Chapter 1119 Aiwass: This land...
Irises, Les Eygents. Rams-Champagne Chapel.
It was already late at night when Aiwass and his group arrived.
"This name... is so strange."
Isabel murmured, "It sounds like the name of some kind of wine."
After all, this was Isabelle's first trip abroad outside of her marriage. And this first trip was to the land of love and beauty. Although Les Eyjanes wasn't considered the artistic capital of the Iris Kingdom, the various novel and magnificent buildings made her eyes widen.
Aiwass smiled and reached out to stroke Isabel's hair, holding the girl who seemed to have stars in her eyes in his arms.
"—Ah, because it is indeed the name of the wine."
It was Yassen who answered Isabel.
At this point, he smacked his lips and said, "To be honest, this wine is just average. Otherwise, I wouldn't be advertising it."
Yasen didn't think this was something to be proud of, but rather felt a little ashamed.
"Because Iris has a bad relationship with the Theocracy...or rather, its relationship with the elves isn't very good, the Theocracy hasn't deployed any Elven Bishops in Iris."
Aiwass replied softly, "Of course... I think one of the important reasons is that Iris is one of the few human nations that accepts dwarves. And the elves have always been unkind to dwarves."
At this point, Aiwass couldn't help but smile.
He remembered a joke—part of the culture of the iris flower was somewhat similar to the France of his previous life. And there's a famous French joke: The only people who can save France are women, dwarfs, and foreigners.
The existence of the dwarves also allowed Iris, who revered the path of beauty, to develop technology normally. Iris's devotion to art was similar to the nation's devotion to science and engineering in its previous life... It was the kind of thing where, regardless of your talent, if you were a good student or intelligent enough, you should study art.
Under such circumstances, it is normal for technology to stagnate and industry to lag behind.
Without the dwarves, their technology would have lagged far behind their neighbors. It was thanks to the dwarves' superior armaments that even the heavily armed Star Antimony dared not invade Iris. Thanks to these weapons, Avalon, surrounded by the sea and supposedly possessing the foremost navy, was easily shattered in a naval battle.
In this respect, the dwarves had indeed done their best. Without them, Iris might have been swallowed up by Star Antimony fifty years ago.
"Even without funding from the Theocracy, the Church is still necessary. Even with a large number of witches providing potions, the Iris hierarchy doesn't need the priests' treatment that much... but without the Church's protection, the undead are simply too numerous.
"Even though only first-level priests can preside over funerals, that's the population of a country after all—Iris's population is much larger than Avalon's. Even if it's just to purify the undead and let the deceased rest in peace, a certain percentage of dedicated transcendents are needed."
Aiwass said softly, "And dedication... requires money."
This is also what Aiwass finds quite ironic.
Just as the alchemy of the Path of Balance requires expenditure, the Path of Devotion also requires money—for individual transcendents of the Path of Devotion, it may not cost much, but at the church level, the cost is considerable. Uniforms, icons, churches, ritual materials for consecrations and ceremonies, salaries for ordinary clergy, plus the costs of maintaining nursing homes, orphanages, or church schools... it's a huge sum of money, and it's an ongoing expense.
With witches competing for the business of treating dignitaries and the Moon Children generally unwilling to accept treatment from priests, priests, who are generally of lower rank than those in other countries, find it difficult to earn enough money.
——In this case, pastors can only rely on "sponsorship".
"Lambran Champagne Chapel was sponsored by Lambran Champagne. They built the church, and they also paid for the maintenance of the affiliated church school, welfare home, and Mercy Hall."
Yasen scoffed, "Being willing to fund the construction of a temple is a good way to maintain the company's reputation... but that's the problem. There aren't many philanthropists among the capitalists. Most of those who need to fund the construction of a temple are often because they are too immoral and want to improve their reputation.
"Take Lahm, for example—they were involved in a 'recipe theft' scandal about thirty years ago. Another century-old champagne brand, Saint-Réaud, publicly accused them of plagiarizing their recipe. Anyone who has tasted both champagnes can tell the similarities and differences between them—Lahm's quality has shrunk by one-third, and the ingredients used are noticeably inferior... Now their quality is getting worse and worse, and they're adding synthetic flavorings to enhance the aroma. I even suspect their alcohol might be synthetic, too. Of course, their price is as low as one-third of the classic Saint-Réaud, and it hasn't increased in thirty years.
"Because they were being blamed nationwide, they funded the construction of churches and orphanages to try to distract attention. It worked quite well, after all, some people just needed cheap wine. They had no shortage of supporters, and this 'holy sponsorship' served as a selling point for whitewashing. Now, thirty years later, San Lerro Champagne has closed down, and young people no longer know about the incident."
"...Sounds interesting."
Sherlock, who was sitting nearby reading a book, looked up when he heard this topic.
He glanced at Aiwass and said briefly, "This is essentially the same as asking the church to endorse you—in exchange for giving back some of your dirty money to society."
"Yeah," Aiwass nodded. "After all, the reputation of low-level devotees among the people is unrivaled. Most people don't know how crazy the high levels of the dedication path are, because ordinary people can't even reach the fourth level.
"Especially with so many poor people in Iris... A stable daily porridge service at the Charity Hall can offset any bad reputation. So many people rely on them for survival. If the business goes bankrupt, how many people will starve to death? And aren't those who starve to death the very people who voted for them?
