur on his face was tangled.
What a good person! How can there be such a good person!
From now on, Hope City will be the home of us cat-lizardmen! We will protect our homeland to the death!
"Come on, come on, everyone, there's enough room for you." Xia Xifeng remembered the information in the game saying that there were less than 50,000 cat-lizardmen in the entire dream world, and it would be considered good if there were more than a thousand cat-lizardmen living near Green Sand City.
I hope that City will expand in the future, and even if all the cat-lizard people in the dream world move in, the city will be able to accommodate them.
Now, Xia Xifeng’s manpower pressure has been temporarily resolved.
There's a proverb on a certain island nation that goes, "So busy that you have to borrow a cat's paw." This time, I really need a cat's paw.
Xia Xifeng regained his cheerful demeanor. "Lao Qin, players used to complain that there were less than 50,000 cat people in the entire Dream World, so why were we giving every player a cat follower? Even without events, the peak number of players online in Fantasy World at night would exceed one million. Now we can each have 10,000 cat followers!"
Xia Xifeng spread out his five fingers, but no one knew how his five fingers could represent ten thousand cats.
"Yeah." Qin Lang's answer was still cold and perfunctory.
He would not tell Xia Xifeng that he saw Xia Xifeng was busy and almost crazy, so he remembered the existence of the cat-lizard man. He searched for the cat-lizard man's traces for a long time with a glimmer of hope, and did the "plot mission" that he was most reluctant to do for several days before he waited for the cat-lizard man to scam him.
There's nothing much to say.
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