Chapter 119 Analysis
"The Radiant Church is indeed powerful." The professor gazed at the crowd with a serious expression. "For centuries, it has been a double mountain, deeply rooted in the bodies and minds of the lower classes. Its roots are already entangled. More importantly, it controls the birth of the most powerful group of people today: the warlocks."
He unfailingly pulled a sheet of paper from the table and drew a cross on it, with the horizontal axis representing internal and external factors, and the vertical axis representing the Church and the Society. This was a novel approach no one had ever seen, and everyone listened intently.
"Speaking solely of the Academy, from an external perspective, the students you have trained have already entered various professions, with many holding prominent positions. Even within the Vatican, there are many students from the Academy, making them naturally easy allies to win over. From an internal perspective, the Vatican's corruption and brutality will inevitably provoke resentment and resistance from the youngest, most advanced, and most passionate groups in the empire, and this resistance will only intensify."
Compared to the highly inflammatory speech he had just given in front of everyone in Baita Town, the black-haired young man's tone at this moment seemed particularly dull, as if he was just giving a project proposal report - but the effect was no less than a sudden thunderclap.
"As for the Church? With the gods asleep, the sorcerers have gradually declined, and with the rise of productivity, from an external perspective, many groups, including the royal family, the nobility, the wealthy merchants, and the common people, have long been dissatisfied with the 'privileges' they have long held. From an internal perspective, there are also enlightened clergy within the Church who sympathize with the common people, detest corruption, and hope for reform."
"More importantly, the Church is no longer able to plunder anything valuable from the Society. All it can do is put up a desperate fight and try to reclaim what it once possessed. Meanwhile, the Society is gradually gaining support from those who originally believed in God—so, in the long run, the Church is bound to fail."
He spoke as if he had foreseen the future from a scrap of paper. Wyatt glanced at the owl—it said nothing, stroking its cane with its fingers.
"This will be a long, difficult, bloody, and even repetitive process," Nova said, lowering his eyes as if watching a small ball chugging along its track. "But from a macro historical perspective, victory is an inevitable outcome."
Owl didn't seem moved by the extremely exciting speech. He looked at the young man calmly and said, "You have to say but."
"...That's true, but the society still has two biggest, most fatal flaws." The black-haired young man raised his head and raised two fingers expressionlessly: "First, the society still lacks a broad mass base. Second, the society has no armed forces of its own."
Wyatt's face suddenly began to turn pale.
"...What exactly do you want to do?"
This is definitely not what is needed for ordinary power grabbing and profiteering.
"Don't worry. I'm not suggesting that a bunch of students wielding sharpened pens storm the Church of Light right now. I'm not that radical yet. You have to eat your food slowly, or you'll die of overeating." Nova replied nonchalantly, even though some people were already looking at him as if he were a madman. "But I suggest you start considering what I'm saying from now on."
He hadn't said another word.
——Victory will definitely belong to the people, but not necessarily to the society.
When there were only two people left in the principal's office, the expression on Gibson Wyatt's face finally became unbearable.
"What exactly do you want to do with him?" He looked at his old friend with a sad face. "I know you've never given up the idea of becoming a god - but now is different. There are countless people behind us who rely on you and my protection. I don't believe you can't see how dangerous the path he has chosen is. It will drag Baita University and even the society into the abyss..."
"Gibson," Owl interrupted him coldly. "Truth must be pursued through personal will. There is absolutely no tenderness or affection on this path. As long as the Church exists, those mindless maggots willingly crawling on the ground will greedily devour every spark of wisdom seeking truth. This is a reality that cannot be changed even by my death!"
He raised his hands toward the ceiling, his voice growing louder, his jeweled eyes flashing with an inorganic brilliance on his furry hood, as if declaring war on an imaginary enemy.
"—Don't you want to know what a god really is? Don't you want to know how to break the seventh shackle? Don't you want to understand the ultimate truth of the world's ideas?"
“—Oliver!”
Wyatt suddenly interrupted him. He stared at his old friend sadly, and fatigue flashed across his face: "Admit it, we are old!"
The crazy figure suddenly froze.
After a long while, he slowly turned around with a creaking sound, as if a puppet lacked oil.
"...Ah, it's a name I haven't heard in a long time." The owl murmured in a particularly gloomy tone, "It's been so long since I last heard it that it makes me miss the past and think of that naive and foolish fool."