“So no matter how bad their reputation is, no matter how strong the brand and quality of San Leo champagne is, or how solid the evidence is, the Iris Parliament cannot—and dares not—take action against Ram champagne.
"I know you hate these unethical businessmen, Yasin. But there's no need to worry too much about it... Although the original intention was bad, at least the result was good, wasn't it?"
"...But, Aiwass, do you think this is right?"
Isabel frowned slightly, she felt a little confused.
As an Avalonian, she felt that the Iris people's public relations method of first committing illegal acts and then using money to buy reputation to protect themselves was outrageous - if this happened in Avalon, they would have been caught on the spot by the Arbitration Hall.
But she couldn't explain it, because these people had indeed saved tens of thousands...even hundreds of thousands of people in this way.
Using illegal black-hearted money to grant favors, and letting the poor people who benefit protect themselves——
Stealing and copying recipes is clearly wrong, and causing a century-old brand with excellent quality to fail is even more sinful. Yet, they use a significant portion of their earnings to support social welfare programs...
Isabelle had seen the Lam Champagne Welfare Home and the Lam Champagne Charity House on her way to the Vendôme Palace a few days ago. She hadn't seen the inside of the welfare home, but there was a long line of hundreds of people waiting to get porridge at the Charity House.
It was a salty porridge with onions, a small amount of fish, and plenty of rice. It wasn't exactly nutritious, but at least it was enough to survive on. She even witnessed a child in ragged clothes receive a single serving of porridge, finish it, and then return to the end of the line to join the queue again—intuitively, this was clearly against the rules, but no one else reacted, clearly a common occurrence.
It is precisely because they have sufficient funds that they don't care about such trivial matters.
Their funds were sufficient because the quality of Ram champagne was declining, and the cost was falling. As profits increased, they also needed to whitewash the profits... but this was also an obvious mistake.
San Lero Champagne was squeezed out because of its similar taste and went bankrupt - if they were willing to also use some of the money to support the church, they would probably be able to close the gap in this regard. But they obviously did nothing wrong and there is no need to do so... and their quality is excellent, so there is no profit to compete with Lahm Champagne.
People who do wrong are supported by others, while people who do nothing wrong have nothing.
This caused a bug in Isabel's brain, and she entered a vicious loop.
"There's not so much 'right' and 'wrong' in this world, Isabel. Although you don't have the heart of authority, you are still influenced by it..."
Aiwass said calmly, "Because, to be honest, this is the Iris government's fault. They've left so many people homeless, without food and clothing, wandering the streets. These unscrupulous businessmen are able to whitewash themselves this way because they're shouldering some of the responsibilities that should have been the responsibility of the Iris government."
"It's like the street gangs of Avalon. Isn't it because the Inspectorate couldn't maintain order in Lloyd's Quarter that a new order was established for the locals? Since the local people chose them, it means that at least they are irreplaceable.
"If we truly want to make these unethical companies disappear, then the Iris Council must take responsibility—find a way to address the widespread slums. Collect taxes and fines from the businesses, and use the money to support public welfare and churches. After all, keeping the city free of the undead benefits everyone...and that should be funded by the state.
"Since they don't want to pay, don't want to take care of things, and don't want to save people—then someone else comes to do it. Don't blame them for getting support they don't deserve. Originally, this support should have gone to the Iris Council, right?"
“…Is this also a form of dedication?”
After hearing what Aiwass said, Yasen seemed to understand: "Using other people's interests to help others... Is that why the church is silent?"
"Yes. Justice does not belong to devotion, justice belongs to authority. Although this is a kind of hypocrisy, hypocrisy is better than pure evil."
Aiwass nodded slightly. "But ultimately, it's because this land itself is sick. Moonchild, Hawkeye... they weren't the people's choice. The nobles, the parliament, the merchants, the witches, the artists... they've never cared about the masses at the bottom. When everyone is cannibalizing, there's no right or wrong. Because from the very beginning, there was no way to choose 'right'.
"People take it for granted to do evil, to kill, and to die. And to cure a disease, one must remove the source of the disease. But the source of the disease is within them... To remove the source of the disease, one must also kill."
Aiwass looked at the empty Ram Champagne Chapel, which was only lit by candles.
According to intelligence, the Blood Sky Division is located beneath this sinful land.
When he arrived here, Xue Tiansi must have sensed his presence.
But Xue Tiansi didn't react at all...
Maybe he was ambushing Aiwass, or maybe he wanted to talk to Aiwass.
Aiwass decided to trust the Blood Sky Master for once - with Don Quixote's protection, he had the confidence to choose to trust.
His eyes were deep: “That’s why I said that Yulia chose an extremely difficult path.
"She wants to give these people a chance to live... which is essentially the same as attempting to single-handedly defy the entire era, defying the vices, greed, and vanity in the hearts of millions. She has to kill to save others, while enduring the hostility of those she saves... This is far more difficult than killing to save others and then enduring their praise.
"If she can succeed, it will be a feat that will be hailed for a thousand years—it will be more than enough to make her a Celestial Official or a candidate Pillar God."
This is probably why Sand Timepiece chose Yulia.
Update completed meow!
After dinner at 7 o'clock yesterday, I thought I would take a nap and continue writing, so I set the alarm for 9 o'clock. I woke up at almost 11 o'clock... I knew at that time that I would not be able to finish two chapters (
I can only say that the alarm clock tried its best!
Rest for a while and then go to sleep...
(End of this chapter)
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