"Oliver, the Oliver who tried to pursue God, but was turned into a monster by God."
The madman with the mask hummed in a strange tone, and suddenly approached the other person, his voice was so hoarse that it was terrible: "But no, Gibson, no, I am no longer Oliver, I am just an owl hiding in the endless dense forest, who can never close his eyes."
"Gibson Wyatt, my old friend," he said, as if in the climax of a long poem: "--what has made your heart so old?"
…
Not long after the professor returned, his office was filled with a swarm of young people. Nova looked at the listless students of the White Tower Youth Association and slowly raised his eyebrows.
——So what is this for? His limited stock of biscuits is not enough to supply so many people.
The black-haired young man simply leaned back in his chair and folded his fingers together: "Mr. Adrian, although it was inappropriate, I remember you have already apologized to me."
"Professor," the young man in the lead said with a sad face, "This is all our fault. We acted on our own initiative. Why don't you scold us a few more times?"
Otherwise it would be really scary.
"What's there to scold?" Nova looked at the foolish boy, whom he had, in a sense, fully exploited, with some confusion. "Although you are indeed stupid, impulsive, and naive, and dared to run to the gate of the Church of Light without proper preparation to speak ill of the Glorious Church, and probably even directly exposed your identity, and ended up being detained on the spot..."
——That’s right, that’s the feeling.
Adrian felt the corners of his eyes twitching. He was touched and in pain, and was so conflicted that he felt dizzy and uneasy.
"We need to master some guerrilla tactics," the professor lazily instructs these overly naive students. "We need to arrange for people to pass on information, keep watch, and take advantage of the priests being too busy to wander around during worship to go and curse them. If we see the Vatican approaching, we need to flee quickly, firing each shot and moving to another location. If we encounter the Inquisition, we need to rush to White Tower University immediately."
He looked very serious, not at all aware that he was teaching anything particularly sinister or cunning. "Mr. Owl should be at White Tower University these days anyway, so it would be a waste if he wasn't used."
Students: “…”
"You support us taking to the streets to give speeches?" A student looked up at him with a mixture of surprise and joy, muttering, "I thought you thought this was just a childish and useless game..."
"It's not a question of whether I support it or not," Nova replied calmly, "it's a question of whether you have considered the dangers of this behavior."
"The owl arrived just in time today, but what about next time? And the time after that?" The professor's expression grew stern. "This isn't a test. If you make a mistake, it's yours. You can retake it. But if you make a single misstep, or even if you haven't done anything wrong but are simply unlucky, the price you'll pay will be far more than just your life!"
He sternly examined every student present. The figures reflected clearly in his silver-mirror-like eyes were all young, passionate souls in their twenties. "I don't want you to be taken to the execution ground along with your family, friends, and lovers one day, still confused and unaware of what you are sacrificing yourself for, or even to wonder if it's worth it!"
"...But you did that, didn't you?" Adrian suddenly whispered, "You've already chosen to stand up, even standing right in front of us—"
...The man stretched out his arms, as if his arms could stretch endlessly, until the starry sky of truth rose from under his feet.
"I just wonder... maybe you'd be willing to give some advice on the White Tower Youth Association's future actions?"
The professor looked at them silently. Adrian didn't know what he was thinking. He just felt inexplicably nervous and his heart was beating deafeningly in his chest.
"Okay." The other party suddenly said, "I will give you a task, a social investigation task."
"I want you to go out of the school, get close to the common people, and listen to the problems they encounter regarding the Glorious Church, especially those involving heresy, whether they are praising or dissatisfied." Nova simply tore off the manuscript paper and listed a few questions as proofs.
Adrian took the paper in confusion: "But what's the use of this?"
"Without investigation, there's no right to speak." The professor tapped the paper with his pen. "Public opinion can sometimes be a very powerful tool. The Glorious Church does this very well, but it's not good enough. They treat the common people like a group of docile, stupid livestock, rather than as individuals capable of independent thought. They only think that carrots and sticks are enough to tame the common people, but they ignore the subtle forces surging beneath the seemingly calm tide."
His voice returned to a calm, eerily calm tone. "What we need to do is unite these seemingly insignificant undercurrents until they become a tsunami powerful enough to engulf the sky."
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